USS Lexington (1861) - Purchase and Conversion

Purchase and Conversion

Lexington was built as a sidewheel steamer at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1861 and was purchased by the War Department and converted into a gunboat at Cincinnati, Ohio, under the direction of Commander John Rodgers.

The gunboat, operated by the navy, joined the army's Western Flotilla at Cairo, Illinois, 12 August 1861. On 22 August she seized steamer W. B. Terry at Paducah, Kentucky, and on 4 September, with Tyler, she engaged Confederate gunboat Jackson and southern shore batteries at Hickman and Columbus, Kentucky. On 6 September the two gunboats spearheaded General Ulysses S. Grant's drive to seize strategic Paducah and Smithland, Kentucky, at the mouths of the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers. In his first use of strength afloat, Grant countered a Confederate move into the state, helping preserve Kentucky for the Union and foreshadowing his skillful use of naval mobility and support during the coming campaigns which divided the Confederacy and won the entire Mississippi system for the Union.

Lexington's next action came on the 10th when she and Conestoga silenced a Confederate battery and damaged Jackson at Lucas Bend, Missouri, while covering a troop advance. An 8 inch shell from Lexington exploded in Jackson's starboard wheelhouse causing severe damage. Only the powerful batteries on the bluffs at Columbus, Kentucky, saved Jackson and another Southern steamer from capture.