When the US Civil War came to Williamstown

When Confederate ship Shenandoah sailed through the heads of Port Phillip Bay there was an explosion of excitement in the colony. And its captain wasted no time recruiting Melbournes to his cause.

Captain James Waddell was nothing but a pirate to some, and nothing but a hero to others.

A loyal Confederate through and through, he was regarded as one of the South’s finest naval tacticians and seafarers during the American Civil War.

He could strut the floor of a ballroom with the poise of any prim and proper gentleman, but when he walked the deck of a ship there was no doubt about his brutality.

In 1862, barely a year into the bloody four-year conflict, Waddell already had runs on the board as a Yankee killer.

He had commanded shore artillery in Virginia that ravaged US Navy ships, and by 1864 when one of the largest ships in the Confederate fleet, the Alabama, was sunk off France, Waddell was ordered to find a replacement and take it as his own command.

An illustration of one of Shenandoah’s raids in the Pacific, which devastated US ships. Picture: State Library of Victoria

That took Waddell to Liverpool in England where a purchasing agent found the perfect vessel, a three-masted, fully rigged ship with steam auxiliary power and a screw propeller.

The Confederate navy named her CSS Shenandoah and Waddell embarked on a bloody and controversial tour of the oceans, smashing US-flagged merchant ships and whaling vessels.

Ship after ship from the North Atlantic to the Southern Ocean were disabled by force, the crew taken prisoner or pressed into service in the Confederate Navy, and the vessel set on fire and left to sink.

Captain James Waddell of Shenandoah, and a 1860s newspaper article about the ship’s arrival at Williamstown. Picture: Trove

After one such operation in late 1864, in which a group of US whalers were left on an island and their supplies stolen by Shenandoah, Waddell and his crew had a problem.

The ship’s propeller was making a frightful noise and, on closer inspection, was found to be in desperate need of repair.

This far south, there was hardly anywhere that had the right dock for the job.

But Waddell had sailed almost every inch of the oceans, and he knew of a little place far east of the Shenandoah’s position that might take in a Confederate ship.

They could ride the winds east on sail power and make it to this little port just in time.

It was a port called Williamstown.

THE CIVIL WAR COMES TO MELBOURNE

Australia never officially took sides in the American Civil War.

The industrial revolution in Britain was hungry for cotton that flowed from plantations in the American South, many of which were worked by slaves.

For political and economic reasons, Britain remained neutral during the American Civil War, and therefore so did the colonies that would soon become Australia.

There was a general rule that British-run ports could not favour one side or the other, and could give material aid to neither.

That wasn’t exactly the case when Shenandoah sailed through the heads of Port Phillip Bay in January 1865.

Visitors on the deck of Shenandoah during her repairs at Williamstown. Picture: State Library of Victoria

The port authorities were reluctant to let her in, but after Waddell explained the propeller was busted, a pilot was sent to take her to Williamstown.

There was an explosion of excitement in the colony.

Thousands turned out to catch a glimpse of the Confederate ship, which was opened up to visitors.

The Confederate officers were treated like celebrities and the crew were shown every form of hospitality in Williamstown.

The area around Hobson’s Bay had built up rapidly during the gold rush and was now awash with hotels, bars and brothels.

While the crew got up to God-knows-what in the Melbourne seaside establishments, the Confederate officers were treated like royalty.

Captain Waddell, among other officers, was invited to dine with the colony’s elite in prestigious local clubs and a ball was thrown in their honour at Craig’s Hotel in Ballarat during which, as illustrations of the event suggest, the Confederate flag was openly displayed.

But there was a dissenting voice among the frivolity.

A newspaper illustration of a ball in Ballarat thrown for Confederate officers of Shenandoah. The Confederate flag can be seen in the background. Picture: State Library of Victoria

William Blanche was America’s Consul in Melbourne — the American North, that is — and insisted the Confederate ship be declared hostile and arrested.

Blanche had taken into his care a Yankee officer and his wife who had been imprisoned on Shenandoah.

The pair relayed tales of horror inflicted by Waddell and his crew on US ships.

By now Shenandoah had been hauled from the water and her propeller was being fixed in a government dock at Williamstown, but the repairs were dragging on and on.

Soon it became apparent there was another motive for staying in port a bit longer — Waddell was actively recruiting Melbourne locals to the Confederate Navy.

THE UNWELCOME GUESTS

When Blanche approached the Victorian Government with news the Confederates might be recruiting locals, it should hardly have come as a surprise.

With the peak of the gold rush long gone, there were plenty of idle men mulling about the ports, many of whom leapt at the chance of adventure.

A Melbourne magistrate ordered the Shenandoah be searched for stowaways and four men were pulled off the ship and arrested.

By now the Confederates had overstayed their welcome.

With the propeller repairs completed, they sailed back through the heads to continue their reign of terror on the seas.

But it is believed most of the stowaways were never found by Victorian authorities.

As many as three dozen are believed to have emerged on deck after Shenandoah sailed out, having successfully hidden in the ship or climbed on board later from small boats.

A cartoon lampooning Captain Waddell’s continued naval campaign long after the Civil War had ended, and a plaque at Williamstown commemorating the visit of Shenandoah.

Shenandoah went on to destroy another 29 US ships, but there was a serious problem.

Captain Waddell, having not heard about the defeat of the American South in April 1865, continued his savage sea attacks for months after the war ended.

Shenandoah effectively became a pirate ship without knowing it.

Upon hearing of the end of the Confederacy, Waddell lowered the flag and sailed to Britain.

In what is regarded by many as the final act in the war, Waddell walked up the steps of Liverpool Town Hall with a letter of surrender.

But it didn’t quite end there.

Because Shenandoah had escaped arrest in Williamstown while the officers and crew got drunk on Melbourne hospitality, a huge legal battle was fought between the victorious North and the British Empire.

A tribunal set up in 1871 in Geneva found Britain was responsible for the actions of Shenandoah after she left Williamstown because the colonial government had failed to arrest her.

For the hospitality shown to the Confederate Navy by the people of Melbourne, the British Empire was forced to pay more than US$15M, more than AU$175M in today’s money.

The story of the Shenandoah and her stay in Melbourne is memorialised at the Seaworks Maritime Precinct at Williamstown and a plaque rests near the dock where she was repaired.