CONFEDERATE STATES SIGNAL CORPS.
The Confederate States Signal Corps frequently rendered some very efficient service to the blockade runners after they had succeeded in getting between the blockaders and the beach, where they were also in danger of the shore batteries until their character became known to the forts.
As the signal system developed, a detailed member was sent out with each ship, and so important did this service become that signal officers, as they were called, were occasionally applied for by owners or captains of steamers in the Clyde or at Liverpool before sailing for Bermuda or Nassau to engage in running the blockade.
The first attempt to communicate with the shore batteries was a failure, and consequently the service suffered some reproach for a while, but subsequent practice with intelligent, cool-headed men resulted in complete success, and some valuable ships, with still more valuable cargoes, were saved from capture or destruction by the intervention of the signal service, when, owing to the darkness and bad landfall, the captain and pilot were alike unable to recognize their geographical position.
To the late Mr. Frederick W. Gregory, of Crowells, N.C., belonged the honor of the first success as a signal operator in this service. Identified with the corps from the beginning of the blockade, and with the Cape Fear at Price's Creek Station, which was for a long time in his efficient charge, he brought to this new and novel duty an experience and efficiency equalled by few of his colleagues and surpassed by none. It was well said of him that he was always ready and never afraid, two elements of the almost unvarying success which attended the ships to which he was subsequently assigned. It was my good fortune to be intimately associated with Mr. Gregory for nearly two years, during which we had many ups and downs together as shipmates aboard and as companions ashore. He was one of the few young men engaged in blockade running who successfully resisted the evil influences and depraved associations with which we were continually surrounded. Unselfish and honorable in all his relations with his fellows, courageous as a lion in time of danger, he was an honor to his State and to the cause which he so worthily represented.
The following narrative related by him gives a more explicit account of the signal service than I could offer by description of its workings:
"Some time early in 1863, the Confederate Government purchased on the Clyde (I think) two steamers for the purpose of running the blockade. The first to arrive was the Giraffe. While in the Cape Fear, Captain Alexander, who had charge of the signal corps at Smithville, suggested the propriety of putting a signal officer aboard to facilitate the entrance of ships into the port at night by the use of two lights, a red and a white, covered with a shade in front of the globe to lift up and down, by which we could send messages as we did with the flag on land in the day and with the torch at night; the red light representing the wave to the right and the white light the wave to the left. After some consultation General Whiting ordered Captain Alexander to send up a signal officer to join the Giraffe, and Robert Herring was detailed for that purpose and sent to Wilmington, where the lights were prepared, and he went aboard. The Giraffe went out and returned successfully, but from some cause (I never understood why) Herring failed to attract the attention of the land force and sent no message ashore. In the meantime the other steamer, the Cornubia, arrived in port, and Captain Alexander having been ordered elsewhere, and Lieutenant Doggett having been sent down from Richmond to take charge of the signal corps, General Whiting ordered a signal officer for the Cornubia, and I was detailed and sent to Wilmington to prepare the lights and report on board.
"We cleared the bar successfully, with Captain Burroughs in command, and C.C. Morse as pilot, and had a good voyage to St. George, Bermuda, where we unloaded our cargo of cotton and reloaded with supplies for the Southern Army. On our return trip we made the land fifty or sixty miles above Fort Fisher and coasted down to the inlet, our intention being to get near the land inside the blockading fleet, which was obliged to keep off a certain distance on account of shoal water. As well as I remember, when within fifteen to twenty miles of Fort Fisher, Captain Burroughs sent for me to come on the bridge, and asked if I had my lights ready, and if I thought I could send a message ashore, Pilot Morse in the meantime telling me that he would let me know when we were opposite the signal station on the land, where a constant watch was kept all night for our signal. We had not gone far when Morse told me we were opposite the post. We were feeling our way very slowly in the dark. I was put down on the deck, with the gangways open, my lights facing the land and a screen behind, when I was ordered to call the station. The officers and sailors were highly interested in the movement and crowded around to watch the proceedings. I had called but a few times when I was answered from the shore with a torch. I turned to Captain Burroughs and told him I had the attention of the land forces, and asked what message he wished to send. He replied as follows: 'Colonel Lamb, steamer Cornubia. Protect me. Burroughs.' I got the O.K. for the message from shore, and saw the corps on land call up one station after the other, and transmit my message down to Fort Fisher, miles ahead of us, and afterwards learned that General Whiting was notified by telegraph of the arrival of the Cornubia before she crossed the bar that night; and when we arrived at the fort we found Colonel Lamb down on the point with his Whitworth guns ready to protect us if necessary. The success of this attempt gave an impetus to the signal corps, and from that time every steamer that arrived applied to the Government for a signal officer before leaving port."