Qualla: Battle of Roanoke Island

Battle of Roanoke Island: Introduction

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sedna10387 (talk), Public domain. Ambrose Burnside chose the worst ship in his fleet. With storms battering the armada off Cape Hatteras, the general abandoned his comfortable quarters aboard the transport George Peabody and transferred to the Army gunboat Picket -- the leakiest, most unseaworthy vessel in his command. It was January 1862, and Burnside was leading nearly 13,000 men and over a hundred guns on a secret mission to seize a twelve-mile sliver of land that most Americans had never heard of. But Roanoke Island, wedged between the shallow sounds of northeastern North Carolina, was the cork in the bottle. Whoever controlled it controlled access to Albemarle Sound, the Dismal Swamp Canal, and the back door to Norfolk. The Confederacy could not afford to lose it. Burnside intended to take it in two days.

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Image: Sedna10387 (talk) | Public domain

Battle of Roanoke Island: The Cork in the Bottle

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Vbofficial, Public domain. Northeastern North Carolina is a landscape defined by water -- vast, shallow sounds stretching between the mainland and the sandy ribbon of the Outer Banks. Pamlico Sound fills the south, Albemarle Sound extends nearly to Virginia in the north, and the narrow passage between them...

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Image: Vbofficial | Public domain

Battle of Roanoke Island: A Garrison of Shotguns

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. The men defending Roanoke Island were set up to fail. General Henry A. Wise commanded roughly 1,400 infantrymen, many of them North Carolina troops so poorly equipped they carried their own hunting shotguns instead of military rifles. A quarter of his force was sick at any given ...

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Image: Unknown author | Public domain

Battle of Roanoke Island: Two Days of Reckoning

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Robert Underwood Johnson and Clarence Clough Buel (Book authors)., Public domain. The Union fleet opened its bombardment on February 7, sending shells crashing into Fort Bartow while other gunboats engaged the Mosquito Fleet. The weakness of the Confederate position showed immediately -- only four guns at Fort Bartow could bear on the attackers, and when the g...

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Image: Robert Underwood Johnson and Clarence Clough Buel (Book authors). | Public domain

Battle of Roanoke Island: The Door Swings Open

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lt. Andrews, 9th N.Y. Regiment (not otherwise identified), Public domain. The casualty figures were modest by Civil War standards -- 37 Union killed and 214 wounded against 23 Confederate killed, 58 wounded, and 62 missing. But the strategic impact was enormous. Some 2,500 Confederates became prisoners of war, including reinforcements from the 2nd Nort...

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Image: Lt. Andrews, 9th N.Y. Regiment (not otherwise identified) | Public domain

Battle of Roanoke Island: Freedom's Colony

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sarah Stierch, CC BY 4.0. After the guns fell silent, Roanoke Island took on an unexpected role. The Army classified enslaved people on the island as contraband, and by late 1862, hundreds of people who had escaped slavery had made their way there. In 1863, a Congregational chaplain named Horace James was...

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Image: Sarah Stierch | CC BY 4.0