The Union Takes New Orleans Early in the War

 

When President Lincoln ordered a blockade of all key Southern ports after the first battle of Bull Run, New Orleans was the most prosperous city in the South and had the largest population. Its roots tied it to France, yet the valuable cotton crop flowed to Britain from the port, bringing in much needed revenue to fight the war. In mid-November 1861, naval commander David Porter approached Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles with a proposal to take New Orleans. Porter’s plan proved a success when Union forces took the city in April 1862.

 

Planning the Union Attack and Defending the Confederate Port

 

Although the Union blockade was modestly successful, over 800 ships managed to evade Union warships during the first year of the war. Additionally, as the war progressed, the Confederate government embarked on the development of crude ironclads to sink blockading vessels and purchased formidable “blockade runners” like the CSS Alabama from Britain. It was in the best interests of Lincoln to take New Orleans and thereby effectively end this lifeline to Europe.

 

Eighteen Union warships, commanded by sixty-year old Admiral David Farragut, would be supported by General Benjamin Butler’s 18,000 troops. The operation took months of planning and was shrouded in secrecy. New Orleans’ commander, Major General Mansfield Lovell, a West Pointer, believed that the rumors of a large Union fleet were planning to attack Mobile, Pensacola, or some other target.

 

New Orleans was a poorly defended city. Defending troops had been withdrawn to points further up the Mississippi. The city relied on Forts Jackson and St. Philip, which guarded the approaches to New Orleans, 75 miles upriver. Recent successes by New Orleans’ gunboats forcing Union blockaders to withdraw lulled the populace into a false sense of security.

 

Farragut Arrives at the Mississippi Delta

 

The primary goals of the New Orleans operation were to close the Mississippi to trade and to end Southern cotton exports to Europe. Southerners, however, burned their cotton even before the city was taken, destroying a quarter of a million bales.

 

Forts Jackson and St. Philip sustained days of bombardment, beginning on Good Friday, April 1862. During the night, Union soldiers dislodged the heavy chain that had been placed in the river to stop the warships from proceeding on to the city. Running the forts, the fleet sailed on to New Orleans, described by one diarist as “silent, grim, and terrible.”

 

General Lovell had withdrawn his troops when it became obvious that the city leaders were not willing to risk the destruction of the city. Butler’s troops marched into the city and the South lost one of its most prized possessions. After occupying the city, Farragut and Butler continued upriver, capturing Baton Rouge and Natchez. Only Vicksburg eluded their efforts.

 

The Aftermath of the New Orleans Campaign

 

Historian Page Smith states that, “the entire operation was a model of careful planning and bold action…” Several historians point out that Napoleon III of France shelved his decision to officially recognize the Confederacy after the fall of New Orleans. It was also noteworthy that Butler only commanded 18,000 men (some historians use the figure 15,000); General McClellan, who had been consulted during the initial planning, suggested the operation would need 50,000 men.

 

The inability of the Confederacy to properly defend was also evident in the lack of industrial capacity: the CSS Mississippi, perhaps the most formidable ironclad yet constructed, was burned because vital metal parts could not be delivered in time. The fate of the Mississippi became a focal point of the Confederate investigation into why New Orleans fell. New Orleans provided the opening to attempt a similar action in Charleston. That attempt, however, failed.

 

Sources:

 

Shelby Foote, The Civil War: A Narrative Fort Sumter to Perryville (Vintage Books, Division of Random House, 1986)

Dean B. Mahin, One War at a Time: The International Dimensions of the American Civil War (Washington D.C.: Brassey’s, 2000)

Page Smith, Trial By Fire: A People’s History of the Civil War and Reconstruction (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1982)

First published August 11, 2009 in Suite101 by M.Streich. copyright