The Union's Stone Fleet...

5fish

Captain
Joined
Aug 26, 2007
Location
Central Florida
Here something I thought would interest for everyone.....The Union navy had a Stone Fleet during the Civil War and Bobby Lee thought the use of the Stone fleet an a quote "an abortive expression of the malice and revenge" of the north....

What was the Stone Fleet?

Herman Melville(Moby Dick Fame) wrote a poem about the Stone fleet...

History question the effectiveness of the Stone Fleet...

A link or more to the Stone Fleet....One link has the poem...Other link middle of the page...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Fleet

http://sites.google.com/site/mycwessays/stone-fleet

http://books.google.com/books?id=6m...Q6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Union Stone fleet&f=false

The navy also used the same idea on the rivers along the Virginia coast....Was the idea of the Stone Fleet effective?

A few thoughts..??
 
Well, given the number of Federal flags I pass on the way to the shop, offhand I'd say No, the idea of filling hulks with debris and sinking them in river channels was not effective.
 
From what i understood of the blockade the stone fleet in the harbors and inlets to harbors in the Carolinas was made les than effective by the storms in the area. Every time one of these storms came in the geography under the water was moved about and swept clean by massive amounts of silt.
 
Rowena Reed suggests that the premature use of a Stone Fleet actually worked against the Union in the waters along the NC and GA border. According to Reed the chance at an early seizure of Charleston was lost when the sinking of the stone ships blocked most of the channels on the Stono River. The ships had been placed by the Navy without regard to the possibilities of combined operations.
 
This is for the International Law people, The United States government was concern that England, France or other European nations would declare the blockade of the Souther states null or void because the blockade runners were being successful at getting past the union ships. Our government decided to block the harbors as a way to keep enforce the blockade, the Stone fleet.

I do not know what it means in International Law if some third party nation like England declares our blockade of the south null or void...Does anyone know???

As we know, no nation declared our blockade of the south null or void so the Stone fleet did its job?

In time our United States Navy had enough ships to enforce the blockade without the use of the Stone fleet.

Can a blockade be declare null or void???
 
Any country can declare it or simply ignore the blockade and dare the blockade owners to do something about it. The world wars were a fine example. A blockade is far larger than closing off harbors, there is also the closure of rivers and land routes, the largest part of any blockade is diplomatic, with this you get other countries to agree to support your blockade by refusal to allow your enemy entry into foriegn harbors and the refusal of major repairs and fuel, minor repairs and small amounts of fuel will be provided to get you to the next port. They wash their hands of you when you clear their waters.
 
Here is a report from the SC Department of Archeology about the Stone Fleet and other wrecks in Charleston Harbor. Subsequent to this report, an underwater archeological study performed with a grant from NPS was done. They have pinpointed the location of some of the wrecks and are pretty sure they found the remains of one of the Stone Fleets. They are currently analyzing a rock from the site to verify its origins. I attended a lecture about this on Wednesday. The speaker, Jim Spirek, of the SCIAA, said he would be posting the presentation to their site, but as of yet he has not done so[FONT=Arial, Helvetica]. [/FONT]I will keep looking for it and post it here.

http://www.cas.sc.edu/sciaa/mrd/documents/nws_sc.pdf
 
Period Harpers Weekly Articles Re: The Stone Fleet

http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/civil-war/1862/january/charleston-harbor-stone-fleet.htm

http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/civil-war/1862/january/charleston-harbor-stone-fleet.htm

Other Articles:

http://www.hazegray.org/danfs/csn/annex_4.txt

http://civilwarnavy150.blogspot.com/2011/04/stone-fleet.html

http://wigwags.wordpress.com/2007/11/06/the-siege-of-charleston-%E2%80%93-the-stone-fleet/

stone-fleet.jpg
 
The Second Stone Fleet – as it came to be known – sunk at the end of January 1862, but in the end historians say it was pretty lousy at keeping Confederate goods from going out and military supplies from coming in, as it was intended to do.

Now, the ghost of those whaling vessels may prove a successful obstacle after all, although this time it’s a $15 million Isle of Palms beach renourishment project that’s being forced to navigate around them.
http://www.moultrienews.com/20160831/160839947/iop-renourishment-plans-held-up-by-civil-war-blockade
 
They have pinpointed the location of some of the wrecks and are pretty sure they found the remains of one of the Stone Fleets. They are currently analyzing a rock from the site to verify its origins.

Bet those rocks would sell as souvenirs.
 
Apparently the Stone Fleets are still wreaking havoc for Charlestonians.
I am curious to see more of the report of "cause-and effect" of the Stone Fleets on these barrier islands. How are they distinguishing natural erosion, which plagues all the barrier islands of the Southeast coast, from man-caused erosion? Morris Island is now almost completely gone and Folly Beach has to be replenished about every decade.
 
The Stone Fleet. An Old Sailor’s Lament

by Herman Melville

I have a feeling for those ships,
Each worn and ancient one,
With great bluff bows, and broad in the beam;
Ay, it was unkindly done.
But so they serve the Obsolete—
Even so, Stone Fleet!

You’ll say I’m doting; do but think
I scudded round the Horn in one—
The Tenedos, a glorious
Good old craft as ever run—
Sunk (how all unmeet!)
With the Old Stone Fleet.

An India ship of fame was she,
Spices and shawls and fans she bore;
A whaler when her wrinkles came—
Turned off! till, spent and poor,
Her bones were sold (escheat)!
Ah! Stone Fleet.

Four were erst patrician keels
(Names attest what families be),
The Kensington, and Richmond too,
Leonidas, and Lee:
But now they have their seat
With the Old Stone Fleet.

To scuttle them—a pirate deed—
Sack them, and dismast;
They sunk so slow, they died so hard,
But gurgling dropped at last.
Their ghosts in gales repeat
Woe’s us, Stone Fleet!

And all for naught. The waters pass—
Currents will have their way;
Nature is nobody’s ally; ’tis well;
The harbor is bettered—will stay.
A failure, and complete,
Was your Old Stone Fleet.​
 
Can a blockade be declare null or void???
A blockade is both a legal action and a military action.

In 1864 Denmark declared a blockade of all Prussian ports.
After x days (think it was 14, but not sure) it comes into effect.
This delay is to give all neutral ships time to leave the ports.

As long as the blockade is in effect, any neutral ship that try to enter or leave the effected ports, can legally be sized by danish warships, without it being an act of war.
This makes it risky for neutral shipping to use the port.

But for it to be in effect, it need to be effective. That is ships must be in position to stop neutral ships sailing to the port in an ordinary fashion. (but don't need to stop blockade runners from using inlets to drop of cargo)

But this is all about neutral shipping. Shipping belonging to the "enemy" can obviously always be taken as prizes.


Here is a bit about the danish blockade in 1864. It is from the book "Bismarks first war" It mention some of the issues.
IMG_0925.JPG


Note footnote 3.
IMG_0926.JPG
 
Back
Top