Through Four Wars—
Fort Caswell
Guards River
By EUGENE FALLON
“Fortress, moat and wall,
place without peer,
May God be the Watchman
before thy gate
That the feet of Misfortune
Enter not here . .
—Hafiz.
For 136 years it has guarded
Southport’s fine harbor, and if no
guns are to be found today at
Fort Caswell the troops are still
there. Baptists all, in summer
they garrison this commanding
position.
It was not always thus. Cas
well was built originally as one of
Uncle Sam’s strong string of forts
along the coast from Maine to
Florida. In that chain perhaps no
better site for a fortress could
be found. Splitting the harbor
squarely in two, and guarding the
two entrances of the great Cape
Fear River, Caswell served well
its purpose through four wars,
the Civil War, the Spanish-Amer
ican War, and World Wars No. I
and No. II.
Work was begun on the fort in
1826 and was continued for well
over a decade before they had it
strong enough to suit its purpose.
Major George Blaney, Engineer
ing Corps, U. S. A., was in charge
of construction for 11 years, until
his death in 1837. Blaney was just
past his 53rd birthday when he
succumbed at Smithville in the
summer of that year. A Bostonian
by birth, it could have been that
the Yankee officer never quite
grew acclimatized to Coastal
Carolina. At all events he died of
fever with the job unfinished.
Over the long years to come,
fevers were to kill far more
troops on Caswell than shot and
Shell.
A truism states that no man is
indispensable, and to Blaney's
trusted assistant engineer, Cap
tain A. J. Swift, fell the task of
completing the rising bulwark of
river and ocean defense. This
sterling officer had the honor of j
completing the Herculean job.
And Caswell was builded well. A
trip to the island today will prove
that point. The old brick are as
firm and well-placed in 1962 as
when they left the skilled hands:
Which lifted them in the 1820’s.
When the government had it
finished they cast about for a
suitable name. There was Richard
Caswell, first governor of North
Carolina. VThat better name for
a Tar Heel fort than Caswell?
And when they raised Old Glory
over the majestic acres and the
first troops were marched in they
marched into Fort Caswell, U. S.
A.
In this connection a very illus
trious American, one Edgar Allen
Poe, a man of moods and miseries,
just missed being attached to
Caswell. This in 1848, when Poe
was sent from New York to Fort
Moultrie, South Carolina. Poe.
who had resigned in semi-disgrace
from West Point, where he had
been charged with gambling and
partaking too freely from the cup
that cheers, rejoined the U. S.
Army, this time as an enlisted
man. His original orders were for
that “new fort in North Carolina,
Caswell”, but a small outbreak
of yellow jack sent him instead
to Sullivan’s Island, where he re
mained for a year’s service as
artilleryman; and where he im
mortalized that South Carolina
isle as the scene of the "Gold
Bug”, a suspenseful tale of buried
treasure, skeletons and strange
curses.
Through its early history Fort
Caswell was garrisoned by only
token troops. In fact its entire
personnel strength in the days
immediately preceding the War
Between the States consisted of a
sergeant and two troopers. The
sergeant’s name was James Reil
ly, and he was first-generation
Irish from Holyoke, Mass.
Whereas the life of Reilly is
proverbally one of happiness and
of ease, one doubts that this par
ticular Reilly was much elated
with the status quo of those dan
gerous days. Reilly was hemmed
in with hostility and may have
longed desperately for the free
life of a sailor. But he was no
fool. And when a body of Wil
mington militiamen, under the
command of Colonel John J. Hed
rick, weapons at the ready, dis
embarked from boats and claimed
the fortress for North Carolina,
Reilly said as he reckoned “that
was a fair and square arrange
ment.”
The remarkable part of this
bloodless encounter is that it was
Mighty Fortification
This is a portion of the massive concrete bat
tery which was erected by the United States Gov
ernment at Fort Caswell to protect the entrance to
the Cape Fear River. There were emplacements for
powerful coast artillery guns, which were capable
of laying down a devastating barrage far from
shore.
consummated at least 3 months be-1
fore the Star of the West was
fired upon by Citadel cadets,
while that Union supplyship was
bringing provisions to the garri
son of yet another harbor fort
called Sumter. This on January
9, 1861. Hedrick’s company had,
a few hours earlier, also captured
Fort Johnston in Smithville. It
is said that the population of the
town wildly cheered the N. C.
militia as they jumped the gun
before the - start of the dreadful
race tq determine if the country
could pVoperly support two sepa
rate nations.
What of Sergeant Reilly? Well,
since the hulking fellow with the
Irish brogue had been by-and
large pretty decent about it all,
they let him mount a ragged mule
and set off in the general direc
tion of Holyoke, Mass. No ehains
for the sergeant. It is further
stated that Reilly was offered
mufti to travel in; it having been
pointed out that right much
Rebel territory remained between
Brunswick and Massachusetts,
but that Sergeant Reilly properly
refused to discard his uniform,
saying that, as a soldier, he would
take his chances on safe exit.
Reilly comes through as a pretty
good fellow all the way.
It was, of course, quite pre
1 mature, this first Rebel raid; so
much so that up at Raleigh Gov- .
ernor John W. Ellis was down- j
right discomforted by the news. :
Said Ellis: “Whereas I feel that I
this move was actuated by pa
triotic motives, I cannot hold j
with it in my position. There is I
no declared war. The fort belongs |
I to the U. S. Government and j
must be relinquished to it.”
Down in Brunswick a some- j
what deflated Hedrick reluctant- j
' ly withdrew his “army” from j
Caswell. For two full days the ;
fort was deserted, before Hedrick I
came back once more and Cas- 1
well remained a Confederate post
until the dying days of the des
perate conflict. •
At this point in the compelling 1
story of Fort Caswell, it might j
not be amiss to include a nostal- j
gic footnote. In late October of I
1838, the government in noting !
that Fort Caswell was completed, '
added that its “total cost came to
$473,402.” A sum which undoubt
edly seemed immense then, seems
comically insignificant today when
billions are spent to send a man
around the world in a capsule.
Perhaps one of the strangest
things connected with Fort Cas
well during the four years of civil
strife was the complete absence
of any major campaign by the
! Union, to retake the fort from the
^ Confederates. Outside an occa
sional artillery duel between the
blockading- Union warfleet and!
the fortress, no landing party |
was sent against Caswell until al
most the final hours of the war. j
There may have been several ex- j
planations for this. First and
foremost was the strength of the
great bastion. It would have had
high cost in lives to wrest it from ,
the lads in Gray. Secondly it
might have gone against the
Union grain to smash and batter
what Union money and craft had
built. On the other hand, Fort
Fisher and Sumter were practi
cally reduced to rubble by Union
fire. Whatever the reason, Cas
well sailed almost untouched by
the stern crucibles of shot, shell
and assault.
And it was worth its weight in
gold to the loyal sons and daugh
ters of the South. There can be
no doubt that Fort Caswell kept
[ Smithville out of Union hands;
saved Fort Johnston, and, above
! all, furnished firepower and pro
: tection for those brave men who
kept the lifelines of the Confed
eracy clear through running the
blockade.
If Caswell on the whole remain
ed a peaceful oasis in the desert
of fiery warfare, it died violently
enough, murdered by the garrison
of Tarheel soldiery. On the night
of Sunday, January 15, 1865, Fort
Fisher fell to an assault party of
Unionists. The cause was falter
ing. The handwriting was now on
the wall of history. Word came
down from Wilmington that the
position -of Caswell, now being
untenable, that fort must be relin
quished. It was still war. The
earth must be scorched, must be
rendered temporarily useless.
Captain E. S. Martin, C. S. A.,
was ordered to destroy the fort.
On the following day (Monday),
Martin set afire all the wooden
barracks at Caswell. There were
five powder magazines at the fort.
One of these held 100,(100 pounds
of black gunpowder. These were
mined and at one a. m. the mor
ning of Tuesday, . January 17,
1865, the charges were ignited.
The resultant explosion sent
Smithville residents tumbling
from their beds. The sound was
heard at Wilmington, and even as
far as Fayetteville, more than
one-hundred miles distant. The
heavy odor of cordite hung over
Fort Caswell for days afterward.
A tattered Confederate flag still
waved above the ruined fortress.
The war over and done with,
Fort Caswell was staffed with a
tiny handfull of U. S. troops,
once again under command of a
non-commissioned officer. There
| seems to exist a local belief that
Continued on page three
Waterfront
The Rev. L. D. Hayman, whose ,
first love outside the ministry is I
fishing, is a subscriber to the
publication “The Fish Boat”, and
since he received two copies of
the February issue, he gave one
of them to us. It was the first
time we had seen this little maga
zine, which appears to be de
voted entirely to commercial fish
ing news and advertising.
Right away, there was one ar
ticle \vhich caught our eye: The
one entitled “New Shrimp Fish- :
ery" ?. There are several reasons
for our interest. One is the fact
that shrimping was so bad that;
i it became almost non-existant j
here last season. Another is that
many Brunswick county boats
migrate southward into waters
where the new discovery was
made. And a third reason is that
there appears to be good reason
to be alarmed over the shrimp
ing picture as a whole unless a
new source of supply is found.
The following information is
being quoted from the magazine
story:
“Possibilities of a new shrimp
fishery for the South Atlantic are
currently tested in the area be- 1
tween Fort Pierce and Fernan- j
dina Beach, Florida, with some 1
commercial strikes already made !
in the deep waters off St. Augus
tine by a small pioneer fleet
made up of boats from St. Marys,
Georgia and Fernandina Beach.
These boats are following up the
work of the Bureau of Commer- j
cial Fisheries experimental vessel
Silver Bay which has been study
ing fishery possibilities in the area
for some time, and were directed
by the Silver Bay to the most
likely fishing grounds. When in
the proper depths, which to date
have ranged between 170 and
200 fathoms, boats have been
able to produce from one to
three boxes per drag of the
deepwater red shrimp which is
known also as the royal red
shrimp. One boat, the Sea Pearl,
operated out of St. Marys by Cal
vin Lang, brought in five boxes
for one trip, while Edison Sasey’s
Sally B., also of St. Marys, re
portedly had 15 boxes aboard
from operations of one trip. Other
boats fishing the area are the
Miller Bros, of St. Marys, operat
ed by Dan Miller, and the Miss
Julie of Fernandina Beach operat
ed by Henry Montford.
“This is the' second time that
efforts have been made to estab
lish a fishery based on the red
shrimp in the Gulf Stream. The
first attempts was made several
years ago, principally by boats
of the H. F. Sahlman and Wal
pace fleets, and while this effort
showed tangible results, it also re
vealed serious difficulties as to
gear, particularly the hoist, and
fishing was discontinued before
establishment of a fishery. Ef
forts are being made to correct
these difficulties, and Standard
Hardware Company of Fernan
dina Beach is giving major at
tention to the problem of pro
Continued On Page 3
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Southern Cakes
.ANGEL POOR or
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COUNTRY EGGS • »»■ 99<
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PICNICS 27c
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SAUSAGE 29c fc.
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