Rebel "Pirates" in Panama

Atlantic Confederate Privateer Florida and the USS Wachusett

The steamer Salvador was the second failed attempt by the Confederacy to conduct privateering in the Pacific.  Back in January, I posted the story of “Rebel Pirates” and the Chapman—the first futile effort.  Let’s take a closer look at the second attempt, the rebel attempt to seize the merchant steamer Salvador, which was owned by the Panama Railroad Company.  How confident these rebel “pirates” must have been.  They had a secret plan, the required gear, and the approval of the Confederate government. 

At the direction of the Secretary of the Confederate Navy, Confederate agents were authorized to seize a vessel and convert it into a Confederate cruiser preying on American commerce in the Pacific.[1]  The conspirators hatched the plan in Havana, Cuba.  The plan called for them to take the steamer Guatemala; the steamer Salvador was the backup target. 

The pirates arrived at Aspinwall (now known as Colón) on the Royal Mail steamer Tamar on 25 October 1864.  Aspinwall was founded by Americans in 1850 as the Caribbean terminal of the railroad that transversed the isthmus.  The railroad, completed in 1855, accommodated passengers traveling between America’s east and west coasts.

Little did the swaggering pirates know that American intelligence sources had uncovered the plot and alerted Union officials.  In Cuba, the State Department employed a network of spies that reported on Confederate blockade runners and raiders, as well as illicit slave traders.  U.S. diplomat Thomas Savage served as the Vice Consul General in Havana from 1858 to 1868.  On 3 October 1864, Savage warned the U.S. Consul in Panama, Alex McKee, of the “long-concocted plan for the seizure of our steamer running from that port to San Francisco.”[2]  On 21 October, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles shared Savage’s report with Acting Rear Admiral Charles Bell, Commander of the Pacific Squadron.  The USS Lancaster, a side-wheel, 26-gun sloop-of-war, was Bell’s flag ship.

The War Department had also gleaned intelligence of the pirate plot.  Journalist Charles A. Dana was appointed Assistant Secretary of War in 1864.  He used his intuition and network to become a confidant of President Lincoln.  Dana “organized a Secret Service force which became most efficient in the detection of frauds and disloyal practices against the government.”[3]  Dana learned of “a party of rebels at Havana have undertaken to seize a steamer running between San Francisco and Idaho.”  On 9 October, Dana reported the conspiracy to Major General Irvin McDowell, Commander of the Department of the Pacific.  Dana provided names and information on the rebels’ intent to rendezvous in Idaho on 15 November.[4]

On 10 November 1864, the pirates walked the metaphorical plank.  Disguised as civilian passengers, the rebels boarded the Salvador in Panama City.  Apparently, the pirates did not notice what other passengers had observed—two USS Lancaster’s gigs and boarding parties lying in wait. 

The Salvador’s crew directed the embarking passengers to the main saloon to validate their tickets and assign their berthing.  Reportedly, the pirate chief told the skipper of the Salvador that he “would present him with a pair of bracelets before arriving at their destination up the coast” in honor of his forthcoming wedding.[5]

Waiting in the saloon were U.S. Navy Captain Henry Kellock Davenport, Commanding Officer of the USS Lancaster, and a contingent of 60 Marines led by David M. Cohen, Captain of Marines.  Davenport read the passenger list.  The suspects were identified and separated.  Lancaster Marines and sailors searched the suspects and their luggage.  They seized:  letters of marque and commissions from the Confederate government, switchblade knives, pistols, nautical charts, and confederate flags.  They discovered the Salvador’s crew list and two-dozen pairs of handcuffs and opium, which the pirates intended to use to drug the captain and officers of the Salvador.  They found an oath of secrecy signed by twenty conspirators.

Seven conspirators were transferred to the USS Lancaster:  Confederate Ship Master Thomas Egenton Hogg (also known as (aka) William Eason); Confederate Midshipman Edward A. Swain (aka J. Young, second in command); Engineer John S. Hiddle; Robert B. Lyon; T. J. Gray (aka Thomas Malloy); Assistant Paymaster William L. Black; and Joseph Higgin. 

Admiral Bell intended to ship the rebels to New York, but the President of Panama refused to allow the U.S. to transport the prisoners across the isthmus.  Instead, Bell sent them to the naval base at Mare Island in the San Francisco Bay.  In response to Consul McKee’s opinion that the Panamanian President is a friend of the U.S., Bell said “save me from my friends.”[6]

A Military Commission convened in San Francisco on 22 May 1865, a month after the Confederate surrender at Appomattox.  Colonel Edward McGarry, 2d Cavalry California Volunteers, presided.  The seven defendants, engaged by the “so-called Confederate States,” were charged with violations of the laws and usages of civilized war.[7] 

Frank Morrison Pixley—a well-known, somewhat eccentric, San Francisco attorney—defended the pirates on principle.  Pixley had served in the California state legislature (1859-1860) and as California’s Attorney General (1861 to 1863).  He maintained an office in San Francisco’s Exchange Building, workplace of many attorneys and stockbrokers.  He lived on his estate in Cow Hollow and employed two domestics and a coachman.[8]  Although Pixley disparaged the “rebels mad effort to destroy the Government of the United States,”[9] after the trial he wrote, “the privilege of counsel…is guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States...  The duty of counsel to persons accused of crime is settled as a question of ethics by the best authorities of England and America… ”[10] 

The crux of Pixley’s defense strategy was that no crime had been committed at all since the defendants did not succeed in seizing the Salvador.  Therefore, the Military Commission had no jurisdiction in the case.[11]  Others contended that privateering "was a stratagem in war perfectly allowable under the laws and usages of civilized war" and therefore allowable.

The pirates did not help their case.  During the trial, they boasted that they desired to share the honors of the Confederate Navy that "had swept the ocean, lit battle fires in many a sea, and illumined the darkness of night with many a burning wreck."   Mayhem and bounty were clearly their goals.[12]

Despite Pixley’s robust defense, on 3 June 1865, the military court sentenced the seven defendants to be hung by the neck.  General McDowell quickly mitigated the sentences, reasoning that an attempt to commit a crime should not be punished with same severity as an actual commission.  The defendants were sentenced to confinement in the State penitentiary, at San Quentin.  Hogg was sentenced for the term of his natural life.  The other six received ten-year sentences.[13]  In April 1866, President Andrew Johnson released the seven privateers.[14]

Newspaper coverage of the trial varied.  One referred to the pirates as the “Hogg litter.”[15]  Another said, “Mr. Pixley who so ably and chivalrously defended the alleged ‘pirates’ at a time when few members of the San Francisco bar had the moral courage” to do so.[16]

Timely intelligence enabled U.S. authorities to easily thwart the Salvador plot.  Throughout the American Civil War, the Confederates failed to execute privateer operations in the Pacific.


[1] Letter dated 9/16/1865 from the Secretary of War to the President (accessed on 11/27/2022, https://ehistory.osu.edu/books/official-records/121/0751).

[2] Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies on the War of the Rebellion: Operations of the Cruisers—Union, p 302.

[3] James Harrison Wilson, The Life of Charles A. Dana, 1907, p. 185.

[4] C. A. Dana letter to Major General McDowell, 10/9/1864. 

[5] Daily Alta California, 11/29/1864, p. 1 cols 5, 6, 7; Marysville Daily Appeal, 11/20/1864, p 3 col 2

[6] New York Times, 12/5/1864, p. 8.

[7] Headquarters Department of the Pacific, General Orders, Number 52, dated 6/27/1865 (accessed on 11/27/2022, https://ehistory.osu.edu/books/official-records/121/0679).

[8] San Francisco Directory 1865, p. 60, 89, 106, 359, 486. 

[9] Daily Alta California, 6/12/1865, p 1 col 3 (letter to the editor from Frank M. Pixley).

[10] Daily Alta California, 6/12/1865, p 1 col 3 (letter to the editor from Frank M. Pixley).

[11] Daily Alta California, 6/6/1865, p 1 col 1.

[12] General Order 52, Department of the Pacific, San Francisco, CA 6/27/1865; Letter form Secretary of War for the President, 9/16/1865.

[13] General Order 52, Department of the Pacific, San Francisco, CA 6/27/1865; Letter form Secretary of War for the President, 9/16/1865.

[14] Jo Ann Gardner, “Hogg wild: The adventurous pirate form Cecil County,” Cecil Whig, 10/8/2016.

[15] Daily Alta California, 6/4/1865, p 2, col 1

[16] Placer Herald, 5/26/1866, p 1, col 4.