My interest was piqued one day by yet another federal solider monument in yet another charming Down-East town. In true Southern style, what with being wrapped up in Sherman burning down Georgia, and Lee surrendering at Appomattox, I simply had no time to think about those soldiers. Much to my surprise Maine played an important role in the “War Between the States,” as we call it back in NC.
So to the library I went to find out why Maine was so proud of its involvement in that great war.
I discovered Portland’s Casco Bay bustled as a seaport for New England and Canada well before the Civil War and long after. Encouraged to flourish with the Eastern Maine Railroad, its important role was shipping goods south to the soldiers in blue.
I chanced upon a short article mentioning the “Sea Wolf of the Confederacy,” a Lt. Charles Reade, that had me entranced and secretly proud of his Southern daring. In 1863, one week before that fateful battle at Gettysburg, Reade snuck into the Casco Bay harbor on a ship he’d pirated, the Archer, and attempted to spirit away the U.S. cutter Caleb Cushing. That summer Reade had sailed up the New England coast burning and taking ships as he went. His plan, some believe, was to burn Portland to the ground — the industrial harbor of Maine had to be shut down if the war was to be won.
But things didn’t go as Reade planned and a grand battle was played out before the eyes of the town of Portland as people looked out 20 miles to sea and saw cannons shooting and smoke rising. Reade’s men set fire to the Caleb Cushing and tried to escape in their purloined vessel, but out of ammunition and surrounded, they surrendered and became prisoners of war. This defeat was a crushing blow for the Confederacy’s attempt to master the war at sea.
Even if he was a bit of a bad guy, and it’s a good thing he wasn’t successful, the “Sea Wolf’s” story recorded here in the history of Maine made me feel suddenly not so far from home.
Ironically, my new connection with Maine stems from sharing a moment in history. Down South you grow up with the breath of the “War Between the States” wafting on your cheeks in implicit romanticism. We may have lost, but we know a good story when we hear one, and so for generations that story about our defiance and defeat has been repeated over and over, embellished until it is the religion of those who need to believe.
I grew up absolutely disinterested in that whole war thing. In fact, I only gave the monuments and ceremonies back home a cursory glance. I didn’t give a damn about it — slavery was evil, we lost, move on! Yet, my lesson learned is that it’s deep in my bones. The Civil War story is, in a way, my story even if I never accepted it, and all it took was a few monuments and a daring battle story for me to feel right at home here in Maine, as far north as a Southern girl could want to go!
Rebekah Cowell is a graduate of UNC with a degree in philosophy and studies in piano performance. Full-time mother to an amazing toddler, Hannah, she writes in all her spare time (i.e. when Hannah sleeps!).