Battery White

About this property

Battery White was an artillery battery constructed by the Confederates during the American Civil War. Built in 1862–63 to defend Winyah Bay on the South Carolina coast, the battery was strongly situated and constructed; however, it was inadequately manned, and was captured without resistance during the final months of the war. The battery is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. It is located on private land, but is open to the public. Even before the outbreak of the Civil War, the secessionist government of South Carolina was concerned with the possibility of attack by sea in Georgetown County. Shortly after the December 20, 1860, passage of the Ordinance of Secession, an aide-de-camp to governor Francis Pickens urged Lowcountry planters to "aid in the erection of Batteries to protect and defend the entrance of Winyah Bay and the Santee River". The area offered a tempting target to Union forces. Winyah Bay would furnish a sheltered anchorage large enough for the entire United States Navy of 1861. The city of Georgetown on the bay was the largest on the South Carolina coast north of Charleston. Georgetown County produced nearly half of the rice grown in the United States, amounting to some 54 million pounds (24,000 tonnes) in 1860; Georgetown exported more rice than any other port in the world. This production and shipping could be disrupted by gunboats moving up the Black, the Pee Dee, the Waccamaw, and the Sampit rivers, which flow into the bay; and the two distributary channels of the Santee River, whose mouths lie just below the bay. Curtailing rice production would not only damage the local economy, but would impair the Confederacy's ability to feed its armies. In May 1861, General P. G. T. Beauregard ordered the development of coastal defenses for South Carolina, including batteries situated on three islands flanking the mouth of Winyah Bay: North Island, South Island, and Cat Island. The Federal capture of Port Royal in November 1861 lent urgency to the construction and improvement of these works, which was done under Robert E. Lee, the newly appointed commander of the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and East Florida, with Colonel Arthur Middleton Manigault in charge of the district that included Georgetown and Horry counties. The island fortifications were never tested against a major Union attack. However, they served a useful purpose in dealing with grounded ships, both Confederate and Federal; in protecting the entrance to the bay; and in maintaining Confederate possession of the islands. Matters changed in early 1862. In March of that year, Lee was recalled to Richmond as military advisor to President Jefferson Davis. He was replaced by General John C. Pemberton, who ordered the withdrawal of troops and artillery from the positions around Georgetown, apparently in order to concentrate his limited manpower on shorter defensive lines.

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Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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