Name: CSS GENERAL STERLING PRICE, Commissioned as warship: 1861, Fate: sunk 6 June 1862 at the battle of Memphis, United States Name: USS GENERAL PRICE, Commissioned: 30 September 1862, Decommissioned: 24 July 1865, Fate: sold 3 October 1866 to W.H. Harrison at Mound City Ill. For USA$14,000
General characteristics: Displacement: 633 tons, Length: 182 ft (55,47 m), Beam: 30 ft (9.14 m), Draft: 9.2 ft (2.79 m), Propulsion: steam engine. Armament: four 9" Dahlgren rifles, Armor: 4 inch oak sheath with a 1 inch iron covering on her bow, double pine bulkheads filled with compressed cotton bales. Crew of 77 officers and men.
Built as LAURENT MILLAUDON a wooden side-wheel river steamboat launched at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1856 operating in the New Orleans, Louisiana area, and captained by W.S. Whann. At the beginning of the American Civil War she was taken into service by the Confederate Navy as CSS GENERAL STERLING PRICE. On 6 June 1862, she was sunk at the Battle of Memphis.
She was raised and repaired by the Union army, and on 16 June 1862 was moved into Union service as USS GENERAL PRICE and served until the end of the war. (Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships 1968 p525). USS GENERAL PRICE was a cottonclad river ram and gunboat in the United States Navy during the American Civil War. Cottonclads were lightly armored gunboats that had a 4-inch oak sheath with a 1-inch iron covering on their bows. They also had double pine bulkheads filled with compressed cotton bales, giving them the nickname “cottonclads.” She was formerly a Confederate ram named CSS GENERAL STERLING PRICE that was sunk and captured during the battle of Memphis on 6 June 1862 by Union naval forces under Flag Officer Charles H. Davis. After the Union victory, she was raised by the Union army and taken to Cairo, Illinois for repairs. She was moved into the Union service under Lt. LeRoy Fitch on 16 June 1862 and was moved to Cairo for repairs. The ram was formally transferred to the Navy by Quartermaster H. A. Wise at Cairo on 30 September 1862. Although at that time she was renamed USS GENERAL PRICE, she continued to be referred to as GENERAL STERLING PRICE in Union dispatches. Completing repairs and conversion at Cairo on 11 March 1863, GENERAL PRICE departed for duty with the Mississippi River Squadron, arriving at Black Bayou a few days later, to join in the Union's Vicksburg campaign. The commander of the squadron, Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter was at that time attempting to move up the shallow and overgrown Steele's Bayou on the Mississippi river in a move to cut off Vicksburg, Mississippi from the rear, and GENERAL PRICE joined the expedition. After several days of slow and difficult progress, harassed by Confederate troops, the gunboats were forced to withdraw on 22 March 1863. General Ulysses S. Grant and Admiral Porter then conceived a plan to attack Vicksburg from the south. This would require the Mississippi squadron to slip past the Confederate blockade of the river at Vicksburg in order to defend and transport Grant's army across the Mississippi south of the city. As a member of Admiral Porter's flotilla, GENERAL PRICE ran the Confederate blockade at Vicksburg on 16 April 1863. Lashed to the starboard side of the ironclad USS LAFAYETTE during the run, she suffered little damage, and arrived safely at New Carthage, Louisiana early the next day with the rest of the fleet. Porter was then in a position to assault Grand Gulf, Mississippi, and, during the heavy engagement with the batteries there on 29 April and 3 May 1863, GENERAL PRICE, under the command of Commander Selim E. Woodworth, carried troops across the river and conveyed transports under fire. The Confederacy was forced to evacuate this vital point on the river, and the fate of Vicksburg was sealed. GENERAL PRICE departed Grand Gulf for the Red River on 3 May and took part in the capture of Alexandria, Louisiana, and assisted in the partial destruction of Fort De Russy, Louisiana between 3 May and 17 May. During this period, GENERAL PRICE acted briefly as Admiral Porter's flagship, and on 10 May she was sent on a reconnaissance up the Black River, where she engaged strong Confederate batteries at Harrisonburg, Louisiana. On 22 June 1863 the Sterling price received 8 replacements to augment the 12 aboard that were fit for duty, the remainder of the crew being ill. As Union pressure against Vicksburg mounted, GENERAL PRICE played a major part in the continuing bombardment of the city and in gunfire support of the Union troops until the Confederacy's river stronghold finally surrendered on 4 July. She was at Bayou Sara, Louisiana below Vicksburg on 7 July 1863 and was in Memphis on 16 July and left there for Cairo and much-needed repairs, which were not completed until about 19 November. GENERAL PRICE rejoined the squadron at Memphis on 2 December 1863 and soon became part of Rear Admiral Porter's planned expedition up the Red River. Before joining Porter, she accidentally rammed the USS CONESTOGA on 8 March 1864 after a confusion in whistle signals, causing the latter ship to sink quickly as a total loss. Accompanying the Red River expedition as far as Alexandria, Louisiana, GENERAL PRICE returned to the mouth of the river on 6 April convoying transports. She then took up regular cruising station on the lower Mississippi River, protecting transports, landing reconnaissance parties, and keeping the river free from Confederate guerrillas. While on this duty, she engaged a Confederate battery off Tunic Bend, Louisiana on 19 May forced it to withdraw, and landed a shore party which burned the Confederate headquarters. GENERAL PRICE continued her patrol duties between New Orleans, Louisiana and Donaldsonville, Louisiana until the end of the war. She decommissioned at Mound City, Illinois on 24 July 1865 and was sold on 3 October 1866 to W. H. Harrison at Mound City for USA$14,000. Fate unknown.
Erhard Jung
USA Forever stamp 2013 sg?, scott? . (she is the ship alongside the USS LAFAYETTE the second ship in the line of ships.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurent_M ... %281856%29, http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-u ... n-pric.htm, http://navalwarfare.blogspot.de/2013/11 ... price.html, https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar//Onlin ... n-pric.htm