Confederate States Revenue Service



"Attention, this is the Confederate States Revenue Ship Vigilant, cut your engine and prepare to be boarded for inspection."

- The CSRS Vigilant hailing a suspected smuggling vessel

The Confederate States Revenue Service was a maritime organisation of the Confederate States of Earth, a breakaway nation of the Union of Earth States, which dealt with the upholding of Maritime Law, the early organisation was formed from the parts of the Union States Revenue Service which had defected to the Confederacy, as with the vast majority of defections this performed by crews either born or raised in Confederate states, or by those who were sympathetic to it. At the founding of the service there were 20 ships, all of which were crewed by defectors from the Union, many of which were reassigned to serve in the new Confederate service, these ships formed the backbone of the service for the first 6 months of its existance. Ships of the service carried the prefix "C.S.R.S" (usually written as "CSRS", without the stops), thus stood for "Confederate States Revenue Ship".

The service was a branch of the Confederate Treasury Department, a government organisation concerned with the economy of the nation, ranging from things such as the minting of money, to the collection of taxes and tarriffs, the Confederate States Revenue Service was responsible for the collection of import duties from foreign ships, as well as the combating pirates and smugglers.

As a branch of the treasury the Revenue Service was not involved with the Confederate States of Earth Navy, and flew a different ensign to signal this fact, though some Revenue ships did fight along side their Navy brothers in battles, though this was rare and was almost totally the result of the revenue ships being in the area at the time of the battle, revenue ships were generally more lightly armed, but very fast, compared to navy ships, because it was considered that their main combat would be directed against mere smugglers and pirates.

A notable battle involving the Revenue Service was the Duel off Cape Brig, in which two revenue ships battled each other, these ships were the Confederate Vigilant-class Revenue Ship CSRS Observant and the Union Chaser-class Revenue Ship Pursuer, the Observant won this duel, marking the only time two revenue ships ever came head-to-head in a naval duel.

The service was also considered distinct from the Confederate States Coast Guard, though sometimes the mission of these two maritime organisations did overlap, there were cases were Revenue ships performed Coast Guard duties, and vice-versa.