Simms, Charles Carroll
First Lieutenant Charles Carroll Simms, Confederate States Navy, (In USN service, 1839-1861; in CSN service 1861-1865)
Charles Carroll Simms, a native of Virginia, became a U.S. Navy midshipman in 1839. He served in the Navy for more than two decades, achieving the rank of Lieutenant in 1854. He was dismissed from the service in April 1861, after his state left the Union, and briefly was an officer in Virginia's Navy. Commissioned as a First Lieutenant in the Confederate Navy in June 1861, during that year he commanded the steamer George Page and was assigned to the steamer Saint Nicholas (or Rappahannock). As an officer of the ironclad Virginia, he took part in her March-May 1862 actions in the vicinity of Hampton Roads. Subsequently, he served in the gunboats Nansemond, on the James River, and Selma, in Mobile Bay. During the Civil War's final year, while assigned to the Mobile Squadron, he commanded the ironclads Baltic and Nashville. First Lt. Simms surrendered to Federal forces in early May 1865 and was paroled soon afterwards.
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