[CIVIL WAR]. A group of 3 exceptional CDVs of Brown Water Navy gunboats, incl. USS Benton, Lafayette, and Louisville.

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American Historical Ephemera & Photography

By Cowan's Auctions

Jun 25, 2021

Set Reminder 2021-06-25 10:00:00 2021-06-25 10:00:00 America/New_York Bidsquare Bidsquare : American Historical Ephemera & Photography https://www.bidsquare.com/auctions/cowans/american-historical-ephemera-photography-7043
The June 25 American Historical Ephemera and Photography Auction features an exciting assemblage of 18th-early 20th century material, including Civil War archives, Early Photography, Western Americana, Autographs and Manuscripts, and more. Cowan's Auctions dawnie@cowans.com

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• Lot Description
  CDV showing bow quarter of the "Gun Boat / Benton" inked on verso. N.p.: n.p. [1860s]. (Trimmed top and bottom with the lower corners clipped, minor soiling, small spots/smears of ink in the upper field.) Riding at anchor, the menacing guns have been run out as the crew loiters on deck. The USS Benton was taken up from the civilian trade, converted into a warship named after Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri and commissioned on February 24, 1862 into the Army's Western Gunboat Flotilla. One of that fleet's heaviest armed warships, she spent her entire career as the flagship of the Brown Water Navy hosting both Admirals David Porter and Andrew Foote. Benton first steamed into action at Island No. 10 during March-April 1862 followed by a fight at Plum Point Bend on May 10 where USS Cincinnati and USS Mound City were ambushed and sunk. Reinforced by Colonel Charles Ellet's flotilla of gunboats on June 6, Benton and her consorts engaged and routed a small Confederate squadron at the Battle of Memphis. In July, Benton led a contingent to attack the Rebel ironclad CSS Arkansas near Vicksburg without success - low water during the high summer forced the shallow draft vessels to withdraw to deeper water above Vicksburg. In October 1862 the Navy assumed command of all military vessels on the Mississippi with Benton assigned to patrol duty on the Yazoo River. During the opening stage of the Vicksburg Campaign in April 1863, Benton "led a nighttime charge past the guns" of the river bastion and was hit at least five times by Rebel batteries, one shot a large 10" shell that "split her casemate" causing casualties. Later in the month Benton steamed with seven ironclads to bombard enemy shore batteries at Grand Gulf, Mississippi. Once more a Confederate shell penetrated Benton's armor this time accounting for 25 men wounded. The Mississippi's reliably hazardous current then overwhelmed Benton's engines and she was swept downriver as the Federal bombardment continued. Benton returned to station off Vicksburg in May and maintained the intense cannonade of the besieged city until it finally capitulated on July 4. In April 1864, Benton participated in the ill conceived Red River Campaign, the unstated objective of which was to acquire a large supply of cotton to sell to Northern speculators while not so coincidentally lining the pockets of a handful of complicit federal officers. At Shreveport, Benton fired a volley from her forward battery during the attack on Fort DeRussy causing the fort to quickly surrender. The broader Red River campaign having quickly come apart, the army lurched into a disjointed retreat while the Navy found itself once more dangerously stranded by low water. Only by means of an incredible engineering feat - involving sluice dams constructed at low points in river - was the Navy able to "escape on the rush of high water." By 1865 the war was nearly over for the Brown Water Navy. USS Benton's last mission was a return to Shreveport in June to take possession of the surrendered ironclad CSS Missouri. The illustrious Benton was decommissioned at Mound City during July 1865, stripped of armor and guns, and sold out of service in November.
  
  [With:]
  
  CDV identified in period ink on verso as "US Gunboat & Ram / Lafayette (iron clad) / Lt. Com. Foster." Baton Rouge: A.D. Lytle, [1860s]. (Shows minor wear and soiling around the mount with rounded corners.) A modern pen identification is also written beneath the photograph. Details are explicit under magnification including the reflection of the ship's boats against the armored hull. The pair of mammoth covered sidewheels bespeak Lafayette's distinctive profile. Originally built as a side-wheel steamer in 1848 as Aleck Scott, the Lafayette (renamed in September 1862) was converted to an ironclad ram and transferred to the Navy with the entire western flotilla by executive order in October 1862. After being commissioned at Cairo, IL, in February 1863, the Lafayette took part in David Dixon Porter’s run past Vicksburg’s Confederate batteries on April 16, 1863, and joined in the bombardment of Grand Gulf, MS, on April 21-29. She also sailed in a preliminary expedition up the Red River in May 1864, and the June 1865 Red River expedition that led to the capture of CSS Missouri. Lafayette was decommissioned in July 1865 and laid up, later sold out of service at New Orleans in March 1866. 
  
  [With:]
  
  CDV, detailed period copy shot of the USS Louisville showing numerous members of her crew standing about the deck facing the cameraman. A ship's boat has pulled up on the bow and shipped oars. Pittsburgh: Purviance Photo, [1860s]. (Minor soiling, wear along edges, rounded/clipped corners.) USS Louisville was a purpose built ironclad gunboat constructed at St. Louis and commissioned on January 16, 1862. Originally an army warship dictated by budgetary imperative, she was later transferred to Navy command in October 1862 and served as such for the duration. USS Louisville first joined in combined operations leading to the capture of Fort Donelson on February 16, 1862. In March she assisted in the occupation of Columbus, Kentucky and capture of Island No. 10 and New Madrid, Missouri through April 7. An established routine of vigorous patrolling prevented the small Confederate naval flotilla and vital transports from ascending the Mississippi while cutting off surreptitious cross river traffic. Louisville joined the Mississippi Flotilla for the attack on Memphis and shared in the laurels for sinking or capturing the entire Rebel naval force on June 6. Afterwards, Louisville bombarded the upper shore batteries of Vicksburg before shifting to the White River. Meeting with a large contingent of Mississippi Squadron warships, Louisville joined in a combined operation in support of W.T. Sherman's troops who captured the dominant feature of Fort Hindman at Arkansas Post, bagging nearly five thousand prisoners but getting no closer to the strategic prize of Vicksburg. In April 1863, USS Louisville and others ran the batteries at Vicksburg on the 16th and engaged in the bombardment of Confederate positions at Grand Gulf silencing those guns so that the siege ring was closed by April 29. From March to April 1864 Louisville and her sisters participated in the ill-fated expedition up the Red River. The campaign included the element of both naval bombardment - there being no enemy warships to fight - and the rapid transport of army troops to pursue and outmaneuver a numerically inferior Confederate force.  Just the opposite happened. Confederate General Richard Taylor succeeded in not only defending the Red River Valley with his smaller force, he also forced Banks to retreat after defeating a portion of the Union Army at the back-to-back battles of Mansfield and Pleasant Hill. On June 20 gunfire from Louisville was instrumental in breaking up a Confederate attack on an isolated Union brigade at a backwater called Gaines' Landing. The final year of Brown Water Navy endeavor focused on patrolling interdict supplies to the Trans-Mississippi while rapidly transporting supplies and troops in lieu of a satisfactory railroad network. Louisville was finally decommissioned at Mound City on July 21, 1865 and laid up awaiting disposal. She was sold at auction in September 1868.
  
  The Richard B. Cohen Civil War Collection Lots 79-98; 116; 138-153; and 266
  
  Cowan's is pleased to offer the third installment of Richard B. Cohen's collection of Civil War Brown Water Navy photography. Richard was known to many in the field as a "disciplined collector who maintained a relatively narrow focus having built an important, perhaps unsurpassed collection in his area of specialization." From cartes de visite to large format photographs, this portion of the collection features a noteworthy selection of images of Brown Water Navy warships, among them, the USS Benton, Choctaw, Lafayette, and Louisville. Many important identified naval officers are also represented, including an exquisite CDV of the promising young officer, Lieutenant Commander William Gwin, who died of wounds aboard the USS Benton following an artillery duel with Confederate forces at Snyder's Bluff, and an exceptionally large war-date photograph of the controversial commander of the USS Pittsburgh, Egbert Thompson.
  
  This auction also features a premiere selection of autographs and manuscripts from Richard's carefully curated collection. Highlights include a letter from Jefferson Davis to his distant cousin, John J. Pettus, Governor of Mississippi, dated a year before secession, conveying intricate plans for securing armaments in preparation for the war; an Abraham Lincoln signed endorsement; a letter from Admiral D.G. Farragut from New Orleans, offering excellent insight into his "political" thinking as well as his dedication to his work; correspondence from Gideon Welles, David Dixon Porter, U.S. Grant, and W.T. Sherman; and a pair of superb letters with highly descriptive accounts of the Battle of the Monitor and Merrimac.
  
  The Richard B. Cohen Civil War Collection Lots 79-98; 116; 138-153; and 266
  
  Cowan's is pleased to offer the third installment of Richard B. Cohen's collection of Civil War Brown Water Navy photography. Richard was known to many in the field as a "disciplined collector who maintained a relatively narrow focus having built an important, perhaps unsurpassed collection in his area of specialization." From cartes de visite to large format photographs, this portion of the collection features a noteworthy selection of images of Brown Water Navy warships, among them, the USS Benton, Choctaw, Lafayette, and Louisville. Many important identified naval officers are also represented, including an exquisite CDV of the promising young officer, Lieutenant Commander William Gwin, who died of wounds aboard the USS Benton following an artillery duel with Confederate forces at Snyder's Bluff, and an exceptionally large war-date photograph of the controversial commander of the USS Pittsburgh, Egbert Thompson.
  
  This auction also features a premiere selection of autographs and manuscripts from Richard's carefully curated collection. Highlights include a letter from Jefferson Davis to his distant cousin, John J. Pettus, Governor of Mississippi, dated a year before secession, conveying intricate plans for securing armaments in preparation for the war; an Abraham Lincoln signed endorsement; a letter from Admiral D.G. Farragut from New Orleans, offering excellent insight into his "political" thinking as well as his dedication to his work; correspondence from Gideon Welles, David Dixon Porter, U.S. Grant, and W.T. Sherman; and a pair of superb letters with highly descriptive accounts of the Battle of the Monitor and Merrimac.
  
  Provenance: The Richard B. Cohen Civil War Collection
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