CSS Fanny
Featured Character – 1861-1862
Sketch of the Gun Boat Fanny, 1860
Courtesy of the U.S. Library of Congress
The CSS Fanny was a wood-hulled propeller steamer that was originally a part of the Union Navy to deliver food and supplies along the Outer Banks of North Carolina. It was captured on October 1, 1861, in the Pamlico Sound at Loggerhead Inlet by the CSS Raleigh, CSS Junaluska, and CSS Curlew. The Confederates captured not only the ship, but a sizeable amount of supplies and members of the 20th Indiana Infantry and Colonel Rush Hawkins' Zouaves. The ship's cree, however, managed to escape. Recommissioned as a Confederate gunboat, the CSS Fanny participated in Confederate raids on the Outer Banks. As a member of the Mosquito Fleet, it also saw action in the Battle of Roanoke Island. During the Battle of Elizabeth City on February 10, 1862, it was shot by the USS Commodore Perry and run ashore near the battery at Cobb’s Point. There, the captain set it on fire. The wreck was salvaged in 1866.