City Class Ironclad - Battles and Other Operations in Which City-class Gunboats Participated

Battles and Other Operations in Which City-class Gunboats Participated

After the gunboats were completed but before their crews were filled out, several of them were pushed forward into the Battle of Fort Henry, 6 February 1862. The boats involved sustained some minor battle damage, but they achieved a complete victory unassisted by the Army. Their success at Fort Henry engendered exaggerated opinions of their effectiveness that were dashed only a week later. At the Battle of Fort Donelson, 14 February 1862, four of the gunboats bombarded the fort and received return fire. All four gunboats were forced out of action by damage they sustained, although the armor minimized casualties.

Two gunboats were vital in assisting the Army in blocking the escape of the Confederate garrison at the Battle of Island Number Ten, 7 April 1862. By running past the Confederate guns under cover of darkness, they gave the first example of the new tactic of bypassing fixed fortifications. The garrison at Island No. 10 made a point of surrendering to the Gunboat Flotilla.

Following the seizure of Island No. 10 and New Madrid, Missouri, the next target was Fort Pillow, upstream from Memphis. The mortar bombardment of the fort began on 14 April 1862 and continued until 4 June 1862. The gunboats assisted by protecting the mortars from Confederate counterattacks. One such counterattack, the Battle of Plum Point Bend, 10 May 1862, caught the flotilla unprepared for an assault by Rebel rams Two of the gunboats were severely damaged, and avoided sinking only by grounding themselves in shallows.

The gunboats were vindicated less than a month later, when they again met the Confederate rams. Whereas at Plum Point Bend they had entered battle one at a time, this time they were a unified force that was ready for battle. At the Battle of Memphis on 6 June 1862, four of the City class gunboats were included in the flotilla that destroyed a force of eight Confederate rams, sinking or capturing seven of the enemy fleet. The gunboats suffered no damage in what was the most lopsided naval battle of the war.

Two City gunboats were among the vessels that accompanied the Army on an expedition into Arkansas along the White River. On 17 June 1862, a Rebel battery at St. Charles, Arkansas, fired a shot that penetrated the casemate of USS Mound City and exploded her steam drum. The escaping steam killed or scalded almost the entire crew. This chance shot soon led to the abandonment of the expedition.

The Western Gunboat Flotilla met the West Gulf Blockading Squadron at Vicksburg, Mississippi on 1 July 1862, where the two fleets attempted unsuccessfully to capture the city with only token support from the Army. On 17 July 1862, the armored CSS Arkansas encountered USS Carondelet and two other vessels on the Yazoo River. Carondelet was disabled, her steering being shot away, so she grounded. Arkansas then continued onto the Mississippi, where she passed through the rest of the Gunboat Flotilla and the West Gulf Squadron.

The gunboats, now part of the Navy's Mississippi River Squadron, cooperated with the Army in the better-supported campaign to capture Vicksburg late in 1862. On a scouting mission up the Yazoo River on 12 December 1862, USS Cairo struck two "torpedoes" (now called mines) and sank, without loss of life. She was the first ship to be sunk by mines in the war. On 27 December 1862, some gunboats feigned an attack on Haynes Bluff, but failed in their purpose of drawing off the Rebel defenses of Vicksburg. On 28–30 December 1862, other gunboats supported the Army by bombarding Confederate positions during the abortive assault at Chickasaw Bayou. Also as a part of the Vicksburg campaign, a joint Army-Navy force moved up the Arkansas River and attacked Fort Hindman on 11 January 1863. The Federal victory there was largely due to the destruction of the fort by the gunboats.

As efforts to bypass some of the Confederate defenses at Vicksburg, elements of the Mississippi Squadron engaged in two operations on minor tributaries of the Yazoo River. First was the Yazoo Pass Expedition, 6 February–12 April 1863, which included one City gunboat. The second, the Steele's Bayou Expedition, 14–27 March 1863, included five. Both expeditions proved futile. The primary reason for the failure was that the vessels were not well adapted to the environment in which they were used.

On the night of 16–17 April 1863, a large force of gunboats, including four City class gunboats, ran past the Confederate batteries on the Mississippi River at Vicksburg. Most sustained only superficial damage during the passage. The ultimate aim of this movement was to assist General Ulysses S. Grant's intended move across the river to attack the defenses from the south. This committed the gunboats, as the boats could not return upstream while being subjected to bombardment from enemy shore batteries.

Initially, Grant planned to cross his army from the west side of the river to the east at Grand Gulf, Mississippi, just below Vicksburg, where the Rebels had set up a pair of batteries that they styled "forts." City class gunboats were among the vessels used to bombard the batteries on 29 April 1863. Although the fleet was able to silence the lower battery and reduce the rate of fire of the upper battery, they could not put the latter completely out of action. The operation was therefore considered to be a failure, and Grant had to revise his plans to cross farther downstream.

After the Union army under Grant had successfully crossed the river and besieged Vicksburg from the Yazoo to the Mississippi, the Mississippi Squadron completed the encirclement by controlling the rivers. No notable naval actions resulted, but Grant regarded the Navy's contribution as a vital link in the campaign that finally ended on 4 July 1863 with the surrender of the city and its garrison.

During the siege of Vicksburg, part of the Mississippi Squadron, including one City class gunboat, was diverted into the Red River to capture Alexandria, Louisiana, and attack nearby Fort De Russy, 4–17 May 1863. The city fell with no struggle, but the attack on the fort fell on empty air, as its defenders had fled. Despite the lack of opposition, too much time would have been needed to destroy the fort completely.

Once the Mississippi was opened following the fall of Vicksburg and Port Hudson, naval activity on the river virtually ceased. In this period of relative calm, USS Baron De Kalb (ex-St. Louis) was sunk in the Yazoo River by two Confederate torpedoes on 13 July 1863. Much of the Mississippi Squadron, including the five remaining City class gunboats, took part in the ill-fated Red River campaign, in which they were almost lost because of falling water levels. This was their final significant action.

All five surviving gunboats were sold for scrap shortly after the end of the war.