May 11 1861 Saturday
California. Pro-Union demonstrations occurred in San Francisco.
District of Columbia. USS Pawnee, Commander Stephen Clegg Rowan, was ordered to proceed from the Washington Navy Yard to Alexandria, Virginia, to organise the protection of vessels from attack by Confederate forces in the Chesapeake Bay.
Maryland. Brigadier-General of Massachusetts Militia Benjamin Franklin Butler captured the experimental Winans Steam Gun near the Relay House. The weapon was a steam-powered centrifugal gun which used centrifugal forces (rather than gunpowder) to propel projectiles. Similar in size to a steam-powered fire engine of the day, the gun had a menacing appearance thanks to a large curved shield covering its inner workings. Its mechanism involved a shielded barrel that rotated up to 250 times per minute. Shot dumped into the top of the barrel rolled down into it and were held back by a spring-loaded gate that opened to allow one shot to be flung out per revolution of the barrel. Despite the effort invested in the project, it was unable to match the accuracy or power of the gunpowder weaponry of the time, and the steam gun project was abandoned. The weapon grew out of work by Ohio inventors William Joslin and Charles S Dickinson on a hand-powered centrifugal gun, which they patented in 1858. After a dispute, Dickinson promoted and patented his own version a few months later, and built a steam-powered gun in Boston in 1860. He brought the device to Baltimore and demonstrated it for the City Council in February 1861. The machine was supposedly capable of shooting 200 projectiles in a minute. In the wake of the clash on 19 April 1861 between a secessionist mob and the 6th Massachusetts Militia in Baltimore, word spread of an allegedly powerful steam gun said to have been invented and built by noted Maryland industrialist and states’ rights advocate Ross Winans to oppose Federal troops passing through Baltimore to Washington in response to President Lincoln’s call for volunteers. The gun was seized by City Police to be put in readiness for use if needed. Available evidence suggests that it was taken to the foundry and machine shop of Ross Winans and his son Thomas who were hired by the city’s Board of Police to make weapons and munitions. Shortly after, the gun was taken from the Winans’ facility and publicly displayed with other weapons being gathered by city authorities. In the excitement of the times, Ross Winans’ public involvement in states’ rights politics in Maryland, his great fortune, word of the munitions work being done at his factory for the city, city defense appropriations, and the appearance of a menacing looking gun that had emerged from his factory caused controversy in the press across the country.
The gun was taken back to Winans’ shop for repair at city expense and then returned to Dickinson, who attempted to take it to Harper’s Ferry to sell to the Confederate army. Union troops confiscated the gun and arrested its handlers on 11 May 1861 at Ellicott Mills, Maryland, and took it to their camp at Relay, Maryland. While not a party to the attempt to escape with the gun, Ross Winans was detained by Federal forces for 48 hours, until he agreed not to take up arms against the government. Following its capture, the gun was tested by members of the 6th Massachusetts Infantry before being sent via Annapolis, and Fortress Monroe, to Lowell, Massachusetts, where it was presented to a mechanics’ organization. Despite the political and media attention it attracted in 1861, the weapon remained little more than a curiosity and was eventually scrapped.
Missouri. Pro-secession riots continued to break out in St Louis. A mob fired on a company of Union Home Guards. The Home Guards replied, and the exchange resulted in the deaths of three Guardsmen and four civilians. The 5th Missouri Reserve Regiment quelled the protests by force.
Missouri. Union Brigadier-General William Selby Harney reasserted his command of the Department of the West over Captain Nathaniel Lyon, who had been acting beyond his official powers against armed pro-secession groups under the direction of US Representative Francis Preston Blair Jr. Colonel Edmund Brooke Alexander (10th US Infantry) had deputised temporarily and nominally as the senior officer in the Department since 29 April 1861 from Fort Laramie, Dakota Territory. However, Alexander was too distant to influence developments in Missouri and Lyon filled the void in leadership. Harney issued a proclamation announcing his determination to enforce order and the authority of the Federal government.
Virginia. Pro-Union demonstrations occurred in Wheeling.
Union Organisation
USA: Brigadier-General William Selby Harney resumed command of the Department of the West, succeeeding Colonel Edmund Brooke Alexander (10th US Infantry)
Commander in Chief: President Abraham Lincoln
Vice-President: Hannibal Hamlin
Secretary of War: Simon Cameron
Secretary of the Navy: Gideon Welles
Coast Blockading Squadron: Silas Horton Stringham
Gulf Blockading Squadron: William Mervine
Pacific Squadron: John Berrien Montgomery
Potomac Flotilla: James Harmon Ward
General–in-Chief: Winfield Scott
Department of Annapolis: Benjamin Franklin Butler awaited
Department of the East: John Ellis Wool
Department of Florida: Harvey Brown
Department of New Mexico: Vacant
Department of the Ohio: George Brinton McClellan awaited
Department of the Pacific: Edwin Vose Sumner
- District of Oregon: George Wright
Department of Pennsylvania: Robert Patterson
Department of Texas: Vacant
Department of Utah: Philip St George Cooke
Department of Washington: Joseph King Fenno Mansfield
Department of the West: William Selby Harney
Confederate Organisation
CSA: Benjamin McCulloch was promoted Brigadier-General PACS.
Commander in Chief: President Jefferson Finis Davis
Vice-President: Alexander Hamilton Stephens
Secretary of War: Leroy Pope Walker
Secretary of the Navy: Stephen Russell Mallory
Department of Alexandria: Philip St George Cocke
- Alexandria Line: Philip St George Cocke
Department of North Carolina: Theophilus Hunter Holmes
- Defences of North Carolina: Theophilus Hunter Holmes
Department of South Carolina: Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard
- “Forces in Charleston”: Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard
Department of Southwestern Virginia: William Wing Loring
Department of Texas: Earl Van Dorn
Department of West Florida: Braxton Bragg
- “Forces in Pensacola”: Braxton Bragg
District of Louisiana: David Emanuel Twiggs
- “Forces in New Orleans” “Army of Louisiana”: Braxton Bragg
Defences of Savannah: Alexander Robert Lawton
Potomac Line: Daniel Ruggles
Forces in Harper’s Ferry”: Thomas Jonathan Jackson
“Forces in Norfolk”: Walter Gwynn
Forces in Richmond: John Bankhead Magruder
Forces in the Kanawha Valley: Christopher Quarles Tompkins
Union Generals
Major-General USA
Winfield Scott
Brigadier-General USA
John Ellis Wool
William Selby Harney
Edwin Vose Sumner
Confederate Generals
Note: Italics, awaiting confirmation of the commission
Major-General PACS
David Emanuel Twiggs
Brigadier-General ACSA
Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard
Braxton Bragg
Brigadier-General PACS
Alexander Robert Lawton
Milledge Lake Bonham
Benjamin McCulloch
American Civil War High Command 