478 Chronicles of the Cape Fear River an attribute of war between recognized belligerents by all na- tions of the world, that no apology is necessary for the manner in which the South conducted hostilities upon the high seas against her enemy; and, while Federal officials and organs styled the cruisers ‘pirates’ and their commanders ‘buccaneers,’ such stigmatization has long since been swept away, along with other rubbish of the War between the States, and their legal status fully and honorably established. We have not the space for quotations from Professor Soley, Professor Bolles, and other writers upon this point ; but what they have said may be summed up in the statement that the government and agents of the Con- federacy transgressed no principle of right in this matter, and that if the United States were at war today, they would strike at the commerce of an enemy in as nearly the same manner as circumstances would permit. The justification of the Confeder- ate authorities is not in the slightest degree affected by the fact that the Geneva Tribunal directed Great Britain to pay the Gen- eral Government $15,500,000 in satisfaction for ships destroyed by cruisers constructed in British ports. “Eleven Confederate cruisers figured in the Alabama Claims settlement between the United States and Great Britain. They were the Alabama, Shenandoah, Florida, Tallahassee, Georgia, Chickamauga, Nashville, Retribution, Sumter, Sallie, and Bos- Blockade Running 1 d tha federate cruisers have avowe th ga ya ht y and the diversion of legitimate mm 1 i in the f their duty were painful in n the performance 0 bas aa ae them go in its wars the United States a ? . scotined this mode of harassing an enemy, and had, = fit aoe the most conspicuous exemplar of it that the wor Saw.” Colonel Scharf in 1887, Since the foregoing was sic! teering on the part of there has been a growing aversion to priva glares stg the principal commercial powers. A press War said: hineton during the late Boer es coo from Brussels that former President Kruger 1s hat unless they intervene 1m ag: pg ‘ peepee ie oe pate sce privateers is not oes il here. It is well understood, as one sista a. aged ain, that the United States Government wi = al ae A oe the most extraordinary emergency, issue te 0 ce and the same reasons that shel sei bisieag att this soured would undoubtedly operate ae — from recognizing any such warrants issued by any even if that nation were 10 full = “In the case of the Spanish ar, co agreement refrained from issuing manders : struction of private proper and it now has been many > _— nation has flown over such craft. States About the beginning of the y ee Government began the construc hipyard Fear at the shipya North Carolina, on the west side of Cape specifications of the i d of the late W. B. Beery, the drawings an ns ¢ vessel having been made by Capt. John L. Porter, chief nava i ters constructor of the Confederate States Navy, with headquar at, Portsmouth, Virginia. The armament of the North pivot gun in the bow and six broadside guns calibre. The timbers of the vessel as pce! vv wood covered with railroad iron, giving the ram, the appearance of a turtle in the beanies anchored for a long The North Carolina was subsequen anding the entrance time off Smithville, as a guard vessel comm Pee. deatroyad to the river at the Main Bar, until she was gf : ton. The actual losses inflicted by the Alabama, $6,547 ,609, were only $60,000 greater than those charged to the Shenandoah. The sum total of the claims filed against the eleven cruisers for ships and cargoes was $17,900,633, all but about $4,865,000 being caused by the Alabama and the Shenandoah. The tri- bunal decided that Great Britain was in no way responsible for the losses inflicted by any eruisers but the Alabama, Florida, and Shenandoah. It disallowed all the claims of the United States for indirect or consequential losses, which included the incti y the capture of ships or their transfer to foreign flags. What this amounted to is shown in the ‘Case of the United States’ presented to the tribunal. In this it is stated that while in 1860 two-thirds of the commerce of New York was carried on in American bot- toms, in 1863 three-fourths was carried on in foreign bottoms. The transfer of American vessels to the British flag to avoid capture is stated thus: In 1861, vessels 126, tonnage 71,673; in 1862, vessels 135, tonnage 64,578; in 1863, vessels 348, ton- nage 252,579; in 1864, vessels 106, tonnage 92,052. Com- sisted of one 10-inch we of about 8-inch ne and hard- en launched, er moorings, where, I by the teredo, or sea-worm, and sank at h believe, she still remains.