USS William G. Anderson (1859)
| History | |
|---|---|
  United States
|
|
| Launched: | 1859 |
| Acquired: | 23 August 1861 |
| Commissioned: | 2 October 1861 |
| Decommissioned: | 21 July 1866 |
| Struck: | 1866 (est.) |
| Fate: | sold, 28 August 1866 |
| General characteristics | |
| Tonnage: | 593 |
| Length: | 149 ft 7 in (45.59 m) |
| Beam: | 30 ft 1 in (9.17 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 14 ft 3 in (4.34 m) |
| Propulsion: | sail |
| Armament: |
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USS William G. Anderson (1859) was a barque used by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was assigned by the Navy to patrol navigable waterways of the Confederacy to prevent the South from trading with other countries.
William G. Anderson—a fast sailing bark built in 1859 at Boston, Massachusetts, by C. F. and H. D. Gardiner—was initially owned by Edmund Boynton of Boston and acquired at Boston by the Navy on 23 August 1861. William G. Anderson was commissioned at the Boston Navy Yard on 2 October 1861, Acting Volunteer Lieutenant William C. Rogers in command.
Standing out to sea on 11 October, William G. Anderson joined the West Gulf Blockading Squadron, searching for Confederate privateers in the sea lanes of the West Indies. At daybreak on 12 November, lookouts on the bark made out a sail running before the wind in the Bahama channel and tacked to give chase. When within four miles, those in William G. Anderson saw the schooner bear away with the British flag at the main masthead. At 0930, the Union vessel succeeded in bringing the stranger to, and discovered her to be the Confederate privateer Beauregard, seven days out of Charleston, South Carolina. William G. Anderson sent over an officer to board the prize, who found that the crew had gotten drunk and was engaged in spiking the privateer's sole 12-pound pivot gun and cutting her rigging and sails. A prize crew took over the erstwhile privateer, and the Confederate crew was placed in irons on board William G. Anderson.
After bringing her prize into Key West, Florida, on 19 November, William G. Anderson set sail a week later. She cruised off Puerto Rico, Cuba, Bermuda, and the Windward Islands into the spring of the following year. She sighted 210 vessels, boarded 66, and had found Confederate privateers, in her commander's words, "rare during that time." She concluded that cruise at the Boston Navy Yard on 16 April 1862.
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