S. P. Lee letter January 25, 1864

Report of Acting Rear-Admiral Lee, U.S. Navy, urging that the War Department be requested to restore to the Navy its magazine, etc. at Norfolk.
 Flagship Minnesota,

Off Newport News, Va., January 25, 1864.

Sir: Many years ago the Navy Department built, with appropriations made by Congress, a bombproof magazine, three fireproof buildings for filling rooms and storehouses, and another building for quarters on the site of old Fort Norfolk, an abandoned fort used by the Army during the war of 1812-1815. This magazine is surrounded by a wall, and has a railway leading to a stone wharf carried out to deep water, and with a crane for hoisting guns, all built by and for the Navy.

The rebels seized this magazine.  At the evacuation of Norfolk the naval magazine, like the naval hospital, fell into the possession of the Army.  The hospital, after much trouble, was restored to the Navy.  The necessities of the naval service now require the restoration of its magazine.  This the Army occupies.  In the magazine it has some powder and fixed ammunition, principally for fieldpieces, etc.  In the storehouses it has 150 or 200 prisoners of all sorts. There are no guns mounted there, and the rebel earthwork has been removed.

When the rebels occupied Norfolk the Navy was constrained to stow its powder in the bombproofs at Fortress Monroe and to establish a temporary naval depot there, keeping some of its ordnance supplies in vessels afloat.  The frigate St. Lawrence (kept at considerable expense) and two hulks( both of which leak, and when repaired are needed for storeships at Beaufort) are now used for naval ordnance off Fortress Monroe.

The Navy ordnance material is now inconveniently kept, and that part of it afloat is exposed to the machinations of the enemy.

Last summer and fall Norfolk and the navy yard were made very secure by a double line of fortifications.

General Butler now applies to have the ordnance depot moved from Fortress Monroe. It is no longer necessary to continue it there, where it is inconvenient to both services.
The naval bombproof and fireproof magazine and buildings and grounds below Norfolk afford all the accommodation the Navy requires.

It is my duty to make known the necessity of the service to the Navy Department, and to suggest that the War Department may be requested to restore to the Navy its magazine, buildings, and grounds.

I have the honor to be, sir, very respectfully, yours,

S.P. Lee,

Actg. Rear Admiral, Comdg. North Atlantic Blockading Squadron.

Hon. Gideon Welles,
 Secretary of the Navy, Washington D.C.

Fort Norfolk Documents

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Source of Information

OFFICIAL RECORDS OF THE UNION AND CONFEDERATE NAVIES IN THE WAR OF THE REBELLION PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF The Hon. JOHN D. LONG, Secretary of the Navy,  BY PROF. EDWARD K. RAWSON, US NAVY, Superintendent Naval War Records, and MR. CHARLES W. STEWART By authority of an Act of Congress approved July 31, 1894 SERIES I VOLUME 9 NORTH ATLANTIC BLOCKADING SQUADRON From May 5, 1863 to May 5, 1864 WASHINGTON GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 1899