The First Battle of Fort Fisher Ended on Christmas Day, December 25, 1864

From the December 25, 2020, AeroTech News "Remembering Christmases past, major  military events."

For most of the Civil War, Fort Fisher, guarding the port of Wilmington, North Carolina, saw very little combat.  But that changed as Christmas 1864 approached.  The Union decided to close that last port of the Confederacy still open to the rest of the world.  The effort ended in a debacle.

First, the Union attempted to load a ship with explosives, run it in close to the sand fort and explode with the idea that the force of the explosion would knock down the fort's walls.  It didn't work, but alerted the fort's Confederate defenders that an attack was near.

The morning of December 23, the Union fleet, the largest gathering of U.S. ships until that time, moved in close to the fort and opened fire, expending some 10,000 shells in the process.

--Old Secesh