Battle of Gloucester Point (1861) Battle of Gloucester Point (1861) The Battle of Gloucester Point, Virginia was an inconclusive exchange of cannon fire between a shore battery on the York River which was manned by Virginia (soon to be Confederate) forces and the Union gunboat USS "Yankee". The action occurred on May 7, 1861, three weeks after the start of the American Civil War (Civil War) at Fort Sumter in the harbor at Charleston, South Carolina on April 14, 1861. The Gloucester Point engagement is notable as the earliest exchange of gunfire between the Union Navy and organized Rebel (Confederate) forces after the U.S. Army
Fort Sumter 135 guns in three tiers of gun emplacements, although it was never filled near its full capacity. On December 26, 1860, six days after South Carolina seceded from the Union, U.S. Army Major Robert Anderson abandoned the indefensible Fort Moultrie, spiking its large guns, burning its gun carriages, and taking its smaller cannon with him to be trained on the city. He secretly relocated companies E and H (127 men, 13 of them musicians) of the 1st U.S. Artillery to Fort Sumter on his own initiative, without orders from his superiors. He thought that providing a stronger defense would delay