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Ironclads and Columbiads: The Civil War in North Carolina, The Coast
Ironclads and Columbiads recounts the exciting battles and events that shook the coast of North Carolina during America's bloodiest war. Throughout the Civil War, North Carolina's coast was of great strategic importance to the Confederacy. Its well-protected coastline offered a perfect refuge for privateers who sallied forth and captured so many Union merchant vessels in the early days of the war that maritime insurance companies in the North went into a panic, forcing the government to mount an expedition against Cape Hatteras. North Carolina's coastal counties and the state's coastal railroad system were vital to the feeding and resupply of Robert E. Lee's army. And even after the tightening blockade and powerful Federal assaults closed off the ports of Charleston, New Orleans, and Mobile, Wilmington continued to provide a haven for blockade runners. That city eventually became the most strategically important location in the entire Confederacy. To subdue Fort Fisher, which stoutly defended Wilmington, the Union was forced to assemble what was then the largest naval and amphibious landing force in American history. William R. (Bill) Trotter is an essayist, book reviewer, and author of The Civil War in North Carolina and A Frozen Hell , among other books, as well as several short stories and novellas, and has twice been nominated for the Bram Stoker Award. He wrote a monthly column called "The Desktop General" for PC Gamer magazine until 2004. He was the first recipient of the North Carolina English Teachers' Association "Lifetime Achievement Award." He lives in Greensboro, NC.
Paperback
First published June 1, 1989
About the author
William R. Trotter
18 books17 followersWilliam R. Trotter was educated at Davidson College, where he earned a B.A. in European History. He has worked as a regional music critic, a book reviewer, and a freelance historian and feature writer.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 11, 2016
This volume, the third and final one, concentrated primarily on the campaigns in and around Fort Fisher. I liked the series and this volume in particular. The movie, "Glory," detailed some of the Fort Fisher campaign, but there was so much more that was presented here. Anyone with a general interest and anyone with a specific interest in North Carolina and the Civil War should read this entire series.
November 14, 2011
The title says the topic. What I learned is that there is always more to learn even after reading the Shelby Foote and Bruce Catton American Civil War volumes. The war in NC was is a fascinating study, mainly because of Governor Vance, Fort Fisher, and the Burnside campaign, to name a few reasons. Trotter is a splendid writer. The book is easy to follow and keeps your attention.
May 12, 2026
I had a history teacher who put on every test the question “what is history?” The answer was, History is the branch of knowledge that records and explains past events”.
History’s role was not to play “what ifs”, or to look back at a poker tournament with 20/20 vision and say this person should not have folded bc they had the winning hand.
I feel Trotter did this a lot. We cannot second guess a military decision from the comfort of our armchairs 150 odd years after the war!! The person deciding to attack takes the responsibility for failure of the offensive.
That said, I still found the book interesting.
History’s role was not to play “what ifs”, or to look back at a poker tournament with 20/20 vision and say this person should not have folded bc they had the winning hand.
I feel Trotter did this a lot. We cannot second guess a military decision from the comfort of our armchairs 150 odd years after the war!! The person deciding to attack takes the responsibility for failure of the offensive.
That said, I still found the book interesting.
July 21, 2025
This was a really good book to get a comprehensive view of the Civil War in coastal North Carolina. Trotter is an engaging writer with an eye for a memorable anecdote. Would recommend!
If there's anything to learn from the Civil War in North Carolina, it's that it's impossible to defend an extended coastline if you have nothing to match your enemy's navy. Command of the sea is everything!
If there's anything to learn from the Civil War in North Carolina, it's that it's impossible to defend an extended coastline if you have nothing to match your enemy's navy. Command of the sea is everything!
June 25, 2017
Approachable, informative, engaging - the best sort of historical non-fiction. The only weakness is the author's penchant for the occasional hyperbole, but only to a minor degree.
Will read more by this author.
Will read more by this author.
February 7, 2013
one of the best books I have read.
December 26, 2016
It's very interesting to read a history that covers land you yourself have traveled over. Very good history of the War Between the States in the coastal region of NC.
April 20, 2017
The ironclad ships slid through the sluggish waters of the coastal sounds, like giant sea reptiles from a bygone age. The Columbiads – large-caliber, smoothbore cannons utilized as coastal artillery – belched forth fire and death against invading enemy forces. And these two examples of military and naval technology were of particular importance during the coastal phases of the Civil War in North Carolina, as William Trotter makes clear in this energetic and well-written study.
Ironclads and Columbiads is the third and last in a multi-volume study of North Carolina’s role in the American Civil War – thus the book’s somewhat unwieldy full-length title of Ironclads and Columbiads: The Civil War in North Carolina, Volume 3 – The Coast. Readers who want even more of Trotter’s recounting of the Civil War in the Tar Heel State can seek out Volume 1, Silk Flags and Cold Steel: The Piedmont, and Volume 2, Bushwhackers: The Mountains. But if you are vacationing on the North Carolina coast, somewhere between Carova Beach and Sunset Beach, and you see this book on the shelves at some coastal-resort bookstore, be assured that Ironclads and Columbiads reads just fine as a self-contained work of history, “Volume 3” or no “Volume 3.”
Trotter writes well about military conflict – his best known book may be A Frozen Hell, a powerful look at the 1939-40 Winter War in which tiny Finland successfully held off the mighty Soviet Union and its supposedly invincible Red Army – and Ironclads and Columbiads conveys well the drama inherent in the struggle between Unionists and Confederates along the picturesque coast of North Carolina.
The reader should expect a history recounted from the perspective of a proud North Carolinian sympathetic to the heroism of his state’s ordinary soldiers, and displeased with the policies of the Confederate central government as administered by Jefferson Davis. Characteristic in that regard is a passage in which Trotter reflects on the Davis administration’s seeming indifference to Union encroachments against the North Carolina coast:
”To the professional soldiers of North Carolina, no less than to [Governor Henry T. Clark], it seemed inexplicable that Richmond should wantonly neglect the defense of such an obviously vital point. This attitude fed the growing suspicion that there was an anti-North Carolina cabal within the Davis administration, comprised of men who disliked and distrusted the state for its Unionist history and its reluctance to secede (North Carolina was the last state to join the Confederacy). There was some truth to these suspicions, but the neglect of the coastal defenses can probably be attributed more to sheer confusion, and a blinding inability to sort out strategic priorities, than it can to sinister political motives. Davis and his aides were already basing too many of their decisions, as they were to do throughout the war, on short-sighted political considerations.” (p. 57)
Thoughtful, and energetically stated – even if North Carolina wasn’t the last state to join the Confederate States of America (Tennessee was). Indeed, part of the fun of reading this book is sensing the contempt with which Trotter deploys the term “Richmond” as a form of metonymy or synecdoche to refer to the Confederacy’s central government and bureaucracy as headquartered in the Virginia capital – as when he writes that Fort Fisher, the bastion that guarded the last open Confederate port at Wilmington, “fell as a direct result of Richmond’s negligence and incompetence” (p. 3). Hmmm. I wonder how folks up in RVA might read these parts of the book.
Trotter’s tone becomes much more positive when he writes of the successes of Confederate soldiers and officers who are themselves North Carolinians. Consider, for instance, the glowing tones in which he describes Brigadier General Robert Hoke’s victory in the 1864 Battle of Plymouth as “the cleanest, most competent victory ever gained by the Confederacy on North Carolina soil. It had been a North Carolinian’s show, too, since Hoke was a native of the state and most of his regiments were Tar Heels as well” (p. 248). Similar praise goes to another native North Carolinian, Commander James W. Cooke of the ironclad C.S.S. Albemarle, “whose resolute handling” of his ship “had, in the space of a few hours, unlocked the whole [Union] defensive scheme of Plymouth” (pp. 248-49). Contrast these words of warm praise with the way Trotter describes Jefferson Davis as acting “from the depths of innermost perversity” (p. 337) when he sent Braxton Bragg to command at threatened Wilmington. Folks down at Davis’s museum and “presidential library” in Mississippi might not like Trotter’s attitude toward Davis very much, but it certainly makes the book entertaining.
Different chapters of Ironclads and Columbiads deal with, among other topics, the successful Union campaign against the Outer Banks of North Carolina; the burning by Union forces of the small town of Winton; the siege of Fort Macon, today a well-preserved fortification for modern-day visitors; the back-and-forth fighting over Plymouth, a small city that seems to have suffered considerably as it was occupied or re-occupied by one side or the other; the C.S.S. Albemarle and its successful sorties against Union naval forces, until it was destroyed in a daring commando operation led by U.S. Lieutenant William Baker Cushing; the wild atmosphere that prevailed in Wilmington when it became the last port of the Confederacy; and the campaign against Fort Fisher that closed the port of Wilmington and hastened the demise of the rebel cause. Other chapters, dealing as they do with relatively minor operations, may be of interest chiefly to the really serious Civil War antiquarian.
Trotter seems to sympathize with the Confederates, albeit in a subtle way. The Emancipation Proclamation does come up in the book, for example, but only in connection with a Unionist North Carolinian, Edward Stanly, who resigned as pro-Union governor of the state “in protest over the Emancipation Proclamation” (p. 151). Well! That certainly doesn’t draw a sympathetic picture of Unionists in North Carolina. Elsewhere, Trotter devotes an entire appendix to an attempt to absolve the Confederate victors at the Battle of Plymouth from a charge of having massacred African-American Union soldiers after the battle – a charge that appeared, most notably, in James McPherson’s popular and influential Battle Cry of Freedom (1988). And in the book’s concluding image, Trotter evokes “that proud morning when the C.S.S. Albemarle set forth to challenge one of the most powerful navies in the world, and for one brief moment of triumph ruled supreme on the inshore waters of North Carolina” (p. 410). How you feel regarding Trotter’s sympathies will no doubt rely on your own.
I first bought Ironclads and Columbiads on a family visit to Hatteras Island, and re-read it years later, on a weekend trip to Carolina Beach. On both occasions, it was a striking thing to look out at the peaceful ocean and reflect on how that gorgeous seaside panorama was once a scene of desperate military conflict. If you enjoy reading Civil War history, then Ironclads and Columbiads could provide a good accompaniment for your next visit to the North Carolina coast.
Ironclads and Columbiads is the third and last in a multi-volume study of North Carolina’s role in the American Civil War – thus the book’s somewhat unwieldy full-length title of Ironclads and Columbiads: The Civil War in North Carolina, Volume 3 – The Coast. Readers who want even more of Trotter’s recounting of the Civil War in the Tar Heel State can seek out Volume 1, Silk Flags and Cold Steel: The Piedmont, and Volume 2, Bushwhackers: The Mountains. But if you are vacationing on the North Carolina coast, somewhere between Carova Beach and Sunset Beach, and you see this book on the shelves at some coastal-resort bookstore, be assured that Ironclads and Columbiads reads just fine as a self-contained work of history, “Volume 3” or no “Volume 3.”
Trotter writes well about military conflict – his best known book may be A Frozen Hell, a powerful look at the 1939-40 Winter War in which tiny Finland successfully held off the mighty Soviet Union and its supposedly invincible Red Army – and Ironclads and Columbiads conveys well the drama inherent in the struggle between Unionists and Confederates along the picturesque coast of North Carolina.
The reader should expect a history recounted from the perspective of a proud North Carolinian sympathetic to the heroism of his state’s ordinary soldiers, and displeased with the policies of the Confederate central government as administered by Jefferson Davis. Characteristic in that regard is a passage in which Trotter reflects on the Davis administration’s seeming indifference to Union encroachments against the North Carolina coast:
”To the professional soldiers of North Carolina, no less than to [Governor Henry T. Clark], it seemed inexplicable that Richmond should wantonly neglect the defense of such an obviously vital point. This attitude fed the growing suspicion that there was an anti-North Carolina cabal within the Davis administration, comprised of men who disliked and distrusted the state for its Unionist history and its reluctance to secede (North Carolina was the last state to join the Confederacy). There was some truth to these suspicions, but the neglect of the coastal defenses can probably be attributed more to sheer confusion, and a blinding inability to sort out strategic priorities, than it can to sinister political motives. Davis and his aides were already basing too many of their decisions, as they were to do throughout the war, on short-sighted political considerations.” (p. 57)
Thoughtful, and energetically stated – even if North Carolina wasn’t the last state to join the Confederate States of America (Tennessee was). Indeed, part of the fun of reading this book is sensing the contempt with which Trotter deploys the term “Richmond” as a form of metonymy or synecdoche to refer to the Confederacy’s central government and bureaucracy as headquartered in the Virginia capital – as when he writes that Fort Fisher, the bastion that guarded the last open Confederate port at Wilmington, “fell as a direct result of Richmond’s negligence and incompetence” (p. 3). Hmmm. I wonder how folks up in RVA might read these parts of the book.
Trotter’s tone becomes much more positive when he writes of the successes of Confederate soldiers and officers who are themselves North Carolinians. Consider, for instance, the glowing tones in which he describes Brigadier General Robert Hoke’s victory in the 1864 Battle of Plymouth as “the cleanest, most competent victory ever gained by the Confederacy on North Carolina soil. It had been a North Carolinian’s show, too, since Hoke was a native of the state and most of his regiments were Tar Heels as well” (p. 248). Similar praise goes to another native North Carolinian, Commander James W. Cooke of the ironclad C.S.S. Albemarle, “whose resolute handling” of his ship “had, in the space of a few hours, unlocked the whole [Union] defensive scheme of Plymouth” (pp. 248-49). Contrast these words of warm praise with the way Trotter describes Jefferson Davis as acting “from the depths of innermost perversity” (p. 337) when he sent Braxton Bragg to command at threatened Wilmington. Folks down at Davis’s museum and “presidential library” in Mississippi might not like Trotter’s attitude toward Davis very much, but it certainly makes the book entertaining.
Different chapters of Ironclads and Columbiads deal with, among other topics, the successful Union campaign against the Outer Banks of North Carolina; the burning by Union forces of the small town of Winton; the siege of Fort Macon, today a well-preserved fortification for modern-day visitors; the back-and-forth fighting over Plymouth, a small city that seems to have suffered considerably as it was occupied or re-occupied by one side or the other; the C.S.S. Albemarle and its successful sorties against Union naval forces, until it was destroyed in a daring commando operation led by U.S. Lieutenant William Baker Cushing; the wild atmosphere that prevailed in Wilmington when it became the last port of the Confederacy; and the campaign against Fort Fisher that closed the port of Wilmington and hastened the demise of the rebel cause. Other chapters, dealing as they do with relatively minor operations, may be of interest chiefly to the really serious Civil War antiquarian.
Trotter seems to sympathize with the Confederates, albeit in a subtle way. The Emancipation Proclamation does come up in the book, for example, but only in connection with a Unionist North Carolinian, Edward Stanly, who resigned as pro-Union governor of the state “in protest over the Emancipation Proclamation” (p. 151). Well! That certainly doesn’t draw a sympathetic picture of Unionists in North Carolina. Elsewhere, Trotter devotes an entire appendix to an attempt to absolve the Confederate victors at the Battle of Plymouth from a charge of having massacred African-American Union soldiers after the battle – a charge that appeared, most notably, in James McPherson’s popular and influential Battle Cry of Freedom (1988). And in the book’s concluding image, Trotter evokes “that proud morning when the C.S.S. Albemarle set forth to challenge one of the most powerful navies in the world, and for one brief moment of triumph ruled supreme on the inshore waters of North Carolina” (p. 410). How you feel regarding Trotter’s sympathies will no doubt rely on your own.
I first bought Ironclads and Columbiads on a family visit to Hatteras Island, and re-read it years later, on a weekend trip to Carolina Beach. On both occasions, it was a striking thing to look out at the peaceful ocean and reflect on how that gorgeous seaside panorama was once a scene of desperate military conflict. If you enjoy reading Civil War history, then Ironclads and Columbiads could provide a good accompaniment for your next visit to the North Carolina coast.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews