title: The Rebel Raiders: The Astonishing History of the Confederacy's Secret Navy
author: James T. de Kay
description: DeKay (Monitor) here presents the drama of the Confederacy's commerce raiders, built in Great Britain early in the Civil War and designed to disrupt Northern trade and consequently divert the North's naval blockade of Southern cotton. He recounts the immensely successful efforts of Confederate purchasing agent James D. Bulloch to contract with English builders, focusing on the famous Alabama, launched in 1862 amid swirling controversy as the U.S. ambassador to England, Charles Francis Adams, tried unsuccessfully to convince the British administration to seize the ship. Captained by Raphael Semmes, the Alabama wreaked havoc on the Union merchant fleet, eventually seizing or destroying 66 vessels. Northern intelligence efforts had uncovered Bulloch's deceptions early on, and on June 19, 1864, the Alabama was finally sunk off Cherbourg, France, by the Union warship Kearsarge. Of equal importance is the postwar tale of the Alabama Claims, in which America's outrage over England's support of the South at times threatened war or reprisals against the British for the destruction of America's merchant marine. The claims were submitted to an international tribunal and England paid America a hefty $15 million in 1873. Although recent books on this subject (including Charles M. Robinson's 1995 book on the Alabama, among others) have already minutely detailed this topic, DeKay's engagingly written book is carefully and knowledgeably constructed, and will appeal to the uninitiated.<br />Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
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  Rebel Raider  
  
  
    
  
  
  This page formatted 2007 Blackmask Online.
  
  
  # Rebel Raider
  
  
  ### H. Beam Piper
  
  
  This page formatted 2007 Blackmask Online.
  
  http://www.blackmask.com  
    
  
  
  Produced by Greg Weeks, Sankar Viswanathan, and the Online Distributed
  Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Transcriber's Note:
  
  This etext was produced from “True: The Man's Magazine,” December  
  1950\. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.  
  copyright on this publication was renewed.
  
  
  Rebel Raider
  
  
  by H. Beam Piper
  
  * * * * * 
  
  It was almost midnight, on January 2, 1863, and the impromptu party at the
  Ratcliffe home was breaking up. The guest of honor, General J. E. B. Stuart,
  felt that he was overstaying his welcome—not at the Ratcliffe home, where
  everybody was soundly Confederate, but in Fairfax County, then occupied by the
  Union Army.
  
  About a week before, he had come raiding up from Culpepper with a strong force
  of cavalry, 