Civil War in North Carolina

North Carolina’s secession from the Union was reluctant at best. While the state had overwhelmingly supported pro-slavery candidates in elections leading up to the secession crisis, when it came to the matter of seceding from the Union, North Carolina hedged, not leaving the Union until after Virginia, the bellweather state for much of the South, had also seceded. Many of the state’s small farmers and landowners, who did not own slaves and therefore had no compelling reason to support slavery or secession, did not necessarily agree with the secession of North Carolina from the Union, and this feeling only intensified during the war.

Yet despite the ambivalence in North Carolina regarding secession and the war, the state became very important to the Confederate war effort. Many of the regiments who fought with the Confederacy in major battles of the war, including Gettysburg, were raised in North Carolina, and the state was the site of numerous battles and skirmishes.

However, North Carolina was most important for the Confederacy for the fact that the port city of Wilmington remained open for trade throughout most of the war, despite the fact that the South had been virtually isolated by the Union blockades that had stopped trade in other port cities.

Located on the Cape Fear inlet of the Atlantic Ocean, which provided both natural and man-made barriers that the Union Army struggled to overcome, Wilmington became the Confederacy’s only major seaport early in the war. Much-needed imports from England and France - including arms and ammunition - reached the Confederacy by way of Wilmington after Union blockades had shut down other major port cities such as Charleston and New Orleans. Rice, cotton, tobacco and other Southern products were exported via the ports of Wilmington, allowing the Confederacy to sell its goods to foreign countries when the Union embargoed trade with the seceded states.

Fort Fisher, which has since become famous as “the last major stronghold of the Confederacy,” protected Wilmington and the Cape Fear River basin so well that the war was not felt as keenly in these areas as it was in other areas throughout the South. Work on the rice plantations that surrounded Fort Fisher continued, and those who lived in the city of Wilmington and smaller towns in the area carried on as usual right up until the end of the war.

The Union recognized the importance of the Wilmington ports to the Confederacy, and tried throughout the war to create a blockade on the Cape Fear River basin, as well. However, the Confederate men who guarded Fort Fisher took advantage of the natural barriers that the small islands located in the inlet between the Atlantic Ocean and the Cape Fear provided, while also creating hazards just below the water’s surface that would damage or destroy any enemy ships that approached. Yet the Confederates at Fort Fisher managed to navigate friendly ships carrying cargo to or from Wilmington through this watery mine field, allowing trade to continue in this important harbor.

It was early 1865 when Union forces were finally able to take Fort Fisher, and cut off Confederate trade completely. Until then, North Carolina was essential to the Confederacy, and its loss certainly sped the end of the war.