Thursday, 1 June 1865
A Federal expedition travels through Pocahontas and Pendleton Counties, West Virginia, and Highland County, Virginia, reportedly in search of horse thieves. The Yankees moved to Huttonsville, Gatewood's, Back Creek Valley, Galltown, Monterey, New Hampton, and the surrounding areas, without finding any horse thieves.
Skirmishing breaks out at Sweetwater Station, in the Nebraska Territory.
In his report regarding the surrender of Confederate forces, Major General Edward R. S. Canby, commanding the Military Division of West Mississippi, noted: "...during the whole period of my command in the Southwest, I was materially aided by the zealous and efficient cooperation of the naval forces of the West Gulf and Mississippi squadrons, and a more effective acknowledgement than mine is due to Admiral Farragut, Commodore Palmer, Admiral Thatcher, successive commanders of the West Gulf, and Admirals Porter and Lee, of the Mississippi Squadron, and to their subordinates in both squadrons."
Lieutenant Commander Nathaniel Green, in the U.S.S. Itasca, commanded the naval units in a combined Army-Navy movement to occupy Apalachicola, Florida. Brigadier General Alexander Asboth, commanding the expedition, commended Green highly for his "...nautical skill and efficiency, as well as his friendly willingness to aid..." which, the General reported, materially contributed to the successful execution of the mission.
The last official orders of the War Between the States sees a Navy expedition head up the Red River north of Shreveport to take possession of the C.S.S. Missouri and a small naval flotilla which includes a number of submarines. Warned of underwater activity in the area, the wary sailors arrive to find the Missouri and her crew waiting for capture, and the submarines all scuttled and their crews escaped.
Full report: Lieutenant William E. Fitzhugh, in the U.S.S. Ouachita, leads a naval expedition of seven gunboats up the Red River escorting 4,000 troops under Major General Francis J. Herron. These troops were moving into the trans-Mississippi theater to garrison the forts and posts surrendered by Confederate General Kirby Smith and to establish law and order in the region. At Alexandria, Louisiana, Fitzhugh met with Lieutenant Jonathan H. Carter, the senior Confederate naval officer in the trans-Mississippi department and received the surrender of all naval vessels, equipment, and personnel in that region. The most formidable vessel surrendered was the stern-wheel ironclad, C.S.S. Missouri, commanded by Lieutenant J. H. Carter. The ship had been built in Shreveport and late in March, when the river had risen sufficiently, had steamed down river to Alexandria. There Carter had written enthusiastically to General Simon B. Buckner: "I will...be pleased to welcome you on the deck of the Missouri, when we arrive at Grand Ecore...I hope to be a valuable [addition] to your forces defending the valley." The Missouri, however, never had this opportunity for battle, although she had the distinction of being the last Confederate ironclad to be surrendered in home waters.
Before burning the Abigail, the commander of the C.S.S. Shenandoah, Lieutenant James Iredell Waddell, obtained a stove from her for his cabin, one of the many items that had not been provided when the C.S.S. Shenandoah hastily left the Liverpool the previous Autumn. He needed it in the ensuing days as he navigated along the frozen shores of Siberia. "I continued as far as the Chi-jinskiki Bay, but found it so full of ice the steamer could not be entered. I then stood along the land of eastern Siberia as far as Tausk Bay, when she was forced away by the ice, and I left for Shantaski [Shantarski] Island, but I found ice in such quantities before we reached the 150º meridian of east longitude that she was forced to the southward finding ice in almost every direction and apparently closing on her."
"The situation caused anxiety of mind, and I solved the seamanship problem before us. The scene was cold, the mercury several degrees below zero, the ice varied in thickness from fifteen to thirty feet and, although not very firm, was sufficiently so to injure the Shenandoah if we were not very careful. I wanted to reach Shantarski Island (called by whalers Greer Island) for there is fishing there and in the bays southwest of it."
In this chill sea, the Shenandoah met severe gales. "The damage from these gales is much increased by the heavy ice which a vessel is likely to be driven on and wrecked. We encountered the first one of those gales to windward of twenty miles of floe ice, and if we had been lying to with the ice under our lea, the Shenandoah would probably have been lost with her entire crew."
"It became imperatively necessary to relieve the ship of her perilous situation. She was run a little distance from and along the floe until a passage was seen from aloft through it with open water beyond. Into this passage she was entered and in a short time she was lying to under close reefed sails with the floe to windward, and this was the solution of that seamanship problem alluded to a little time before, for our dreaded enemy was now become our best friend, the fury of the sea was expended on it and not against the Shenandoah. It was a breakwater for the ship."
"She laid perfectly easy, the water was as smooth as a pond, while the seas on the weather edge of the floe broke furiously, throwing sheets of water twenty feet high, to all appearances a fog bank."
"It was so far away we could only hear the hurrying of wind as it piped louder and carried in it a penetrating mist. The Shenandoah being relieved of the threatened danger, the next thought was to prevent her from going into the ice during the thick weather, which now came on in fine rain and sleet. The wind was bitter cold, turning the rain into ice and forming a crust everywhere. The braces, blocks, yards, sails, and all the running rigging was perfectly coated with ice from a half to two inches thick, so that it was impossible to use the braces and icicles of great length and size hung from every portion of the rigging."
"The gale had passed over, and it was calm, the clouds were exhausted, the rosy tints of morn opened upon a scene of enchantment, and when the sunlight burst on us, the flash and sparkle from truck to deck, from bowsprit to topsail awakened exclamations of enthusiastic delight over the fair ship."
"The disposition was evidently not to disturb, but leave to enjoyment the crystal mantle of the Shenandoah. Finally the crew was sent aloft with billets of wood to dislodge the ice and free the running rigging. The large icicles falling from aloft rendered the deck dangerous to move upon, and it soon became covered with clear, beautiful ice, which was removed to the tanks, casks, and every vessel capable of receiving it."
A Federal expedition travels through Pocahontas and Pendleton Counties, West Virginia, and Highland County, Virginia, reportedly in search of horse thieves. The Yankees moved to Huttonsville, Gatewood's, Back Creek Valley, Galltown, Monterey, New Hampton, and the surrounding areas, without finding any horse thieves.
Skirmishing breaks out at Sweetwater Station, in the Nebraska Territory.
In his report regarding the surrender of Confederate forces, Major General Edward R. S. Canby, commanding the Military Division of West Mississippi, noted: "...during the whole period of my command in the Southwest, I was materially aided by the zealous and efficient cooperation of the naval forces of the West Gulf and Mississippi squadrons, and a more effective acknowledgement than mine is due to Admiral Farragut, Commodore Palmer, Admiral Thatcher, successive commanders of the West Gulf, and Admirals Porter and Lee, of the Mississippi Squadron, and to their subordinates in both squadrons."
Lieutenant Commander Nathaniel Green, in the U.S.S. Itasca, commanded the naval units in a combined Army-Navy movement to occupy Apalachicola, Florida. Brigadier General Alexander Asboth, commanding the expedition, commended Green highly for his "...nautical skill and efficiency, as well as his friendly willingness to aid..." which, the General reported, materially contributed to the successful execution of the mission.
The last official orders of the War Between the States sees a Navy expedition head up the Red River north of Shreveport to take possession of the C.S.S. Missouri and a small naval flotilla which includes a number of submarines. Warned of underwater activity in the area, the wary sailors arrive to find the Missouri and her crew waiting for capture, and the submarines all scuttled and their crews escaped.
Full report: Lieutenant William E. Fitzhugh, in the U.S.S. Ouachita, leads a naval expedition of seven gunboats up the Red River escorting 4,000 troops under Major General Francis J. Herron. These troops were moving into the trans-Mississippi theater to garrison the forts and posts surrendered by Confederate General Kirby Smith and to establish law and order in the region. At Alexandria, Louisiana, Fitzhugh met with Lieutenant Jonathan H. Carter, the senior Confederate naval officer in the trans-Mississippi department and received the surrender of all naval vessels, equipment, and personnel in that region. The most formidable vessel surrendered was the stern-wheel ironclad, C.S.S. Missouri, commanded by Lieutenant J. H. Carter. The ship had been built in Shreveport and late in March, when the river had risen sufficiently, had steamed down river to Alexandria. There Carter had written enthusiastically to General Simon B. Buckner: "I will...be pleased to welcome you on the deck of the Missouri, when we arrive at Grand Ecore...I hope to be a valuable [addition] to your forces defending the valley." The Missouri, however, never had this opportunity for battle, although she had the distinction of being the last Confederate ironclad to be surrendered in home waters.
Before burning the Abigail, the commander of the C.S.S. Shenandoah, Lieutenant James Iredell Waddell, obtained a stove from her for his cabin, one of the many items that had not been provided when the C.S.S. Shenandoah hastily left the Liverpool the previous Autumn. He needed it in the ensuing days as he navigated along the frozen shores of Siberia. "I continued as far as the Chi-jinskiki Bay, but found it so full of ice the steamer could not be entered. I then stood along the land of eastern Siberia as far as Tausk Bay, when she was forced away by the ice, and I left for Shantaski [Shantarski] Island, but I found ice in such quantities before we reached the 150º meridian of east longitude that she was forced to the southward finding ice in almost every direction and apparently closing on her."
"The situation caused anxiety of mind, and I solved the seamanship problem before us. The scene was cold, the mercury several degrees below zero, the ice varied in thickness from fifteen to thirty feet and, although not very firm, was sufficiently so to injure the Shenandoah if we were not very careful. I wanted to reach Shantarski Island (called by whalers Greer Island) for there is fishing there and in the bays southwest of it."
In this chill sea, the Shenandoah met severe gales. "The damage from these gales is much increased by the heavy ice which a vessel is likely to be driven on and wrecked. We encountered the first one of those gales to windward of twenty miles of floe ice, and if we had been lying to with the ice under our lea, the Shenandoah would probably have been lost with her entire crew."
"It became imperatively necessary to relieve the ship of her perilous situation. She was run a little distance from and along the floe until a passage was seen from aloft through it with open water beyond. Into this passage she was entered and in a short time she was lying to under close reefed sails with the floe to windward, and this was the solution of that seamanship problem alluded to a little time before, for our dreaded enemy was now become our best friend, the fury of the sea was expended on it and not against the Shenandoah. It was a breakwater for the ship."
"She laid perfectly easy, the water was as smooth as a pond, while the seas on the weather edge of the floe broke furiously, throwing sheets of water twenty feet high, to all appearances a fog bank."
"It was so far away we could only hear the hurrying of wind as it piped louder and carried in it a penetrating mist. The Shenandoah being relieved of the threatened danger, the next thought was to prevent her from going into the ice during the thick weather, which now came on in fine rain and sleet. The wind was bitter cold, turning the rain into ice and forming a crust everywhere. The braces, blocks, yards, sails, and all the running rigging was perfectly coated with ice from a half to two inches thick, so that it was impossible to use the braces and icicles of great length and size hung from every portion of the rigging."
"The gale had passed over, and it was calm, the clouds were exhausted, the rosy tints of morn opened upon a scene of enchantment, and when the sunlight burst on us, the flash and sparkle from truck to deck, from bowsprit to topsail awakened exclamations of enthusiastic delight over the fair ship."
"The disposition was evidently not to disturb, but leave to enjoyment the crystal mantle of the Shenandoah. Finally the crew was sent aloft with billets of wood to dislodge the ice and free the running rigging. The large icicles falling from aloft rendered the deck dangerous to move upon, and it soon became covered with clear, beautiful ice, which was removed to the tanks, casks, and every vessel capable of receiving it."
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