V. C. J.
Raising the Cairo and Her Contents
2
The Cairo’s bow and casemate break the surface of the Yazoo for the first time in more than a century.
Courtesy, Vicksburg Post
For almost 100 years the Cairo lay quietly beneath the swift, muddy waters of the Yazoo River. Some of this mud, plus branches and even whole trees, clung to and eventually covered the sunken vessel until only the pilothouse felt the passing water. The survivors of the disaster died, and local residents forgot the location. They remembered the event, however, and in time began to connect it in their minds with the wreckage of a Confederate raft further upstream.
This was the situation in 1956 when Edwin C. Bearss set in motion the chain of events that rescued the Cairo and her contents for history. A thorough student of the Civil War, Bearss was then park historian at Vicksburg National Military Park, Miss. Because of his detailed knowledge of the area and its history, visitors from many parts of the country sought his aid and guidance in their explorations of little-known Civil War sites and their hunts for surviving artifacts. On one such artifact-hunting expedition north of Vicksburg, some local farmers told Bearss that if he were interested and would come back when the water in the Yazoo River was low, he could see, at the foot of Snyder’s Bluff, the remains of the Cairo, the first warship in history to be sunk by an electrically detonated “torpedo.” The wreckage they were talking about was not really the Cairo, and Bearss knew it. His study of contemporary documents and maps had told him that the ironclad, if she still existed, must be several miles downstream from the bluff.
But Bearss’ interest had been kindled, and he decided to take action. With Warren Grabau, a fellow Civil War buff, and Don Jacks, a Park Service maintenance man who had been born in the area and knew the river and all its moods, he set to work. Armed with their combined knowledge and a small pocket compass, they set off in a small boat one cold November morning in 1956 to find the lost ironclad and prove its identity once and for all. After a number of triangulated probes, their eyes carefully watching the compass needle to catch any deflection when it passed over the mass of iron below, the men pinpointed the wreck. It was just where their study of the historical evidence had convinced them it would be—30 feet from the Yazoo’s east bank about 3 miles below Snyder’s Bluff, near the site of Benson Blake’s lower plantation.
