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OBE i nite AEM.

 

 

406 Nortu Carorina Troops, 1861-’65.

was an honor to his State and to the cause which he so worth-
ily represented. During a recent visit to Wilmington, after
an interval of nearly thirty years, Mr. Gregory gave me the
following narrative, which will doubtless prove of interest.

“Sometime early in 1863, the Confederate Government
purchased on the Clyde (I think) two steamers for the pur-
pose of running the blockade. The first to arrive was the
Giraffe. While in the Cape Fear, Captain Alexander, who
had charge of the signal corps at Smithville, suggested the
propriety of putting a signal officer aboard to facilitate the
ship’s entering the port at night, by the use of two lights, a
red and a white, covered with a shade in front of the globe to
lift up and down, by which we could send messages as we did
with the flag on land in the day, and with a torch at night ;
the red light representing the wave to the right and the white
light the wave to the left. After some consultation, General
Whiting ordered Captain Alexander to send up a signal officer
to join the Giraffe, and Robert Herring was detailed for that
purpose and sent to Wilmington, where the lights were pre-
pared and he went aboard. The Giraffe went out and re
turned successfully, but from some cause—I never under-
stood why—Herring failed to attract the attention of the
land force and sent no message ashore. In the meantime,
the other steamer, the Cornubia, arrived in port, and Cap-
tain Alexander having been ordered elsewhere and Lieuten-
ant Doggett having been sent down from Richmond to take
charge of the signal corps, General Whiting ordered a signal
officer to the Cornubia, and I was detailed and sent to Wil-
mington to prepare the lights and report on board.

“We cleared the bar successfully, with Captain Burroughs
in command and C. C. Morse as pilot, and had a good voyage
to St. George’s, Bermuda, where we unloaded our cargo of
cotton and reloaded with supplies for the Southern army.
On our return trip we made the land fifty or sixty miles above
Fort Fisher, and coasted down to the inlet, our intention
being to get near the land inside the blockade fleet, which
was obliged to keep off a certain distance on account of shoal
avater. As well as I remember, when within fifteen or twenty
miles of Fort Fisher, Captain Burroughs sent for me to

 

BLOCKADE RUNNING. 407

come on the bridge, and asked if I had my lights ready and
if I thought I could send a message ashore, Pilot Morse in
the meantime telling me that he would let me know when we
were opposite the signal station on land, where a constant
watch was kept all night for our signal. We had not gone
far before Morse told me that we were opposite the post.
We were feeling our way very slowly in the dark. I was put
down on the deck with the gangway open, my lights facing
the land and a sereen behind, when I was ordered to call the
station. The officers and sailors were highly interested in
the movement and crowded around to watch the proceedings.
I called but a few times, when I was answered from the shore
by a torch. I turned to Captain Burroughs and told him
that I had the attention of the land forces and asked what
message he wished to send. He replied as follows: ‘Colonel
Lamb: Steamer Cornubia. Protect me. Burroughs.’ I got
the O. K. for the message from shore, and saw the corps on
land call up one station after another and transmit my mes-
sage to Fort Fisher miles ahead of us, and afterwards learned
that General Whiting was notified by telegraph of the arrival
of the Cornubia before she crossed the bar that night. When
we arrived at the fort, we found Colonel Lamb down on the
point with his Whitworth guns ready to protect us if neces-
sary. The success of this attempt gave an impetus to the sig-
nal corps, and from that time every steamer that arrived ap-
plied to the Government for a signal officer before leaving
port.”

The name of the Cornubia was subsequently changed to
Lady Davis, in honor of the wife of President Davis, at
Richmond, and Captain Gale, an officer in the old navy who
had gone over to the Confederacy, was placed in command.
“About 20 December, 1863,” Mr. Gregory adds, “we left
Bermuda with a cargo for Wilmington, in charge of Captain
Gale, with Mr. Robert Grissom as pilot and myself as signal
officer. We made land some miles above Wilmington, ap-
parently through bad navigation, almost as far north as Cape
Lookout, and when opposite Masonboro, in coasting down,
we observed rockets going up behind us and not long after,
they were going up directly ahead of us. We were running