Cape Hatteras

I thought that today I would write a little bit about some of my trips down to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. When I had gone down there (and its been a few years now) I didn't know much more about the Civil War than the basics so to say that I was a little surprised to find out that there was a ton of Civil War history down there is an understatement.

I'm not so much a fan of the northern end of the Outer Banks....places like Nagshead, Kill Devil Hills, Kitty Hawk. It's too touristy for me. So I sort of "zone out" until we hit Cape Hatteras National Seashore. This is MY country. When you have to drive 20 miles just to get to the next "town" and that "town" is lucky to have a grocery store I am in heaven. That's when I started noticing "the signs".

The Signs are fairly small and they usually point down some off the beaten path road and they will usually say something like "Civil War Marker" with an arrow. Cool! Now, if it had been one or two signs, I probably could have convinced the family to stop at all those signs....but there were more....lots more.

Now what could possibly have happened on that thin strip of land that juts out into the ocean. The strip of land ranges anywhere from a mile to a couple hundred yards wide. But it goes on forever.....100+ miles. The sound, which is between the Island and the Mainland isn't very deep. I've seen windsurfers way out in the sound, fall off their boards and when they stood up, the water was up to their waists. So, they couldn't have had any kind of naval battle. Hmmm. Just what took place down there???? Well, I've done research. I LOVE research!

I found this on the internet and found it very interesting: The Civil War saw Cape Hatteras Lighthouse in the center of conflict. The Confederate army wanted to destroy the lighthouse to prevent the Union ships benefiting from it, and naturally the Union forces wanted to protect the lighthouse. After several battles in 1861, defeated Confederate troops retreated with the lighthouse's Fresnel lens. In 1862, the tower was relit with a second-order Fresnel lens, and then upgraded the following year with a first-order lens. The tower was severely damaged in the war, and after peace was restored to the country, the Lighthouse Board determined it would be less costly to build a new lighthouse, 600 feet to the north, rather than repair and refit the existing one. The original Cape Hatteras Light was destroyed in a blast of dynamite, and the Fresnel lens it had most recently housed was shipped to California for use in the Pigeon Point Lighthouse. http://www.lighthousefriends.com/light.asp?ID=356

There is a book out called "Touring the Carolina's Civil War Sites" by Clint Johnson that looks to be a good read. I quickly went over it on Google books and it looks interesting. Another book that I have to add to my list (and is that list ever long!!!).

One day I am going to return to The Outer Banks and when I do, I am going to take a picture of every single one of those markers. I am determined to find out exactly what took place, where it took place, who was involved and how it ended. I know that one of the inlets was a good place for ships to use in order to reach the mainland....so that is why the Confederates didn't want the Union forces to be able to approach....but what else happened??? Hmmmm....one day I will know!