Chap. XIII. war. Among the most pressing needs of the Confederates was that of sea-going ships capable of being used for Such vessels as they possessed were, as we have seen, for the most part very small. There was probably not one of these which could have ventured to engage a Federal cruiser of any class without certain destruction. In coast warfare they were able to achieve one or two brilliant though unprofitable successes. But the construction of a large sea-going steamer seems to have been beyond their power; their only ships were such as had fallen into their hands; and they either had not the materials and machinery for turning out marine steamengines, or were unable to use them.1 1 "Workshops and foundries were improvised, wherever it was possible to establish them; but the great difficulty was the want of the requisite heavy machinery. We had not the means, in the entire Confederacy, of turning out a complete steam-engine of any size; and many of our naval disasters are attributable to this deficiency. Wellconstructed steamers, that did credit to the Navy Department and its agents, were forced to put to sea, and to move about upon our sounds and harbours, with engines disproportioned to their size, and incapable of driving them at a speed greater than five miles the hour. "The casting of cannon, and the manufacture of small arms, were also undertaken by the Secretary, under the direction of skilful officers, and prosecuted to considerable efficiency. But it took time to accomplish all these things. Before a ship could be constructed, it was necessary to hunt up the requisite timber, and transport it considerable distances. Her armour, if she was to be armoured, was to be rolled also at a distance, and transported over long lines of railroad, piecemeal; her cordage was to be picked up at one place, and her sails and hammocks at another. I speak knowingly on this subject, as I had had experience of many of the difficulties I mention, in fitting out the Sumter in New Orleans. I was two months in preparing this small ship for sea, practising, all the while, every possible diligence and contrivance. The Secretary had other difficulties to contend with. By the time he had gotten many of his ship-yards well established, and ships well on their way to completion, the enemy would threaten the locus in quo by land, and either compel him to attempt to remove everything movable, in great haste and at great loss, or destroy it, to prevent it from falling into the hands of the enemy. Many fine ships were, in this way, burned on the very eve of completion."-Semmes, My Adventures Afloat, p. 366. Yet the few cruisers which the Confederate Govern- Chap. XIII. ment were able to send to sea performed with considerable success the service for which they were designed; and the Southern ports, though ingress and egress were alike hazardous, were far from being completely closed. The Sumter, as we have already seen, put to sea from the Passes of the Mississippi; the Nashville issued from Charleston in October 1861, ran into Beaufort in February 1862, showing Confederate colours when within musket-range of the blockading steamer, and ran out again in March under the fire of the two which then guarded the channel. The Florida, as we shall see hereafter, entered and left Mobile in the teeth of the blockade. Even before the end of 1861, the rate of insurance on American shipping had risen four or five per cent., and shippers had begun to resort to the device, familiar in maritime war, of protecting or attempting to protect their cargoes by certificates of neutral ownership. In the winter of 1861-62, two Confederate officers had been sent by their Government to Europe, with instructions to procure several steamers, to be purchased in the market or built to order as circumstances might determine. They were warned to proceed with caution, it being probably well known that England had a neutrality law differing very slightly from that of the United States. Captain Bullock, the more prominent of these two agents, a Georgian who had been in the Federal Navy and afterwards in the steam-packet service, took up his abode near Liverpool. It need hardly be said that of him, his associate, or his instructions, nothing could well have been known to the British Government. The Government of the United States possessed in its Consulates, and especially in the Consulate at Liverpool, posts of observation which appear to have been occupied by zealous and intelligent men. Whatever Chap. XIII. occurred in the port of a nature to awake suspicion, the Consul reported to Mr. Adams; and Mr. Adams, if he thought it of any consequence, brought it to the notice of Lord Russell. On the 15th August, 1861, the Foreign Secretary's attention was thus directed to a steamer, the Bermuda, alleged to be fitting out for the Confederate Government at Hartlepool. She proved, however, on investigation, to be intended only for blockade-running. On the 18th February, 1862, a like representation was received respecting another steamer, the Oreto, at Liverpool, and was referred on the same day to the Treasury, to be made the subject of inquiry by the officers of the Board of Customs. They reported that she was intended for an English mercantile house at Palermo, and that she was believed by the firm of engineers to whose order she had been built to be destined for that place; that she was pierced for four guns, but not fitted for the reception of guns, and that she had nothing on board but coals and ballast. Orders were given that she should be vigilantly watched, and that, if any armament prohibited by the Foreign Enlistment Act should be discovered, she should be detained. She was registered on the 3rd March in the name of a merchant then at Liverpool, a member of the Sicilian firm, and cleared on the following day for "Palermo, the Mediterranean, and Jamaica" in ballast, but did not sail till the 22nd, when she left the Mersey with a crew of fifty men, and nothing on board but ordinary ship's stores. Here, for the present, she disappears from view, and for three months nothing more is heard of her. No evidence (beyond vague hearsay and surmise) respecting the construction, destination, or ownership of the vessel appears to have been produced to Government or any of its officers before she sailed. On the 24th June, 1862, Lord Russell was apprised by Mr. Adams "that a new and still more powerful warsteamer was nearly ready for departure from the port of Liverpool on the same errand" as the Oreto, which he Chap. XIII. believed to be then not at Palermo but at Nassau, completing her armament for the purpose of making war against the United States. "This vessel has been built and launched from the dockyard of persons one of whom is now sitting as a member of the House of Commons, and is fitting out for the especial and manifest object of carrying on hostilities by sea. It is about to be commanded by one of the insurgent agents, the same who sailed in the Oreto. The parties engaged in the enterprise are persons well known at Liverpool to be agents and officers of the insurgents in the United States." 1 Mr. Adams sent at the same time, as an inclosure, the following letter, from which his information had been derived : "Sir, Mr. Dudley to Mr. Adams. "United States' Consulate, Liverpool, June 21, 1862. "The gun-boat now being built by the Messrs. Laird and Co., at Birkenhead, opposite Liverpool, and which I mentioned to you in a previous despatch, is intended for the so-called Confederate Government in the Southern States. The evidence I have is entirely conclusive to my mind. I do not think there is the least room for doubt about it. Beauforth and Caddy, two of the officers from the privateer Sumter, stated that this vessel was being built for the Confederate States. The foreman in Messrs. Laird's yard says she is the sister to the gun-boat Oreto, and has been built for the same parties and for the same purpose; when pressed for a further explanation, he stated that she was to be a privateer for the 'Southern Government in the United States.' The captain and officers of the steamer Julie Usher now at Liverpool, and which is loaded to run the blockade, state that this gunboat is for the Confederates, and is to be commanded by Captain Bullock. "The strictest watch is kept over this vessel; no person except those immediately engaged upon her is admitted in the yard. On the occasion of the trial trip made last Thursday week no one was admitted without a pass, and these passes were issued to but few persons, and those who are known here as active Secessionists engaged in sending aid and relief to the rebels. "I understand that her armament is to consist of eleven guns, and that she is to enter at once, as soon as she leaves this port, upon her business as a privateer. 1 Mr. Adams to Earl Russell, 23rd June, 1862. Chap. XIII. "The vessel is very nearly completed; she has had her first trial trip. This trial was successful, and entirely satisfactory to the persons who are superintending her construction. She will be finished in nine or ten days. A part of her powder canisters, which are to number 200, and are of a new patent, made of copper with screw tops, are on board the vessel; the others are to be delivered in a few days. No pains or expense have been spared in her construction. Her engines are on the oscillating principle and are 350 horse-power. She measures 1,050 tons burthen, and will draw fourteen feet of water when loaded. Her screw or fan works in a solid brass frame casting, weighing near two tons, and is so constructed as to be lifted from the water by steampower. The platforms and gun carriages are now being constructed. "When completed and armed she will be a most formidable and dangerous craft, and, if not prevented from going to sea, will do much mischief to our commerce. The persons engaged in her construction say that no better vessel of her class was ever built. These letters were on the 25th referred to the Treasury; and on the 1st July the Commissioners of Customs reported as follows: The Commissioners of Customs to the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury. "Custom House, July 1, 1862. "Your Lordships having referred to us the annexed letter from Mr. Hammond, Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, transmitting, by desire of Earl Russell, copy of a letter from the United States' Minister at this Court, calling attention to a steamer reported to be fitting out at Liverpool as a Southern privateer, and inclosing copy of a letter from the United States' Consul at that port, reporting the result of his investigation into the matter, and requesting that immediate inquiries may be made respecting this vessel, and such steps taken as may be right and proper; "We report― "That immediately on receipt of your Lordship's reference we forwarded the papers to our Collector at Liverpool for his special inquiry and report, and we learn from his reply that the fitting-out of the vessel has not escaped the notice of the officers of this revenue, but that as yet nothing has transpired concerning her which has appeared to demand a special Report. "We are informed that the officers have at all times free access to the building-yards of the Messrs. Laird at Birkenhead, where the vessel is lying, and that there has been no attempt on the part of her builders to disguise, what is most apparent, that she is intended for a |