Lt. Francis Lyell Hoge, CSN: “An Able and True Officer”
Gary McQuarrie
October 11, 2019
Civil War Navy—The Magazine, Fall 2019, Volume 7, Issue 2—Francis Lyell Hoge, from Moundsville, Virginia (now West Virginia), graduated in the third class of the U.S. Naval Academy in June 1860. After the outbreak of the Civil War, Hoge resigned his commission and joined the Confederate States Navy in June 1861 and was assigned to the CSS Patrick Henry. He was appointed lieutenant in February 1862. Hoge saw action on the James River in 1861-1862. He was executive officer for Colonel John Taylor Wood’s expedition against the Union gunboats, Satellite and Reliance in August 1863, in which he was wounded. For “gallant and meritorious conduct,” he was promoted to First Lieutenant. In February 1864, Hoge was part of Wood’s expedition to attack the Underwriter on the Neuse River and was among the first to board the vessel. Hoge played a crucial role in completing the ship’s destruction. On Hoge’s death in 1901, Wood wrote that “at all times and under all circumstances he [Hoge] could be depended upon as an able and true officer.” Lt. Hoge was another of the many Naval Academy’s young midshipmen who played heroic roles in the Civil War’s naval actions.
Revolver (1849 Colt Pocket model, .31 caliber, cap and ball), powder flask, and shoulder strap of Lieutenant Francis Lyell Hoge, and presidential commission appointing Hoge Second Lieutenant in the Confederate States Navy, October 2, 1862, signed by the Secretary of the Navy, Stephen Mallory (background). Courtesy of Mr. Laurence Evans II.
Previously unpublished sitting portrait of Midshipman Francis Lyell Hoge. Courtesy of Mr. Laurence Evans II.