USS Hartford, a sloop-of-war steamer, was the first ship of the United States Navy named for Hartford, the capital of Connecticut. Hartford served in several prominent campaigns in the American Civil War as the flagship of David G. Farragut, most notably the Battle of Mobile Bay in 1864. She survived until 1956, when she sank awaiting restoration at Norfolk, Virginia. Service history East India Squadron, 1859–1861 Hartford was launched 22 November 1858 at the Boston Navy Yard; sponsored by Miss Carrie Downes, Miss Lizzie Stringham, and Lieutenant G. J. H. Preble; and commissioned 27 May 1859, Captain Charles Lowndes in command. After shakedown out of Boston, the new screw sloop of war, carrying Flag Officer Cornelius K. Stribling, the newly appointed commander of the East India Squadron, sailed for the Cape of Good Hope and the Far East. Upon reaching the Orient, Hartford relieved as flagship. In November she embarked the American Minister to China, John Elliott Ward, at Hong Kong and carried him to Canton, Manila, Swatow, Shanghai, and other Far Eastern ports to settle American claims and to arrange for favorable consideration of the Nation's interests. Civil War, 1861–1865 With the outbreak of the American Civil War, Hartford was ordered home. She departed the Sunda Strait with on 30 August 1861 and arrived Philadelphia on 2 December to be fitted out for wartime service. She departed the Delaware Capes on 28 January as flagship of Flag Officer David G. Farragut, the commander of the newly created West Gulf Blockading Squadron. (See also: Confederate blockade mail.) An even larger purpose than the important blockade of the South's Gulf Coast lay behind Farragut's assignment. Late in 1861, the Union high command decided to capture New Orleans, the South's richest and most populous city, to begin a drive of sea-based power up the Mississippi River to meet the Union Army which was to drive down the Mississippi valley behind a spearhead of armored gunboats. "Other operations," Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles warned Farragut, "must not be allowed to interfere with the great object in view—the certain capture of the city of New Orleans." Hartford arrived 20 February at Ship Island, Mississippi, midway between Mobile Bay and the mouths of the Mississippi. Several Union ships and a few Army units were already in the vicinity when the squadron's flagship dropped anchor at the advanced staging area for the attack on New