“three or four feet of slimy mud” — Norfolk Commemorative Silver Half Dollar Coin

Today, the Norfolk Commemorative Silver Half Dollar Coin remembers the Battle of Craney Island on June 22, 1813.

The British plan should have been successful. It wasn’t, and the Americans had no losses.

From the History of the United States of America During the Second Administration of James Madison by Henry Adams, published in 1890:

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Whatever incompetence or neglect was shown elsewhere, Norfolk was under the command of able officers in both services, who neglected no means of defense.

General Wade Hampton had fortified the interior line immediately below the town, where two strong forts were constructed under the direction of Captain Walker Keith Armistead of the Engineers, the first graduate of the West Point Academy in 1803.

Five miles below these forts, where the river widened into Hampton Roads, Brigadier-General Robert Taylor of the Virginia militia, and Captain John Cassin commanding at the navy-yard, established a second line of defense, resting on Craney Island on the left, supported by fifteen or twenty gun boats moored across the channel.

A battery of seven guns was established on the island covering the approach to the gunboats, so that the capture of the island was necessary to the approach by water. The force on the island consisted of about seven hundred men, of whom less than a hundred were State troops. The rest were infantry of the line, riflemen, seamen, and marines.

The town and forts were strongly garrisoned, and a large body of State militia was constantly on service.

To deal with the defenses of Norfolk, Admiral Warren brought from Bermuda, according to newspaper account, a detachment of battalion marines eighteen hundred strong; three hundred men of the One Hundred-and-second regiment of the line, commanded by Lieut-Colonel Charles James Napier, afterward a very distinguished officer; two hundred and fifty chasseurs, or French prisoners of war who had entered the British service; and three hundred men of the royal marine artillery, — in all, two thousand six hundred and fifty rank-and-file, or about three thousand men all told, besides the sailors of the fleet.

At that time no less than thirteen sail of British ships, including three ships-of-the-line and five frigates, lay at anchor within thirteen miles of Craney Island.

The attack was planned for June 22.

The land forces were commanded by Sir Sydney Beckwith, but the general movement was directed by Admiral Warren. The main attack, led by Major-General Beck with in person, was to land and approach Craney Island from the rear, or mainland; the second division, under command of Captain Pechell of the flag ship “San Domingo,” 74, was to approach the island in boats directly under fire of the American guns on the island, but not exposed to those in the gunboats.

The plan should have succeeded. The island was held by less than seven hundred men in an open earthwork easily assaulted from the rear.

The water was so shallow as to offer little protection against energetic attack.

The British force was more than twice the American, and the plan of attack took from the gunboats the chance of assisting the land-battery.

At daylight on the morning of June 22 Beckwith, with about eight hundred men, landed on the main shore outside of Craney Island, and pushed forward to take the island in the rear.

Soon afterward Captain Pechell, with about seven hundred men in fifteen boats, approached the island from the northwest along the shore, far out of the reach of the gun boats.

Toward eleven o’clock the British boats came within range of the American battery on the island.

Contrary to the opinions of several officers, Captain Pechell insisted on making the attack independently of Beckwith’s approach, and pushed on.

Two or three hundred yards from land the leading boats grounded in shoal water.

Apparently the men might have waded ashore; but “one of the seamen, having plunged his boat-hook over the side, found three or four feet of slimy mud at the bottom;” the leading officer’s boat being aground was soon struck by a six- pound shot, the boat sunk, and himself and his crew, with those of two other launches, were left in the water.

The other boats took a part of them in, and then quickly retired.

The affair was not improved by the fortunes of Sir Sydney Beckwith, who advanced to the rear of Craney Island, where he was stopped by creeks which he reported too deep to ford, and accordingly re-embarked his troops without further effort; but the true causes of the failure seemed not to be understood.

Napier thought it due to the division of command between three heads, Warren, Cockburn, and Beckwith ; but incompetence was as obvious as the division of command.

Admiral Warren’s official report seemed to admit that he was also overmatched: — ” Upon approaching the island, from the extreme shoalness of the water on the seaside and the difficulty of getting across from the land, as well as the island itself being fortified with a number of guns and men from the frigate [‘Constellation’] and the militia, and flanked by fifteen gunboats, I considered, in consequence of the representation of the officer commanding the troops of the difficulty of their passing over from the land, that the persevering in the attempt would cost more men than the number with us would permit, as the other forts must have been stormed before the frigate and dockyard could be destroyed. I therefore directed the troops to be re-embarked.”

On neither side were the losses serious.

The American battery inflicted less injury than was to be expected.

Fifteen British boats containing at least eight hundred men, all told, remained some two hours under the fire of two twenty-four-pound and four six- pound guns, at a range differently estimated from one hundred to three hundred yards, but certainly beyond musketry fire, for the American troops had to wade out before firing.

Three boats were sunk; three men were killed, and sixteen were wounded. Sixty-two men were reported missing, twenty-two of whom came ashore from the boats, while forty deserted from Beckwith’s land force.

The Americans suffered no loss.

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The Norfolk Commemorative Silver Half Dollar Coin shows with a map of the Battle of Craney Island.

Norfolk Commemorative Silver Half Dollar Coin