U. S. S. Virginia
The third Virginia was
originally the British
merchantman Pet built at Dumbarton, Scotland, in
1861. Pet sailed as
Noe-Daquy during the early months of the Civil War and,
in December 1862, was acquired by a Havana merchant for use as a
Confederate blockade runner. Renamed Virginia, the vessel was
captured off Mugeres Island,
Mexico, by Wachusett and Sonoma on 18 January
1863; was later purchased by the Navy
from the New York prize court
on 1 September; and was
commissioned at the New York Navy Yard on 12 June.
Virginia
was assigned duty with Rear
Admiral David G.
Farragut's West Gulf Blockading Squadron and, within a week of her
commissioning, departed New York, bound for the Gulf of Mexico. En
route, she touched
briefly at Hampton Roads, Va., finally joining
Farragut's squadron in July.
However, further repairs
and modifications were needed
before the vessel could
become a fully effective fighting unit; and the ship spent
August and most of September
at New Orleans undergoing
overhaul.
Virginia
finally returned to active duty in late September
and was deployed along the coast of Texas for
the duration of the war. There,
she conducted numerous patrol and reconnaissance
missions—which often took her
up the rivers which empty into the gulf—and also
compiled an impressive list of
captures. Her first
success was the seizure of the British blockade runner
Jenny
off the Texas coast with a
cargo of cotton on 6
October. Between 2 and 14 November, Monongahela,
Owasco,
and Virginia convoyed
and supported General
Nathaniel Banks' successful landing at Brazos Santiago,
Tex., near the mouth of the Rio Grande River. Here,
Virginia also captured the British steamer Mata-moras
on the 4th and the
English brig Dashing Wave
on the 5th. This expedition
began a Union offensive
aimed both at wresting Texas from Confederate control and
deterring French troops in Mexico from attempting to invade the
state. On the 4th, Southern forces evacuated
Brownsville, giving the Union a strong foothold at
the Mexican border.
After the Rio Grande expedition,
Virginia returned
to blockade duty and found the waters off Texas a fertile
breeding ground of smuggling activity. This was
especially true of the area
off San Luis Pass, Tex., and
Virginia
made most of her captures here.
These included the
British schooner Mary Douglas and her
cargo of coffee, bananas, and
linen which were seized on 15 February 1864, and the English
schooner Henry Colthirst
which she took on
the 22d. On the 29th off Galveston, Tex., Virginia overhauled
the Confederate schooner
Camilla with a cargo of cotton. The sloop
Cassie Holt
was also captured at the same
time, but she grounded off San Luis Pass and was burned. Once again
off San Luis Pass,
Virginia captured the sloop Randall
on 8 March, the schooner
Sylphide on the 10th, and the Mexican schooner Juanita
on 11 April. However, Juanita
grounded on the 13th
and was recaptured with the
loss of the prize crew. This
incident was partially offset
by the capture of the Mexican schooner Alma on
the 19th and the seizure and
destruction of the sloop
Rosina
on the 20th. Virginia's
last captures off San Luis Pass included the schooner Experiment,
which she took on 3
May and subsequently destroyed and 94 stacked bales of cotton picked
up ashore on the 7th and 8th.
Virginia
returned to New Orleans in
mid-May for badly needed repairs to her boilers. She remained at
New Orleans until
December, leaving on the 5th
for the blockade off Galveston.
Here, she captured the
schooner Belle on 27 December and helped to destroy the
side-wheel steamer Acadia in February 1865.
After the war
ended in April 1865, Virginia sailed for
Philadelphia on 17 July. The
veteran blockader was
sold at public auction at New York City to Perry
Brothers on 30 November; was
documented on 14
December; and was rerigged as a barge on 24 March
1885.
