At 4 P.M. on April 17, 1864, an advanced Union patrol on the Washington Road was captured by Confederate cavalry. A company of the 12th N. Y. Cavalry attacked the Confederates, but was repulsed. Soon a large force of Confederate infantry appeared on the Washington Road, and at the same time Fort Gray, two miles above Plymouth on the river bank, was attacked by advanced Confederate infantry. During the evening skirmishing continued from the Washington Road to the Acre Road. Union General Henry W. Wessells' garrison of about 3,000, which had held Plymouth since December, 1862, was under attack by General Robert F. Hoke's Division of over 5,000 men.
At 5:30 A.M. on April 18, a heavy Confederate artillery fire was directed against Fort Gray. Both Fort Gray and Battery Worth in Plymouth returned the fire. Soon a Union gunboat, the Bombshell, was disabled by the Confederate barrage.
At 6:30 P.M. on the 18th the Confederates advanced their line and began an infantry assault upon the Union position; but this attack was abandoned at 8 P.M. The 85th Redoubt was then attacked and captured at 11 P.M.
At 3 A.M. on April 19, the Confederates again attacked Fort Gray. Soon the Confederate iron-clad ram Albemarle, aiding the army, passed undetected down the river. The Albemarle engaged the Southfield and the Miami at 3:30 A.M., sinking the former and driving the latter away. The Albemarle then began to shell the Union defenses.
On April 19 the Confederates opened fire on the Union line from the 85th Redoubt. Fort Williams and Battery Worth returned the fire. Heavy skirmishing continued all day. At 6:30 P.M. the Confederates crossed Coneby Creek in an unexpected advance. Their infantry were now in an important position east of Plymouth. At 5 A.M. on April 20, the Confederates under General Matt W. Ransom assaulted the Union line east of Plymouth, while General Hoke, with two brigades, demonstrated against the Union right. After capturing the Union defenses east of Plymouth, the Confederates halted their advance and re-formed. Union infantry counter-attacked, but were repulsed by a renewed Confederate advance. In spite of determined resistance by the garrison of Fort Williams, the town was surrendered by General Wessells at 10 A.M.
The capture of Plymouth by the Confederates was significant for many reasons. It returned two rich eastern North Carolina counties to the Confederacy. It also supplied "immense ordnance stores" to the Southern war effort. The Roanoke River was also reopened to Confederate commerce and military operations. Plymouth's fall also resulted in a massacre.
The 40 to 300 Black soldiers and Unionists, as well as other Black people freed by the Emancipation Proclamation, present at the Battle of Plymouth were in particular danger after Wessell’s surrender. According to a March 1864 Charlotte Daily Bulletin article, “Ransom’s brigade never [took] any negro prisoners. Our soldiers would not even bury the negros–they were buried by the negros.” Confederate government had no absolute policy for Black prisoners of war. As such, the fate of captured Black soldiers and Unionists was decided by the capturing soldiers. The treatment Black prisoners ranged from being “restored to their” enslavers or being killed upon capture. Confederate policy did state that they were not to be treated as “prisoners of war” as white Unionists or white Union soldiers were. Massacres of Black soldiers and civilians occurred during the Civil War. Confederate soldiers had massacred Black soldiers at Fort Pillow, Tennessee only eight days prior to the Battle of Plymouth. Black soldiers and emancipated people displaced by the fall of Fort Williams were treated similarly. Accounts from both Black Unionists, like that of Sergeant Samuel Johnson (Company D, Second U.S. Colored Cavalry), and Confederate occupants, like that published in the May 3, 1864 edition of the Raleigh Daily Confederate, conclude that Confederate soldiers massacred Black captives during and after the battle. Death tolls range as high as 600 and include Black Unionists, Union soldiers, emancipated laborers, and women and children.
References:
Barrett, John Gilchrist. The Civil War in North Carolina. University of North Carolina Press, 1963.
Barefoot, Daniel W. General Robert F. Hoke: Lee's Modest Warrior. Blair Publishers: 1996.
Brogue, Hardy Z. "Confederate Victory at Plymouth." Confederate Veteran, November-December 1991.
Elliott, Robert G. Ironclad of the Roanoke: Gilbert Elliott's Albemarle. White Mane Publishers: 1994.
“Gen. Ransom’s Expedition.” The Daily Bulletin (Charlotte, N.C.), March 18, 1864. https://newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn84020701/1864-03-18/ed-1/seq-1/ (accessed August 23, 2023).
Jordan, Weymouth T., and Gerald W. Thomas. “Massacre at Plymouth: April 20, 1864.” The North Carolina Historical Review 72, no. 2 (1995): 125–97. https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/23521768.pdf (accessed August 23, 2023).
Moss, Juanita Patience. Battle of Plymouth North Carolina (April 17-20 1864): The Last Confederate Victory. Heritage Books. 2009.
Newsome, Hampton. The Fight for the Old North State: The Civil War in North Carolina January-May 1864. University Press of Kansas. 2019. https://research.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=707a5c87-1092-318b-8a6d-fe3585a32380 (accessed October 31, 2024).
“The Plymouth Battles.” The Daily Confederate (Raleigh, N.C.), May 3, 1864. https://newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn83025813/1864-05-03/ed-1/seq-2/ (accessed August 23, 2023).
Trotter, William R. The Civil War in North Carolina: Ironclads and Columbiads. Blair Publishers: 1989.
