Confederate Secret Service

Confederate Secret Service is an umbrella term for a number of official and semi-official operations conducted by the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War.

Overview

During the Civil War a number of secret operations sprang up, some at the direction of the government, some with its tacit approval, and some that were under only the most tenuous control, or even under no control whatsoever. Many of these operations involved acts that were considered, by the Union, to go beyond the normal conduct of "civilized" warfare. From the Confederacy's point of view, these were desperate measures necessary to compensate for the fact that, in terms of conventional warfare, they were out-manned, out-supplied, and out-gunned. By 1864, the Confederate government was attempting to gain control over the various operations that had sprung up since the beginning of the War, but often with little success. In April 1865, most of the official papers of the Secret Service were burned by Confederate Secretary of State Judah P. Benjamin just before the Confederate government evacuated Richmond, so the full story of Confederate secret operations may never be known.

In 1864, secret legislation was put before the Confederate Congress to create an official Special and Secret Bureau of the War Department. The legislation was not enacted until March 1865 and was never implemented, so no one really knows what an official "Confederate Secret Service" would have looked like. However, all these various bits and pieces have been referred to at one time or another as having been part of the Confederate Secret Service.

Military Operations and Officially Sanctioned Secret Service Activities

Foreign Agents

The Confederacy's first secret service agent may have been James D. Bulloch. In 1861, almost immediately after the attack on Fort Sumter, Bulloch traveled to Liverpool, England, and established a base of operations there. Britain was officially neutral in the conflict between North and South, but private and public sentiment favored the Confederacy. Britain was also willing to buy all the cotton that could be smuggled past the Union blockade, which provided the South with its only real source of hard currency. Bulloch established a relationship with the shipping firm of Fraser & Trenholm to buy and sell Confederate cotton; Fraser Trenholm became, in effect, the Confederacy's international bankers. Bulloch arranged for the construction and secret purchase of the commerce raider CSS Alabama as well as many of the blockade runners that acted as the Confederacy's commercial lifeline. Bulloch arranged for cotton to be converted to hard currency, which he used to purchase war materiel including arms and ammunition, uniforms, and other supplies.

Signal Corps

The Confederate Signal Corps was established in 1862. Nearly 1,200 men were in the secret service, most of whom were well-to-do and knew more than one language.

Torpedo Bureau

The Torpedo Bureau, authorized on October 31, 1862 and headed by Brigadier General Gabriel Rains, was charged with the production of various explosive devices, including land mines, naval mines and "coal torpedos".

Submarine Battery Service

Created at the same time of the Torpedo Bureau, the Submarine Battery Service was the Confederate Navy's group of torpedo specialists. The Submarine Battery Service primarily utilized electrically-detonated torpedoes to protect the South's waterways. Originally commanded by Cmdr. Matthew Maury, also known as "The Pathfinder of the Seas", the reins of command were turned over to his protege`, Lt. Hunter Davidson, when Maury was sent abroad to further his experiments involving electrical torpedoes and to procure needed supplies and ships for the Confederate Navy. The Service was found operating along the James River between Richmond and Hampton Roads, Wilmington, NC, Charleston, SC and Savannah, GA among other locales.

Espionage

The Confederacy benefitted from the services of a number of "traditional" spies including Rose O'Neal Greenhow, Belle Boyd, and Catherine Virginia Baxley.

Sanctioned Destructionists, Privateers, and Licensed Operators

The Bounty Law

The Confederacy knew it was in trouble from the beginning of war, because it didn't have a Navy. All the ships of the United States Navy naturally belonged to the Union, and the few privately owned ships that could be converted to military service were really no match for the Union Navy. Privateering was essential. On May 21, 1861, the Confederate Congress enacted an amendment to their May 6, 1861 Declaration of War which provided that

the government of the Confederate States will pay to the cruiser or cruisers of any private armed vessel commissioned under said act, twenty per centum on the value of each and every vessel of war belonging to the enemy, that may be sunk or destroyed by such private armed vessel or vessels, the value of the armament to be included in the estimate.

This was a useful incentive program but it didn't go far enough. In 1862, possibly following a suggestion from Sage, the Confederate Congress enacted a bounty of fifty percent of the value of any vessel destroyed by means of a new invention.

The Congress of the Confederate States of America do enact, That the first section of the above entitled Act be so amended, that, in case any person or persons shall invent or construct any new machine or engine, or contrive any new method for destroying the armed vessels of the enemy, he or they shall receive fifty per centum of the value of each and every such vessel that may be sunk or destroyed, by means of such invention or contrivance,

This naturally attracted the attention of engineers, entrepreneurs, patriots and crackpots. Horace Hunley put together a group of investors to finance the submarine that bears his name, hoping to cash in on the bounty. Private individuals with engineering experience such as E. C. Singer, C. Williams, and Zere McDaniel developed and patented new torpedoes and fuses.

The Coal Torpedo

Developed by Thomas Courtenay of the Confederate Secret Service, coal torpedoes were hollow metal castings resembling a lump of coal. The castings were filled with powder and then secreted in the coal bunker of enemy vessels. When the coal replicas were shoveled into the fire boxes of ship's boilers, the resulting explosions either damaged or sank the ship. A variation of the coal torpedo used against river steamers was a piece of wood, hollowed out and filled with powder, which could easily be concealed in the fuel piles of cord wood stacked along the river banks and which was capable of producing disaster to the unlucky ship that hoisted it aboard.

See also

• American Civil War spies
• Secret Service

External links

• Civil War Torpedoes

Sources

• Perry, Milton F. "Infernal Machines: The story of Confederate submarine and mine warfare." Louisiana State University Press, 1985.
• Crowley, R.O. "Confederate Torpedo Service" in The Century / Volume 56, Issue 2, The Century Company, New York, June 1898.
• Bulloch, James D. "The Secret Service of the Confederate States in Europe; or, How the Confederate Cruisers Were Equipped." 1883.
• Tidwell, William A. "April '65." Kent State University Press, 1995.
• Kochan, Michael P. and John C. Wideman. "Torpedoes: Another look at the Infernal Machines of the Civil War." 2002.