THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 3, 1994 TAG: 9407020216
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 10 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Olde Towne Journal
SOURCE: Alan Flanders
LENGTH: Medium: 99 lines
``Once your ship is blown up, there's not much left to do but join the Army and continue to fight on land,'' says Jeff Johnston, a Civil War re-enactor.
Dressed in a Confederate Navy uniform that is a duplicate of those worn 132 years ago, the Portsmouth resident doesn't seem to have much time to lament his fate. Just the fact that he is sitting on a chest of gunpowder while working a brass screw into the center of a small barrel, plugged at both ends with hand-hewn pine cones, would be enough to get most people's attention.
That is exactly what Johnston and fellow Civil War re-enactor Jeff Cranford of Chesapeake were doing several weekends ago as a cool breeze from Newport News' Lake Maury played with the canvas awning over their encampment and makeshift work site.
To help shake the morning chill, Cranford worked over the campfire preparing a pot of coffee.
With a lake and thicket of woods as a backdrop, both men were in a perfect setting for a living lesson in history about a little known, but elite group of Confederate sailors who took on a strange, new identity after the CSS Virginia was blown up off Craney Island.
Fire from within their once-fearsome ironclad lighted their way inland during the predawn hours of May 11, 1862, for what would be a new assignment manning the batteries at Drewry's Bluff in the defense of Richmond.
However, it was the story about a select group of sailors from the Virginia that was converted into what became known as the ``Submarine Battery Service'' and stalled the Federal Navy with their torpedoes on the James that first attracted Johnston over a decade ago to join the James River Squadron re-enactors.
``Don't let the term `Submarine Battery Service' or `torpedo' mislead you,'' warns Johnston as he rolls one of several small barrels around a ground tarp and reaches for one of several authentic Civil War machinists tools laying about him. ``These were not the kind of torpedoes many people are familiar with from World War II movies. ``The Confederacy didn't have that kind of technology. Instead they took ordinary wooden casks like these, filled them with gunpowder, attached a fuse, which was then connected by wires to a battery and firing position on shore. They anchored them about five feet down in the channel and waited for an enemy ship to make contact.
``But don't get me wrong, they could be just as dangerous as a modern torpedo,'' he said.
``What we have here is Civil War-era mine warfare, and those who were assigned to work around this stuff were paid as electricians,'' Johnston said. ``Bet you didn't know that.''
Both men have spent considerable time and effort researching the entire process of setting up a torpedo battle station and collecting or making the replica tools and equipment that one would have found at Drewry's Bluff.
Johnston soon had several onlookers curious about the process of arming and setting Confederate torpedoes or mines.
``What we've got here are ordinary salt-pork casks, the kind you would have found in Gosport or in the stores of the CSS Virginia.
``Matthew Fontaine Maury and John Mercer Brooke had come to Portsmouth and experimented on the design right after the shipyard was captured.
``Our job is to now arm these casks and turn them into keg torpedoes by adding approximately 35 pounds of gunpowder. We then try to get the torpedo as water resistant as we can before we seed them in our plantation, the location where we will anchor them.
``At the same time, lookouts down river will signal when they see a Federal warship. Since we have already charged up the galvanic batteries, the fuses should be ready to trigger. Once the safety has been pulled out of the fuse, the rest of the work is to simply wait and hope the enemy ship comes in contact and listen for the explosion.''
When asked what could possibly go wrong to foul up the operation, both admitted that if they were spotted, U.S. Marines would be deployed either on the decks of the approaching ship or landed to pick off the electricians in the battery shed.
If indeed Federal troops could make a landing on the site, the electricians probably would be forced to withdraw, leaving their equipment behind.
But Johnston and Cranford are certain they can hold back the Federals with their mines and the guns above Drewry's Bluff that were manned by their shipmates.
``You have to remember,'' Johnston said, ``our job was to deter their advancement.''
Eventually, of course, Richmond did fall, but there is no doubt that the batteries along Drewry's Bluff that were comprised of many from the Virginia's crew proved to be an obstacle. The Confederate Submarine Battery made the advance of the Federal Navy a ponderous one at best.
History records that the Confederate Submarine Battery represented the beginning of a new chapter in naval warfare, a chapter that introduced a deadly weapon that mariners fear most of all to this day - the mine. ILLUSTRATION: Photos by ALAN FLANDERS
Jeff Cranford, left, and Jeff Johnston, Civil War re-enactors, show
how to arm a Confederate torpedo.
Sailor turned soldier Jeff Johnson warms up coffee at the campsite.
Sailor-turned-soldier Jeff Johnson warms up coffee at the campsite.
KEYWORDS: REENACTMENT CIVIL WAR by CNB