As good of an explanation of the battle as can be found.
Fort Macon, NC
Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside under took the capture of For Macon as part of Operation Anaconda, the Union blockade of the South. After the defeat at Bull Run, or Manassas as the Confederates called it, elements within Union high command realized that the war was going to take more than a march on Richmond to end the war. Operation Anaconda was inaugurated to strangle the Southern economy and end the South’s ability to make war. The key to this strategy was the Union Blockade.
To counteract the blockade the South licensed privateers and blockade runners to smuggle in need war material from Europe. The Carolina Coast, fronting the Atlantic, and honeycombed with little inlets and waterways that led to places like New Bern with railroad access right in town, made the Carolina Tidewater a critical place in the Union plans. Coastal river craft sporting a single cannon and sea going men-of-war need places to refuel and resupply to stay on line. If they have to travel to far for refitting then they are gone too long to be effective. Furthermore, ships patrolling the Atlantic Coast are subject to the buffeting of frequent storm and hurricanes and need a place to pull in for repair. Beaufort Harbor was in a perfect position to perform these services for the fleet. All Burnside needed to do was capture Fort Macon.
Arial View
Fort Macon is a good example of why we stopped building masonry forts, it looks very strong and would have been a very difficult place to storm by an infantry overland attack; but it surrendered after one day of concentrated artillery and navel shelling. These old forts did good service blocking access to individual ships trying to enter or leave a harbor, in the case of Forts Monroe and Wool they combined with navy ships of the line and strong Union infantry to make an unassailable position. Individual forts however could not stand on their own against a determined enemy.
Throughout the course of history I can only think of one fort, Fort Wagner in South Carolina that withstood all attacks. Masada made it a year and Montsegur held out a little longer depending on when you want to start counting, but that is about the best a fort can do. With the adoption of rifled artillery and improvement in metallurgy the Civil War saw the end of forts as anything more than a place to sleep and drill. The French of course didn’t believe it and built a line of forts to stop any German invasion after WWI; the Germans bypassed the forts by going through Belgium but some German Storm Troopers did attack over the Rhine just to see what would happen and the Maginot Line fell in two hours. Fortess Europe and the Atlantic Wall held what six hours? Maybe eight in some places.
Forts don’t move. That’s the basic problem. You can think of a ship as a fort, but it moves, in a fight between a fort and a ship the ship has all of the advantages and none of the limitations of the fort. Even an attacker’s land artillery can move if it finds that one of the forts cannons has found its range but the forts gunners are stuck where they’re at no matter what happens.
The very nature of a fort pins the defenders down and prevents them from gaining the initiative in a battle, they have to sit there in their fort and wait to see what the attackers are going to do and then respond. They themselves cannot initiate anything without leaving the fort exposed. In the case of Fort Macon, it was surrounded by Union land forces with siege cannon as well as the navel gun boats, the worst of all dilemmas.
The Union was able to put Fort Macon into service as part of Anaconda stopping up the Beaufort Inlet to Confederate shipping, but it was never without a supporting flotilla to keep away any of the Mosquito Navy that might seek to threaten it. The Beaufort Sound became a major Union support harbor for coaling and maintaining the fleet.
What makes these old forts interesting today is the detailed work and craftsmanship that went into their construction. As you look at the pictures, or if you get a chance to go to the fort yourself look at the beautiful brickwork and workmanship in the supporting wooden beams. Some fine iron work is on display as well.
Visitor's Center and Park Entrance
The flag of North Carolina.
The Main Gate
The first view of the moat on the way in.
The top of the inter wall was covered with dirt.
I like to find a place where the brickwork has been damaged so you can see the detail of the construction used in the wall.
Ports for firing at attackers inside the moat between the outer and the inter walls. This space use to be deeps and could be flooded with seawater.
Another view of the moat and its defenses.
The covertways under the outer walls are flooded.
A gate between the moat and the Parade Ground in the inter portion of the fort.
Interior view of the fort looking over the Parade Ground.
The hot shot oven, designed for heating cannonballs to red hot, used for setting wooden ships on fire. With advent of iorn clad ship hot shot became pointless.
Inside the walls are the usual passages that allowed defenders to move around the fort without going outside during an attack.
Fireplaces provided heat inside the cold drank walls that served as barracks as well as defence.
Ramps and stairways provided access to battle stations.
Some of the supporting beams inside the walls, showing signs of the wear and tear caused by years of tourists.
An old hand crank water pump and cistern. Although these old forts were built at the mouth of large rivers, a supply of good, sweet water that couldn't be cut off from the outside was always a problem. The usual solution was to build cisterns to hold rainwater inside the fort.
Man, they use a lot of bricks.
Casualties: 5 US, 459 CS