The Union warship W.G. Anderson encountered the Confederate privateer Beauregard a hundred miles north-east of the Abaco Islands in the northern Bahamas.  The Beauregard, a schooner, had been granted letters of marque in Montgomery, Alabama on October 14, 1861 but had not yet done any damage to Union shipping.  Poorly armed, the privateer surrendered without a fight and the vessel, with its mostly Irish-born crew of twenty-seven, was taken to Key West in Florida, arriving on November 20, 1861.  (By John Osborne)

At the English port of Liverpool, just after mid-day, a private telegram brought the first news to Britain that U.S. Navy units had intercepted and boarded the Royal Mail packet Trent in the Caribbean and seized the two Confederate commissioners bound for Europe on November 8, 1861.  Outrage was immediate in the city and a large and heated meeting of cotton importers was held at the Liverpool Exchange in the afternoon.  (By John Osborne) 

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)  

The U.S. Navy bought aging whaling ships in New England with the goal of sinking them, loaded with stone, to block the channels of Southern harbors. The assembled fleet sailed from Port Royal, South Carolina bound for Charleston Harbor.  There, they were deliberately 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)  

The U.S. Navy had been buying aging whaling ships in New England since September 1861 with the goal of sinking them, loaded with stone, in the channels of Southern harbors to facilitate the blockade. On November 2, 1861, a large group of these vessels sailed from New Bedford in Massachusetts.  They, with other ships, assembled at Port Royal and then sailed to Charleston Harbor where they were sunk under the direction of Captain Charles Henry Davis December 19-20, 1861.  Herman Melville later commemorated the fleet in verse. (By John Osborne)  

Ethelinda Eliot Beers wrote the poem "The Picket Guard" in September 1861 and it was published in Harper's Weekly Magazine on November 30, 1861 under the initials "E.B."  Southerner John Holl Hewitt put the words to music and published the song in Columbia, South Carolina in 1862 and it became popular on both sides of the conflict  The Confederate soldier Lamar Fontaine claimed credit for the lyrics and although disputed ever since, evidence indicates that Beers was the actual author of the original poem.  (By John Osborne) 

The Belgian railroad company, Compagnie de Chemin de Fer de Liége á Maastricht, completed and opened the railway link between Liège in Belgium and Maastricht in southern Holland. (By John OSborne)

The firm of Seville, Denbigh, and Hobbs completed the laying of the underwater cable in Charleston Harbor linking Fort Moultrie with Fort Sumter.  The event was commemorated with the firing of a combined salute from the forts, ordered over the new communication.  (By John Osborne)