The _Fannie and Jennie_ was a side-wheel Confederate steamer of note,
engaged in running the blockade for about a year during the Four Years'
War. She was of good speed, fourteen knots, and was commanded, it is
said, by Captain Coxetter, of Charleston. During the night of February
9, 1864, she made the land to the northward of Wrightsville Beach,
but her pilot, Burriss, was not sure of his position, so he anchored
the ship and made a landing in the surf to ascertain his bearings.
It having been the intention of the captain to make the land about
two miles north of Fort Fisher, he then proceeded down the beach in
the darkness. Unhappily, however, she stood too close in shore, and
grounded repeatedly, and at about midnight stranded on a shoal a mile
or two to the southward of where Lumina now stands. At daylight she
was discovered by the Federal cruiser _Florida_, commanded by Capt.
Peirce Crosby, who made me a prisoner of war a few months later.
Captain Crosby, desiring to save the _Fannie and Jennie_ and realize
big prize money, ran a hawser from his ship to the stranded vessel,
intending to pull her off into deep water, when a Confederate flying
battery of Whitworth guns of long range, from Fort Fisher, opened fire
from Masonboro Beach, and with great precision cut off one of the
_Florida's_ paddle-wheel arms, broke a second one, and cut a rim of the
wheel in two; also, one of the Confederate shells exploded on board
the _Florida_ and came near destroying her. The _Florida_ returned the
fire, which so alarmed the captain and crew of the _Fannie and Jennie_
that some of them attempted to reach the beach in boats. In this
attempt Captain Coxetter and his purser were drowned in the breakers,
the others gaining the shore; the rest of the crew, twenty-five in
number, who remained on board were made prisoners by the Federals.
Captain Coxetter had in his keeping a very valuable gold jewelled
sword, which was to be delivered to Gen. R.E. Lee as an expression of
the admiration of many prominent English sympathizers. It is still on
board this wreck, which lies near a line of breakers to the south of
Lumina. The _Fannie and Jennie_ was loaded with a valuable cargo, five
days out from Nassau bound to Wilmington, when she was stranded.