The three-masted ship was considered a sloop-of-war, or corvette, though at 186 feet in gun-deck length she was the largest ship of that class built by the U.S. Although the wind-powered ship lacked the engineering department found on a steam-powered vessel equipped with engines, her other shipboard duties were essentially the same as most Navy ships.Ĭonstellation was a relatively new ship in 1861, having only been commissioned in 1855, and was the last sail-powered vessel built for the U.S. By examining how the crew of one ship, USS Constellation, functioned, one can get a sense of the work performed by the men who served aboard warships in that conflict. Those thousands of Northern sailors performed myriad shipboard tasks, some more glamorous than others, but all requiring hard work and skill. By 1865, it had grown to some 670 vessels, and more than 118,000 men had been in naval service at some point during the war, a tremendous buildup in such a short time. For example, in April 1861 the Union Navy consisted of about 9,000 men and 89 vessels, many of which were not in commission. Both sides had to scramble to build up their military forces. Though sectional tensions had been building within the United States for several years, the outbreak of the Civil War found both the Union and the Confederacy largely unprepared to fight a major war. USS Constellation: Union Man-of-War in the American Civil War Close
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