CSS Arkansas-- Part 2: Lt. Brown Puts a Rush On Completion

Nevertheless, with great energy to overcome shortages and difficulties of every nature, Lt. Brown completed the Arkansas, reinforced her bulwarks with cotton bales, and mounted a formidable  armament of 10 guns.

Lt. George W. Gift, CSN, who served in the ship later recorded that "within five weeks from the day we arrived at Yazoo City, we had a man-of-war (such as she was) from almost nothing -- the credit for all that belongs to Isaac Newton Brown, the commander of the vessel."

A number of Army artillerists volunteered to cat as gunners on board the ram.

--Old B-R'er

Lt. Gift Reflects on Fate of the South

FEBRUARY 28TH, 1865:  Lt. George W. Gift, CSN, on sick leave at his wife's home in Georgia, reflected on the fate of the South:  "It is all too disheartening!  The press brings accounts of new defeat for us.  The Water Witch has been captured and destroyed.  Mobile has fallen, so that all the ports in the Confederacy are lost!  That goes for the Navy...."

ALSO ON FEBRUARY 28TH, 1865:  Armed boats from the USS Honeysuckle forced the blockade running British schooner Sort aground on a reef near the mouth of Crystal River, Florida, where she was abandoned.  The Sort had previously been captured in December 1864 by the USS O.H. Lee.

--Old B-R'er