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Book Description

Campaign for the Confederate Coast

The Federal blockade of the Confederate coast during the American Civil War (1861-1865) did not cause the ultimate Federal victory, but it contributed to that victory to a significant degree. The Federal blockade deterred much of the commerce that might have flowed into the Confederacy, but it also created a profit opportunity for those willing to accept the risk of running the blockade. Although blockade running sustained the Confederates’ ability to continue the battle for four years, the effect of this economic warfare substantially weakened the armies upon which the Confederate assertion of independence rested.

In this highly informative book, readers will learn the story of blockade running from a nuanced, all-points-of-view perspective. Without recounting hundreds of encounters between pro-Confederate blockade runners and Federal blockading forces, it traces the ebb and flow of events as the U.S. Navy, blockade runners and foreign governments (primarily the British) all pressed for advantage. At first unable to detect blockade runners, the Federals developed tactics that made them increasingly effective at making captures, although they did not eliminate blockade running altogether until they captured the principal Confederate ports. To compete with the rapidly growing Federal Blockading Squadrons, the Confederates waged asymmetrical warfare in coastal waters using mines and torpedo boats to destroy the blockaders and deter their aggressiveness, and they attempted to draw Federal resources away from the blockading by sending commerce raiders to prey upon U.S. flag vessels on the high seas.

Gil Hahn is an attorney and historian who grew up in Washington, DC, near Battery Kemble, one of the ring of forts defending the Federal capital, and also within easy touring range of many Civil War battlefields in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania.

He works part time at the Hagley Museum in Wilmington, Delaware, which preserves the original DuPont gunpowder factory, and where he demonstrates and explains the operation of nineteenth century industrial equipment, including the steam engine.

Mr. Hahn was educated at Dartmouth College, Vanderbilt Law School, and Columbia Business School. He has been employed as a lawyer in various capacities, and in various jurisdictions, since 1978. He has an abiding interest in American History, Military History, and the History of Technology.

Hahn’s first book, Four Score and Four: America in 1860, which analyzes political events and military resources alongside social, cultural, economic, and technological circumstances of the time, is undergoing a revision. A new edition will be forthcoming.

Gil lives near Wilmington, Delaware, with his wife and their three cats, which they have dubbed The Cat Nation. This unique nation comprises Mister, a feline incarnation of Ferdinand the Bull; Tabitha, a perpetually skinny cat; and Caliban, who is a suspicious, orange, female ninja.

Gil and his wife have an adult daughter who works as an architect on the West Coast.  She energizes Gil’s social conscience.