at the New York Navy Yard on 14 May 1863. Recommissioned on 20 July 1864, Susquehanna was assigned to the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron and participated in the abortive attacks on Fort Fisher, North Carolina, on Christmas Eve 1864. However, in mid-February 1865, the double-ender was in the mighty force which finally took that Confederate stronghold and closed Wilmington, North Carolina, the Confederate States of America's last major port. At that time, she was under command of Rear Admiral Sylvanus William Godon. One of her crewmen, Landsman Henry S. Webster, was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions in the Second Battle of Fort Fisher. Atlantic Squadron, 1866–1868 Following the end of the American Civil War, Susquehanna brought American delegates to Veracruz bay in Mexico during the destruction of the Second Mexican Empire in order to open up relations with the United States backed Mexican president Benito Juárez. When the Susquehanna found out that the acting imperial ruler Maximilian I of Mexico had decided not to abdicate, the ship turned around to head home 1866. The USS Susquehanna also sailed for Brazil and operated on the Atlantic coast of South America until returning home and decommissioning on 30 June 1866. Recommissioned on 2 November 1866, the ship ended her active service as flagship of the North Atlantic Squadron. Decommissioned at the New York Navy Yard on 14 January 1868, Susquehanna was laid up until she was sold for scrapping on 27 September 1883 to E. Stannard of New York City. In fiction The ship appeared in Jules Verne's book Around the Moon, a sequel to From the Earth to the Moon, in which the ship rescues the main protagonists from their spacecraft, a projectile made of aluminium and launched by cannon, which splashed down off the coast of the California Peninsula. See also Union Navy List of steam frigates of the United States Navy Bibliography of early American naval history References External links Journal of a Cruise on Board the U S Steam Frigate Susquehanna, 1850-1853, MS 18 held by Special Collections & Archives, Nimitz Library at the United States Naval Academy Ships of the Union Navy Ships built in Brooklyn Steamships of the United States Navy Gunboats of the United States Navy American Civil War patrol vessels of the United States 1850 ships Jules Verne Paddle steamers of the United States