Battle of Santa Rosa Island - Confederate Forces Attempt to Capture Fort Pickens

When Florida seceded from the Union on January 10, 1861, the new Confederacy viewed Pensacola’s naval shipyard and railroad link as invaluable assets to the Southern cause. On January 12, Florida and Alabama state troops, along with many local citizens, forced U.S. Commodore James Armstrong to surrender the naval shipyard. In the bargain, the Southerners also acquired a million-dollar dry dock, workshops, warehouses, barracks, a hospital, 175 cannons, projectiles and ordnance stores.

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