USS Grand Gulf (1863)
| History | |
|---|---|
 United States
|
|
| Ordered: | as Onward |
| Laid down: | date unknown |
| Launched: | date unknown |
| Acquired: | 14 September 1863 |
| Commissioned: | 28 September 1863 |
| Decommissioned: | 10 November 1865 |
| Struck: | 1865 |
| Fate: | sold, 30 November 1865 |
| General characteristics | |
| Displacement: | 1200 tons |
| Length: | 210 ft 4 in (64.11 m) |
| Beam: | 34 ft 6 in (10.52 m) |
| Draught: | 20 ft 6 in (6.25 m) |
| Propulsion: |
|
| Speed: | 11.5 knots |
| Complement: | not known |
| Armament: |
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USS Grand Gulf (1863) was a screw steamer acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was effective in performing blockade duty, and captured a number of Confederate blockade runners.
Grand Gulf was purchased in New York as Onward 14 September 1863 from her builders, Cornelius and Richard Poillon; and commissioned 28 September 1863, Comdr. George Ransom in command.
Grand Gulf stood to sea from New York on 11 October and 9 days later joined the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron off Wilmington, North Carolina. Her two exits to the sea at Beaufort and the Cape Fear River made Wilmington one of the most important and most difficult to blockade of all Confederate ports. She remained on blockade duty there, with intervals for repair at the New York and Norfolk Navy Yards, until 4 October 1864.
On 21 November 1863, assisted by Army Transport Fulton, Grand Gulf took blockade runner Banshee with a general cargo of contraband from Nassau. Off the Carolina coast, Grand Gulf, 6 March 1864, captured the British steamer Mary Ann trying to run the blockade with a cargo of cotton and tobacco; seizing the cargo and 82 passengers and crew members, Grand Gulf put a prize crew on the steamer and sent her to Boston, Massachusetts. A second British ship, Young Republic, fell captive to Grand Gulf after a wild chase 6 May 1864, with both ships steaming at full speed and the blockade runner throwing overboard bale after bale of precious cotton and even the anchor chain in a futile attempt to lighten ship. Grand Gulf garnered some 253 bales of cotton as well as 54 prisoners from this prize. Two weeks later, Rear Admiral Samuel Phillips Lee wrote Ransom congratulating him on taking the prize; "Every capture made by blockaders deprives the enemy of so much of the 'sinews of war,' and is equal to the taking of two supply trains from the rebel Army."
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