This article is currently being merged. After a discussion, consensus to merge this articlewith George W. Blunt (1856) was found. You can help implement the merge by following the instructions at Help:Merging and the resolution on the discussion. Process started in August 2021. |
History | |
---|---|
6 September 1856United States | |
Name |
|
Namesake | George W. Blunt, nautical publisher |
Operator |
|
Builder | Daniel Westervelt of New York City |
Cost | $10,000, 23 November 1861 |
Launched | 6 September 1856 |
Completed | 1856 |
Acquired | 23 November 1861 |
Commissioned | 4 December 1861 |
Decommissioned | 13 May 1863 |
In service | 2 June 1863 |
Out of service | 16 August 1865 |
Stricken | 1865 (est.) |
Nickname(s) | Blunt |
Fate | Sold, 20 October 1865 |
General characteristics | |
Class and type | sails; wood |
Tonnage | Uncertain [note 1] |
Length | 76 ft 6 in (23.32 m) |
Beam | 20 ft 6 in (6.25 m) |
Draught | depth of hold 8 ft 9 in (2.67 m) |
Propulsion | schooner sail |
Speed | 10 knots |
Complement | not known |
Armament |
|
USS G. W. Blunt was a Sandy Hook pilot boat acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War in 1861. See George W. Blunt (1856) for more details. [1] [2] She was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat as well as a dispatch boat in support of the Union Navy blockade of Confederate waterways.
Towards the war's end, she was reconfigured as a rescue and salvage ship. Her new task was to remove many of the shipwrecks, hulks, and other in-water debris of war.
The G. W. Blunt, formerly the pilot schooner George W. Blunt, was a wooden two-masted schooner built by Daniel Westervelt in New York and launched 6 September 1856. The schooner was acquired by the Navy Department in New York City on 23 November 1861 by George D. Morgan, who was the purchase agent for the U.S. government. The cost was $10,000. [3] As a result of this purchase, the Sandy Hook pilots had a replacement boat built in July 1861, from Boston builders Brown & Lovell [4] [note 2] She was commissioned on 4 December 1861 and acting Master was Henry Sherwood who was in command. [1] [2] [5]
Arriving at Port Royal, South Carolina, on 11 December 1861, G. W. Blunt served as a mail and dispatch boat for the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron between Charleston, South Carolina, Wassaw Sound, Georgia, and Fernandina, Florida. En route to Georgetown, South Carolina, on 19 April 1862 she captured the blockade-running schooner Wave with a cargo of cotton. [2]
For the following year, the G. W. Blunt was on a blockade duty off Charleston and assisted in capturing several more vessels. She departed Port Royal, South Carolina, for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on 7 May 1863 and was decommissioned for repairs on 13 May 1863. Recommissioned on 2 June 1863, the G. W. Blunt rejoined the blockading squadron off Charleston, patrolling the many small inlets and bays near the main harbor. [2]
Cruising on Charleston station on 1864, the G. W. Blunt was sent to Port Royal on 7 August 1864 and on 25 August was fitted with diving equipment for salvage duty. She worked on many wrecks, including Constance on 13 November and the USS Housatonic, (sunk 17 February 1864 by Confederate submarine H. L. Hunley) from 15 to 19 November. She was sent to Savannah, Georgia, on 1 March 1865 to clear obstructions from the harbor, and returned to Charleston 1 April 1865. [2] [6]
The G. W. Blunt was decommissioned on 16 August 1865 at Port Royal and was sold there on 20 October 1865. [2]
USS Housatonic was a screw sloop-of-war of the United States Navy, taking its name from the Housatonic River of New England.
Princess Royal was a British merchant ship and blockade runner that became a cruiser in the Union Navy during the American Civil War and later returned to civilian service.
USSKeystone State was a wooden sidewheel steamer that served in the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was a fast ship for her day and was used effectively to blockade Confederate ports on the Atlantic coast. She participated in the capture or destruction of 17 blockade runners. In addition to her military service, Keystone State had a lengthy commercial career before the war. Renamed San Francisco, she also sailed commercially after the war. The ship was built in 1853 and scrapped in 1874.
USS Wabash was a steam screw frigate of the United States Navy that served during the American Civil War. She was based on the same plans as Colorado. Post-war she continued to serve her country in European operations and eventually served as a barracks ship in Boston, Massachusetts, and was sold in 1912.
USS Potomska was a wooden screw steamer rigged as a three masted schooner purchased at New York City from H. Haldrege on 25 September 1861. She was commissioned at the New York Navy Yard on 20 December 1861.
USS Huron was a Unadilla-class gunboat built for the United States Navy during the American Civil War for blockage duty against the ports and rivers of the Confederate States of America.
USS Flambeau was a screw steamship purchased by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat, operating in Confederate waterways.
USS James S. Chambers was a schooner acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat in support of the Union Navy blockade of 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 George W. Rodgers was a schooner captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was initially intended to be used as part of the stone fleet of sunken obstructions; however, she was retained and used as a picket boat and dispatch vessel and, later, as a survey ship, concentrating her efforts in the waterways of the Confederate South.
USS Hope was a 19th-century wooden yacht schooner, designed and built in 1861 by Henry Steers for Captain Thomas B. Ives of Providence, Rhode Island. She was acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was placed into service as a gunboat assigned to support the fleet blockading the ports of the Confederate States of America. However, at times, Hope was assigned extra tasks, such as that of a dispatch boat, supply runner and salvage ship. She was a pilot boat from 1866 to 1891 and in 1891 she was replaced by the Herman Oelrichs, when the Hope was wrecked ashore the Sandy Hook Point.
The third USS Union was a heavy (1,114-ton) steamer with a powerful 12-inch rifled gun purchased by the United States Navy during the American Civil War.
USS T. A. Ward was a 284-ton schooner was purchased by the Union Navy during the Union blockade of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War.
The Sinking of USS Housatonic on 17 February 1864 during the American Civil War was an important turning point in naval warfare. The Confederate States Navy submarine, H.L. Hunley made her first and only attack on a Union Navy warship when she staged a clandestine night attack on USS Housatonic in Charleston harbor. H.L. Hunley approached just under the surface, avoiding detection until the last moments, then embedded and remotely detonated a spar torpedo that rapidly sank the 1,240 long tons (1,260 t) sloop-of-war with the loss of five Union sailors. H.L. Hunley became renowned as the first submarine to successfully sink an enemy vessel in combat, and was the direct progenitor of what would eventually become international submarine warfare, although the victory was Pyrrhic and short-lived, since the submarine did not survive the attack and was lost with all eight Confederate crewmen.
Commodore John R. Goldsborough was an officer in the United States Navy. Goldsborough was made a cadet-midshipman in 1824 and as such saw action in the Mediterranean against pirates. In one incident, while in charge of 18 men he attacked and captured a Greek pirate ship with a 58-man crew.
John Cummings Howell was an officer in the United States Navy during the American Civil War. He rose to the rank of rear admiral and late in his career was commander-in-chief of the North Atlantic Squadron and then of the European Squadron.
William Edgar Le Roy was an officer in the United States Navy who served in the Mexican War, on the African Slave Trade Patrol, and in the American Civil War. He rose to the rank of rear admiral and late in his career was consecutively commander-in-chief of the South Atlantic Squadron, the North Atlantic Squadron, and the European Squadron.
George W. Blunt, completed in 1856, was a schooner built in New York that operated as a New York Sandy Hook pilot boat designated Pilot Boat No. 11. The schooner was used to pilot vessels to and from the Port of New York and New Jersey. That schooner was sold to the United States Navy in 1861, renamed and commissioned as the USS G. W. Blunt (1856), serving in the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron in the South. A second schooner, also named George W. Blunt, was built in East Boston in 1861 and purchased to replace the first schooner as a pilot boat.
This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships .The entry can be found here.