NC: Ironclad CSS Raleigh, Defender of the Cape Fear

 The CSS Raleigh 

 

Its keel laid down in the Spring of 1862 at James Cassidey’s

shipyard in Wilmington and construction delayed by labor

disputes and material shortages, the CSS Raleigh was

commissioned by the Confederate States Navy on

3 April 1864 and placed under the command

of Lt. John Wilkinson. 

This officer had just returned from Canada where he

was to command the captured USS Michigan on

Lake Erie had the secret operation not been compromised.

Wilkinson returned South and his assignment to the

CSS Raleigh lasted only a few weeks as he was

ordered to Richmond to be part of an operation to

free Southern prisoners at Point Lookout.

Command of the CSS Raleigh fell to

Lt. John Pembroke Jones, an officer very familiar with

local waters as he was part of the US Navy’s Coast

and Geodetic Survey detachment in the 1850s which

surveyed and charted the coastline in this area.

The CSS Raleigh was a Richmond Class ironclad,

designed by Capt. John L. Porter, Chief Naval

Constructor for the Confederate States Navy.

Its length was 150 feet (172’ overall), a beam of

32 feet, drew 12 feet of water, and armament

consisted of 4-6” guns and perhaps a spar torpedo.

To man the vessel, 197 officers and crew, plus

a detachment of 24 marines were aboard.

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