65 www.ReadMPM.com | www.MountPleasantMagazine.com | www.MountPleasantPodcast.com BY SARAH ROSE Originally designed as a ferry to commute passengers up and down the coast of Maine and once a week into Boston, the steamship Harvest Moon was acquired by the U.S. Navy in 1864. Assigned to the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, the USS Harvest Moon prevented Confederate vessels from delivering supplies to the ports of Savannah, Charleston and Georgetown. SABOTAGE AT SEA According to historian Paige Sawyer, Admiral John Dahlgren was stationed on the Harvest Moon, which was in port when Charleston surrendered on Feb. 17, 1865. Upon hearing Georgetown was ready to capitulate as well, Dahlgren and his crew traveled on the Harvest Moon up the coast to the port city where they delivered surrender papers to town hall, declaring freedom for all enslaved people in Georgetown County. By the time the transaction was completed, it was too late in the day to return to home base in Charleston, so the ship anchored in nearby Winyah Bay off of Battery White, an abandoned Confederate fortification. Sawyer said that same evening, upstairs in the old Kaminski Hardware shop on Front Street, two Confederate soldiers were busy packing several mines with gunpowder. Under the cloak of darkness, on an outgoing tide, they rowed out into the bay and weighted the torpedoes 2 feet under the water’s surface. The next morning, on March 1, Dahlgren gave orders for the Harvest Moon to be dispatched to Charleston. The top of the smokestack that is still visible in Winyah Bay at low tide. Sunken HISTORY Shipwrecks of Georgetown County Photo by Paige Sawyer.
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