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| In
light of the North's vast naval superiority, one of the most remarkable feats
of the American Civil War was the Texans tenacious defense of their Gulf Coast
ports. From Sabine Pass
in the north to Brownsville
in the south, the Texans bent now and then but they refused to break. At the beginning
of the war, Texas Governor Edward Clark divided Texas into 32 militia districts
to better coordinate the defense of the state. Each district was commanded by
a brigadier general. Brigadier General Earl Van Dorn served as the commander of
the district along the Texas Gulf
Coast from April to September 1861. General Van Dorn organized local defense
companies, called for the use of slave labor to build coastal fortifications and
did his best to procure heavy cannons to provide protection for the Gulf Coast
ports. |
| Confederate
General Earl Van Dorn
Wikimedia
Commons |
General Van Dorn
was replaced by Brigadier Paul Octave Hebert who concluded that without sufficient
heavy ordinance the Texans would be unable to prevent a Union landing along the
coast. Rather than defending the coast, General Hebert felt that it was necessary
to fall back and fight the enemy in the interior of the state. Therefore, he ordered
the removal of most of the heavy artillery from Galveston Island, which in his
opinion was indefensible. However, this strategy only served to entice the Union
Navy into action. In November 1861, Federal naval forces initiated a series of
harassing actions. Port
Lavaca, Indianola
and Aransas Pass were
shelled, and the naval blockade was tightened along the entire Texas coast. In
April, a small Union flotilla attempted to capture Corpus
Christi but was repulsed. A brief naval action also occurred at Sabine
Pass in September 1862, but the principal Federal effort was aimed at the
largest and most active seaport on the Texas coast, Galveston Island. |
| Confederate
General Paul Octave Hebert
Wikimedia
Commons |
| The United States
Navy began the blockade of Galveston Harbor in July 1861, but no further action
was taken by the Federals until October 1862, nearly fourteen months later. Early
in the morning of October 4, William B. Renshaw, commanding officer of the Union
blockade, ordered the U.S.S. Harriet Lane to steam into the harbor under
a flag of truce. He intended to warn Galveston
authorities that the ships of the Union blockade would attack in one hour if the
town refused to surrender, but when Confederate commander Colonel Joseph Cook
ignored the demand, the Harriet Lane weighed anchor and returned to the
fleet. |
USS
Harriet Lane
Wikimedia
Commons |
Commander Renshaw
then led four Union gunboats into the harbor with a mortar boat in tow and began
a heavy bombardment of the Confederate gun positions. When the Confederate guns
fell silent, Renshaw demanded an unconditional surrender or he would move his
bombardment to the town. The Confederates reluctantly agreed to evacuate the city,
taking all their weapons, ammunition and supplies. The Union Navy now controlled
the most important harbor in Texas, but the town
was not fully occupied until December 25 when 264 men of the Forty-second Massachusetts
Infantry arrived in Galveston
to occupy Kuhn’s Wharf and set up regular patrols.
General Hebert seemed
to be more interested in enforcing martial law than defending the Texas Coast,
and after the fall of Galveston,
he was replaced by a new district commander, General John Bankhead Magruder. General
Magruder, a Virginian with an aggressive reputation, immediately made plans for
the recapture of Galveston.
Two Buffalo Bayou steamboats, the Neptune and the Bayou City were
converted into Confederate “cottonclads” by stacking bales of cotton
on their gunwales and decks to form breastworks. The converted ships commanded
by Captain Leon Smith were then manned by 300 of General Henry Hopkins Sibley’s
veterans freshly returned from their trials in New Mexico, and led by Colonel
Thomas Green. Two smaller ships packed with additional Confederate riflemen sailed
in support of the larger vessels.
|
| Confederate
General John Bankhead Magruder
Wikimedia
Commons |
| Confederate
Colonel Thomas Green
Wikimedia
Commons |
General Magruder’s
land forces consisted of both infantry and cavalry and were supported by twenty
light and heavy cannons. He concentrated his troops at Virginia Point near the
railroad bridge that connected the mainland to Galveston Island and assumed personal
command on December 29. The operation was planned as a joint assault by land and
sea and began at 1:00 AM on New Years Day. 1863, when General Magruder led his
forces across the bridge and prepared them for a dawn assault on the city. The
assault was timed to coincide with an attack on the Union ships in the harbor
by the Confederate cottonclads. At dawn, the Confederate artillery opened fire
on the Federal ships and the Union troop positions along the waterfront, and Magruder
launched a ground assault that drove the small Federal garrison to the extreme
north end of the island.
Meanwhile, the cottonclads Neptune and
Bayou City steamed into the harbor and steered a course for the Federal
ships that lay at anchor. The Neptune was immediately struck by a shell
from the Harriet Lane, and the damaged ship veered into shallow water and
sank. Undeterred, the Bayou City moved in close alongside the Harriet
Lane and her makeshift marines raked the deck of the Federal ship with a deadly
hail of rifle fire. The Harriet Lane struck her colors after a short but
vicious firefight in which all of her officers were either killed or wounded.
In the confusion, the U.S.S Westfield, flagship of the Union flotilla,
ran aground on Pelican Spit. Commander Renshaw was killed in a premature explosion
when the crew attempted to scuttle the flagship. Disheartened by the rout of the
navy, the Federal garrison on the island surrendered. |
 |
The
capture of the Harriet Lane by the Bayou City
Wikimedia
Commons |
| Although defeated
at Galveston Island, the Union blockade fleet continued to maintain command of
the sea along the Gulf coast and fought several skirmishes near Sabine
Pass, where the Sabine and Neches Rivers flowed into the Gulf of Mexico. Based
on the results of the fighting, the Union commanders in the Gulf, Admiral David
Farragut and General Nathaniel Banks, conceived of a major campaign for the fall
of 1863. The fleet would seize Sabine
Pass and land 5000 troops who would then march overland and capture Beaumont,
Houston and Galveston.
General William B. Franklin was placed in overall command of the operation. The
General planned to send his gunboats up the narrow channel at Sabine
Pass, knock out the guns at the small Confederate fort that guarded the waterway
and land his troops on the shores of Sabine Lake. |
| Union
General William Buel Franklin
Wikimedia
Commons |
Map of the Battle of Sabine Pass
Wikimedia
Commons |
| The Confederate earthwork
fortification guarding Sabine
Pass from the Union gunboats was known locally as Fort Griffin. Since neither
of the senior commanders of Fort Griffin were present for the battle, the forty-two
man garrison was commanded by a junior lieutenant, Richard
“Dick” Dowling. Fort Griffin’s armaments consisted of two old 24-pounder smoothbores,
two 32-pounders and two howitzers, but Lieutenant Dowling had trained his artillerymen
well. In preparation for an attack, Dowling
had ranged his guns to the narrowest part of the channel and trained his gunners
on makeshift targets. The Confederates were ready when the Union gunboats streamed
into the channel on the morning of September 8, 1863. |
|
Confederate Lieutenant Richard Dowling
Wikimedia
Commons |
| Lieutenant Dowling
remained cool, ordering his battery to hold their fire until the Union gunboats
steamed within range. The Federals opened fire first, but the intense shelling
did not prevent the Confederate gunners from delivering accurate return fire.
Lieutenant Dowling’s guns addressed the Union gunboats one at a time as they entered
the targeted area and the results were spectacular. The lead gunboat, U.S.S.
Sachem, was hit in the steam drum and slowly fell out of action. Immediately
turning their attention to the U.S.S. Clifton, the Confederate gunners
cut her tiller rope with their accurate cannon fire, and the gunboat drifted helplessly
until she ran aground under the guns of Dowling’s battery. With no choice, the
captain of the Clifton raised a white flag. The remainder of the Union
flotilla fled the Pass toward open water and eventually sailed back to New Orleans.
|
Picture
of the Battle of Sabine Pass
Wikimedia
Commons |
Lieutenant Dowling’s
battery had won the day against overwhelming odds. The Federals lost two ships,
100 dead and wounded and 350 prisoners. The Confederates remained essentially
untouched. In only a few minutes, the artillerymen under Dowling
had fought the most glorious and definitive small unit action of the war. The
Federals never again attempted to force their way through Sabine Pass. After the
ignominious defeat, many people in the North questioned the efficiency of their
navy, and the U.S. dollar lost five percent of its value against the gold standard.
By personal order of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, a special decoration
for bravery was struck for the heroic defenders of Fort Griffin. |
 |
However, in spite
of the Confederate victory at Sabine
Pass, the Union forces at sea were much too formidable to be completely denied.
Since the beginning of the war, textile manufacturers in New England had been
pressuring President Lincoln to seize the Texas Gulf coast and restore the flow
of cotton to the North, but the President refused to act until the Union captured
Vicksburg, Mississippi. The city of Vicksburg served as the key link in the Confederate
supply line between Texas and the eastern states.
In July, 1863, Vicksburg surrendered, and now that the Trans-Mississippi region
was cut off from the rest of the Confederacy, taking possession of the Texas cotton
fields seemed like the next logical step. Lincoln was also concerned about interference
from the French who had recently intervened in Mexico.
In furtherance
of Lincoln’s plans, General Banks landed 6,000 troops on Brazos Island near the
mouth of the Rio Grande in November 1863. After storming the island, the troops
marched inland and captured Brownsville,
temporarily cutting off the vital cotton trade
between Texas and Mexico. The retreating Confederates set fire to the town, and
the looting and violence continued for several days. After occupying Brownsville,
General Banks split his forces, sending one column up the Rio Grande River to
capture Rio Grande
City and the other column north along the coast to capture Corpus
Christi, Aransas Pass
and the Matagorda Peninsula. By the end of 1863, Sabine
Pass and Galveston
were the only ports on the Texas coast controlled by the Confederacy. |
|
Union General Nathaniel Banks
Wikimedia
Commons |
Fortunately for Texas,
the temporary loss of the coastal region had little adverse effect on the course
of the war. The ports along the Gulf Coast were far from the population centers
in east and central Texas, and even if they had been in Confederate hands the
Union blockade would have prevented them from shipping or receiving any goods.
However, Union control of the ports did lessen the possibility of cooperation
between the Confederacy and the French that the South hoped for. General Magruder
called for additional soldiers to drive the Yankees out of Southern Texas, but
as the threat of French intervention slowly waned, many of General Banks’ troops
were transferred to Louisiana where a major offensive was planned for the spring
of 1864.
Eventually every Federal garrison in south Texas was transferred
except the one occupying Brownsville.
The city of Brownsville
was the key to the southern border of Texas and its possession enabled the Union
to disrupt the vital cotton trade between Texas
and Mexico. However, with the withdrawal of the majority of Federal troops, John
“Rip” Ford’s Cavalry of the West soon recaptured most of the occupied territory.
In the summer of 1864, Ford reoccupied Brownsville
and once again opened the cotton trade with
Mexico. By the end of the war, the only land on the lower Texas coast that remained
in Union hands was Brazos Island.
© Jeffery
Robenalt
"A Glimpse of Texas
Past"
April 2, 2013 Column
jeffrobenalt@yahoo.com
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References
for "War on the Texas Gulf Coast" |
| Ashcraft, Allen
Coleman, Texas, 1860-1866: The Lone Star State and the Civil War (Ph.D. dissertation,
Columbia University, 1960.) Barr,
Alwyn, “Sabine Pass, September 1863,” Texas Military History 2 (February 1962).
Barr, Alwyn,
“Battle of Galveston,” Handbook of Texas Online (http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/geg01),
Accessed November 29, 2012.Buenger,
Walter L., Secession and the Union in Texas (Austin: University of Texas
Press, 1984)Cumberland,
Charles C., “The Confederate Loss and Recapture of Galveston, 1862-1863,” Southwestern
Historical Quarterly 51 (October 1947). Muir,
Andrew Forrest, “Dick Dowling and the Battle of Sabine Pass,” Civil War History
4 (December 1958). Tolbert,
Frank X., Dick Dowling at Sabine Pass (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1962). |
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