 |
|
|
(1809 -1885)
Semmes, Alexander
Alderman: Midshipman 27 Oct 1841. Lieutenant
15 Sep 1855. Lieutenant Commander 16 Jul 1862. Commander 25 Jul 1866. Captain 24 Aug
1873. Commodore 10 Mar 1882. Died 22 Sep 1885. USS Lehigh (Aug 1864-Mar
1865).
Source: The Iron
Captains
As he sat at his small desk in the cramped cabin, Alexander A. Semmes was reasonably content on this New Year's Day in 1864. He was a 23 year
veteran and a Lieutenant Commander of the United States Navy. He was
also going to finally marry the woman he loved, Mary Dorsey of
Baltimore. The date was established to be Feb. 9th 1864 only 5 weeks away.
Until that time he was still the captain of the U.S.S. "Tahoma",
awaiting his transfer orders and dreaming of a life with Mary.
"Tahoma" was currently assigned to the East Gulf Blockade Squadron
under
the command of Admiral Cornelius Stribling, a South Carolinian who had
stayed loyal to the Navy he had served so long. Lt. Cmdr. Semmes had
overcome a lot of medical illnesses, reminders of his service around the
world, and enjoyed a good reputation as an aggressive commander who made
several successful captures and raids against the Rebel enemy on this
west coast of Florida. He knew the coast well, having served as a
lieutenant on the USS "Rhode Island" during that first year of the
war,
when she made the first capture of an enemy ship in these waters, the
schooner "Aristides" off Charlotte Harbor.
By March of 1862 he had been given the command, his first, of the U.S.S.
"Wamsutta". Then in July of 1862 he had finally gotten promoted to the
rank of Lieutenant Commander after 21 years in the Navy. The years of
slow peacetime promotions were over. Now, with the war forcing the Navy
to expand like it had never done before, promotions were coming faster.
On Oct. 17, 1862, he was given the U.S.S. "Tahoma", a newly-built 158
foot screw (propeller) gunboat named after the Salishan Indian word for
"snow peak." He had read that the name of his ship was also the name
of
a glacier on the slope of Mount Rainier in the Territory of Washington.
The important thing for Semmes however, wasn't the name of his ship, it
was his own name and reputation. That reputation had been steadily building in the Navy. During these
first three years of this awful war he was getting known for getting
results. In the first six months of his command of the "Tahoma" she
had
made seven captures off the west coast of Florida, from Charlotte Harbor
to the Anclotte Keys. In addition to making captures at sea, the
"Tahoma" had extended her reach onto shore, with an expeditionary
force
landing at Tampa Bay the previous October and an engagement with shore
batteries at Gadsden Point in April of 1863. Yes, Alexander A. Semmes
had a good reputation in the Navy for being loyal and aggressive, but
then he had no choice, and all because of Raphael.
For as good as Alexander Semmes was or would ever be, he still shared
the last name of the infamous (or famous, if you were from the
confederacy) Raphael
Semmes, the U.S. Navy officer of 35 years service,
who had resigned his commission on Feb. 15, 1861, to fight with the
South against his former comrades. Not only did Raphael leave the Navy to
fight against it, he had become the most aggressive and successful
captain in the Confederate States Navy. During his wartime cruses in the C.S.S. "Sumter" and later the C.S.S. "Alabama", Raphael
Semmes was
roaming the world, capturing ships by the dozen. "Old Beeswax," as his
men called Raphael Semmes, had captured the attention of the world. As he sat and listened to the workings of his ship, Alexander Semmes
remembered back to the days when he was growing up in Maryland. Raphael
and his brother Samuel, whose parents had died when Raphael was ten
years old, had been taken in by the rest of the Semmes family. The two
distant cousins, Alexander and Raphael, were 16 years apart in age
(Raphael being the elder) and both had ended up in the U.S. Navy.
Raphael had joined the Navy first, when Alexander was still a small
boy. Later, when Alexander followed his cousin's example and joined the Navy himself, little did he know that one day they would serve in
opposing fleets.
The pre-War Navy was small, with most of the officers knowing each other.
Raphael's hatred of the Yankee New Englanders was well known, and his
leaving the Navy to "go South" surprised no one. After all, Raphael
had
lived in Alabama for some time, and was vocal on the subject of state's
rights. Still, it was a loss to the U.S.Navy, especially so after
Raphael's success with the C.S.N. The last that Alexander had heard, the
dashing Raphael Semmes and the "Alabama" were in the Far East,
destroying American shipping and causing panic in the Pacific. Alexander
hoped that Raphael would stay in the Pacific, but he knew that Raphael would
return to the coast of the Confederacy sooner or later.
Remembering his cousin, Alexander wondered what Raphael was thinking of
at this moment, in a captain's cabin much like this, on the other side
of the world. The war on land was finally starting to gain momentum,
ending the bloody stalemate of the last three years. The Confederacy's
days were numbered, and Alexander Semmes, U.S.N., wondered if his cousin
Raphael Semmes, C.S.N., would survive to see the nation whole again,
even if it was against his will.
Source: Civil
War Interactive Forgoten
Sailors (The Clan of Mariners) by Robert Macomber