Henry Von Phul was an American 709-ton sidewheel steam packet built as a merchant and passenger vessel in Paducah, Kentucky and St. Louis, Missouri in 1860.University of Wisconsin–Madison.The New Orleans Crescent (Nov. 26, 1860), p. 3.The Daily Picayune (Dec. 7, 1860), p. 4. During the Red River campaign of the Civil War she served as a Union transport on the Mississippi River and the Red River, and on December 8, 1863, she was twice heavily bombarded by Confederate guns. On November 15, 1866, she caught fire on the Mississippi with 3,800 bales of cotton and was run ashore near Donaldsonville, Louisiana.
Military service
On the morning of December 8, 1863, while en route to St. Louis from New Orleans, Von Phul was shelled by a Confederate shore battery of 6 guns about 5 miles (8 km) from Morganza.Smith (2010), p. 154.Civil War Naval Chronology (1961–66), 3, p. 163. Captain Patrick Gorman, commanding, was killed by a shell which entered the pilot house, killing him instantly; a barkeeper and a deckhand were also mortally wounded.The Evansville Daily Journal (Dec. 19, 1863), p. 1. The damaged ship then made for the nearby Union anchorage off Morganza and was from there escorted by Neosho, a 523-ton river monitor. After continuing only a few miles, she was targeted again: this time by some 4 pieces of horse artillery which waited for the monitor to pass by them before firing on the transport from the levee; they struck Von Phul some twenty times, wounding nine and disabling the ship. Neosho turned to fire upon and scatter the gunners, and was supported by Signal. Meanwhile, Captain Harry McDougall's Atlantic, a 2,668-ton side-wheeler en route to New Orleans from St. Louis, came alongside the Von Phul, at considerable risk to herself, and towed the crippled transport to safety.Smith (2010), pp. 154–5.
Fate The steamer Henry Von Phul, with 3,800 bales of cotton, burned at 3 a.m. on November 14, 1866, above Donaldsonville, Louisiana.The Missouri Republican (Nov. 14, 1866), p. 3. The fire spread to the cotton from the pipe of a deck hand, and was soon under full headway. The boat was immediately run ashore. There were 101 persons aboard, including a number of women, nearly all of whom escaped ashore with the loss of all their baggage and clothes, many of them having only their night clothes.The Daily Picayune (Nov. 14, 1866), p. 1. The boat was owned in Memphis, Tennessee, and was not insured.Public Ledger (Nov. 14, 1866), p. 2.
See also
Steamboats of the Mississippi
References
Bibliography
Newspapers