The U.S. Navy's "Stone Fleet" is deliberately sunk in the channels of Charleston Harbor

The U.S. Navy purchased aging whaling ships in New England with the goal of sinking them, loaded with stone, in the channels of Southern harbors to facilitate the blockade. The assembled fleet sailed from Port Royal, South Carolina bound for Charleston Harbor.  There, they were sunk in the harbor channels under the direction of former Coastal Survey officer Captain Charles Henry Davis. Success at closing the harbor was only partial and further sinkings took place in 1862.  Herman Melville later commemorated the fleet in verse. (By John Osborne)