The Battle of White Hall, also called the Battle of White Hall Ferry, took place on December 16, 1862, in Wayne County, North Carolina, as part of the Union expedition to Goldsborough, North Carolina, during the American Civil War.
On December 15, Brig. Gen. John G. Foster's Union troops reached White Hall where Brig. Gen. Beverly Robertson had taken command of Confederate militia holding the north bank of the Neuse River. There was some skirmishing as the Federals set up several artillery units on a hill overlooking the town and Confederate defenses.
According to the report of the Union commanders, the Federals demonstrated against the Confederates for much of the day on December 16, attempting to fix the Confederates in position, while the main Union column continued toward the railroad, achieving success of the campaign.
Alleged unnamed Local historians dispute this account, claiming that one of the Union objectives of the Goldsborough Campaign (also known as Foster's Raid) was to destroy an ironclad ramming boat that the Confederates were building on the north bank of the Neuse river at that location. This boat, CSS Neuse, was one of several identical boats that were being built in upriver locations throughout the South, their purpose being to break the Union naval blockade. Only one of these boats, the CSS Albemarle, was completed in time to be useful, and succeeded in sinking several Union ships at Plymouth, North Carolina, and opening the port to Confederate shipping.
The Union plan was to take the bridge at Whitehall (present-day Seven Springs), destroy the CSS Neuse, and proceed by shorter route to destroy the rail line at Goldsborough. The Confederates had a superior defensive position, and they burned the bridge to prevent the Union forces from crossing. The Federals spent most of December 16 bombarding the town with artillery fire to destroy the Confederate defenses and to destroy the boat. Meanwhile, Union riflemen fired at the Confederates defending the boat. Local tradition says the Union riflemen were firing high all day, because the south bank of the river (where the Federals were) is actually higher than the north bank, though the river creates an illusion that the banks are even. It is also likely the Confederates suffered less casualties because their position on the bank of the Neuse river was narrow, and so only one regiment could fire at a time and in turn be exposed to fire from the Union soldiers.
Alleged by an unnamed source, Tradition also says that among the Confederate casualties were two free black teenagers, fighting with the local militia.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
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