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Edward Alfred Pollard, The lost cause; a new Southern history of the War of the Confederates ... Drawn from official sources and approved by the most distinguished Confederate leaders., Chapter 40: (search)
Grant to open still another base of operations towards Richmond, and with the capture of Wilmington, to effect an early communication with Sherman, and to sustain his march north by a co-operating column. Besides, it was important to get possession of Wilmington, as the most important sea-coast port left to the Confederates, through which to get supplies from abroad, and send cotton and other products out by blockade-runners. The Federal navy had been unable to seal the harbour, and Secretary Welles had been forced to confess, that fifty fast Federal steamers had been quite unable to maintain the blockade here. The theory of the enemy was that the nature of the outlet of Cape Fear River was such that it required watching for so great a distance, that without possession of the land north of New Inlet, or Fort Fisher, it was impossible for the navy to entirely close the harbor against the entrance of blockade runners. An expedition directed by Gen. Grant, in the close of December