USS Mattabesett (1864)

The Battle of Albemarle Sound. Mattabesett is second from right
History
Name:	USS Mattabesett
Builder:	A. & G. T. Sampson, Boston, Massachusetts
Laid down:	1862
Launched:	1863
Commissioned:	7 April 1864
Decommissioned:	31 May 1865
Fate:	Sold, 15 October 1865
General characteristics
Type:	Gunboat
Displacement:	1,173 long tons (1,192 t)
Length:	205 ft (62 m)
Beam:	35 ft (11 m)
Draft:	8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)
Installed power:	1 × 712 ihp inclined direct-acting steam engine, auxiliary sails
Propulsion:	2 × sidewheels
Sail plan:	Schooner-rigged
Speed:	14 knots (26 km/h; 16 mph)
Complement:	100 officers and enlisted
Armament:	2 × 100-pounder (45 kg) Parrott rifles 4 × 9 in (230 mm) smoothbore Dahlgren guns 4 × 24-pounder (11 kg) guns 1 × 12-pounder (5 kg) smoothbore gun 1 × 12-pounder (5 kg) rifled gun

USS Mattabesett, sometimes spelled Mattabeset, a schooner-rigged, wooden hulled, double-ended sidewheel gunboat, was built by A. & G. T. Sampson, Boston, Massachusetts, and named for the Mattabesset River in Connecticut. Mattabesett was delivered to the New York Navy Yard on January 18, 1864, and commissioned April 7, 1864, Commander John C. Febiger in command.

Mattabesett departed New York on April 21, 1864 for duty in the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron and arrived at Hampton Roads on April 23 as escort to USS Onondaga. Continuing down the coast to enter the North Carolina Sounds, she took part in an engagement between Union forces and the Confederate ram CSS Albemarle, accompanied by CSS Bombshell and CSS Cotton Plant, off the mouth of the Roanoke River on May 5. In the course of the battle, leading to the capture of Plymouth, North Carolina by Confederate forces, Mattabesett, with USS Sassacus, captured Bombshell, but Albemarle and Cotton Plant escaped.