Raphael Semmes
1809
- 1877
Raphael Semmes was born in Charles County, Maryland, to Catherine Middleton Semmes and Richard Thompson Semmes, a tobacco farmer. His parents died while he was a child, so he was raised by two uncles. He received a private school education in Georgetown, with a brief stint at Charlotte Hall Military Academy. He became a midshipman in 1826 and entered active duty in 1832. On his first naval assignment, he traveled throughout the Caribbean and Mediterranean. During leaves of absences he studied law under his brother's tutelage and passed the Maryland bar in 1834. That same year he moved to Cincinnati, where in 1837 he married Anne Elizabeth Spencer. He was at sea for several years, then bought land in Alabama. He was indifferent to slavery but believed that the South economically suffered under Northern dominance.
Semmes served in
the Mexican War, participating in General Winfield Scott's arrival at Veracruz
and fighting at Cerro Gordo, Churubusco, and Chapultepec. In November 1847 he
went back to Alabama and wrote the popular Service Afloat and Ashore During the
Mexican War (1851). In 1856 he was appointed lighthouse inspector for the Gulf
of Mexico region, then was promoted to secretary of the Lighthouse Board in
Washington, D. C.
In January 1861
Semmes resigned from the U. S. Navy when Alabama seceded from the Union and was
assigned by Confederate President Jefferson Davis to purchase matériel and hire
mechanics to manufacture ordnance. After the capture of Fort Sumter, Semmes took
over command of the CSS Sumter, the only ship in the Confederate Navy at that
point. For six months under his helm it was a successful blockade runner,
capturing eighteen prizes. Forced to abandon the ship at Gibraltar, he purchased
the CSS Alabama from shipbuilders in neutral Britain. The swift and mighty
Alabama proved to be a highly effective vessel, seizing or destroying sixty-nine
Union ships over its career before being defeated by the USS Kearsarge in June
1864. After touring Europe, Semmes returned a hero to the Confederacy. Promoted
to rear admiral, he took command of the James River squadron that protected the
Confederate capitol of Richmond. Forced to flee when Richmond fell, he finally
surrendered to Union forces at Greensboro, North Carolina.
President Johnson
granted Semmes a pardon in May 1865, and he returned to Alabama. Upon landing at
Mobile, he was arrested on charges of international piracy by order of Navy
Secretary Gideon Welles. After three months in a Washington, D. C. jail, Semmes
was released when the charges against him were dropped. Elected as probate judge
of Mobile County, he was soon forced out of office by Radical Republicans. In
1866 he began teaching at Louisiana State Seminary, but political pressure again
compelled him to resign. He served briefly as editor of the Memphis Daily
Bulletin. Semmes returned to
Mobile, Alabama and practiced law. He
also published “Memoirs of Service Afloat During the War Between the
States.” Semmes died in Mobile,
on August 30, 1877.