D. BENTLEY Gbt D. BENTLEY, an aged craft, was reputedly outfitted as a gunboat at Port Hudson in February 1863 to assist FRANK WEBB in a proposed attack on USS CONESTOGA and other Union ships near the mouth of the Red River. DALMA, see DALMAN DALMAN DALMAN, also known as DALMA, served as receiving ship in Mobile Harbor in 1862. She continued her duty on the Mobile Station with Adm. Franklin Buchanan's force. DALMAN was surrendered to Union authorities 4 May 1865. DAMASCUS DAMASCUS was one of several ships reported to have been sunk by the Confederates late in 1862 to obstruct the James River near Drewry's Bluff. DAN Str: t. 112 DAN, a small river steamer built in 1858 at Calcasieu, La., was in Confederate service on the Calcasieu River and Lake in early October 1862 when she was captured by a launch from USS KENSINGTON and sent in as a prize. She was sunk in the Mississippi during February 1863 while in Union service. DANMARK, see SANTA MARIA DANUBE FltBtry: t. 980; l. 170'4"; b. 30'11"; dr. 16'11"; a. 4 42-pdr. DANUBE was built at Bath, Maine, in 1854. She was confiscated in Mobile Bay by the Confederate authorities in May 1861. In 1863 DANUBE was anchored at the Apalachee Battery as part of the defense of Mobile. The Confederates ordered her sunk in Mobile Bay in November 1864 in the upper line of obstructions in the Spanish River gap. DARBY Str DARBY served as a transport for stores, ordnance, and troops on Bayou Teche and in Berwick Bay, La., in support of Confederate army forces at Camp Bisland, Bayou Teche, which fell to combined Army-Navy forces of the Union on 14 April 1863. DARLINGTON SwStr: t. 298 DARLINGTON, built at Charleston, S.C., in 1849, was probably employed by the Confederate Army along the Florida coast. She was captured by launches of USS PAWNEE under Comdr. C. R. P. Rodgers on 3 March 1862 while trying to escape with military wagons, mules, and stores from Fernandina, Fla., when that town fell to the Union. She was transferred to the U.S. Army for use as a transport. DAVID StTB: l. 50'; b. 6'; dr. 5'; cpl. 4; a. 1 spar torpedo DAVID [1] was built as a private venture by T. Stoney at Charleston, S.C., in 1863, and put under the control of the Confederate States Navy. The cigar-shaped boat carried a 60- or 70-pound explosive charge on the end of a spar projecting forward from her bow. Designed to operate very low in the water, David resembled in general a submarine; she was, however, strictly a surface vessel. On the night of 5 October 1863 DAVID, commanded by Lt. W. T. Glassell, CSN, slipped down Charleston Harbor to attack the casemated ironclad steamer NEW IRONSIDES. The torpedo boat approached undetected until she was within 50 yards of the blockader. Hailed by the watch on board NEW IRONSIDES, Glassell replied with a blast from a shotgun and DAVID plunged ahead to strike. Her torpedo detonated under the starboard quarter of the ironclad, throwing high a column of water which rained back upon the Confederate vessel and put out her boiler fires. Her engine dead, DAVID hung under the quarter of NEW IRONSIDES while small arms fire from the Federal ship spattered the water around the torpedo boat. Believing that their vessel was sinking, Glassell and two others abandoned her; the pilot, W. Cannon, who could not swim, remained on board. A short time later, Assistant Engineer J. H. Tomb swam back to the craft and climbed on board. Rebuilding the fires Tomb succeeded in getting DAVID's engine working again, and with Cannon at the wheel, the torpedo boat steamed up the channel to safety. Glassell and Seaman J. Sullivan, DAVID’s fireman, were captured. NEW IRONSIDES, though not sunk, was seriously damaged by the explosion. The next 4 months of DAVID's existence are obscure. She or other torpedo boats tried more attacks on Union blockaders; reports from different ships claim three such attempts, all unsuccessful, during the remainder of October 1863. On 6 March 1864, DAVID attacked MEMPHIS in the North Edisto River, S.C. The torpedo boat struck the blockader first on the port quarter but the torpedo did not explode. MEMPHIS slipped her chain, at the same time firing ineffectively at DAVID with small arms. Putting about, the torpedo boat struck MEMPHIS again, this time a glancing blow on the starboard quarter; once more the torpedo missed fire. Since MEMPHIS had now opened up with her heavy guns, DAVID, having lost part of her stack when rammed, retreated up the river out of range. MEMPHIS, uninjured, resumed her blockading station. DAVID's last confirmed action came on 18 April 1864 when she tried to sink the screw frigate WABASH. Alert lookouts on board the blockader sighted DAVID in time to permit the frigate to slip her chain, avoid the attack and open fire on the torpedo boat. Neither side suffered any damage. [1] The term "DAVID" came to be the generic term for any torpedo boat resembling DAVID who was the prototype of others built in Charleston. The names, if any, that were given to these other boats are not known. Their existence caused some concern among Union naval officers but they were never a serious threat to the blockade. The exact number of "DAVIDs" built is not known. Page 514 The ultimate fate of DAVID is uncertain. Several torpedo boats of this type fell into Union hands when Charleston was captured in February 1865. DAVID may well have been among them. DAY, see JAMES L. DAY DE SOTO (SwStr) DE SOTO was a sidewheel steamer, one of the many taken over by the Confederate forces for use on the Mississippi and other rivers. In April of 1862 she was busy ferrying troops to evacuate the area near Island No. 10 and was used, under a flag of truce, to communicate with the Union gunboats. On 7 April 1862 she carried Confederate officers who surrendered possession of Island No. 10 to Flag Officer Foote. It was at night, and DE SOTO approached cautiously, giving four blasts of her whistle, repeatedly, until answered, whereupon Federal officers came on board to accept surrender. She then became USS DE SOTO, with a later name change to GENERAL LYON. SwStr: t. 857 [771]; l. 238'; b. 26'2"; dph. 17'10"; dr. 7'6"; cl. Owl DEER was the last ship of the first class of steel blockade runners procured for Secretary of the Navy Mallory by Comdr. James D. Bulloch, CSN, in United Kingdom shipyards; four hulls were bought in Liverpool, well along on the ways at Jones, Quiggin & Co., and finished up on schedule without alterations; Deer was Hull No. 170. The financial raison d'etre of these vessels is explained in Commander Bulloch's letter to Secretary Mallory 15 September 1864: that they "are not *** to be paid for out of the funds of the Navy Department, but the cost of construction and outfit is provided for by the Treasury Department, through its financial agent, General C. J. McRae *** the management and navigation of the ships to and from the Confederate ports will be under the control of the Navy Department." DEER carried a particularly sensitive Navy cargo on her maiden voyage out of Liverpool, early in November 1864: "goods *** almost exclusively for submarine defense," consigned to Comdr. Hunter Davidson, CSN, the torpedo (mine) specialist, and an "Ebonite machine" for Comdr. Matthew F. Maury. Her second trip, DEER was not so lucky: Running into Charleston with a valuable load of copper and arms, 18 February 1865, her lookout failed to spot a trio of monitors, USS CANONICUS, CATSKILL and MONADNOCK, lying across the channel entrance; the fleet DEER submitted to the ultimate humiliation of surrendering to slow "cheese boxes on rafts." The prize court in Boston sold DEER to Nickerson's line of steamers whom she served locally as PALMYRA; resold to the Argentine in June 1869, she disappears from the registers before 1875. DEFIANCE SwRam: t. 544; l. 178'; b. 29'5"; dph. 10'11"; a. 32-pdr. DEFIANCE, a high pressure steamer, was built at Cincinnati, Ohio in 1849. She was purchased for the Confederate Army, probably from the Southern Steamship Co., New Orleans, La., in the latter part of 1861. Capt. J. E. Montgomery, a former river steamboat captain, selected her to be part of his River Defense Fleet [See Annex II]. On 25 January 1862 he began to convert her into a cottonclad ram by placing a 4-inch oak sheath with a one-inch iron covering on her bow, and by installing double pine bulkheads filled with compressed cotton bales. On 10 March 1862, DEFIANCE's conversion was completed and she steamed from New Orleans to Fort Jackson on the lower Mississippi to operate in the Confederate defense of New Orleans. DEFIANCE, with five other ships of Montgomery's fleet in that area was under the overall command of Capt. J. A. Stevenson, who operated under Capt. J. K. Mitchell, commanding Confederate naval forces on the lower Mississippi. When Flag Officer D. G. Farragut, USN, ran his fleet past Forts Jackson and St. Philip on 24 April 1862 on his way to New Orleans, DEFIANCE, under Capt. J. D. McCoy, was the only river defense vessel to escape destruction or capture. On 26 April Captain Stevenson turned her over directly to Captain Mitchell after her captain, officers, and crew left her. On 28 April, Cap- Page 515 tain Mitchell, not having enough men for a crew, and realizing that capture was inevitable after the forts surrendered, burned her to keep her from falling into Union hands. DELIGHT Sch DELIGHT, a fishing smack which sailed under Confederate papers was captured by USS NEW LONDON on 9 December 1861 near Cat Island Passage in Mississippi Sound. DEW DROP SwStr: t. 184 DEW DROP, built at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1858, was used by Confederate army forces in western waters. Early in May 1863 she was ordered to transport commissary stores up the Sunflower River. While so engaged knowledge came of approaching Federal gunboats and on 30 May 1863 she was burned to the water's edge to prevent capture. Union forces led by volunteer Lt. G. W. Brown later effected her complete destruction. DIANA StRam: dr. 3'2"; cpl. 61; a. 2 12-pdr. how. DIANA was a steamer offered for charter or sale at Galveston, Tex. on 23 September 1861 by the Houston Navigation Co., along with steamers BAYOU CITY and NEPTUNE NO. 2. She was mentioned as a steamer of the Houston Line on 19 December 1861 when she took the seized Federal metal life boat FRANCIS in tow for San Jacinto, Tex., to be put in sailing trim for CSS GENERAL RUSK fitting out in that port. Mentioned as a steamer under Captain Blakmen, she was ordered to carry the crew of CSS GENERAL RUSK from Galveston to Houston on 20 January 1862. DIANA and BAYOU CITY where eventually fitted out as rams and used as gunboats of the Texas Marine Department [See Annex III] for the defense of Galveston Bay. One-inch iron protected their bows and their decks were barricaded with cotton. The two warships, listed by the Texas Marine Department as gunboats, were still on duty in Galveston Bay as of 27 October 1863. SwIrcGbt: t. 239 DIANA was a steamer reported to have escaped from Farragut's passage of Fort St. Philip and Fort Jackson 24 April 1862, into the city of New Orleans. She was taken possession of by USS CAYUGA on the 27th. DIANA was appraised for Union service at New Orleans on 5 May 1862 and became a transport on interior waters. Finally assigned to assist Federal ships in Berwick Bay, La., she was sent into Grand Lake, 28 March 1863, to make reconnaissance down the Atchafalaya to the mouth of Bayou Teche. When she had passed the mouth of Bayou Teche, near Pattersonville La., Confederate shore batteries cut away her tiller ropes, disabled her engine, and caused her to drift ashore where she surrendered. Her Union commander Acting Master T. L. Peterson, along with five other men were killed and three were wounded in this brave 2- hour action. DIANA was taken into the Confederate army service on Bayou Teche in support of troops at Camp Bisland, La. On 11 April 1863 under Lieutenant Nettles of Valverde Battery, CSA, she showed great skill as a gunboat in driving Union troops back on Bayou Teche from Camp Bisland. Nettles, taken severely ill, was relieved on 13 April 1863 by gallant Captain Semmes of the Artillery as thousands of Union troops moved in with the support of Federal gunboats for a fierce action on Bayou Teche and Camp Bisland that lasted until sundown. She concentrated on the center of the advancing Union line with a battery of Parrott guns until a 30-pounder shell penetrated her front plating and exploded in the engine room to kill the first and assistant engineer and damaged her engine. Pulling beyond range of the Union guns, she completed repairs near midnight and was ordered the following morning to move up to Franklin, La., to support the right flank of Confederate troops by sweeping the fields and woods formerly held by Union forces. When badly outnumbered Confederate forces began their withdrawal from Franklin, she maintained her position near an already burning bridge until General Mouton and his staff followed their troops across to safety. Semmes and his brave crew then abandoned and burned DIANA to prevent her capture by Union forces. DICK KEYES, see DICK KEYS DICK KEYS Str DICK KEYS, sometimes reported as DICK KEYES, was captured by the Confederate fleet off Mobile on 8 May 1861, sold into private ownership and chartered to assist blockade runners out of that port. She joined steamer CRESCENT in saving 30,000 pounds of powder and a million musket caps from the British steamer ANN, 29-30 June, 1862, when that ship grounded under the guns of Fort Morgan. ANN floated out on the ebb tide to be taken by Union ships before all of her cargo could be removed. In the following years DICK KEYS gave valuable service in Mobile Bay as a transport between the forts and the city of Mobile. She assisted in towing CSS TENNESSEE down the Mobile River on 29 February 1864 and came under Federal gunfire of Fort Gaines on 5-6 August 1864. On the night of 24 October 1864 DICK KEYS was to leave Mobile carrying Lt. J. M. Baker, CSN, bound for Blakely, Ala., whence a boat expedition of 100 men would be launched overland in wagons to sail the Perdido River for a landing near Fort Pickens, Fla. No further record of her service has been found. DIME Str DIME, used to transport Confederate army troops and materiel, was assigned in October 1863 to the Texas Marine Department for service as a tender and transport [See Annex III]. DIXIE Sch: t. 110; cpl. 35; a. 3 guns DIXIE was originally the Baltimore-built schooner H. & J. NEILD, completed in 1856. Capt. Thomas J. Moore of Virginia bought her in 1860 and operated in the West Indian trade until war broke. Then he rechristened her DIXIE, ran the blockade into Charleston, formed a syndicate and petitioned for a letter of marque. DIXIE was commissioned a privateer 26 June 1861, Captain Moore still commanding. Her month's cruise netted two valuable prizes out of three taken: BARK GLEN. the 23rd, was run into Morehead City, N.C., and condemned; schooner MARY ALICE fully laden with sugar surrendered the 25th, but was recaptured by USF WABASH before making a Confederate port; ROWENA of Philadelphia had a complement Page 516 that would endanger his small prize crew, so Captain Moore took command of her himself and brought with him all but a skeleton crew of 5 to man DIXIE. After some narrow escapes, DIXIE and prize together slipped back into Charleston through Bull's Bay and up under the guns of Fort Pinckney, 27 August. DIXIE was sold as well as ROWENA very satisfactorily; on 15 October the little privateer schooner ended her successful chapter as a privateer, went to A. J. White & Son, locally, later becoming KATE HALE and SUCCESS. DOCTOR BATEY, see DR. BEATTY DOCTOR BEATY, see DR. BEATTY DODGE Sch: t. 153 [71.5]; l. 100'4"; b. 23'; dph. 8'8"; cpl. 26; a. 1 9-pdr. DODGE was originally USRC HENRY DODGE serving under the command of Capt. W. F. Rogers of the U.S. Revenue Marine. She was seized by the State of Texas on 2 March 1861 and subsequently turned over to the Confederate Navy. Remaining in Roger's command, she assisted the Confederate Army in defending the Texas coast until December 1862 when she was officially transferred to the control of the Confederate Army's Quartermaster at Houston. In 1864 DODGE passed into private hands and under the name MARY SORLEY operated as a blockade runner. She was captured by USS SCIOTA off Galveston, Tex., on 4 April 1864 en route to Havana with a cargo of cotton. DOLLIE WEBB StwGbt: t. 139; a. 5 guns WEBB-only twice referred to in published official records by any but her last name, once as DOLLIE and once as DOLLY-is believed to have been a Wheeling, Va., steamer built there in 1859. [It does not seem likely she was FRANK WEBB, as one compiler has suggested, unless there were two different ships involved]. In the one available description of her, she was a large sternwheeler, "ship built", "a regular gunboat" with "five pieces of artillery and a complement of 200 men, and is commanded by Major [George T.] Howard. I judge her ... to be a towboat altered," wrote Lt. George H. Preble, USN, on 22 July 1862. WEBB appears to be inseparable from MUSIC for about two weeks and then both fade into obscurity again. [see MUSIC, inf.] DOLLY Str DOLLY was a steamer which served Confederate authorities in the Roanoke River. She was seized by the U.S. Navy near Edwards Ferry, N.C., in May 1865; on the 27th it was reported that she had been sunk in a canal along with a lighter of iron plates. Her dimensions and importance are not recorded. DON ScStr: t. 390; l. 162'; b. 23'; dph. 12'3"; dr. 6'; cpl. 43; s. 10-14 k. DON was the iron, twin-screw, two-stacked running-mate of HANSA-both of which were blockade-runners operated and partly owned by the State of North Carolina and are generally considered to have been public vessels for all practical purposes. A Captain Cory commanded DON when, as a still new, $1l5,000 ship carrying a $200,000 cargo of Army uniforms, blankets and shoes in from Nassau, she fell prey to USS PEQUOT, 4 March 1864, on her third attempt that voyage to run into Wilmington, N.C. She was purchased from the Boston prize court next month and commissioned USS DON, assigned to the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron which had captured her. She was sold to commercial interests 28 August 1868 after being stricken from the Navy register. DOUBLOON SwStr: t. 293; l. 165'; b. 33'; dph. 5' DOUBLOON, built in 1859 at Cincinnati and taken over at New Orleans in 1861, served as a Confederate Army transport in the western rivers throughout the war. She is last mentioned in the records by U.S. gunboat LAFAYETTE in the Red River on 30 May 1863 as being hemmed in somewhere "in the rivers above." DR. BATTIE, see DR. BEATTY DR. BELT SwStr: t. 281; l. 171'; b. 28'9"; dph 6'; a. 1 20-pdr. DR. BEATTY, spelled variously as DOCTOR BEATY, DOCTOR BATEY, and DR. BATTIE, was built at Louisville, Ky., in 1850. She was described as a frail steamer by the Confederates who had outfitted her with 900 bales of cotton for use as a transport and boarding ship. DR. BEATTY was a unit of the expeditionary force that included the rams QUEEN Of The WEST and WEBB, and the steamer GRAND ERA which attacked USS INDIANOLA near New Carthage, Miss., on 24 February 1863. During the engagement this steamer, commanded by Lt. Col. F. Brand, CSA, and carrying a volunteer boarding party of 250 men closed INDIANOLA only to receive word of her sinking condition and surrender. During July 1863 DR. BEATTY escaped capture by USS MANITOU and PETREL by running under the guns of the fort at Harrisonburg in the Ouachita River. DREWRY Gbt: t. 166; l 106'; b. 21'; dph. 8'; dr. 5'; a. 1 6.4" r., 1 7" r. DREWRY was a wooden gunboat with foredeck protected by an iron V-shaped shield. Classed as a tender she was attached to Flag Officer F. Forrest's squadron in the James River sometime in 1863 with Master L. Parrish, CSN, in command. In addition to transporting troops and other routine service, she took part in several engagements along the river prior to 24 January 1865, when, in Trent's Reach, she was destroyed by two shots from a 100- pounder rifle in a battery of the 1st Connecticut Artillery. The second hit exploded her magazine as she assisted CSS RICHMOND to get afloat-all but two of her crew had reached safety before the explosion. DUANE Sch: dp. 153; l 102'; b. 23'; dph. 8'8"; dr. 9'7" DUANE was the schooner-rigged United States Revenue Cutter WILLIAM J. DUANE, seized by the Confederates at Norfolk, Va., on 18 April 1861. She was built at Philadelphia by Jacob Tees. Page 517 DUNBAR Str DUNBAR, a steamer under Captain Fowler, was dispatched from Fort Henry, Tenn., on 4 February 1862 in company with steamer LYNN BOYD to embark two regiments stationed at Paris Landing, Tenn. General Tilghman, CSA, and Major Gilmer, CSA, debarked in a small boat the morning of 6 February 1862 to direct the defense of Fort Henry which surrendered to Union forces that same day. DUNBAR was sunk in the Tennessee River, in Cypress Creek, to prevent her capture by the Federal Gunboat Fleet. She may have been the 213-ton side-wheel steamer that was built in 1859 at Brownsville, Pa., and first home ported in Pittsburgh, Pa.