sail and regained contact at dawn, but the quarry had worked its way to windward. He ordered boilers fired, had the propeller lowered, took in royals and topgallants, and approached under steam. About 1 p.m., he raised English colors. The stranger replied with the U.S. flag or “the old gridiron” as Lieutenant Chew called it: “Then joy could have been seen depicted on each face. We were all desirous of seeing a ship destroyed at sea and especially when that destruction touches a Yankee pocket.” The Confederate flag replaced the English; the bark of the signal gun echoed across the water and, as required by international law, the vessel hove to for inspection.
Waddell lowered a boat and armed the crew under the direction of sailing master Bulloch. They were received at the gangway by the captain in his shirt sleeves, an informality Midshipman Mason considered to be “true Yankee style.” She was the bark Alina of Searsport, Maine, on her maiden voyage to Buenos Aires from Newport, Wales, with a cargo of railroad iron. Bulloch examined the ship’s papers, sent Alina’s captain and first mate to Shenandoah, lowered the U.S. flag, and waited impatiently for orders.
Lining observed from across the water, “I never saw greater excitement than was on board our ship when the Yankee flag came down, which showed us we had the first prize to Shenandoah.” Whittle was delighted to see the “emblem of tyranny” thus humbled. In accordance with his understanding of international law, Waddell assembled a board of officers in the wardroom as prize court. He sat as judge at the head with First Lieutenant Whittle and Alina’s master, Captain Everett Staples, to his left. Paymaster and captain’s clerk Breedlove Smith was on Waddell’s right, other officers filling the table. Whittle put the prisoner under oath and interrogated him concerning the vessel’s ownership, tonnage, and cargo.
The cargo of railroad iron was owned by an English firm, as specified on the bill of lading. Although Alina was a U.S. registered vessel, she had been loaded at a neutral port in Wales and was bound for another neutral port, Buenos Aires, with a cargo presumably owned by citizens of a neutral nation. The prize should have been bonded and released; they could not destroy the enemy ship without sacrificing neutral cargo. (A bond was formal written assurance that, in lieu of capture or destruction, the vessel’s owners would pay ransom equal to the value of ship and cargo. It would have been legal international debt had the Confederacy achieved independence.)
Here again, Raphael Semmes blazed the way. (In addition to his naval career, Semmes was an experienced lawyer and student of international law who first held prize courts on board Sumter in 1861 and again on Alabama.) He claimed to have never condemned a ship or cargo “without the most careful, and thorough examination of her papers, and giving to the testimony the best efforts of my judgment.” However, to justify destruction of ship and cargo, Semmes was at least as punctilious in finding ambiguity or inconsistency in the paperwork—efforts for which his enemies vociferously branded him a pirate.9
Yankee masters, in turn, applied every stratagem to avoid loss by hiding behind nebulous provisions of the law and false documents. One favorite trick was to have an official in a local British consulate certify the cargo belonged to one of their citizens, whether true or not. Upon examination of these certificates, Semmes pronounced them fraudulent and burned the ship. “The New York merchant is a pretty sharp fellow, in the matter of shaving paper, getting up false invoices, and ‘doing’ the custom-house; but the laws of nations . . . rather muddled his brain.” Semmes preserved records of the “Confederate States Admiralty Court” on Alabama to justify these decisions.10
Unfortunately for Captain Staples of Alina (named for his daughter), Waddell followed Semmes’ example. In this case, the cargo owner had not sworn before a magistrate that the iron was his property and that he was an Englishman; there was no seal and notary signature to that effect. The lack of this legal detail sealed the fate of the vessel. Waddell officially condemned her as a prize of the Confederate States of America. Upon hearing this, recorded Lieutenant Chew, the Yankee’s lips trembled. He remained silent for a time, then said, “[Captain], if you burn my ship you will make me a beggar. I have been going to sea for twenty three years. All my profits of these years of toil and danger are invested in that vessel.” Waddell replied, “It is a sad duty, but it is one I owe my government and my people. Think of the property destroyed, the orphans and widows made by the Yankee army.” With this, the hearing ended; the captain rose from the table and all followed.
Alina crewmen gathered personal property and were rowed over to Shenandoah. Lining boarded the prize: “Such a scene of indiscriminate plundering commenced as I never saw before or expect to again.” Grimball noted that she was brand new, in good order, and of good quality, “the prettiest barque I ever saw.” Everything that possibly could be of use was seized and put into boats. Waddell admitted that there were no people who understood the equipment of vessels so well as Yankee shipwrights. They carried off a variety of blocks, including ones suitable for the gun tackles, along with line and cotton canvas for sailmaking. Cabin doors were taken down, drawers from under bunks taken out, and furniture removed. Officers fitted themselves out with basins, pitchers, mess crockery, knives, and forks. Waddell obtained a spring-bottomed mattress. Chronometers and sextants were seized. The doctor recovered a store of canned meats for the wardroom as well as flour, bread, and other items.
They had not been working long when another vessel was sighted, possibly a Union warship, coming down from windward, “in which case the joke would be turned against us,” wrote Chew, now in charge on board the prize. Or maybe it was another Yankee merchantman. The captain wished to be ready in either case—chase or run. Chew received instructions to send over only valuable articles and to sink Alina immediately. The carpenter knocked a hole below the waterline and bored holes in the bottom with an auger. Boats scuttled back and were hoisted on board. Shenandoah steamed off, all attention focused on the strange sail.
The newcomer turned out to be a neutral vessel, so they turned back and saw Alina settling in the water. Mason stood on the poop watching, an entirely new spectacle for him. She was a beautiful little thing, he wrote, as neat as a pin. Yards were square, all sails set and sheeted home including royals and flying jib. At every pitch the doomed vessel seemed not to rise as much as before. At about 5 p.m., the sea reached deck level and swept over the stern. She pitched heavily once more and then reared up like a warhorse; thrust her bowsprit to the heavens; and, accompanied by a crescendo of cracking and tearing of rigging and sails, snapping lines, crashing masts, and tumbling and rumbling cargo, slipped straight out of sight, swallowed in an instant by the sea. As the bow went under, an enormous jet of water erupted into the air followed for some time by loose gear—hatch covers, blocks, spars, and flotsam—bursting the surface to splash among a boiling mass of wreckage.
“It was a grand and peculiar sight,” recorded Chew. “I was saddened at the thought of being in duty bound to such work. I felt very sorry for them even after thinking of the hellish work of the Yankees at home, of the tears they have wrung from once happy, beaming eyes. No, none of us took pleasure in it. None but fiends could.” Whittle described it as grand and awful: “You might go to sea for many a day and would not see a vessel sink. . . . She was in this position [like] a man going down for the first time and struggling to prevent it.” Lining wrote, “It was a beautiful, yet to me a melancholy sight, to see her go down, even though she was an enemy’s property. It is our duty to do it, & stern necessity alone makes it right.”
Alina’s captain watched to the last. The doctor could not help feeling sorry for him although he regretted it later: “[Captain Staples] was a black hearted rascal & will do us all the injury in his power. He showed a mean spirit during all his stay on board, for he was a real down-east Yankee.”
A sailor learns to love a ship as something almost animate, recalled Master’s Mate Cornelius E. Hunt: “To see one deserted in mid-ocean by her guardians and slowly settling in the unfathomable waters is like standing beside a deathbed to watch a soul sinking into the ocean of eternity. But I was fated to have a large experience in this direction
