Battle of New Orleans (Civil War)

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For other uses of the name, see Battle of New Orleans (disambiguation)

Battle of New Orleans

Panoramic View of New Orleans-Federal Fleet at Anchor in the River, ca. 1862.

Date	April 25–May 1, 1862
Location	New Orleans and St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana
Result	Union victory

Combatants

United States of America

Confederate States of America

Commanders

Officer David G. Farragut and Maj. Gen. Benjamin Franklin Butler

Maj. Gen. Mansfield Lovell

Strength

Department of the Gulf

Department No. 1

Casualties

Lower Seaboard Theater
Fort Sumter - Santa Rosa Island - Fort Pulaski - Forts Jackson and St. Philip – New Orleans – Secessionville – Simmon's Bluff – Tampa – Baton Rouge – 1st Donaldsonville - St. John's Bluff - Georgia Landing - 1st Fort McAllister - Fort Bisland – Irish Bend – Vermillion Bayou - 1st Charleston Harbor – 1st Fort Wagner – Grimball's Landing – 2nd Fort Wagner – 2nd Fort Sumter – 2nd Charleston Harbor - Plains Store – Port Hudson - LaFourche Crossing – 2nd Donaldsonville – Kock's Plantation – Stirling's Plantation - Fort Brooke - Gainesville - Olustee - Natural Bridge

The Battle of New Orleans is a seven-day battle in which the Union gained control of the largest Confederate city without a single casualty. The battle, fought at New Orleans and St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana between April 25 and May 1, 1862, is a major turning point of the American Civil War.

New Orleans was captured by the Union without a battle in the city itself early on in the war and thus was spared the destruction suffered by many other cities of the American South.

1 Prelude
2 Battle
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] Prelude

The political and commercial importance of New Orleans, as well as its strategic position, marked it out as the objective of a Union expedition soon after the opening of the Civil War. Captain D.G. Farragut was selected by the Union government for the command of the Western Gulf squadron in January 1862. The four heavy ships of the squadron (none of them armoured) were, with many difficulties, brought up to the head of the passes, and around them assembled nineteen smaller vessels (mostly gunboats) and a flotilla of twenty mortar-boats under Commander D.D. Porter. The main defences of the Mississippi River consisted of the two permanent forts, Jackson Fort and St. Philip Fort. These were of masonry and brick construction, armed with heavy rifled guns as well as smooth-bores, and placed on either bank so as to command long reaches of the river and the surrounding flats. In addition, the Confederates had some improvised ironclads and gunboats, large and small. On the April 16, after elaborate reconnaissances, the Union fleet steamed up into position below the forts, and on the April 18 the mortar-boats opened fire. Their shells fell with great accuracy, and although one of the boats was sunk and two disabled, Fort Jackson was seriously damaged. But the defences were by no means crippled even after a second bombardment on the 19th, and a formidable obstacle to the advance of the Union main fleet was a boom between the forts designed to detain the ships under close fire should they attempt to run past. At that time the eternal duel of ship versus fort seemed to have been settled in favor of the latter, and it was well for the Union government that it had placed its ablest and most resolute officer at the head of the squadron. Gunboats were repeatedly sent up at night to endeavour to destroy the boom, and the bombardment went on, disabling only a few guns but keeping the gunners of Fort Jackson under cover. At last the gunboats Pinola and Itasca ran in and broke a gap in the boom, and at 2 AM on the April 24 the fleet weighed, Farragut in the corvette Hartford leading. After a severe conflict at close quarters, with the forts and with the ironclads and fire rafts of the defence, almost all the Union fleet (except the mortar-boats) forced its way past.

[edit] Battle

At noon on April 25, Farragut anchored in front of New Orleans; Forts Jackson and St. Philip, isolated and continuously bombarded by the mortarboats, surrendered on April 28; and soon afterwards the military portion of the expedition occupied the city.

The commander, General Benjamin Butler, subjected New Orleans to a rigorous martial law so tactlessly administered as greatly to intensify the hostility of South and North. In the city Butler was nicknamed "The Beast", or "Spoons Butler" (the latter arising from silverware looted from local homes by some Union troops, though there was no evidence that Butler himself was personally involved in such thievery). Butler's administration did have benefits to the city, which was kept both orderly and due to his massive cleanup efforts unususally healthy by 19th century standards. Towards the end of the war General Nathaniel Banks held the command at New Orleans.

At the end of the battle Union forces engraved "THE UNION MUST AND SHALL BE PRESERVED" on the statue of Andrew Jackson that honored him for the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812.