February 23 In Civil War History

Jim Klag

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On this day in Civil War history
Compiled by Mitchell Werksman and Jim Klag

February 23, 1818 - Jeremy F Gilmer, Maj Gen/Chief Engineer Confederate War Dept. is born in Guilford County, NC.

February 23, 1824 - Lewis Cass Hunt, American Brigadier General (Union Army), born in Brown County Wisconsin (d. 1886)

February 23, 1838 - Gilbert Moxley Sorrel, Brigadier General (Confederate Army), born in Savannah, GA. (d. 1901)

February 23, 1861 - President-elect Abraham Lincoln arrives in the nation's capital, Washington, DC.

February 23, 1861 - Texas citizens ratify the actions of the secessionist convention, voting to secede, 34,794 to 11,235.

February 23, 1862 - Ulysses S. Grant orders William Nelson to advance on Nashville, Tennessee.

February 23, 1862 - Fayetteville, AR, is occupied by the Union forces, under Brig. Gen. Samuel R. Curtis, USA, and Brig. Gen. A. Asboth, USA.

February 23, 1862 - The Dept. of the Gulf is constituted, under the command of Maj. Gen. Benjamin Franklin Butler, USA, FL, AL.

February 23, 1862 - Brig. Gen. John Pope, USA, assumes the command of the Army of Mississippi, assembling at Commerce, MO.

February 23, 1862 - Federal reconnaissance from Greenville, MO, and skirmish. (Feb 23-25)

February 23, 1862 - Federal reconnaissance to Pea Ridge Prairie, MO, and skirmish. (Feb 23-24)

Federal reconnaissance on the Bull River and Schooner Channel, SC.

February 23, 1862 - Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston, CS A, assumes the immediate command of the Central Army, TN.

February 23, 1862 - Nashville, TN, is evacuated by the Confederates under Brig. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, CSA, and occupied by the Federal forces under Brig. Gen. Don Carlos Buell, USA. (Feb 23-25)

February 23, 1863 - Affair at Athens, KY.

February 23, 1863 - Engagement of the US Steamers, Dakota and the Monticello, at Fort Caswell, NC.

February 23, 1863 - Brig. Gens. Andrew A. Humphreys and Adolph von Steinwehr, USA, are temporarily and respectively commanding the 5th and the 11th US Army Corps, the Army of the Potomac, VA.

February 23, 1863 - Former US Secretary of War and Governor of Pennsylvania, Simon Cameron, resigns his post as Minister to Russia.

February 23, 1864 - William Brimage Bate, C.S.A., is appointed Maj. Gen.

February 23, 1864 - Robert Charles Tyler, CSA, is appointed Brig. Gen.

February 23, 1864 - Skirmishes near Dalton and at Catoosa Station and Tunnel Hill, GA, between Gen. Joseph E. Johnston, CSA, and Maj. Gen. John McCauley Palmer, USA, under Maj. Gen. George Henry Thomas, USA, the Army of the Cumberland.

February 23, 1864 - Maj. Gen. John A. McClernand, USA, resumes the command of the 13th US Army Corps, LA.

February 23, 1864 - Federal scout from Springfield, MO, into Northern Arkansas, and skirmishes with guerrillas near Buffalo City (Mar 1), and at Bennett's Bayou (Mar 2). One guerrilla killed was an ex-Baptist minister. (Feb 23-Mar 9)

February 23, 1864 - Skirmish near New Albany, MS, the Meridian, MS, Expedition.

February 23, 1864 - In light of the Pomeroy Circular, President Lincoln meets with his Cabinet, without Secretary of Treasury, Salmon P. Chase.

February 23, 1865 - The siege of Petersburg is ongoing.

February 23, 1865 - Thomas Ewing, Jr., U.S.A., is appointed Maj. Gen.

February 23, 1865 - Federal expedition from Barrancas to Milton, FL, and skirmishes. (Feb 22-25)

February 23, 1865 - Bvt. Maj. Gen. Stephen G. Burbridge, USA, is relieved from the command of the District of Kentucky.

February 23, 1865 - Federal scouts from Salem and Licking, MO, to Spring River Mills, AR, with skirmishes, as the Yankees continue to punish the guerrillas. (Feb 23-Mar 2)

February 23, 1865 - Skirmish near Camden, SC, as Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman, USA, crosses the Catawba River and heads for North Carolina. Heavy rains will slow his progress over the next several days.

February 23, 1865 - Federal expedition from Yorktown aboard the gunboat, USS Mystic, to West Point, VA, where the Yankees are unsuccessful in their attempt to capture Col. Richardson of Gen. Robert E. Lee's staff who was home on 60 days leave; he was warned by a spy. The Yankees also missed breaking up a wedding where a band of Rebels were supposed to attend; they got the wrong date, as it is scheduled for Mar 2. The Yankees proceed to burn Richardson's home, and other barns, with thousands of pounds of bacon and about 25,000 bushels of corn and grain, before returning to Yorktown, VA. (Feb 23-24)

February 23, 1870 - Mississippi re-admitted to the United States.

February 23, 1870 - Mississippi granted representation in the U. S. Congress with the same provisions as Virginia.
 

5fish

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February 23, 1863 - Engagement of the US Steamers, Dakota and the Monticello, at Fort Caswell, NC.
They were chasing another steamer when they engaged the Fort..

https://books.google.com/books?id=b...#v=onepage&q=Daniel Braine ft caswell&f=false

Here is what Monticello was up to then... https://www.historycentral.com/navy/CWNavy/monticello.html

Monticello operated around Little River through 1863, taking British schooner Sun 30 March, and steamer Old Fellow 15 April. She joined the expedition to Murrell's Inlet 25 April, and shelled a schooner there 12 May with Conemaugh. In November she destroyed salt works near Little River Inlet.

Here is the Fort... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Caswell_Historic_District


Located in North Carolina on the Atlantic Coast, the Fort Caswell Historic District encompasses 2 sites, 43 buildings, and 23 structures; it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2013.[2] The fort itself was occupied by various branches of the U.S. armed forces for most of the period between 1836 and 1945 and is now a part of the North Carolina Baptist Assembly, a Christian retreat, owned and operated by the Baptist State Convention of NC. It is accessible by the public to a limited extent per the conditions set forth by the Assembly’s Director.

LUINK:

Fort Caswell
by Paul Branch, 2006

Fort Caswell, Marker: D-62. Image courtesy of NCMarkers, North Carolina Office of Archives & History.Fort Caswell, named after North Carolina's first governor and Revolutionary War hero Richard Caswell (1729-89), was a permanent masonry garrison built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on the eastern end of Oak Island in Brunswick County between 1826 and 1838. It guarded the mouth of the Cape Fear River as part of a national chain of forts for coastal defense of the United States known as the Third System. Designed by Brig. Gen. Simon Bernard, Fort Caswell was an irregular pentagon with a completely encircling outer wall, or covered way, and an inner main work that was loopholed for defense.

The fort was never fully armed, and until 1861 it was usually occupied only by army caretakers. Following South Carolina's secession from the Union, fears that the Federal government would send troops to occupy North Carolina's forts prompted local secessionist militia troops to seize Fort Caswell on 9 Jan. 1861. But North Carolina had not seceded, and so the fort was returned, only to be retaken on 16 April, after the Civil War began.

Now armed, the fort became one of the main Confederate defenses of the Cape Fear River. The Confederates strengthened it by constructing a massive earthwork defense around the fort and on top of the main work to accommodate 29 heavy guns. However, the fort was never directly attacked; its guns occasionally fired on Union warships in the ocean blockading the Cape Fear entrance. After Union forces captured Fort Fisher on the opposite side of the river on 15 Jan. 1865, retreating Confederate forces detonated gunpowder magazines in Fort Caswell on the morning of 17 January, literally blowing away the southeast face and shattering the west face. After the war, the fort reservation was returned to caretaker status.

In 1885 Secretary of War William C. Endicott's Fortifications Board selected Fort Caswell to receive modern defenses. The work continued from 1894 to 1904, significantly altering the original fortification. The army used the reservation until after World War I, when, in 1923, it was closed by the War Department and listed for sale as surplus property. In 1925 it was purchased by Florida developers. With the onset of World War II, the U.S. Navy bought the reservation in 1941. Sold to the Baptist State Convention
 
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