USS Sciota (1861)
USS Sciota (2nd ship from left)
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| History | |
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  United States
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| Name: | USS Sciota |
| Builder: | Jacob Birely (Philadelphia) |
| Cost: | $96,000 |
| Launched: | 15 Oct 1861 |
| Commissioned: | 15 Dec 1861 |
| Fate: | Struck mine and sank, 14 Apr 1865; salvaged; sold 25 Oct 1865 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Unadilla-class gunboat |
| Displacement: | 691 tons |
| Tons burthen: | 507 |
| Length: | 158 ft (48 m) (waterline) |
| Beam: | 28 ft (8.5 m) |
| Draft: | 9 ft 6 in (2.90 m) (max.) |
| Depth of hold: | 12 ft (3.7 m) |
| Propulsion: | 2 × 200 IHP 30-in bore by 18 in stroke horizontal back-acting engines; single screw |
| Sail plan: | Two-masted schooner |
| Speed: | 10 kn (11.5 mph) |
| Complement: | 114 |
| Armament: |
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USS Sciota was a Unadilla-class gunboat built on behalf of the United States Navy for service during the Civil War. She was outfitted as a gunboat, with both a 20-pounder rifle for horizontal firing, and two howitzers for shore bombardment, and assigned to the Union blockade of the waterways of the Confederate States of America.
The first U.S. Navy ship to be so named, USS Sciota was one of the "ninety-day gunboats" rushed through construction at the beginning of the Civil War, Sciota was laid down in the summer of 1861 at Philadelphia by Jacob Birley and J. P. Morris and Company; launched on 15 October 1861; and commissioned at the Philadelphia Navy Yard on 15 December 1861, Lieutenant Edward Donaldson in command.
The new screw gunboat was assigned to the Gulf Blockading Squadron and arrived at Ship Island, Mississippi, on the afternoon of 8 January 1862. On 6 February, she captured blockade runner, Margaret, off Isle of Breton, Louisiana, as the sloop was attempting to escape to sea laden with cotton.
When Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles divided naval jurisdiction in the Gulf of Mexico between Flag Officer William McKean and Flag Officer David Farragut, Sciota was assigned to Farragut's West Gulf Blockading Squadron which had been created to wrest New Orleans from Southern hands.
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Wikipedia