Battle of Hatteras Inlet Batteries - Northern Reaction

Northern Reaction

The depredations on Northern commerce emanating from Hatteras Inlet could not pass unnoticed. Insurance underwriters pressured Union Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles for remedy. Welles needed no prodding. He already had on his desk a report from the Blockade Strategy Board suggesting a way to perfect the blockade of the North Carolina coast. The board recommended that the coast be rendered useless to the South by sinking old, useless, ballast-laden ships in the inlets to block them up. (Their reports also contained a statement that is easily overlooked: "These plans may undergo some modification in the hands of the person to whom their execution shall be intrusted.")

Soon after he received the board's report, Secretary Welles began to implement its recommendation. He ordered Commander H. S. Stellwagen to go to the Chesapeake Bay to buy some suitable old hulks. At the same time, he was told to report his activities to Flag Officer Silas H. Stringham, commandant of the Atlantic Blockading Squadron. As such, he was the naval officer in charge of the blockade of the North Carolina coast. This was the first involvement of Stringham with what was to become the attack at Hatteras Inlet. In time, he would become the most important person in the expedition.

Stringham opposed the plan to block the inlets from the beginning. He believed that the tidal currents would either sweep the impediments away or would rapidly scour new channels. As he saw it, the Rebels could not be denied access to the sounds unless the inlets were actually held by the Union. In other words, in order to establish an effective blockade in this part of North Carolina, the forts that the state had set up would have to be captured. Since the Navy could not do it alone, the cooperation of the Army would be needed.

As it happened, the Army was willing to cooperate. They had to do something with the political general Benjamin F. Butler, who was a political force that had to be dealt with, but was already emerging (according to the virtually unanimous consensus of historians) as a military incompetent. Butler was ordered to assemble a force of some 800 men for the expedition. He soon had 880: 500 from the German-speaking 20th New York Volunteers, 220 from the 9th New York Volunteers, 100 from the Union Coast Guard (an Army unit, actually the 99th New York Volunteers; the U.S. Coast Guard as we know it did not exist in 1861), and 20 army regulars from the 2nd U.S. Artillery. The men were put aboard two of the vessels that Commander Stellwagen had purchased, Adelaide and George Peabody. When objection was made that the two ships would not be able to survive a Hatteras storm, Stellwagen pointed out that the expedition could proceed only in fair weather anyway, as a storm would prevent landings.

While Butler was gathering his forces, Flag Officer Stringham was also making preparations. Somehow he learned that the War Department orders to Butler's superior, Major General John E. Wool, had contained the statement, "The expedition originated in the Navy Department, and is under its control." Reasoning that he would be blamed if anything went wrong, he decided to follow his own plans. He selected seven warships for the expedition: USS Minnesota, Cumberland, Susquehanna, Wabash, Pawnee, Monticello, and Harriet Lane. All but the last were ships of the U.S. Navy; Harriet Lane was a cutter, part of the US Revenue Service. He also included in his force the tug Fanny, needed to tow some of the surf boats that would be used for the landing.

On 26 August 1861, the flotilla, less Susquehanna and Cumberland, departed Hampton Roads and moved down the coast to the vicinity of Cape Hatteras. On the way, they were joined by Cumberland. They swung around the Cape on 27 August and anchored near the inlet, in full view of the defenders there. Colonel William F. Martin of the 7th North Carolina Infantry, commanding at Forts Hatteras and Clark, knew that his 580 or so men would need help, so he called for reinforcements from Forts Ocracoke and Oregon. Unfortunately for him and his garrison, communication among the forts was slow, and the first reinforcements did not arrive until late the next day, when it was too late.