USS Alfred Robb (1860)
| History | |
|---|---|
  United States
|
|
| Name: | USS Alfred Robb |
| Laid down: | date unknown |
| Launched: | 1860 |
| In service: | June 1862 |
| Out of service: | 9 August 1865 |
| Captured: |
|
| Fate: | sold, 17 August 1865 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Gunboat |
| Displacement: | 86 long tons (87 t) |
| Length: | 114 ft 9 in (34.98 m) |
| Beam: | 20 ft (6.1 m) |
| Draft: | 4 ft 6 in (1.37 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 4 ft (1.2 m) |
| Propulsion: |
|
| Speed: | 9.5 kn (10.9 mph; 17.6 km/h) |
| Complement: | 30 |
| Armament: | 2 × 12-pounder rifles, 2 × 12-pounder smoothbore guns |
| Armor: | tinclad |
USS Alfred Robb (1860) was a stern wheel steamer captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War.
She was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat in support of the Union Navy blockade of Confederate rivers and other waterways.
Alfred Robb — a wooden-hulled, stern-wheel steamboat built at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1860 — operated on the Ohio River and the other navigable streams of the Mississippi watershed system until acquired by the Confederate Government at some now-unknown date during the first year of the Civil War for use as a transport.
Reconnaissance probes up the Tennessee River by Federal gunboats had convinced leaders of the Union Navy in the area that Southern forces had destroyed this vessel after the fall of Fort Henry, lest she fall into Northern hands. Nevertheless, Alfred Robb remained safe and active until Lieutenant William Gwin — who commanded the side-wheel gunboat Tyler — seized her at Florence, Alabama on 21 April 1862. This capture and the burning of the steamer Dunbar in nearby Cypress Creek at about the same time cleared the Tennessee River of the last Confederate vessels afloat, giving Union warships complete control of the river.
Gwin placed a crew of 11 men on the prize and renamed her Lady Foote to honor Flag Officer Andrew H. Foote — who then commanded the Western Flotilla of which Tyler was a part — and his wife. However, Foote found this action embarrassing and directed Gwin to restore the vessel's original name.
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