SEPTEMBER 16TH, 1864: Commander Bulloch wrote Secretary Mallory from Liverpool: "The loss of the Alabama occurred just at a time when the financial condition of the Navy Department began to improve and ...I took immediate steps to look up a successor.
"I now have the satisfaction of informing you of the purchase of a fine composite ship ship, built for the Bombay trade, and just returned from her first voyage. She is 1,160 tons builder's measurement, classed A-1...frames, beams, etc., of iron, but planked from keel to gunwhale with East Indian teak....
"My broker has had her carefully examined by one of Lloyd's inspectors, who pronounced her a capital ship in every respect.... The log of the ship shows her to be a fast sailor with canvas, for with screw up, she has made 330 miles in 24 hours by observation."
Bulloch was describing the steamer Sea King, a ship which would become renowned as the raider CSS Shenandoah.
He also informed Mallory that contracts had been let for the torpedo boats which the secretary had ordered two months before.
Things Looking Up in Europe. --Old B-R'er
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