Mark Costin on “The Battle of Fort Fisher”

By late 1864 virtually every Southern port on the Atlantic seaboard besides Wilmington, NC, had been closed by the Federal blockade. As long as Wilmington remained open, blockade runners could continue to supply the Confederate forces in the eastern theater. South of Wilmington the Confederate army constructed some of the world’s most sophisticated fortifications for the time. A key fortress was Fort Fisher. This talk discusses the two two joint army-navy combined operations to take Fort Fisher and close the port of Wilmington. The first unsuccessful one in December 1864 and the second successful attack in January 1865.

As an added note, the presentation will include a brief biography of Robley Dunglison Evans, who was at Fort Fisher and later became a prominent admiral in the US Navy and participated in the Battle of Santiago de Cuba in the Spanish American War.

Mark Costin is an engineer living in Sunnyvale, CA, recently retired from working on functional safety for automated and autonomous vehicles. A long time history buff, Mark now has more time to devote to his hoppy. He holds a Ph.D. in Systems Engineering from Case Western Reserve University, an M.Eng from McMaster University, and B.Eng from McGill University.