Hidden History of Old Charleston by Margaret Middleton Rivers Eastman

Author:Margaret Middleton Rivers Eastman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing Inc.
Published: 2012-11-02T16:00:00+00:00

On July 31, 1892, the New York Times published an article entitled “Read the Union Signals, Mr. Lowndes Valuable Services to the Confederacy.” It describes an interview with T. Pinckney Lowndes at a dinner welcoming the North Atlantic squadron to Charleston. Excerpts are quoted below:

Mr. Lowndes…was in the opinion of men who know, one of the most expert signal officers the Confederacy possessed. His service was confined almost entirely to the operations in and about Charleston, and in the duty he performed in Fort Sumter and in the batteries on Sullivan’s Island and John’s Island, his remarkable expertness in intercepting and deciphering the Union signals blocked many a plan which need only secrecy of preparation to assure success.

The first Union signal intercepted by Lowndes was a wig-wag message from the new ironsides iron-clad to Morris Island…from Admiral Dahlgren to General Gillmore. The message related to the massing of the small boats of the fleet in Lighthouse inlet for the conveyance of troops to a designated point on Morris Island. It was read by Lowndes from Fort Sumter. The distinction of first intercepting a Union signal cast on the enterprising officer the responsible as well as arduous duty of watching on the parapet of Fort Sumter without relief for four days and nights consecutively.

When asked by the Times correspondent, Mr. Lowndes said that the first key to the Federal signals was obtained through a ruse practiced upon some Federal signal men captured on John’s Island. A confederate officer, Major K. Pliny Bryan, was placed among the prisoners disguised as one of their own people. Shortly afterward, a supposed key was furnished to Lowndes, which after a few corrections, unraveled the mystery of the Federal signals…The most difficult part of interpreting signals, Mr. Lowndes declared, was the determining whether the signal operator had his face or back to him. It necessitated a double reading often, in order to insure the obtaining of something tangible.

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