USS Advance, the second United States Navy ship to be so named, was later known as USS Frolic, and was originally the blockade runner Advance captured by the Union Navy during the latter part of the American Civil War. She was purchased by the Union Navy and outfitted as a gunboat and assigned to the blockade of the waterways of the Confederate States of America. She also served as dispatch ship and supply vessel when military action eventually slowed.
The first USS Sonoma was a sidewheel gunboat that served in the United States Navy during the American Civil War. She was named for Sonoma Creek in northern California, Sonoma County, California, and the town of Sonoma, California, that in turn were named for one of the chiefs of the Chocuyen Indians of that region.
USS Seneca was a Unadilla-class gunboat built on behalf of the United States Navy for service during the American Civil War. Seneca was outfitted with guns for horizontal fire as well as with two howitzers for bombardment of shore targets. With her crew of 84, she was assigned to the Union blockade of the Confederate States of America.
The Union blockade in the American Civil War was a naval strategy by the United States to prevent the Confederacy from trading.
USS Chenango was a side-wheel steamer in the service of the United States Navy during the American Civil War.
The USS Daylight was a steamship acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Navy to patrol navigable waterways of the Confederacy to prevent the South from trading with other countries.
The first USS Dawn was a steam-operated vessel acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Navy to patrol navigable waterways of the Confederacy to prevent the South from trading with other countries.
USS Pembina was a Unadilla-class gunboat built for the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Navy to patrol navigable waterways of the Confederacy to prevent the South from trading with other countries.
USS Penobscot was a Unadilla-class gunboat built for the Union Navy during the American Civil War.
USS Isaac Smith was a screw steamer acquired by the United States Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Union Navy to patrol navigable waterways of the Confederate States of America to prevent the Confederacy from trading with other countries. In 1863, she became the only warship in the American Civil War to be captured by enemy land forces. She then served in the Confederate States Navy as CSS Stono until she was wrecked.
The first USS Calypso was a steamer captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War.
USS Catalpa was a steamer acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Navy for various purposes, but especially to patrol navigable waterways of the Confederacy to prevent the South from trading with other countries.
The first USS Emma was a steamer captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Union Navy as a picket and patrol vessel on Confederate waterways.
The first USS Wanderer was a high-speed schooner originally built for pleasure. It was used in 1858 to illegally import slaves from Africa. It was seized for service with the United States Navy during the American Civil War. In U.S. Navy service from 1861 to 1865, and under outright U.S. Navy ownership from 1863 to 1865, she was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat, as a tender, and as a hospital ship. She was decommissioned, put into merchant use, and lost off Cuba in 1871.
USS State of Georgia was a large steamer with powerful guns acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. State of Georgia, with her crew of 113 sailors and officers, was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat in its blockade of Confederate waterways.
USS Gertrude was the British blockade-running steamship Gertrude captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was placed in service by the Navy as a gunboat and assigned to patrol the southern coast of the United States for ships attempting to run the Union blockade of Southern ports. She was later the American merchant ship Gussie Telfair until wrecked in 1880.
USS Percy Drayton was a sloop captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She served the Union Navy’s struggle against the Confederate States of America as a ship’s tender, supporting the Union ships on blockade duty with provisions, ammunition, water, and other needs.
USS Thunder was a blockade running steamer captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War.
The third USS Virginia was a 581-ton blockade-running steamer captured by the United States Navy and put to use by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. Virginia served the U.S. Navy primarily as a mortar gunboat. Her ordnance included six 24-pounder howitzers and a 12-pounder rifled gun.
Throughout the American Civil War, blockade runners were seagoing steam ships that were used to get through the Union blockade that extended some 3,500 miles (5,600 km) along the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coastlines and the lower Mississippi River. The Confederate states were largely without industrial capability and could not provide the quantity of arms and other supplies needed to fight against the industrial North. To meet this need blockade runners were built in Scotland and England and were used to import the guns, ordnance and other supplies that the Confederacy desperately needed, in exchange for cotton that the British textile industry needed greatly. To penetrate the blockade, these relatively lightweight shallow draft ships, mostly built in British shipyards and specially designed for speed, but not suited for transporting large quantities of cotton, had to cruise undetected, usually at night, through the Union blockade. The typical blockade runners were privately owned vessels often operating with a letter of marque issued by the Confederate States of America. If spotted, the blockade runners would attempt to outmaneuver or simply outrun any Union ships on blockade patrol, often successfully.
United States