The opening phase of what came to be called the Burnside Expedition, the Battle of Roanoke Island was an amphibious operation of the American Civil War, fought on February 7–8, 1862, in the North Carolina Sounds a short distance south of the Virginia border.

The attacking force consisted of a flotilla of gunboats of the Union Navy drawn from the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, commanded by Flag Officer Louis M. Goldsborough, a separate group of gunboats under Union Army control, and an army division led by Brig.

On the second day, February 8, the Union soldiers advanced but were stopped by an artillery battery and accompanying infantry in the center of the island.

Although the Confederates thought that their line was safely anchored in impenetrable swamps, they were flanked on both sides and their soldiers were driven back to refuge in the forts.

Northeastern North Carolina is dominated by its sounds; large but shallow bodies of brackish-to-salt water that lie between the mainland and the Outer Banks.

Through most of the first year of the Civil War, the Confederate forces retained control of the sounds, so that coastwise water-borne commerce of the eastern part of the state was unimpeded.

Hill set his soldiers to putting up earthworks across the center of the island, but he was called away to service in Virginia before they were completed.

Gen. Richard C. Gatlin, who commanded the Department of North Carolina, while Wise was under Maj. Gen. Benjamin Huger, who was in charge of the defenses of Norfolk.

Seven gunboats, mounting a total of only eight guns, formed the Mosquito Fleet, commanded by Flag Officer William F. Lynch.

He gave vent to his feelings after the battle: Captain Lynch was energetic, zealous, and active, but he gave too much consequence entirely to his fleet of gunboats, which hindered transportation of piles, lumber, forage, supplies of all kinds, and of troops, by taking away the steam-tugs and converting them into perfectly imbecile gunboats.

A short time after Hatteras Island was captured for the Union, Burnside began to promote the idea of a Coast Division, to be composed of fishermen, dockworkers, and other watermen from the northeastern states, and used to attack coastal areas.

Although Burnside had initially intended to operate in Chesapeake Bay, in the hands of McClellan and the War Department his ideas were soon transformed into a planned assault on the North Carolina interior coast, beginning with Roanoke Island.

An unspoken reason for the change of target was the mistaken belief that pro-Union sentiment was being suppressed in North Carolina, and an invasion would allow them to express their true loyalties.

As recruiting progressed, Burnside organized the Coast Division into three brigades, led by three friends from his Military Academy days.

[14] Although the Union Navy would provide most of the gunnery that would be needed to suppress the Rebel batteries, Burnside decided to have some gunboats under Army control.

The Navy had no vessels sturdy enough to go to sea and at the same time draw little enough water to be able to pass through the shallow inlet, thought to be about 8 feet (2.4 m).

He chose this vessel because he considered her to be the least seaworthy ship in his command, and by showing his troops that he was willing to share their misery, he earned their devotion.

Three vessels in the armada were not so lucky: City of New York, laden with ordnance and supplies; Pocahontas, carrying horses; and Army gunboat Zouave were all lost, although all persons aboard were rescued.

Others were too deep even to be kedged in; the men or materials they carried had to be brought ashore on Hatteras Island, and the ships sent back.

She returned to Annapolis with the majority of the regiment, the 53rd New York, and only a detachment of the command was active in the Battle of Roanoke Island.

The major change was negative: on February 1 Wise came down with what he called "pleurisy, with high fever and spitting of blood, threatening pneumonia."

Although he continued to issue orders, effective command on Roanoke Island fell to Col. H. M. Shaw of the 8th North Carolina Infantry.

The fleet got under way early the morning after they had assembled in the sound (February 5), and by nightfall were near the southern end of Roanoke Island, where they anchored.

They first fired a few shells inland at Ashby Harbor, the intended landing place, and determined that the defenders had no batteries there.

[27] The Federal soldiers moved out promptly on the morning of February 8, advancing north on the only road on the island.

[28] The leading elements of the First Brigade spread out to match their opponents' configuration, and for two hours the combatants fired at each other through blinding clouds of smoke.

The Burnside Expedition ended only in July, when its leader was called to Virginia to take part in the Richmond campaign.

Based in New Bern, James supervised the Trent River contraband camp there, but decided to make Roanoke Island a self-sustaining colony.

The Freedmen's Colony of Roanoke Island was an important model that lasted four years; it had a sawmill, established a fisheries, and by 1864 it had 2200 residents.

It was overcrowded when residents reached 3900 at its peak, in part because poor soil on the island limited productivity of agriculture.