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DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
805 KIDDER BREESE SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060
Photo # NH 48178: CSS McRae

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- SHIPS of the CONFEDERATE STATES --

CSS McRae (1861-1862)

CSS McRae, a 680-ton screw gunboat, was formerly the Mexican Marquis de la Habana. Captured in 1860 by the U.S. Navy as a suspected pirate, she was purchased by the Confederate Government a year later and placed in service to help defend New Orleans. Under the command of Lieutenant Thomas B. Huger, McRae protected blockade runners as they left and arrived at the mouth of the Mississippi and took part in an engagement with Federal blockaders on 12 October 1861. During the 24 April 1862 naval battle near Forts Jackson and Saint Philip, she gave a good account of herself, but was badly damaged and her commander mortally wounded. Sent to New Orleans under flag of truce on 27 April, CSS McRae sank after her arrival there.

This page features our only views of the Confederate gunboat McRae.


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.

Photo #: NH 48178

CSS McRae (1861-1862)


Photograph of a 19th Century watercolor.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 95KB; 740 x 595 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 46483

CSS McRae (1861-1862)


Photograph published in Francis T. Miller's "The Photographic History of the Civil War", 1911.

Courtesy of Frederick Way, Jr., 1941.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 64KB; 740 x 470 pixels

 


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


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Page made 21 May 2000
Coding updated 5 May 2001