Built as a 230 foot steam clipper, she was armed cruiser with a speed of 9 knots; complement 109; armament: 4 8-inch smoothbores, 2 32-pounder rifles, full sail rigged with auxiliary steam power. Adventures ensued in the northern Pacific Ocean and by early 1865 she needed supplies and minor repairs.
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| The Shanandoah hauled out for repairs in Williamstown, Melbourne, Feb 1865. |
She took refuge in the colonial port of Melbourne where she was refitted, took on supplies and surreptitiously recruited a few local"stow-aways" as replacement crew. This caused quite a stir and some anxious moments with over zealous local constabulary that started to become serious. The situation became quite heated with the gun frigate HMS Victoria standing close by, and the Shenandoah's Captain ordering her guns to be loaded with shot. Then:
"Fortunately for everyone, the Australians knew how to smooth ruffled feathers: they threw a party up in Ballarat and stoked it with pretty girls. The railroads supplied the Confederates with free passes, and the entire population turned out to greet them" (The Last Shot, pp 146-7)
Two days later the Shenandoah proceeded to sea without further incident!
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| Article from Melbourne's "The Age" newspaper, 26 January 1865 |
After her effective anti-commerce patrols, Shenandoah became the only Confederate warship to circumnavigate the globe during the conflict and was the last Confederate military unit to surrender at the war's end. In fact, it was well after the war officially ended! While General Lee surrendered the Confederacy in April 1965, the CSS Shenandoah remained at sea, capturing and burning a Union whaling fleet in the Bering Sea as late as June (and what were probably the last shots fired in the war).
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| 40 year old Lieutenant James Waddell, Captain of the Shenandoah,poses for a photograph in Melbourne at the studio of Batchelder & O’Neill in 1865. |
It wasn't until 2 August that Captain James Waddell met a British ship (the bark Barracuta on her way home to Liverpool from San Francisco) and received confirmed news that the Confederacy had fallen months earlier. Fearing they would be hanged as pirates if they returned to the now victorious United States of America, the crew chose to sail 9,000 miles to Liverpool, which was the hub of the Confederacy’s overseas operations and the ship's original place of construction as the troop transport Sea King. The city was effectively the Confederate capital abroad, home to financial agents and the Confederate naval commander James Dunwoody Bulloch, who had secretly overseen the building of their fleet.
The CSS Shenandoah finally sailed into Liverpool on 6 November 1865, where Captain Waddell officially surrendered to the Royal Navy’s HMS Donegal, marking the final surrender of the war and the last time the Confederate flag was lowered. Shenandoah had remained at sea for 12 months and 17 days, had sailed 58,000 miles and had sunk or captured 38 ships. Most were whalers and two-thirds of them were after the close of hostilities. Waddell took close to a thousand prisoners without a single casualty among his crew. Only two crewmen had died, and they of disease.
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| CSS Shenandoah anchored astern of HMS Donegal in the River Mersey (Edward D. Walker) |
Post Scripts:
-In post war proceedings seven years after the way, an international tribunal investigated claims that Britain had harboured Confederate Raiders in breach of the laws of neutrality in rendering assistance in Melbourne. The United States was awarded reparations of $US15.5 million with estimates that $3.8 million were related to the Shenandoah)
- In 1866 the US took possession of Shenandoah and sold her to the first Sultan of Zanzibar. He renamed her after himself El Majidi. On 15 April 1872 a hurricane hit Zanzibar and ex-Shenandoah, one of six ships owned by Seyed Burgash, was blown upon the shore and damaged beyond repair. The most feared commerce raider in the Confederate States Navy was no more.
[VSF Thought bubble] Now what if this incident was based on a raiding Confederate dirigible instead...
http://us-civil-war.suite101.com/article.cfm/css_shenandoah_confederate_raider
http://ahoy.tk-jk.net/MaraudersCivilWar/CSSShenandoah.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSS_Shenandoah
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-us-cs/csa-sh/csash-sz/shendoah.htm
2015 EDIT - Interesting news article posted here for the 150th Anniversary of this event
2026 EDIT
I just read about a mystery 6 pounder cannon on Churchill Island, south of Melbourne. It sits outside an old historic home, formerly owned by the Amess family. Local legend had it originated from the Shenandoah during her 1865 refit. However, Shenandoah was only fitted with 12 pounders and it has British foundry markings. Then again, she may have taken it as a prize from one of here victims along the way.
Naturally this theory has its supporters and detractors, but nobody really knows!
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