Author: James Sprunt

Publisher: Theclassics.Us

Published: 2013-09

Total Pages: 202

ISBN-13: 9781230225289

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1914 edition. Excerpt: ... Blockade Running FINANCIAL ESTIMATES OF BLOCKADE RUNNING. Some idea of the magnitude of the blockade running interests involving the Cape Fear alone may be gathered from Badeau's statement that "in little more than a year before the capture of Fort Fisher, the ventures of British capitalists and speculators with Wilmington alone had amounted to sixty-six million dollars in gold, and sixty-five million dollars worth of cotton in gold had been exported in return." In the same period 397 steamers had run the blockade at Wilmington. Ridpath says that the number of prizes of blockade runners made during the four years' war was 1,504 vessels captured, stranded, or destroyed. Admiral Porter, who directed the naval operations against Fort Fisher, says that a telegraphic dispatch from General Lee to Colonel Lamb, at Fort Fisher, was captured, which read as follows: "If Fort Fisher falls, I shall have to evacuate Richmond." In "Tales of the Cape Fear Blockade," published in the North Carolina Booklet, February 10, 1902, page 20, under the caption "Financial Estimates," the writer said: "I have not been able to obtain an approximate estimate of the value of supplies brought by blockade runners into the Confederacy during the four years' war, nor the amount of the losses by shipowners who failed to make a successful voyage through the Federal fleet. I have, however, carefully computed the actual sum realized by the United States Government from public sales of prizes, recorded by Admiral Porter in his Naval History of the Civil War, which aggregates $21,759,595.05; to which may reasonably be added $10,000,000 for prizes to my knowledge not included in this report, and $10,000,000 more for valuable ships and cargoes stranded or destroyed by design or...