monitors. This included the rebuilding of the turrets and pilot houses to increase their armor thickness from to 10 inches and to replace the bolts that secured their armor plates together with rivets to prevent them from being knocked loose by the shock of impact from shells striking the turret. Other changes included deepening the hull by to increase the ship's buoyancy, moving the position of the turret to balance the ship's trim and replacing all of the ship's deck armor. Completion of the ship was further delayed by the low depth of the Ohio River which prevented her movement from Cincinnati in December 1864 to finish fitting out. The river finally rose in March 1865 which allowed the ship to reach Mound City, Illinois on 7 March, where Oneota was placed in ordinary after completion, together with her sisters and Tippecanoe. The ships needed a deep-water berth and were moved opposite Cairo, Illinois in mid-1865 even though they still had to be anchored in the main channel where they were often struck by debris, drifting ice, and vulnerable to accidents. Tippecanoes anchor chain was broken on 27 March 1866 when she was struck by a steamboat towing barges and the monitor collided with Oneota and the two ships were dragged downstream before they could be brought under control. This was a persistent problem and the Navy finally decided to move the ships down to New Orleans in May 1866. In August 1867, the Navy turned over Oneota and Catawba to Swift & Co. contingent on a guarantee that they would be returned in good shape if they could not be sold, and the company began refitting them for Peruvian service. In October 1867, an agent for Swift & Co. negotiated a deal with Peru to purchase Oneota and her sister for a million dollars apiece. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy, initially indicated that the company could repurchase the two if it refunded the government's costs to build them, but changed his mind and said that he had no authority to do that. Congress debated the issue and ultimately decided that they would be appraised by a board of officers and that the highest competitive bid in equal to or in excess of the appraised value would be accepted. The ship was appraised at $375,000 and sold for that amount, possibly after a rigged bid, on 11 April 1868.