USS Patapsco, a 1335-ton Passaic class monitor built at Wilmington, Delaware, was commissioned in early January 1863. Assigned to the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, she took part in a bombardment of Fort McAllister, on Georgia's Ogeechee River, on 3 March. On the 7th of April Patapsco joined eight other ironclads in a vigorous attack on Fort Sumter, off Charleston, South Carolina, and received 47 hits from Confederate gunfire during that day. Beginning in mid-July, she began her participation in a lengthy bombardment campaign against Charleston's defending fortifications. This led to the capture of Fort Wagner, on Morris Island, in early September. Fort Sumter was reduced to a pile of rubble, but remained a formidible opponent.
In November 1863, Patapsco tested a large obstruction-clearing explosive device that had been devised by John Ericsson. Remaining off South Carolina and Georgia during much of 1864 and into 1865, the monitor, or her boat crews, took part in a reconnaissance of the Wilmington River, Georgia, in January 1864 and helped capture or destroy enemy sailing vessels in February and November of that year. On 14 January 1865, while participating in obstruction clearance operations in Charleston Harbor, USS Patapsco struck a Confederate mine and sank, with heavy loss of life.
This page features all the views we have related to USS Patapsco (1862-1865).
If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions." |
Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.
In addition to the views presented above, the following photograph
has been identified in one published source as having been taken
on board USS Patapsco: Photo # NH 51953, a view of officers on the deck of a Passaic class monitor, circa 1864-65. |
If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions." |
Page made 12 September 2001
New image added 23 September 2001