Archaeologists to date have located more than 5,000 shipwrecks in the state’s inland waterways and coastal waters. That number includes 61 Civil War ships at or near the mouth of the Cape Fear River, the largest con-centration of derelicts from that time period anywhere in the world. Fifty-five of the undersea carcasses were former Confederate commerce vessels that ran aground while attempting to run the gauntlet of US Navy blockading gunboats deployed to prevent them from getting to and from Wilmington’s docks. Historians believe that as many as 100 different steam-ships operated as blockade-runners at the Tar Heel sea-port during the war, to say nothing of the undetermined number of sailing vessels employed as smugglers. The Confederacy depended heavily on overseas trade with European nations, especially Great Britain, to supply its military and civilian needs. It did not have enough factories to manufacture products to meet its wartime demands while fighting against the much more powerful North. At least 50 percent of everything the South consumed and used during the war was brought in through the blockade. The Confederacy imported more goods through Wilmington than any other Southern seaport, including the larger ports of New Orleans and Charleston. Some of the local Confederate blockade-runners are as famous today as they were then. One of the most often told tales of blockade running at the Cape Fear concerned the steamer Fanny and Jenny that 18 WBM february 2014 wrecked along Wrightsville Beach in early 1864. Legend has it that she carried a gold sword destined for General Robert E. Lee, commander of the Army of Northern Virginia. Strong circumstan-tial evidence suggests that the story might actually be true.
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