Second Battle of Charleston Harbor
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Siege of Charleston Harbor
Part of the American Civil War
Date August 17 – September 7, 1863 Location Morris Island, South Carolina & Fort Sumter, South Carolina Result Inconclusive
Belligerents
United States (Union)	CSA (Confederacy)
Commanders
Quincy Gillmore John A. Dahlgren	P.G.T. Beauregard
Strength
X Corps	Forts Wagner & Sumter garrisons
Casualties and losses
859	816

The Second Battle of Charleston Harbor (or the Siege of Charleston Harbor, Siege of Fort Wagner, or Battle of Morris Island) took place during the American Civil War in the late summer of 1863 between a combined Union Army/Navy force and the Confederate defenses of Charleston, South Carolina.

Siege

After being repulsed twice trying to take Fort Wagner by storm, Maj. Gen. Quincy Adams Gillmore decided on a less costly approach and began laying siege to the fort. In the ensuing days, Union forces besieged the Confederate works on Morris Island with an array of military novelties. Union gunners made use of a new piece of artillery known as the Requa gun–25 rifle barrels mounted on a field carriage. While sappers dug zig-zag trenches toward Fort Wagner a second novelty was used–the calcium floodlight. Bright lights were flashed upon the defenders blinding them enough to decrease accurate return fire while the Union gunners fired safely behind the lights.

The Confederate defenders had advantages also. The ground the Union sappers were digging through was shallow sand with a muddy base. The trenching efforts also began to accidentally uncover Union dead from the previous assaults on Fort Wagner. Despite this, by mid August Gillmore had his siege guns within range of Fort Sumter. On August 17, he opened fire and during the first day of the bombardment nearly 1,000 shells were fired. By August 23 the masonry had been turned to rubble and General Pierre Beauregard removed as many of the fort's guns as possible. Gillmore wired the War Department that "Fort Sumter is a shapeless and harmless mass of ruin".

Gillmore's attention returned to Fort Wagner. Despite the marshy conditions on Morris Island, Union forces had constructed powerful batteries to combat Fort Wagner. One such battery officially known as the Marsh Battery, was dubbed the "Swamp Angel". This 200-pound parrott rifle hurled 35 shots into the city of Charleston itself, but on the 36th shot the gun exploded. On September 4, Dahlgren attacked with an intense bombing of Fort Wagner for nearly two full days. Conditions within Fort Wagner were becoming intolerable, and the garrison commander informed General Beauregard that he now had only 400 men capable of defending the fort. Therefore on the evening of September 6-7, Beauregard ordered Confederate forces to abandon their positions on Morris Island. On September 7 Union troops occupied Fort Wagner.

Fort Wagner had withstood 60 days of constant bombing and held off a much larger Union army. Yet the Union army and navy had captured an important position at the mouth of Charleston Harbor and reduced its most formidable fortress into rubble. The city of Charleston and Fort Sumter itself would remain in Confederate control until William T. Sherman's armies marched through South Carolina in 1865.

Opposing Forces

Union

Dept. of the South - Maj. Gen. Quincy A. Gillmore

• Morris Island - Brig. Gen. Alfred H. Terry
  • 1st Brigade - Col. Henry R. Guss
  • 2nd Brigade - Col. Joshua B. Howell
  • 3rd Brigade - Brig. Gen. Thomas G. Stevenson
  • 4th Brigade - Col. James Montgomery
  • 5th Brigade - Col. William W. H. Davis

• North End of Folly Island - Brig. Gen. Israel Vogdes
  • African Brigade - Brig. Gen. Edward A. Wild
  • Foster's Brigade - Brig. Gen. Robert S. Foster
  • Alford's Brigade - Col. Samuel M. Alford

• South End of Folly Island - Brig. Gen. George H. Gordon
  • 1st Brigade - Brig. Gen. Alexander Schimmelfennig
  • 2nd Brigade - Brig. Gen. Adelbert Ames

Confederate

Dept. of South Carolina, Georgia & Florida - General P.G.T. Beauregard
First Military District - Brig. Gen. Roswell S. Ripley

• 1st Sub-division - Brig. Gen. William B. Taliaferro
• 2nd Sub-division - Brig. Gen. Thomas L. Clingman
• 3rd Sub-division (incomplete)
  • Morris Island - Brig. Gen. Alfred Colquitt
• 4th Sub-division (incomplete)
  • Fort Sumter - Col. Alfred Rhett
• 5th Sub-division - Brig. Gen. W. G. DeSaussure
  • Evans' Brigade - Brig. Gen. Nathan G. Evans
  • Anderson's Brigade - Brig. Gen. George T. Anderson
  • Wise's Brigade - Brig. Gen. Henry A. Wise

References

This article incorporates text from a National Park Service website ([1]) that is a public domain work of the United States Government.

See also

• First Battle of Charleston Harbor
• Second Battle of Fort Sumter