Combat· American Civil War
Croatan Sound pursuit
The naval mopping-up that followed the fall of Roanoke Island.
The day after the island's capture, the Union gunboats pushed on across Croatan Sound in pursuit of the small Confederate flotilla that had supported the defense, the so-called mosquito fleet. Marine guards aboard the squadron's ships shared in the chase as the gunboats ran the Confederate vessels down, drove them off, and destroyed or scattered them, while the works at Cobb's Point and the town of Elizabeth City fell into Union hands. The action broke what little remained of organized Confederate naval resistance in the North Carolina sounds, completing the work begun at Roanoke. No Marine casualties resulted; this was a gunboat pursuit in which the ships' guns did the fighting. With the inland waters cleared, the Union was free to press on against the river towns, New Bern and the others, that lay beyond.
Podcast episodes on American Civil War
Record no. 411