Lt. John Maxwell Stribling

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=37178408

John went down with the ship just off the coast of Montrose and his body washed ashore. his grave is marked as Unknown Seaman 1862

Find A Grave contributor Elreeta Weathers has furnished the following information on Lt Stribling: Lt. John Maxwell Stribling resigned from US Navy in 1861 to enlist in the Navy of the CSA. He ran the blockade at Mobile, AL, on Sept.10,1862, on the "CSS Sumter".

John died on board the Florian Cruiser. His cousin, Robert Trimmier, visited him for 4 weeks before he died. Robert helped bury John Maxwell Stribling. John Maxwell died at age 27. John served as a lieutenant on the crew of the "CSS Sumter" in 1861-1862.

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Ben M. Angel notes that there was no Confederate cruiser named Florian. An apparently better version of Lt. Stribling's story was found posted on Ancestry's Stribling message board:

http://boards.ancestry.com/surnames.stribling/112/mb.ashx

John Maxwell Stribling, Lieut., USN/CSN

• David Trimmier
• Posted: 4 Apr 2000 12:00PM GMT
• Classification: Biography
• Surnames: Trimmier, Stribling, Sloan, Rowland, Kirby, Blair

John Maxwell Stribling (1835-1862)

John Maxwell Stribling was born during 1835 in Charleston, South Carolina to U.S. Naval Lieutenant Cornelius K. Stribling and his wife Helen Maria Payne.

John Maxwell Stribling passed the Academy Medical Board on 7 November 1851 and commenced his three-year course at the U.S. Naval Academy as an Acting Midshipman. With his father serving as Superintendent, it is reasonable to assume that John received more "attention" from the faculty and staff than his peers did. If one considers only John's deportment at the Naval Academy, one could argue that he was unsuited for a naval career. His position in the USNA Class of 1854 was dead last.

During the year of his graduation, Professor Lockwood and a Mr. Matthews reported him for "using or permitting the use of tobacco in his room," "improper conduct at recitation," "allowing skylarking and noise in Recitation Hall at Section formation," "Talking on parade," "Noisy in quarters during study hours," as well as numerous other infractions. During his final year, he accumulated as many conduct demerits as the cumulative total of his class.

Academically, John performed relatively well in Drawing, Spanish, and French. His grade in "Gunnery &c." was barely passing, as were his grades in Mathematics. After his graduation as the first "Anchor" of the U.S. Naval Academy on 22 November 1856, he was assigned to the USS SARATOGA as a Passed Midshipman.

The following represents the chronology of his U.S. Naval Service:

• 6 January 1858 - Detached from USS SARATOGA and three months leave.
• 11 January 1858 – To the USS MARION as Acting Master
• 22 January 1858 - Promoted to master.
• 24 March 1858 – Detached sick and awaiting orders until 15 JUL 1858.
• 27 July 1858 – To the USS SAVANNAH
• 3 May 1859 – Detached from the USS SAVANNAH on her arrival at Pensacola; 3 months leave
• 20 September 1859 – Assigned to the USS WYANOTTE
• 16 March 1860 - Promoted to lieutenant.
• 8 January 1861 – While at the Pensacola Navy Yard, he resigned his commission in the U.S. Navy.
• 29 March 1861 – Appointed Lieutenant in the Confederate States Navy and assigned to the CSNÂ’s first cruiser CSS SUMTER (Raphael Semmes, commanding). The SUMTER's officers were selected by the CSN as early as 18 April 1861. Soon thereafter, they began arriving in New Orleans. Lt. Stribling was 3rd lieutenant, junior to Lieutenants Kell and Chapman, respectively.

Semmes wrote that Lieutenant Stribling was:

"… a native of the glorious little state of South Carolina. He is of medium height, somewhat spare in build, with brown hair, and whiskers, and mild and expressive blue eyes; the mildness of the eye only dwelling in it, however, in moments of repose. When excited at the thought of a wrong, or oppression, have a peculiar stare of firmness, as much to say, 'This rock shall fly, from its firm base as soon as I.' Stribling was also an eleve of the old Navy, and, though tied to it, by cords that were hard to sever, he put honor above place, in the hour of trial, and came South."

During the CSS SUMTER's six months at sea as a commerce raider, she captured several vessels, putting six to the torch. When she arrived in Gibraltar with her boilers leaking, she was refused coal (due to the machinations of the local U.S. Consul), leaving Semmes with little choice but to lay her up and pay off the crew. The officers were instructed to make their way back to the Confederacy. John Stribling, traveling in the company of C.S. Marine Lieutenant B.K. Howell, made his way from Gibraltar to Nassau, via Hamburg and Liverpool.

At the Royal Victoria Hotel in Nassau, they rejoined Semmes and the other officers, who were now directed to Liverpool, to take the CSS ALABAMA to sea. However, another CSN offficer, Lieutenant-commanding John Maffitt was found to be in a desperate state: his assigned vessel, CSS FLORIDA was currently awaiting the result of an Admiralty Court proceeding and he was woefully short of crewmembers. His only available officers were two midshipmen, one of whom had just experienced his first sea cruise during the journey from Charleston to Nassau.

On hearing of his predicament, John Stribling promptly volunteered to relinquish his orders and aid Maffitt, an offer that was promptly accepted. Maffitt recorded that:

"He (Stribling) was on his way home to be reunited with his young and beautiful bride, but on hearing of my situation in regard to officers, he promptly relinquished his orders and volunteered for the FLORIDA."

Prior to his departure from Nassau, Lieutenant Stribling wrote a letter to CSN Commander James North (one of the Confederate Naval Department agents in London) about his opinions of recent Confederate political and naval developments and included:

"The Oreto is here and will (run) out as soon as possible, but there are many difficulties to be overcome before she can be of service. Maffitt is going in her; he has two mids with him, and I have volunteered to go with him, as I considered it my duty to do so under the circumstances, though my inclinations would take me home. Norfolk being evacuated, I know not where my wife has gone. I, however, heard that she was well."

Raphael Semmes, ever mindful of proper military decorum, recorded that:

"At the earnest entreaty of Lieutenant-Commanding Maffitt, I have consented to permit Lieutenant Stribling to remain with him, as his first lieutenant on board the Orteo (Florida) – the officers detailed for that vessel not yet having arrived."

At this point, the arduous and complicated story of sailing the CSS FLORIDA into Mobile Bay, via Cuba commences. It is well-known among students of the naval history of the War Between the States by virtue of the sheer audacity of Maffitt: he sailed a woefully undermanned vessel, sans a single gun crew, past three vessels of the Federal Navy guarding the entrance to Mobile Bay in daylight. The event so enraged President Lincoln (owing to the negative press that it generated) that he ordered that the senior naval officer, Captain George Preble (son of the USNÂ’s hero of the War of 1812), be cashiered from the service.

It is sufficient to say that the event was also a cause for celebration throughout the Confederacy. It is no exaggeration to state that it could not have occurred without the intervention of Lieutenant Stribling. Raphael Semmes later wrote in his memoirs that:

"My ex-lieutenant of the Sumter, Stribling, merited, on this occasion, the praise I have bestowed on him, in drawing his portrait. He is described by an eye-witness to have been cool and self-possessed, as if there had been no enemy within a hundred miles of him."

Fortune was not to smile upon one of the Confederate Navy's newest heroes: for two days after sailing into Mobile Bay, John developed symptoms of malaria, which had decimated the crew during their stay in Cuba. Maffitt immediately recognised the symptoms of yellow fever in his newly tested Executive Officer immediately upon his return from a one-day excursion to Mobile:

• Monday morning, September 8-.... On going on board the FLORIDA I was distressed to find poor Stribling down with a serious attack of fever; had him conveyed to the steamer AREAL that Dr. Barrett could attend him night and day. His mind wandered and there seemed no elasticity in his constitution; I think his chances are very doubtful.
• September 9 - Stribling very ill; will not permit anyone to administer his medicine but me, and I am hardly able to stand....
• September 10 - Am quite exhausted with my efforts to aid poor Stribling; he calls for me all the time....
• September 11 - The same; I now have no hope of poor S.
• September 12 - As I feared, Stribling breathed his last at 6:30 p.m., having never rallied once during his illness. He was a good Christian and excellent officer. Peace be to his soul.

The log of CSS FLORIDA records that a "coffin was sent for from Mobile."

Maffitt's journal continues with,

• September 13 - Paid last honors to our highly esteemed friend and shipmate, Lieutenant Stribling. He is buried at Melrose (sic), near Mr. Stone's country seat."

At the time of his death, John was 27 years old. It is supposed that after the War, his father replaced his grave marker, adjacent to "The Grave of a SEAMAN -1862"

An eroding headstone and a green cast-iron fence now mark his grave in the southeast quadrant of the Montrose Cemetery. It reads:

• SACRED
• to
• the memory of
• Lieut. JOHN M. STRIBLING
• son of
• Rear Admiral C.K. Stribling
• died
• off Montrose, Ala. August 7
• 1862

The actual journal is replicated here:

http://www.csnavy.org/css,fla,log.htm