The Daily Southerner, Tarboro, NC

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September 23, 2009

Did you know the Confederacy had a navy?

W. TERRY SMITH

Chris Grimes feels it's important people know more about a "small part" of the Civil War, and how important it was in Eastern North Carolina.

"I've had people look at me and say, 'I didn't know the Confederacy had a navy,'" Grimes said.

The Roper resident will be in full costume as a Confederate submarine sailor Saturday at Tarboro's History Day celebration on the Blount-Bridgers House grounds. "You get to see exactly how sailors and their officers would dress during the time period" when he and others like him come in their full gear, he said.

He'll also bring along with him diagrams of how the "ironclads" used by the South were constructed.

Grimes noted that many of the Confederacy's submarines, including the CSS Albemarle, were constructed in Eastern North Carolina. A sister sub to the Albemarle was being built in Tarboro by designer Gilbert Elliott. But Grimes said Union forces occupied the town and burned that sub before it could be completed.

The Albemarle was one of the "smaller" submarines that made it into action, he said. It was 159 feet long, 34 feet wide and had an 8 foot draft. The ironclad weighed 320 tons, carried two guns that fired 90-pound rounds, and was manned by a crew of 60-80 men.

"I've got a copy of the original plans" of that particular sub, he added.

In the larger subs, like the 260-foot-long CSS Virginia, Grimes said confederate officers "would have piled hundreds (of men) on top of each other" within the submarines, "especially if they were volunteers."

All together, Grimes estimated that 22 confederate submarines saw action during the Civil War, while the Union used 60-plus submarines.

He will also have with him Saturday a "cutaway of the inside" of the South's submarines, showing the outer layer of iron and the several layers of wood that would be on the inside of it.

Grimes will also discuss the weaponry used by the submarines, including the rounds they would fire from their guns, but also the stationary mines that were commonly used at the time.

He is one of the founders of the reenactment group the Carolina Living History Guild, one of around 20 members currently involved with it.

While he has been involved in Civil War reenactments like many of his guild members, Grimes said that when it comes to an event like History Day, "I like the teaching aspect of it" when brining up history.

Through his efforts to bring more "exposure" to the naval portion of Civil War history, "I feel like there is a need to fill that gap" in knowledge.

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