Blockade Runner Merrimac/ USS Merrimac-- Part 1

In the last post, I mentioned the capture of the blockade runner Merrimac near Masonboro Inlet on July 24, 1863.  It later became the USS Merrimac (not to be confused with the steam frigate USS Merrimac which became the CSS Virginia.

From Wikipedia.

230 feet long, 30 foot beam.  116 crew,  two 30 pdr. Parrott rifles, four 24-pdrs., two 12-pdrs.

Purchased in England by the Confederate government for use as a blockade runner in 1862.  Had a successful career as a blockade runner, but captured by the USS Iroquois off Cape Fear River 24 July 1863.  Purchased in prize court by U.S. Navy 10 March 1864.

Commissioned at New York  1 May 1864 Acting Master William P. Rogers in command.  Joined East Gulf Blockading Squadron in June 1864  Captured a Cuban sloop sailing with cotton from Florida to Havana.  In July, yellow fever broke out on the Merrimac and she sailed north to New York and disembarked her sick sailors, then cruised northward as far as St. John's, Newfoundland.

--Old B-R'er