As Chairman of the team that excavated the H.L. Hunley, a historic Civil War-era submarine that sank in the Charleston Harbor on February 17, 1864, and was not discovered until May 3, 1995, I am deeply interested in Civil War history and the role of South Carolina in the conflict.
South Carolina’s fierce commitments to the preeminence of states’ rights and the institution of slavery predated the war by many years. Politicians like John C. Calhoun and Preston Brooks called for the secession of South Carolina from the United States years before the state formally seceded on December 20, 1860, becoming the first state to do so. South Carolina played a pivotal role in the Civil War, and the first shots of the war were fired nearby Charleston at Fort Sumter. On April 12, 1861, in the Charleston Harbor, South Carolina secessionists successfully wrested the island base of Fort Sumter from the United States troops stationed there.
Throughout the war, South Carolina served as a major source of troops for both armies, with the majority of the white residents joining the Confederacy, and the majority of the freed former slaves forming regiments in the Union army as the war progressed and more and more men and women were liberated.
Though the Southern soldiers generally did not possess as much naval experience as members of the Union army, the Confederacy did win a major naval victory in February 1864 when the H.L. Hunley destroyed the Union ship the USS Housatonic, marking the first time in history a submarine had sunk an enemy warship. All crew of the H.L. Hunley were lost after the vessel sank under mysterious circumstances immediately following the history-making attack.
Just as South Carolina played a pivotal role in the start of the Civil War, so it also figured prominently in the end of the war. The Confederate soldiers evacuated Charleston in February 1865, and on the 21st, the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment, one of the first official black regiments formed after the Emancipation Proclamation, marched into the city and raised the Union flag over Fort Sumter.
