Hampton Roads is a pretty amazing place. Besides being one of the most important ports on the East Coast, it’s also been a cradle for innovation.

While it was ever so critical for the Confederacy to maintain control of New Orleans, events elsewhere, especially in Tennessee, resulted in the city having inadequate defenses and naval support. 

Brigadier General Ambrose E. Burnside’s invasion of the North Carolina inland seas was a major success. In seven days, Burnside, with the support of Flag Officer L.M. Goldsborough’s naval forces, had captured Currituck, Albemarle, Roanoke, and Croatan Sounds. This placed Burnside’s army in a position to capture his next objective, New Bern, North Carolina.

There was no formal naval intelligence system established during the American Civil War. While a few examples exist of Northern sympathizers, free Blacks, like Mary Louvestre of Portsmouth, sent messages to various Union commanders about the Confederate ironclad construction effort.

Samuel Chapman Armstrong was the founder of Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute (now Hampton University). A native of Hawaii, he fought with the Union army during the Civil War.

Something we seldom mention here is the time we spend doing maintenance on large tanks in the Wet Lab as well as in the “Tank Farm”. This summer, we took care of three large tanks located outside and two large tanks inside the Wet Lab.

In this edition of Beyond the Frame, we'll explore Samuel Ward Stanton's narrative dual-ship portrait from 1909 featuring steamships Trojan and Rensselaer as the ships steam along the Hudson River under the light of a full moon. Explore the influences of the passionate artist's life and learn about the "Searchlight route" as we step into this scene in the summer of 1909.

So far, world events of 2020 and 2021 have been interesting, to say the very least. In the maritime world, a unique event occurred on March 23, 2021. If you watched the news that day and for many days following, you most likely heard about and saw how it unfolded. Can you guess what I’m talking about?