Okla-homey
1/9/2007, 07:26 AM
January 9, 1861 Star of the West is fired upon
http://aycu39.webshots.com/image/9758/2005579025341420378_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005579025341420378)
Contemporary engraving (Harpers Weekly) of the cadet battery on Morris Island firing on the Star
A federal contract carrier, the SS Star of the West is fired upon as it tries to bring supplies to Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. This incident was the first time shots were exchanged between North and South and was thus the opening salvo of the Civil War.
http://img236.imageshack.us/img236/2699/star001622yc.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
SS Star of the West, a sidewheel merchant steamer as she approaches Ft Sumter at the mouth of Charleston Harbor.
When it seceded from the Union on December 20, 1860, South Carolina demanded the immediate withdrawal of the Federal garrison from all federal installations within the state, especially at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. President James Buchanan, a Virginian, refused to do so but was also careful not to make any provocative move. It wasn't so much that Buchanan was sympathetic to the South, he simply didn't want to deal with a shooting war since Lincoln had been elected the previous November and Buchanan only had a couple weeks left in office.
Inside the fort, Major Robert Anderson and his 80 soldiers needed re-supply. Anderson, a Kentuckian by birth, had moved into Sumter from the less defensible Ft Moultrie on Christmas Eve 1860.
http://aycu15.webshots.com/image/9774/2005565998755538931_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005565998755538931)
Major Robert Anderson. He did all honor demanded and ultimately surrendered Sumter in April 1861. He would return at war's end amid great fanfare in the spring of 1865 to raise the same flag he lowered over Sumter upon his surrender.
Unfortunately for Anderson and his men, while Sumter was safer from a land-borne attack by South Carolininians since it was on a island in the middle of the harbor, Sumter wasn't finished.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/5678/starftsumter1picture10zm.jpg
Sumter as it appeared in January of 1861
The huge five sided fort had not been completed, it lacked much of its intended armament, and most distressing for Anderson, the only food they had was the food his men had packed in when they rowed over two weeks earlier and that was running low. The Buchanan administration decided to dispatch a civilian ship, the Star of the West, instead of a military transport, in order to keep tensions from flaring.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/1250/stardoubleday15vl.jpg
Abner Doubleday, then a captain, was Robert Anderson's second in command. Note: this is the guy reputed to have invented baseball. He didn't.
The ship left New York on January 5. After it was en route, US Secretary of War Joseph Holt received a dispatch from Anderson that the secessionists were building gun emplacements overlooking the main shipping channel into Charleston Harbor. It had also become apparent that the South Carolina forces in Charleston knew the Star was enroute and why she was on her way -- they had agents in New York who had telegraphed the news. Holt realized that the ship was in great danger and that a war might erupt. He tried in vain to recall Star of the West.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/2997/star11784hx.jpg
In the morning on January 9, Star of the West Captain John McGowan steered the ship into the channel near the fort. He had run up a large American flag in order, he hoped, to discourage attack. Two cannon shots roared from a South Carolina battery on Morris Island.
Those shots came from a section of artillery led by 19 year old gunner George E. Haynsworth, a cadet at The Citadel in Charleston. More shots were fired from the cadet battery, and the ship suffered a hit. Anderson watched from Sumter but did not respond in support of the ship. McGowan came about and headed back to sea. No one was hurt.
The standoff at Fort Sumter continued until the exasperated Confederates attacked about four months later in April 1861.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/3964/starfortsumter5picture10ud.jpg
Sumter as it appeared at war's end in 1865. Pounded into rubble.
The Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina is one of only two state public military colleges at which the entire undergraduate student body comprises the Corps of Cadets. The school, chartered in 1842, was originally begun in order to provide a college education to low and middle income young men in exchange for their assistance in guarding the state of South Carolina's arsenal.
The concept had been bouncing around for a several years since the Denmark Vesey slave revolt. In 1822, Vesey began organizing the black community in and around Charleston to revolt. Vesey, a free black man, developed a very sophisticated scheme to carry out his plan. The conspiracy included over 9,000 slaves and free blacks in Charleston and on the neighboring plantations.
The revolt, which was scheduled to occur on July 14, 1822, was betrayed before it could be put into effect. As rumors of the plot spread, Charleston was thrown into a panic. Leaders of the plot were rounded up. Vesey and 46 other were condemned, and even four whites were implicated in the revolt. On June 23, Vesey was hanged for plotting to overthrow slavery... and kill a lot of white folks in the process.
For the record, I happen to believe all Americans should know about Denmark Vesey because he was a brave American who wanted to free his people from a horrid fate the only way he could...but I digress.
The August 1831 slave revolt led by Nat Turner in Virginia, in which 14 whites were murdered added to the fears of slaveholders.
Given that black folks outnumbered whites in Low Country SC, and thus only lacked a leader with a workable plan to effect their own liberation, the SC legislature acted to establish The Citadel to guard its weapons, while educating a cadre of young men and giving them military instruction in order to defend their fellow South Carolinians from "servile insurrection." Thus, in one way, The Citadel is "the House that Denmark Vesey built."
During the ensuing Civil War, and quite unlike that "pretend" military college in College Station which "yells," The Citadel's cadet battalion fought as a unit in eight separate engagements with enemy forces. The cadet battalion's most notable scrap was probably in Virginia in 1864, at Trevilian Station, under CS Gen. Wade Hampton.
http://aycu27.webshots.com/image/7866/2005885340896635803_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005885340896635803)
Citadel cadet battalion charge at Trevilian Station VA - near Petersburg.
http://aycu20.webshots.com/image/9179/2003368512087022624_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2003368512087022624)
After the Civil War, the Federal occupiers of Charleston shuttered the place in 1865 and it didn't reopen for almost ten years.
Today, with an undergraduate enrollment of approximately 2000 cadets, D-1AA The Citadel still exists. Big southern D-1 football programs like to schedule the school to pad their schedule. In the last three seasons, they've been fodder for Auburn, Ole Miss, Florida State and aTm.
http://aycu15.webshots.com/image/9774/2005539029176388599_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005539029176388599)
Author Pat Conroy (a famous alum) and LTC Thomas N. Courvoisie (A/K/A "The Boo") photographed shortly before Courvoisie's death in 2006.
That's okay though, located in historic Charleston, S.C., The Citadel offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in the humanities, business, math, science, engineering and education. The Citadel's reputation for academic excellence is reinforced by annual rankings from U.S. News & World Report that place The Citadel as number two in public colleges granting master's degrees in the South. The engineering school is nationally ranked at number 27.
http://img236.imageshack.us/img236/3641/citadelsealblue3rq.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
The Citadel ranks No. 1 nationally in their peer group of public colleges in the percentage of students who graduate in four years. The Citadel's top ranking comes from the U.S. Department of Education's comparison of all public colleges whose entering students have average SAT scores between 1000 and 1200. The Citadel's four-year graduation rate is 62.3 percent. The national average four-year graduation rate is 29 percent. To be honest, that's mostly because no one in their right mind would want to spend an extra year marching around and living in the barracks with a stinky roommate while having to leave one's room and walk down to the latrine to take a leak.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/3778/insane7zo4yd.jpg
http://aycu39.webshots.com/image/9758/2005579025341420378_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005579025341420378)
Contemporary engraving (Harpers Weekly) of the cadet battery on Morris Island firing on the Star
A federal contract carrier, the SS Star of the West is fired upon as it tries to bring supplies to Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. This incident was the first time shots were exchanged between North and South and was thus the opening salvo of the Civil War.
http://img236.imageshack.us/img236/2699/star001622yc.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
SS Star of the West, a sidewheel merchant steamer as she approaches Ft Sumter at the mouth of Charleston Harbor.
When it seceded from the Union on December 20, 1860, South Carolina demanded the immediate withdrawal of the Federal garrison from all federal installations within the state, especially at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. President James Buchanan, a Virginian, refused to do so but was also careful not to make any provocative move. It wasn't so much that Buchanan was sympathetic to the South, he simply didn't want to deal with a shooting war since Lincoln had been elected the previous November and Buchanan only had a couple weeks left in office.
Inside the fort, Major Robert Anderson and his 80 soldiers needed re-supply. Anderson, a Kentuckian by birth, had moved into Sumter from the less defensible Ft Moultrie on Christmas Eve 1860.
http://aycu15.webshots.com/image/9774/2005565998755538931_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005565998755538931)
Major Robert Anderson. He did all honor demanded and ultimately surrendered Sumter in April 1861. He would return at war's end amid great fanfare in the spring of 1865 to raise the same flag he lowered over Sumter upon his surrender.
Unfortunately for Anderson and his men, while Sumter was safer from a land-borne attack by South Carolininians since it was on a island in the middle of the harbor, Sumter wasn't finished.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/5678/starftsumter1picture10zm.jpg
Sumter as it appeared in January of 1861
The huge five sided fort had not been completed, it lacked much of its intended armament, and most distressing for Anderson, the only food they had was the food his men had packed in when they rowed over two weeks earlier and that was running low. The Buchanan administration decided to dispatch a civilian ship, the Star of the West, instead of a military transport, in order to keep tensions from flaring.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/1250/stardoubleday15vl.jpg
Abner Doubleday, then a captain, was Robert Anderson's second in command. Note: this is the guy reputed to have invented baseball. He didn't.
The ship left New York on January 5. After it was en route, US Secretary of War Joseph Holt received a dispatch from Anderson that the secessionists were building gun emplacements overlooking the main shipping channel into Charleston Harbor. It had also become apparent that the South Carolina forces in Charleston knew the Star was enroute and why she was on her way -- they had agents in New York who had telegraphed the news. Holt realized that the ship was in great danger and that a war might erupt. He tried in vain to recall Star of the West.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/2997/star11784hx.jpg
In the morning on January 9, Star of the West Captain John McGowan steered the ship into the channel near the fort. He had run up a large American flag in order, he hoped, to discourage attack. Two cannon shots roared from a South Carolina battery on Morris Island.
Those shots came from a section of artillery led by 19 year old gunner George E. Haynsworth, a cadet at The Citadel in Charleston. More shots were fired from the cadet battery, and the ship suffered a hit. Anderson watched from Sumter but did not respond in support of the ship. McGowan came about and headed back to sea. No one was hurt.
The standoff at Fort Sumter continued until the exasperated Confederates attacked about four months later in April 1861.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/3964/starfortsumter5picture10ud.jpg
Sumter as it appeared at war's end in 1865. Pounded into rubble.
The Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina is one of only two state public military colleges at which the entire undergraduate student body comprises the Corps of Cadets. The school, chartered in 1842, was originally begun in order to provide a college education to low and middle income young men in exchange for their assistance in guarding the state of South Carolina's arsenal.
The concept had been bouncing around for a several years since the Denmark Vesey slave revolt. In 1822, Vesey began organizing the black community in and around Charleston to revolt. Vesey, a free black man, developed a very sophisticated scheme to carry out his plan. The conspiracy included over 9,000 slaves and free blacks in Charleston and on the neighboring plantations.
The revolt, which was scheduled to occur on July 14, 1822, was betrayed before it could be put into effect. As rumors of the plot spread, Charleston was thrown into a panic. Leaders of the plot were rounded up. Vesey and 46 other were condemned, and even four whites were implicated in the revolt. On June 23, Vesey was hanged for plotting to overthrow slavery... and kill a lot of white folks in the process.
For the record, I happen to believe all Americans should know about Denmark Vesey because he was a brave American who wanted to free his people from a horrid fate the only way he could...but I digress.
The August 1831 slave revolt led by Nat Turner in Virginia, in which 14 whites were murdered added to the fears of slaveholders.
Given that black folks outnumbered whites in Low Country SC, and thus only lacked a leader with a workable plan to effect their own liberation, the SC legislature acted to establish The Citadel to guard its weapons, while educating a cadre of young men and giving them military instruction in order to defend their fellow South Carolinians from "servile insurrection." Thus, in one way, The Citadel is "the House that Denmark Vesey built."
During the ensuing Civil War, and quite unlike that "pretend" military college in College Station which "yells," The Citadel's cadet battalion fought as a unit in eight separate engagements with enemy forces. The cadet battalion's most notable scrap was probably in Virginia in 1864, at Trevilian Station, under CS Gen. Wade Hampton.
http://aycu27.webshots.com/image/7866/2005885340896635803_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005885340896635803)
Citadel cadet battalion charge at Trevilian Station VA - near Petersburg.
http://aycu20.webshots.com/image/9179/2003368512087022624_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2003368512087022624)
After the Civil War, the Federal occupiers of Charleston shuttered the place in 1865 and it didn't reopen for almost ten years.
Today, with an undergraduate enrollment of approximately 2000 cadets, D-1AA The Citadel still exists. Big southern D-1 football programs like to schedule the school to pad their schedule. In the last three seasons, they've been fodder for Auburn, Ole Miss, Florida State and aTm.
http://aycu15.webshots.com/image/9774/2005539029176388599_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2005539029176388599)
Author Pat Conroy (a famous alum) and LTC Thomas N. Courvoisie (A/K/A "The Boo") photographed shortly before Courvoisie's death in 2006.
That's okay though, located in historic Charleston, S.C., The Citadel offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in the humanities, business, math, science, engineering and education. The Citadel's reputation for academic excellence is reinforced by annual rankings from U.S. News & World Report that place The Citadel as number two in public colleges granting master's degrees in the South. The engineering school is nationally ranked at number 27.
http://img236.imageshack.us/img236/3641/citadelsealblue3rq.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
The Citadel ranks No. 1 nationally in their peer group of public colleges in the percentage of students who graduate in four years. The Citadel's top ranking comes from the U.S. Department of Education's comparison of all public colleges whose entering students have average SAT scores between 1000 and 1200. The Citadel's four-year graduation rate is 62.3 percent. The national average four-year graduation rate is 29 percent. To be honest, that's mostly because no one in their right mind would want to spend an extra year marching around and living in the barracks with a stinky roommate while having to leave one's room and walk down to the latrine to take a leak.
http://img476.imageshack.us/img476/3778/insane7zo4yd.jpg