When I first started The Siege of Petersburg Online back in August 2009, my intention was always to cover the war on the water. I just haven’t been able to get to it in any dedicated fashion until now. I did post some naval posts in my my Siege of Petersburg 150th Anniversary series, but nothing else…until now.
Over the next several months, I’ll be posting daily posts of the ships of the Union and Confederate Navies at the Siege of Petersburg. These unit pages are very similar in format to the unit pages I’ve been posting for years on the regiments, batteries, battalions, and companies of both sides which were at Petersburg and Richmond. This is a continuation of that idea. It gives me a place to put information I find through research on these vessels. It also shows readers where these ships were located throughout the Siege of Petersburg.
Double turreted monitor, Onondaga, James River, Va.
Starting tomorrow with the USS Agawam, I’ll be posting one ship a day, every day, until I’ve listed out every ship which was present. Links to these ship pages will start appearing below in April 2019. Also start to take a look at the permanent pages for the United States Navy and Confederate States Navy, which will ultimately be how you should access the pages for these vessels. I look forward to continuing to research the war on the water and add to the information already present.
I used the legendary Dictionary of American Fighting Ships (DANFS for short) as well as the Navy Official Records, Volume X, Volume XI, and Volume XII to fill in most of the information you see for United States vessels. The Confederate ships have very little written about them, so I’ve pieced together what information I could find from DANFS as well as elsewhere.
List of Union and Confederate Ships at the Siege of Petersburg
- USS Agawam
- USS Alabama
- USS Alert (aka Watch)
- USS Alpha (aka Picket Boat No. 1) (aka Tug No. 1)
- USS Althea
- USS Atlanta
- USS Banshee
- USS Bat
- USS Cactus
- USS Canonicus
- USS Casco
- USS Charles Phelps
- USS Chippewa
- USS Clematis
- USS Clinton
- USS Cohasset
- USS Commodore Barney
- USS Commodore Morris
- USS Commodore Perry
- USS Crusader
- USS Dawn
- USS Daylight
- USS Delaware
- USS Delta (aka Picket Boat No. 4) (aka Tug No. 4)
- USS Dumbarton
- USS Epsilon (aka Picket Boat No. 5) (aka Tug No. 5)
- USS Eutaw
- USS Fahkee
- USS Gamma (aka Picket Boat No. 3) (aka Tug No. 3)
- USS General Putnam aka William G. Putnam
- USS Gettysburg
- USS Glance
- USS Harcourt
- USS Heliotrope
- USS Henry Brinker
- USS Hunchback
- USS Huron
- USS Hydrangea
- USS Isaac N. Seymour
- USS Kansas
- USS Lehigh
- USS Lilac
- USS Mackinaw
- USS Mahopac
- USS Malvern
- USS Massasoit
- USS Maumee
- USS Mendota
- USS Miami
- USS Minnesota
- USS Monadnock
- USS Montauk
- USS Morse
- USS Mount Washington
- USS Mystic
- USS Nansemond
- USS New Ironsides
- USS Onondaga
- USS Osceola
- USS Pawtuxet
- USS Pequot
- USS Phlox
- USS Picket Launch No. 3
- USS Picket Launch No. 4
- USS Picket Launch No. 6
- USS Pink
- USS Pontoosuc
- USS Poppy
- USS Rose
- USS Saffron
- USS Samuel Rotan
- USS Sangamon
- USS Sassacus
- USS Saugus
- USS Seneca
- USS Shawmut
- USS Shokokon
- USS Spuyten Duyvil
- USS St. Lawrence
- USS Stepping Stones
- USS Tecumseh
- USS Tristram Shandy
- USS Tritonia
- USS Unadilla
- USS Unit
- USS Vicksburg
- USS Violet
- USS Western World
- USS Wilderness
- USS Young America
- USS Young Rover
- USS Zeta (aka Picket Boat No. 6) (aka Tug No. 6)
- USS Zouave