USS Albatross was a screw steamer rigged as a three-masted schooner acquired by the Union Navy during the beginning of the American Civil War. She was outfitted as a gunboat with heavy guns and used in the Union blockade of the waterways of the Confederate States of America.
Built in Mystic, Connecticut
Albatross was built at Mystic, Connecticut in 1858. She was purchased by the Navy at Brooklyn, New York on 23 May 1861, and commissioned at the New York Navy Yard on 25 June 1861, Commander George A. Prentiss in command.
Civil war operations
Assigned to the Atlantic blockade
Acquired during the Union Navy's efforts to expand the fleet early in the civil war to carry out the blockade of the Confederate coast established by U.S. President Abraham Lincoln's proclamation of 19 April, Albatross was assigned to the Atlantic Blockading Squadron. She soon sailed for the Virginia Capes, and reported to the squadron's commander, Flag Officer Silas Stringham, at Hampton Roads, Virginia on 1 July 1861.
Following a week's service in the Chesapeake Bay along its eastern shore and off the mouth of the Rappahannock River, the steamer rounded Cape Henry on 10 July and proceeded south to waters outside the bar off Hatteras Inlet to assist in sealing off the North Carolina coast. The ship's first action came on 11 July after a Confederate shore battery near Oregon Inlet opened fire on her. She answered with all her guns, knocked out one of the Confederate cannon, and drove the Southern soldiers from the area.
Albatross made her first capture on 18 July, when a party from the steamer boarded and seized the schooner Velasco of Galveston, Texas, which was carrying false papers while sailing under the Lone Star flag from Matanzas, Cuba, with a cargo of sugar. Albatross took the prize to Hampton Roads and turned her over to Flag Officer Stringham on 20 July. The next day, while returning to her station, Albatross exchanged fire with the North Carolina steamer Beaufort lying off Bodie Island and forced the Southern ship to retire through Oregon Inlet to safety in Pamlico Sound.
Capturing pirates
On 22 July 1861, while Albatross was chasing a sailing vessel near Hatteras Inlet, a black man jumped overboard and shouted, "Save me, captain, she's bound to Charleston." While lowering a boat to pick up the man, Albatross turned her guns on the schooner and ordered her to heave to. That vessel, Enchantress, a schooner of Newburyport, Massachusetts, which had been captured on 6 July by Confederate privateer Jefferson Davis, promptly surrendered. Commander Prentiss, considering the five crewmen captured with the schooner to be pirates, had them put in double irons. He placed Master's Mate Tunis D. Wendell in charge of the prize over a crew consisting of five Union sailors and the rescued man who had been on Enchantress when she surrendered to the Southern privateer.
Albatross took the schooner to Hampton Roads where they arrived on 24 July. Since the Union steamer was in need of repairs, Stringham sent the two vessels on to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. En route north on 1 August, a party from Albatross boarded Elizabeth Ann of Accomac, Virginia and bound from Penns Grove, New Jersey, for Chincoteague, Virginia, and, upon finding her papers to be incorrect, seized that vessel and took her in tow. On 2 August, the three ships reached Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where the schooners were turned over to the prize court and Albatross entered the shipyard for repairs.
After completion of the machinery work late in the month, the steamer returned to Hampton Roads on the evening of 31 August and began cruising in Chesapeake Bay where she took the schooner Alabama off the mouth of the Potomac River on 14 September. Next ordered back to waters off the outer banks of North Carolina, Albatross, except for periodic runs to Hampton Roads for fuel and provisions and a trip to Baltimore, Maryland, for repairs, operated near Beaufort, North Carolina until April 1862 when she was transferred to the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron.
Reassigned to the South Atlantic blockade
The highlight of this stint of service off Beaufort was her discovery and destruction of the grounded 800-ton British ship York of Dublin, Ireland, near Bogue Inlet on 16 January 1862. After reporting to Flag Officer Samuel Francis du Pont, the ship spent May and June in Winyah Bay, South Carolina, blockading Georgetown, South Carolina. There, on 20 June, two boats from Albatross captured the steam tug Treaty and schooner Louisa.
Reassigned to the West Gulf blockade
Early in July 1862, the steamer proceeded to Boston, Massachusetts where she arrived on 10 July for repairs. When ready again for sea, Albatross, commanded by Commander Henry French since 1 August, was reassigned to the West Gulf Blockading Squadron. She stood out to sea on the evening of 7 August and, after reporting to Rear Admiral David Farragut, was stationed off the mouth of the Rio Grande near Brownsville, Texas. There, on 21 September, she captured the schooner Two Sisters of Galveston, Texas, flying the Confederate flag as she was sailing from Sisal, Mexico, toward Galveston with 87 bales of gunny cloth for Southern cotton gins and one case of crinolines, probably intended for a less utilitarian purpose.
Outbreak of yellow fever
Late in September 1862, yellow fever broke out on Albatross. Upon the recommendation of the ship's surgeon, Commander French sailed to Pensacola, Florida, where she arrived on 4 October. Farragut placed the steamer in quarantine, and she was forbidden to communicate with the rest of the squadron. Nevertheless, the admiral reprimanded French for leaving his station before his ship had been properly relieved and, on 29 October, sent him north in with orders to report to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles. Lieutenant Commander John E. Hart took command of Albatross.
After the health of her crew had been restored, the steamer began patrolling off the Gulf of Mexico shore in mid-November. From 24 November until 8 December 1862, boat crews from Albatross and from the armed brig made a series of raids against salt works along the Florida coast between St. Andrews Bay and Pensacola, during which they destroyed over 300 salt pans.
Mississippi River operations
On 11 December 1862, Albatross sailed for the Mississippi River where the tempo of operations to free the river for Union shipping was increasing. On 17 December, she, , , , and supported the uncontested landing of Major General Nathaniel Prentiss Banks' troops at Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Ever since the previous spring, when his thrusts upriver had been nullified by a lack of ground forces, Farragut had been awaiting army support for clearing the Mississippi. After the surrender of Baton Rouge, he was eager to move on to the next Confederate river stronghold, Port Hudson, Louisiana, but no soldiers were made available for the operation.
Finally, with the approach of the spring, misfortunes to Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter's Mississippi Squadron, which had been attempting to send some of its gunboats past Vicksburg, Mississippi, to patrol the river between that strongly fortified position and Port Hudson, prompted Farragut to brave the guns of Port Hudson without help from Banks. On the evening of 13 March 1863, he moved seven of his warships - four saltwater men-of-war and three gunboats - some 15 miles above Baton Rouge and anchored for the night.
During the next day, he gave careful attention to the readiness of each ship in the force for battle. He had three of the heavy warships lashed to the port and soon-to-be-engaged sides of the smaller gunboats, pairing his flagship, , with Albatross, Richmond with , and with . , proceeding alone, brought up the rear. Farragut later explained his selection of Albatross as Hartfords partner:
Albatross being the most vulnerable of the gunboats, and her speed being about equal to that of this ship, was assigned to her. ...
Braving the fire of Port Hudson
Shortly after 10:00 p.m., the fleet got underway. Moving up the river "in good style," Hartford and Albatross weathered the hail of shot from the batteries. Major General Franklin Gardner, commanding Confederate forces at Port Hudson, noted: "She returned our fire boldly." While the flagship and her consort were passing the lower batteries, the current nearly swung the pair around and grounded them; "but," Farragut reported, "backing the Albatross, and going ahead strong on this ship, we at length headed her up the river." Though able to bring only two guns to bear on the upper batteries, Farragut successfully passed those works.
Following the flagship closely, Richmond took a hit in her steam plant, disabling her. "The turning point (in the river) was gained," Commander James Alden, Jr. reported, "but I soon found, even with the aid of the Genesee, which vessel was lashed alongside, that we could make no headway against the strong current of the river, and suffering much from a galling cross fire of the enemy's batteries, I was compelled though most reluctantly, to turn back, and by the aid of the Genesee soon anchored out of the range of their guns."
Next in line, Monongahela ran hard aground under Port Hudson's lower batteries where she remained for nearly half an hour, taking severe punishment. At least eight shots passed entirely through the ship. The bridge was shot from underneath Captain James P. McKinstry, wounding him and killing three others. With Kineo'''s aid, Monongahela was refloated; and she attempted to resume her course upriver. "We were nearly by the principal battery," wrote Lieutenant Nathaniel W. Thomas, the executive officer, "when the crank pin of the forward engine was reported heated, and the engine stopped. ..." The ship became unmanageable and drifted downstream, where she anchored out of range of the Confederate guns.
USS Mississippi is lost after grounding
Meanwhile, on board Mississippi, Captain Melancton Smith saw Richmond coming downstream but, because of the heavy smoke of the battle, was unable to sight Monongahela. Thinking that she had steamed ahead to close the gap caused by Richmonds leaving the formation, he ordered his ship "go ahead fast". In attempting to do so, Mississippi ran aground and, despite every effort, could not be brought off. After being set afire in four places, she was abandoned. At 3:00 a.m., Mississippi was seen in flames floating slowly down river; and, two and one-half hours later, she blew up. Thus ended one of the war's fiercest engagements. Only Hartford and Albatross had succeeded in running the gauntlet.
Commenting on Albatross role, Farragut stated,
"... although it was not in Lieutenant Commander Hart's power to do much, still he did all that was in his power, and whenever he could bring a gun to bear, ahead or astern, on the port side, it was instantly fired." Albatross only casualty in the action was Charles Raick, the captain's steward, who according to the ship's deck log, "... was killed while nobly fighting his gun."
But for a Parrott gun which lost a part of its trunnion when struck by a shell, the ship suffered little material damage.
Beyond the reach of Port Hudson's guns
After reaching comparative safety beyond the range of Port Hudson's guns, the two Union warships operated in the stretch of the Mississippi between that Southern fortress and Vicksburg until both of these Confederate riverbank strongholds had fallen almost four months later. While plying these waters which bristled with hostile batteries, they denied the Southern armies fighting in the East the steady flow of men, food, horses, and miscellaneous supplies which had supported Confederate troops since the onset of the conflict.