USS Nightingale-- Part 6: Purchase By U.S. Navy, Commissioned and Duty on the Gulf Coast

Being a slave ship, the Nightingale was condemned by the New York prize court and then promptly bought by the U.S. Navy, then in serious need of anything that would float and carry guns for the blockade of the South's coasts.

It was commissioned 18 August 1861 under command of Brevet Master  David B. Horne. 

The Nightingale now carried four 32-pounder cannons.

Fitted out as a collier and store ship, the Nightingale got underway south laden with coal the same day she was commissioned.  Stopped at Hampton Roads on the 21st and then left for Key West the following morning.  But for occasional trips north for coal and supplies, she served on the Gulf Coast through the first years of the Civil War.

--Old B-Runner

From Tea Clipper to Slaver to U.S. Navy Ship: The Tale of the Nightingale-- Part 1

I have been writing about this ship in my last four posts and in connection with Lt. John Julius Guthrie, USN, of North Carolina, who commanded the Nightingale's prize crew on its way back to the United States.  Guthrie later was a Confederate naval officer after the war started.

From Wikipedia.

The USS Nightingale (1851) was originally a   tea clipper before becoming a slave ship until captured by the USS Saratoga in Africa in 1861; the U.S. Navy then purchased her and it became a warship.

During the war, it served as a  supply ship and collier (carried coal) for Union blockading ships.  After the war she was sold and went on to a long career in Arctic exploration  before foundering in the North Atlantic in 1893.

Built by Samuel Hanscomb, Jr. of Eliot, Maine.  Cost $43,500, in 1851.

As tea clipper, her route was China to London to New York.  Carrying passengers, she went  from Boston and New York to Australia.

--Old B-Runner