February 1, 1864 - N 34.17.660 W 77.42.612 - The Wild Dayrell was in trouble. The sleek, side-wheeled blockade-runner had bottomed out in lo...
February 1, 1864 - N 34.17.660 W 77.42.612 - The Wild Dayrell was in trouble. The sleek, side-wheeled blockade-runner had bottomed out in low waters along the North Carolina coast just above Wilmington. During the early morning hours, her frantic crew tossed cargo overboard to lighten the load and free the stranded vessel. The boilers were fired up, and thick black smoke steamed from her stack and curled into the sky. The smoke caught the attention of the crew of the federal gunboat Sassacus, then cruising in the Atlantic about one-half dozen miles distant. Francis A. Roe, the lieutenant commander of the ship, ordered his men into action. The crew included a number of dependable citizen sailors, including engineer Ben Wood. Wood joined the crew of the side-wheeler Sassacus in late 1863 and shipped out for duty with the Union blockade fleet off Wilmington. The newly commissioned vessel was named for a 17th century Native American chief from the Pequot tribe. The Sassacus was the first in a class of gunboats with rudders at each end. The design enabled her to travel back and forth without having to turn around in narrow inlets. Meanwhile in a Liverpool, England, shipyard, the Wild Dayrell was commissioned. Named for an acclaimed British thoroughbred racehorse, the vessel was built for speed. Edgar Holden, a writer for Harper’s New Monthly Magazine who accompanied the Sassacus and later wrote about his experience, described the British blockade-runner as having a “long, low hull, with raking masts and smoke-stack.” The Wild Dayrell crossed the Atlantic bound for Wilmington via the Bahaman port of Nassau. The Sassacus found her at the mouth of Stump Inlet. Harper’s writer Holden noted, “Swiftly, like a hawk on its prey, the Sassacus sped toward her. Scarcely six miles away, clearly visible as she was to us, almost, indeed, within range of our guns, yet she tried to escape.” Wood and his fellow sailors steamed close enough to see the bales of goods floating in the water around the ship, and more that had drifted on to a nearby beach. As the desperate crew worked feverishly to free the Wild Dayrell, a shot fired from the Sassacus whistled over their heads. Writer Holden recalled the reaction of the enemy crew: “Helter-skelter ran every one for the boats, and leaving everything as it stood, with the engines still moving, they fled precipitously. A narrow creek led inland, and with all dispatch they pulled up into it and disappeared.” The Wild Dayrell was abandoned. “The surf dashed against her sides and at times completely washed her decks. Clouds of smoke and steam poured from her, mingling with the spray. It seemed certain that the rebels must have set her on fire, great as was their haste,” Holden recounted. Roe and a detachment boarded the Wild Dayrell. Holden reported, “Heavy cases of goods from firms in New York, and of shoes marked as from Lynn, Massachusetts, were lying about the deck.” He added, “In the hold bales of dry goods were still swinging from the whips; while in the cabin all sorts of articles of toilet or apparel, hastily emptied trunks and valises, bottles and glasses, were strewn about the floor.” Roe noted in his after-action report, “I found her furnaces filled with fuel and burning, with the intention of destroying her boilers.” He and his men spent the next two days in several failed attempts to free the vessel and claim her as a prize. The Union gunboat Florida arrived on the scene and pitched in without success. On February 3, a new threat emerged when Confederates hidden along the beach fired on the Union crews. Roe responded with his cannon and drove them off. He then ordered his men to burn the blockade-runner. Holden observed, “The curling tongues of flame that now shot out from the decks of the Wild Dayrell showed that the torch had been faithfully applied; clouds of lurid smoke poured from the holds, and enveloped the whole of her light masts, sails and rigging.” He added, “To insure complete ruin of her engines, and to preclude the remote possibility of her ever serving again either her owners or the rebels, both the Sassacus and Florida took position, and shot after shot was fired through the iron hull. Bursting shells soon tore immense holes in bows and stern, or threw masses of shattered deck and cargo high into the air.” The Wild Dayrell was no more. Text: Excerpts from Civil War News. - February-March 2014 Source: https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=764008490385345 Less
