Siege of Fort Macon

Siege of Fort Macon
Part of the American Civil War
Ground-level color photograph (dated 2003) showing a portion of a wall of a building in the fort and the facing wall of the trench surrounding it.
Fort Macon, NC
DateMarch 23, 1862 (1862-03-23) – April 26, 1862 (1862-04-26)
Location
Carteret County, North Carolina
Result Union victory
Belligerents
United States (Union) CSA (Confederacy)
Commanders and leaders
John G. Parke
Samuel Lockwood[1]		 Moses J. White[1]
Units involved
3rd Division, Department of North Carolina
North Atlantic Blockading Squadron[1]		 Fort Macon Garrison [1]
Strength
3,259 total
2,649 present for duty [2]		 450 total
263 ready for duty [3]
Casualties and losses
2 killed
5 wounded
8 captured [4]		 8 killed
16 wounded
~400 captured[5]

The siege of Fort Macon took place from March 23 to April 26, 1862, on the Outer Banks of Carteret County, North Carolina. It was part of Union Army General Ambrose E. Burnside's North Carolina Expedition during the American Civil War.

In late March, Major General Burnside’s army advanced on Fort Macon, a casemated masonry fort that commanded the channel to Beaufort, 35 miles (56 km) southeast of New Bern. The Union force invested the fort with siege works and on April 25 opened an accurate fire on the fort, soon breaching the masonry walls. Within a few hours the fort's scarp began to collapse, and in late afternoon the Confederate commander, Colonel Moses J. White, ordered the raising of a white flag. Burnside's terms of surrender were accepted, and the Federal troops took possession of the fort the next morning.

  1. ^ a b c d Cite error: The named reference cwsac was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ ORA I, v. 9, p. 381
  3. ^ Trotter, Ironclads and columbiads, p. 141.
  4. ^ ORA I, v. 9, pp. 272, 281, 295.
  5. ^ ORA I, v. 9, p. 294.