The
Confederate Navy was top heavy with Marylanders. Besides the two
admirals, Maryland furnished one commodore, Seven Captains, four
commanders, seven lieutenants commanding and 15 lieutenants.
There were 163 recorded Marylanders who would serve as officers
in the relatively small Southern Provincial Navy. The majority of
career men resigned from the old navy, but their resignations
were not accepted. Instead, their names were stricken from the
roll and marked as dismissed. One such Marylander was James
Iredall Waddell.
Captain James Iredall Waddell was born in Pittsboro, North
Carolina, in 1824 and was appointed to Annapolis on September 10,
1841 After graduating, he was assigned to duty on the U.S. ship,
Pennsylvania. A few months later at Portsmouth, Virginia, he was
shot in the hip during a duel with another midshipman and the
injury caused him to limp the rest of his life. In 1858 he was
promoted to lieutenant and made an assistant professor of
navigation at the Naval Academy. In 1859 he was ordered to the
East India Squadron and, after learning that the war had begun in
1861, mailed his resignation from St. Helena. Returning to
Annapolis, he married his betrothed, Miss Inglehart, the daughter
of James Inglehart, whose family was very strongly inclined to
the South. The marriage took place in December of 1861 and he was
listed on the Naval Registrar as being dismissed from service on
January 19, 1862.
After remaining in Annapolis for a short time, he rode the
blockade to Richmond in February of 1862 and enlisted in the
Confederate Army, receiving a commission of 1st lieutenant dated
March 27,1862. Waddell was sent to New Orleans for a short period
and then returned to Virginia to Drewry's Bluff as an ordnance
officer. He was ordered to Charleston Harbor for a short while
and then to Europe for foreign service, arriving in England in
May of 1863. The Confederate Naval Department purchased a British
merchant steamer, the Sea King, and in October of 1864,
rendezvousing off Liverpool, she was commissioned the C.S.S.
Shenandoah and was commanded by Waddell. This was the last of the
Confederate cruisers and, with the exception of the Alabama,
inflicted the largest amount of injury upon the U.S. commerce
vessels during the war. The Shenandoah wiped out most of the New
Bedford whaling fleet off Alaska, taking many prizes and more
than 1,000 prisoners. At one time, her decks and cabins were so
crowded that she was forced to place her captives in whaling
boats and tow them through the Arctic Sea. From prizes taken on
June 23, 1865, Waddell read accounts in the newspapers of the
April proceedings between Grant and Lee relating to the
surrender. The paper also informed him that the seat of the
Confederate government had been moved from Richmond to Danville
and President Davis had issued the proclamation giving assurance
of the continuation of the struggle by the South. With this
knowledge he had no right to suppose that the war had ended and
so he continued his operations until August 2. On November 6, 1
865, he and his crew surrendered to the English government. Not
until 1875 did Waddell leave England and return to this country.
After re-establishing his home in Annapolis, the white-haired,
limping sailor was once more called to the service of his nation.
The governor of Maryland appointed him in the 1880s to take
charge of the war that the state was waging against the
Chesapeake Bay oyster pirates. After several days, Waddell's
small force had completely wiped out the pirates. Upon his death
in Annapolis, the legislature recessed its session for the day of
his funeral. He died in 1886 and is buried in St. Anne's Cemetery
in Annapolis, Maryland. A large marble monument records a brief
biography, a carved navy fouled anchor and the Confederate Battle
Flag, which has a large star in the crossing.
The last of the
commerce-destroyers was the Sea King, or Shenandoah.
This vessel was a full-rigged ship with auxiliary steam power, of
seven hundred and ninety tons, built on the Clyde, and employed
in the East India trade. She was a very fast ship, a twenty-four
hours' run of three hundred and twenty miles being no uncommon
thing with her.
She cleared from London for Bombay October 8,1864, her Captain,
Corbett, having a power of sale from the owner to dispose of her
at any time within six months. She had on board a large supply of
coal and provisions; but she was not altered or equipped for war
purposes, and she carried no armament except two 12-pounders,
which had been on board when she was originally purchased.
On the same day, the steamer Laurel left Liverpool, having
cleared for Nassau, with several Confederate naval officers, and
a cargo of cases marked " machinery," but containing
guns with their carriages and equipment. Making her way to
Funchal, Madeira, she met the Shenandoah.
The two vessels then proceeded to Desertas, a barren island in
the neighborhood, where the Shenandoah received her armament and
stores, and was transferred by Corbett to Captain Waddell, of the
Confederate navy, her future commander. Waddell put her in
commission, under the name of the Shenandoah, and she started on
her cruise.
The plan of the cruise of the Shenandoah was based upon the
movements of the Pacific whaling fleet. A portion of this fleet
habitually cruised in the vicinity of the Caroline Islands for
sperm whales, going north in spring. It passed the Bonins and
along the coast of Japan, to the Sea of Ochotsk, where it cruised
for right whale. Thence it proceeded to Behring Strait and the
Arctic Ocean. On its return, it refreshed at the Sandwich
Islands, generally arriving there in October or November. The
plan adopted for the Shenandoah was to leave the meridian of the
Cape of Good Hope about the 1st of January for Australia,
arriving about the middle of February; thence after a short stay,
to proceed north through the Carolines; and after spending some
time in the route of the China-bound clippers, to enter the
Ochotsk, and make the round of Behring Strait. Upon her return,
she was to take up a position a little to the northward of the
Sandwich Islands, to intercept such of the flee' as might have
escaped.
This elaborate plan was devised by Commander Brooke at Richmond,
and was the direct result of that officer's experience in 1855,
when serving with the North Pacific Exploring Expedition. It was
sent by the Confederate Secretary of the Navy to Bullock, who had
recently obtained control of the Shenandoah, and who was
considering what disposition should be made of her. Bullock
immediately acted upon it.
As the commerce of the United States had been thinned out in the
cruising grounds of the Alabama and the other
commerce-destroyers, it was desirable to seek a new field of
operations; and the Richmond plan seemed to answer the purpose.
In pursuance of this plan, after cruising for three months in the
Atlantic, and taking several prizes, the Shenandoah proceeded to
Tristan d'Acunha, where the crews of the captured vessels were
landed.
From this point she went to Melbourne, where she remained nearly
a month. She was allowed to make extensive repairs in her
machinery, or at least, repairs that took a considerable time,
and she took on board three hundred tons of coal from a vessel
sent from Liverpool for the purpose. Having left Madeira short of
her complement, she enlisted forty-three men at Melbourne, who
were taken on board as the vessel was on the point of sailing.
Leaving Melbourne on the 18th of February, 1865, the Shenandoah
proceeded under sail to her proposed cruising ground in the
neighborhood of Behring Strait. Here she captured and burned a
large number of whalers. The capture and destruction of prizes
was continued until the 28th of June, when it came to an end, on
account of information received by Waddell, that the Confederate
Government had ceased to exist. Waddell then brought his vessel
to Liver pool, and surrendered her to the British Government.