Page:Historic towns of the southern states (1900).djvu/292

 between Wilmington and the West Indies, and for many miles north and south of the inlets into the Cape Fear, the beach is still marked by the wrecks of those run ashore to escape the blockading squadron. Some of them, however, ran almost with the regularity of mail-boats, and one steamer is said to have made over fifty successful trips. By these vessels supplies of all kinds and munitions of war were brought in, and large fortunes made by the owners and commanders of the successful steamers. The State of North Carolina owned one of the most fortunate and famous of these, the Advance, which eluded capture and continued year after year to bring in shoes, blankets and clothing for the North Carolina soldiers in the Confederate army, and cotton-*cards for the women at home, until a few months before Lee's surrender. Even on her last fatal voyage she had skilfully slipped between the blockading vessels under cover of the darkness, and before day dawned she was well below the horizon on her way to Nassau. But, unhappily, she had been obliged to take in at Wilmington a quantity of coal mined in Chatham County, and not suitable for her use, and a thick trail of smoke settling down over