LCDR Christopher L. Sledge USN - The Unions Naval War In Louisiana, 1861-1863

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THE UNIONS NAVAL WAR IN LOUISIANA, 1861-1863

By

LCDR Christopher L. Sledge, USN

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS

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Union naval operations in Louisiana featured some of the most important operations of the Civil War, led by two of the US Navys most distinguished officers. During the period from 1861 to 1863, Admirals David G. Farragut and David D. Porter led Union naval forces in Louisiana in conducting: a blockade of the New Orleans, the Confederacys largest city and busiest commercial port; a naval attack to capture New Orleans in April 1862; and joint operations to secure the Mississippi River, culminating in the surrender of Vicksburg and Port Hudson in July 1863. These operations have been the focus of many historical studies, but their relationship to Union naval strategy has often been overlooked. The primary elements of that strategy, as it applied in Louisiana, were a blockade of the Confederate coast and joint operations on the Mississippi River. This thesis studies the influences that shaped Union naval strategy in order to provide a strategic context for analyzing the development of naval operations in Louisiana from the implementation of the blockade to the opening of the Mississippi River. The result is a historical case study of the relationship between naval strategy and operations in a joint environment.

The streams that had carried the wealth and supported the trade of the seceding States turned against them, and admitted their enemies to their hearts. {1} Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power upon History

Published in 1890, The Influence of Sea Power upon History would earn its author, Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan, a reputation as the worlds foremost naval historian and strategist. Mahan arrived at his thesisthat the path to national greatness lay in the creation of a strong navyprimarily through his examination of the history of British sea power. But Mahans own experience as a young naval officer on blockade duty in the Civil War also influenced his thinking. Never did sea power play a greater or more decisive part, Mahan wrote, than in the contest which determined that the course of the worlds history would be modified by one great nation, instead of several rival states, in the North American continent. {2}

Mahans first published work, in fact, was a study of the Union navy in the Civil War. In The Gulf and Inland Waters, his contribution to a three-volume naval history of the war, Mahan examined naval operations in the Gulf of Mexico and on the inland waters of the Mississippi Valley. In this work, Mahan weaved together official records and personal interviews to narrate the navys efforts from the initial operations in the Mississippi Valley to the Battle of Mobile Bay. For all its exhaustive detail, however, Mahans first book reveals little of the strategic insight that would characterize his later works.

This thesis is an attempt to blend Mahans early and later approaches to the writing of naval historythe operational-level approach of The Gulf and Inland Waters and the strategic-level approach of The Influence of Sea Power upon History in a historical analysis of Union naval strategy and operations in Louisiana from 1861 to 1863. The primary question that has served as the focus of this study is: What was the relationship between Union naval strategy and the naval operations conducted in Louisiana during the period from 1861 to 1863? The aim of this thesis, then, is to bridge the gap between naval operations and naval strategy by describing not only what happened in Louisiana during the period under consideration, but why it happened. Therefore, several secondary and related questions have influenced the course of the study: What influences shaped the development of Union naval strategy? What were the US Navys primary strategic tasks in Louisiana? How did these tasks drive operations conducted in Louisiana? What effect did the success or failure of these operations have in helping the navy accomplish its strategic tasks? Did naval strategy evolve as a result of naval operations in Louisiana?

While there seems to be no end to the writing of books on the Civil War, the role of naval operations in the war has received relatively little attention when compared to operations on land. Historian Spencer Tucker has recently noted that until recent years, books on the naval aspects of the Civil War were few and far between. The result of this unbalanced treatment, according to Tucker, is the view that the naval war mattered little. {3} This thesis is partly an effort to examine the importance of the naval operations conducted in Louisiana from the blockade of New Orleans to the victories that opened the Mississippi River to Union control.

The primary importance of this thesis, however, lies in its analysis of the relationship between naval operations and naval strategy. In his recent historiography of works relating to Union strategy, Civil War historian Gary Gallagher has noted that the role of the navy languishes among the most neglected aspects of northern strategic planning. Gallagher has further observed that most discussions of northern strategy virtually ignore its naval component. {4} This thesis is an attempt to rectify this deficiency by analyzing naval strategy as it was implemented in a specific theater of war.

The subject of Union naval operations in Louisiana during the period from 1861 to 1863 was chosen for a number of reasons. First, the operations in Louisiana encompassed many of the operational tasks performed by the Union navy during the war: blockading ports, bombarding fixed fortifications, and conducting joint riverine operations in support of the army. Second, because of its location, Louisiana was destined to play an important role in Union strategy. New Orleans, an important commercial center and the Souths largest city, stood in Louisiana at the outlet of the Mississippi River, the primary waterway for transporting commercial goods from the nations interior. Finally, the naval operations conducted in Louisiana during this timethe blockade and capture of New Orleans and the siege of Vicksburg and Port Hudsonwere some of the most significant of the war. These strategic and operational considerations make this a suitable case study for evaluating the relationship between naval strategy and naval operations