This day 150 years ago in Rebel Raiders’ History
-Dedicated to Civil War episodes, battles, people and ships
that also appear in my game, GMT ’s Rebel Raiders on the High Seas.
December 3, 1863 – A Blockade Runner “Double Play” By USS Cambridge
Historical
Event: December 3, 1863 was a banner day for the Federal gunboat
USS
Cambridge. One of many civilian
steamships purchased and converted by the Navy into warships to man the
blockade, the USS Cambridge was on station with the North Atlantic Blockading
Squadron off Cape Fear when the schooner J.C. Roker tried to make her
run. The Rebel was brought to heel, and
her valuable cargo of salt confiscated.
Later that same day, the gunboat, under the command of W. A. Parker,
captured another blockade runner – the schooner Emma Turtle. All told, during the course of her four years
on station the USS Cambridge captured 11 Rebel blockade runners – one shy of a
dozen.
Game Connection: The USS Cambridge is one of
the many warships represented in Rebel Raiders on the High Seas by
the generic Gunboat counters, just
as the generic Blockade Runner
counters represent ships like those plucky Rebel schooners she ran down (some
of which were later outfitted and commissioned to join the USS Cambridge and her
sisters on station).
Although of under 900 tons and armed with only a pair of 8-inch rifles, in Rebel Raiders on the High Seas, as
in the real war, the Gunboats like USS
Cambridge play a vital role in frustrating Southern attempts to bring
war material and other vital supplies back home. In the game, the cargo they
carry if unloaded can be used to build warships and batteries, to buy cards
which convey strategic and tactical bonuses and to fund those counterattacks
which may regain key forts and cities that fall to the advancing Union armies.
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