USS Memphis (1862)

Career
Launched:	1861
Commissioned:	October 4, 1862
Decommissioned:	May 6, 1867
Fate:	Sold May 8, 1869; renamed Mississippi, destroyed by dock fire May 13, 1883
General Characteristics
Displacement:	791 tons
Length:	227 feet
Beam:	30 feet 1 inch
Propulsion:	steam engine
Speed:	14 knots
Armament:	7 guns

See USS Memphis for other ships of the same name.

The second USS Memphis was a 7‑gun screw steamer, built by William Denny & Bros., Dumbarton, Scotland, in 1861, which briefly served as a Confederate blockade runner before being captured and taken into the United States Navy during the American Civil War.

Memphis, while running the Union blockade of Confederate ports on June 22, 1862, ran aground while attempting to enter Charleston harbor, South Carolina. Efficient work by Southern troops got her partially unloaded on the following day, and she was towed to safety before Federal warships could hit her with shell fire. Memphis was captured by side wheel gunboat USS Magnolia outbound from Charleston with a cargo of cotton on July 31, 1862, and purchased by the U.S. Navy from a prize court at New York City on September 4, 1862. Memphis was commissioned on October 4, 1862, Acting Volunteer Lieutenant Pendleton G. Watmough in command.

Assigned to the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, Memphis sailed for Charleston and began service on October 14 with the capture of British steamer Ouachita bound for Havana, Cuba. She continued patrol through 1862 into 1863. On January 4, 1863 she joined side wheel steamer USS Quaker City in taking Confederate sloop Mercury with a cargo of turpentine for Nassau, Bahamas. On January 31, Confederate ironclads CSS Palmetto State and CSS Chicora made a dash out of Charleston Harbor into the midst of the blockading ships. Screw steamer USS Mercedita was rammed and disabled by Palmetto State while side wheel steamer USS Keystone State was next attacked and left for Memphis to take in tow. The two rams then retired.

By March of the following year, Memphis was operating in the North Edisto River. On March 6, 1864 Confederate torpedo boat CSS David attemped a run on the Union blockader. The spar torpedo struck Memphis' port quarter but did not explode. After her second torpedo misfired, David retreated upstream out of range of her foe's heavy guns. Memphis, uninjured, continued her blockading duties to the end of the Civil War.

On May 6, 1867 Memphis was decommissioned and sold to V. Brown & Co., at New York on May 8, 1869. Renamed Mississippi, the screw steamer operated as a freight ship until May 13, 1883 when she was gutted by a dock fire at Seattle, Washington, and her wreck abandoned.

Reference

 This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.