Confederate privateer

Although the appeal was to profit by capturing merchant vessels and seizing their cargoes, the government was most interested in diverting the efforts of the Union Navy away from the blockade of Southern ports, and perhaps to encourage European intervention in the conflict.

In the early days of the war, enthusiasm for The Confederacy was high, and many ship owners responded to the appeal by applying for letters of marque.

Not all of those who gained authorization actually went to sea, but the numbers of privateers were high enough to be a major concern for US Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles.

The capture of the privateers Savannah and Jefferson Davis resulted in important court cases that did much to define the nature of the Civil War itself.

Following the 12 April 1861 bombardment of Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, President Abraham Lincoln called for raising 75,000 volunteers from state militia to put down the "rebellion".

In response, on the 17th of April, Confederate President Jefferson Davis called both for raising troops and for the issuance of letters of marque.

[3] Although the Federal government had only 42 warships in commission, and many of the best were laid up as unserviceable or distributed widely around the world, the Confederate States had almost nothing to offer in opposition.

With a mission to prey upon commercial vessels of the enemy, their pay would consist of the value of seized ships and cargoes, also known as prizes, less legal costs.

[6] When the war began, "legitimate" privateers could legally clear prizes in neutral ports, which were literally worldwide.

Privateers enjoyed limited legal status if they did not murder and if they behaved generally according to the laws of their sponsoring non-signatory government.

In 1856, the United States had declined to ratify the Declaration, or Treaty, of Paris in order to preserve the rights of a smaller fledgling nation against the larger maritime powers of the day.

As a non-signatory of the Treaty, Lincoln could have legally raised a call for privateers himself, but he had much to lose by engaging in the practice because it could have stirred the wrath of the greatest maritime powers on earth, Great Britain, France and Spain, whom he wished instead would join in condemnation of the Confederacy as an illegal government.

The British government, which was the primary sponsor of the Treaty of Paris, made clear that it would not tolerate the death penalty for privateering.

London therefore had reason to fear the prospect of British subjects aboard Southern privateers facing prosecution in American courts on trumped-up charges of piracy.

Great Britain, followed by other signatory nations, quickly revoked that right on May 13, 1861, with a Proclamation by Queen Victoria declaring neutral ports across the Empire to be off limits to prize clearing.

Of course it also meant that if he were to accept the British ruling, Abraham Lincoln had to acknowledge that a war existed and the Southern Confederacy was more than a few states in insurrection.

[10] The initial burst of ardor was great enough that the Confederate government could lay down some rather stringent conditions, such as requiring the deposit of large bonds, to insure that the practice did not degenerate into outright piracy.

A near exception was provided by the armored ram CSS Manassas, which started as a privateer at New Orleans by riverboat Captain John A. Stevenson.

[13] Privateering activity was strongest at the major ports of Charleston, Savannah, and New Orleans, and off the North Carolina coast where the trade of Northern cities with Caribbean and South American countries made use of the Gulf Stream to speed their northward voyages.

Ocean Eagle was registered in New England, so the capture was legal, but it is not clear that it aided the South, as she was carrying her cargo of lime to New Orleans.

Because of privateers, many Northern shipowners either dropped out of the Caribbean trade or transferred their registry to Great Britain to sail under the protection of the British flag.

It posed the first threat to national security because it had the potential to have instantly put more hostile ships at sea than the U.S. Navy could effectively suppress while also striving to enforce a blockade.

President Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles, ordered the Blockading Squadron to secure the primary privateering ports of the South, which was accomplished quickly by joint Army/Navy actions against Forts Hattaras and Clark at the inlet to the NC Sounds, Forts Beauregard and Walker at Port Royal Sound, and Ship Island near New Orleans—all by the end of 1861, while other military efforts, that is, purely Army efforts, stalled.

[19][20] Of these, Enchantress was recaptured, Alvarado was chased ashore and destroyed by a blockader, Windward, Mary E. Thompson, and Mary Goodell were released with prisoners, John Carver was burned at sea, and the black cook of S. J. Waring killed three sleeping members of the prize crew and sailed her to New York City, where he was received as a hero.

[25] According to the view of the Lincoln administration, the letters of marque issued by Jefferson Davis or the seceded states had no legal force, and the privateersmen who relied upon them did not represent a legitimate authority.

[29] With the examples of Petrel, Jefferson Davis, and Savannah before them, shipowners realized that privateering was no longer profitable, and the practice soon died out.

[32] The effort of the Confederate government turned from privateers to their regularly commissioned raiders, which had spectacularly more success in attacking the northern mercantile fleet.

Two attempts at privateering on the west coast, the J. M. Chapman Plot and that of the Salvador Pirates resulted in capture and trials for piracy.