USS Sciota was a built on behalf of the United States Navy for service during the Civil War. She was outfitted as a gunboat, with both a 20-pounder rifle for horizontal firing, and two howitzers for shore bombardment, and assigned to the Union blockade of the waterways of the Confederate States of America. Commissioned in Philadelphia in 1861 The first U.S. Navy ship to be so named, USS Sciota was one of the "ninety-day gunboats" rushed through construction at the beginning of the Civil War, Sciota was laid down in the summer of 1861 at Philadelphia by Jacob Birley and J. P. Morris and Company; launched on 15 October 1861; and commissioned at the Philadelphia Navy Yard on 15 December 1861. Civil War service Assigned to the Gulf Blockade The new screw gunboat was assigned to the Gulf Blockading Squadron and arrived at Ship Island, Mississippi, on the afternoon of 8 January 1862. On 6 February, she captured blockade runner, Margaret, off Isle of Breton, Louisiana, as the sloop was attempting to escape to sea laden with cotton. When Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles divided naval jurisdiction in the Gulf of Mexico between Flag Officer William McKean and Flag Officer David Farragut, Sciota was assigned to Farragut's West Gulf Blockading Squadron which had been created to wrest New Orleans from Southern hands. During the first weeks in April, Sciota, supported Farragut's efforts to get his deep draft ships across the bar off Pass a L'Outre and into the Mississippi River. During this period, she also steamed up the river gathering information about Southern defenses. Bombarding Mississippi River forts On the 18th, the ships of Farragut's fleet took position close to Fort St. Philip and Fort Jackson. Sciota bombarded these forts, and she continued to duel with the Confederate guns intermittently for the next six days. In the early morning darkness of the 24th, Sciota got underway with the fleet and dashed up river past the forts. After New Orleans, surrendered, Sciota operated up the river with Farragut. She attacked and passed the Confederate forts at Vicksburg, Mississippi on 28 June when Farragut raced by that riverside stronghold to join Flag Officer Charles H. Davis' Western flotilla. Since the Army was unable to provide the troops necessary for joint operations against Vicksburg, Farragut decided to return down river to turn his attention to the blockade in the western gulf. Sciota