The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1903-06-02
CONFFEDERATE NAVY.
The First submarine Notwithstanding
of the HousatOnic by One-Sad Fate
of the Formers minis
ccnces of n Confederate Naval Of
fcer.

Written for The Messenger.
While at Old Point, during the
Worlds Fair at Chicago, making obser-
vations with my powerful marine glas :.
ses Of the most formidable fleet of war
vessels Of the different nations that
ever anchored III Hampton Roads, with
all their modern improvements suggest
ed and invented by the Confederate
war. signaling To each other by night
with their v~arrigated colored electric
lights, with their steam and Naptha
launches shooting over the. roads like
fires, my memory drifts back into the
past when the Merrimac came steamlng
slowly down the James into Hampton
Roads, sinking the United states
frigates Congress and Constitution with
her powerful iron PROV, while both fri
gates continued firing their broadside
batteries until the water a into the
muzzles of the guns Of the two sink
ing ships. At this fight the navies of
the world remodeled their warships,
building them of iron and steel instead
of wood. The English man of war
Blake now ancored lower down the a
was then considered the most powerful
man of war afloat. Far out at sea
could be seen the lights and smoke OF
a Spanish man of war towing into the
Roads the models of Columbus two
boats. the Marie and Pinta, upon
whose poop decks he first discovered
America.
On board of the Congress was James
R. Wicks. a common sailor in the Unit
ed States navy from North Carolina,
who escaped from a watery grave by
swimming shore near Newport News.
James A. Wicks, like a great many
other southerners remained in the old
| navy when the war began. From that
fight, he informed me, his conscience
| Smote him and on the first opportunity,
he left the Stars and Stripes and en-
listed under the Stars and Bars of his
| own sunny south. He was sent from
| the James river squadron at Richmond
| with a detachment of sailors and ma
rines to Charleston, S. c., to board and
destroy the United States man of war
Ironsides then blockading Charleston
bar. Their boarding weapons were
| cutlasses, pistols, hand grinades, also
| Belgian rifles.
Torpedoes were then in their first
stages of development. though formula
BILE enough to send the whole federal
blockading fleet to sea by rowing just
before sunset q torpedo boa across the
harbor when we wished to run out q
blockade runner loaded with cotton for
Nassau. About this time this detach-
ment of sailors arrived at Charleston,
and was quartered on board the indian
Chief anchored about a mile from shore
on Cooper river opposite Charleston.
One calm fair day while all hands
We're at dinner, the watch upon deck
of the Indian Chief announced that the
submarine torpedo o a was about &c
drive under the Indian Chief as she had
usually done while exercising her crew
for the awful mission which afterwards
occurred. All on board went TO the
s~tarboard side of the ship to see her rise
to the surface after diving under US
but she did not come 10 the surface
Then all went TO the side n went
down and saw a great quantity Of small
bubbles rising from the bottom of the
river. About this time our attention
was attracted ashore by some n wav'
ing i white handkerchief upOn tn
wharf. \ BOAT was sent ashore anC
was informed by the inventor of the
submarine boat that. against his pos
live orders. the crew had gone out or
the river practicing while he was III
town getting a shave. When informed
Of the fate OF his crew and boat, h,
Immediately secured a river steame,
with diving bell on board and came on
and went Down in the diving bell anC
made fast a large rope 10 the boa o.
the bottom OF the river about forty fee
deep.
Now came the race for life of tn
crew TO get the BOAT on shore inside q
an hour. as the BOAT retains only al
enough for the crew to live only on
hour When the boat was about L
make a dive they arways lighted a can
die and hen they saw the candle begin
to grow dim then they would conc t
the surface for more air.
When pulled ashore the hour had III
OUT and the seven men We're found witt
their shoulders against the nanhol
trying to burst from their imprisoned
Dos on the bottom, all ~suffocated. TIL