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Wilmington, North Carolina once had a thriving Black middle class and an elected interracial government. In 1898 white supremacists used violence to overthrow that government, kill Black residents and drive many others from the city.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
CSS Macon was a wooden-hulled gunboat ordered in 1861 from Henry F Willink's shipyard at Savannah, Georgia, as Ogeechee.[1] There were to have been seven Macon-class vessels, but the only other one completed was CSS Peedee. Macon was 150 feet (46 m) long and 25 feet (7.6 m) wide, with a draft of 10 feet (3.0 m). She was propelled by steam machinery and twin screw propellers, which could drive the ship at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). Macon had an intended complement of 91, and was armed with six guns.[1]
The gunboat was launched as Ogeechee in 1863, but renamed Macon in June 1864, before completion.[1] On 3 August 1864 she was commissioned, with Lieutenant J. S. Kennard, CSN, in command, although still lacking a full complement.[1][2] Macon was initially deployed in the defense of Savannah.[1]
Savannah capitulated on 21 December and three days later Macon departed for Augusta, Georgia, where she surrendered in May 1865, at the end of the war.[1][2]
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CSS Macon was a wooden-hulled gunboat ordered in 1861 from Henry F Willink's shipyard at Savannah, Georgia, as Ogeechee. There were to have been seven Macon-class vessels, but the only other one completed was CSS Peedee. Macon was 150 feet (46 m) long and 25 feet (7.6 m) wide, with a draft of 10 feet (3.0 m). She was propelled by steam machinery and twin screw propellers, which could drive the ship at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). Macon had an intended complement of 91, and was armed with six guns. The gunboat was launched as Ogeechee in 1863, but renamed Macon in June 1864, before completion. On 3 August 1864 she was commissioned, with Lieutenant J. S. Kennard, CSN, in command, although still lacking a full complement. Macon was initially deployed in the defense of Savannah. Savannah capitulated on 21 December and three days later Macon departed for Augusta, Georgia, where she surrendered in May 1865, at the end of the war.
CSS Resolute was a tugboat built in 1858 at Savannah Georgia as the Ajax which served in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War. Resolute entered Confederate service in 1861 and operated as a tow boat, transport, receiving ship, and tender to the sidewheeler CSS Savannah on the coastal and inland waters of Georgia and South Carolina. On 5–6 November 1861, Resolute, under Lieutenant John Pembroke Jones, CSN, in company with CSS Lady Davis, CSS Sampson, and Savannah, under the overall command of Flag Officer Josiah Tattnall III, CSN, offered harassing resistance to a much larger Union fleet preparing to attack Confederate strongholds at Port Royal Sound, S.C. During November 7, while Resolute had been sent to Savannah with dispatches, the Union fleet under Flag Officer Samuel Francis du Pont, USN, pounded the Confederate Fort Walker and Fort Beauregard until they were abandoned. Upon her return, Resolute helped evacuate the garrison of Fort Walker and then returned to spike the Confederate guns at Pope's Landing on Hilton Head Island. Later that month, on November 26, Resolute, in company with Sampson and Savannah, under Flag Officer Tattnall, weighed anchor from under the guns of Fort Pulaski, S.C., and made a brief attack on Union vessels at the mouth of the Savannah River. On January 28, 1862, accompanied by Sampson and Savannah, she delivered supplies to the fort despite the spirited opposition of Federal ships. While on an expedition to destroy the Charleston and Savannah Railway bridge spanning the Savannah River, in cooperation with gunboats CSS Macon and Sampson, under Flag Officer William W. Hunter, CSN, on December 12, 1864, Resolute received heavy fire from battery I, First New York Artillery. Although hit twice, she was not seriously damaged until she was disabled in collision with the two gunboats during their retreat. Although the gunboats escaped, Resolute grounded on Argyle Island on the Savannah River. She was captured on the same day by soldiers of Company F of the 3rd Wisconsin Veteran Infantry, commanded by Captain Charles Ransom Barrager, under Colonel W. Hawly, USA, in the army of General William T. Sherman, and destroyed.
CSS Isondiga was a wooden gunboat that served in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War. Designed according to Matthew Fontaine Maury's plan to produce a large number of small vessels to swamp the Union blockade, Isondiga was one of only two or three of these Maury gunboats actually completed, and the only one completed as designed. The Maury gunboats project had been almost entirely cancelled in favor of ironclad production after the Battle of Hampton Roads. Isondiga was built in Savannah, Georgia, and was transferred to the Confederate Navy in January 1863 to begin the fitting out process. At this time, she was commanded by Lieutenant Joel S. Kennard. In late May 1863, Isondiga accompanied the ironclad CSS Atlanta in an attempt to attack the Union blockade in Wassaw Sound, but this was foiled when Atlanta ran aground. On June 17, Isondiga and the steamer CSS Resolute accompanied Atlanta in an engagement where the ironclad attacked two Union monitors and was quickly captured. At times later in 1863, Isondiga was inactivate because parts of her crew were temporarily transferred to Charleston, South Carolina. She continued service in the Savannah area in 1864. Kennard was transferred to the gunboat CSS Macon in June. In December, the city was about to fall into Union hands, and on December 20, Isondiga covered the Confederate retreat from the city over a pontoon bridge. While trying to escape herself, Isondiga ran aground and was burned by her crew on December 21 under orders from her commander, Lieutenant Hamilton Dalton.
CSS Sampson, sometimes spelled Samson, was employed as a tugboat, prior to her purchase by the Confederate Government in 1861. On 7 November 1861 this ship, Sampson, Lt. J. S. Kenard, CSN, stood out with other gunboats of Commodore Josiah Tattnall III's squadron to engage the heavy ships of Rear Admiral DuPont at the battle of Port Royal, South Carolina. The Confederates finally were forced to withdraw to Skull Creek. After the naval bombardment and evacuation of Port Royal's defensive works, Sampson helped transport a number of the retreating garrison to Savannah. Later in the month she exchanged shots with Federal forces off Fort Pulaski, Ga., and in January 1862, with two others of Tattnall's squadron, ran past the Federal ships in the Savannah River to provision Fort Pulaski. Sampson received considerable damage in this encounter. Thereafter she served as receiving ship at Savannah and on 16 November 1863 returned to combat duty, patrolling the Savannah River with the defense force of Flag Officer W. W. Hunter, CSN. In early December 1864 she joined with Macon and Resolute in an expedition to destroy the Charleston and Savannah Railway bridge spanning the Savannah River, and sustained considerable damage. Prior to the capture of Savannah by General Sherman on 21 December 1864 Sampson was taken up the river to Augusta, remaining there until the end of the war.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Joe Louis.
