Thirty caches are located in five different regions throughout NC. Instructions for sending the documentation are in the passport. Once all five regions are completed, you have earned a special NC Civil War trackable geocoin. Mail the passport to the address inside the passport – then your passport will be returned with your unique coin.
All of the containers are the same - camouflaged 6 inch PVC tubes - the code word you need for your passport is inside the container on a laminated card and also taped on the container that holds the log sheet. Date your logbook and add your code word in the numbered area for the cache. As the containers may become over tightened, carry a TOTT to ease the opening process.
Passports will be available at the event, some Civil War Museums in NC, and via mail if you send me you address or you can download your passport here.
Battle of South Mills
Early in 1862, Union Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside led an expedition to secure the coast of North Carolina and occupy strategically important sites such as New Bern and Eliza-beth City. After Burnside learned of the March 9 clash between USS Monitor and CSS Virginia (formerly Merrimack) in Hampton Roads, Virginia, he became concerned that Confederate ironclads might attack his right flank from Virginia via the Dismal Swamp Canal.
He decided to destroy these locks and close the canal here. Burnside assigned Gen. Jesse L. Reno the task, and before dawn on April 19, Reno led a four gun battery and more than 3,000 men north from Elizabeth City. Three miles southeast of here, Reno encountered Confederate Col. Ambrose R. Wright’s 3rd Georgia Regiment and North Carolina militiamen (about 750 altogether) in a ditch behind a fence, obscured by burning brush in another ditch in front. A Confederate battery commanded the road. After several hours of skirmishing, Union Col. Rush C. Hawkins ordered his 9th New York Zouaves to charge the battery, but strong Confederate fire drove them back with heavy casualties. After more fighting, Wright withdrew to Joy’s Creek to await reinforcements and South Mills engagement on Dismal Swamp Canal more ammunition.
The Federals bivouacked on the field but marched back to Elizabeth City during the night when rumors of a counterat-tack reached Reno. The canal remained intact, the Confederates lost only 28 killed and wounded, and the Federals suffered 127 casualties. Reno’s claims to the contrary, South Mills was clearly a South-ern victory, but no Confederate ironclads ever used the canal and no serious threat was ever mount-ed to Burnside’s flank from Gen. Jesse Reno this direction. Col. Rush C. Hawkins, clad in the Zouaves’ colorful uniform.