The first USS Miami was a side-wheel steamer, double-ender gunboat in the United States Navy during the American Civil War. Miami was launched by Philadelphia Navy Yard on November 16, 1861, and commissioned there on January 29, 1862, Lieutenant Abram Davis Harrell in command. Service history Battle of New Orleans The wooden-hulled gunboat was ordered February 5, 1862, to proceed to Ship Island, Mississippi for duty in the Mortar Flotilla organized to neutralize Confederate riverside forts during Admiral David Farragut's impending attack on New Orleans, Louisiana. Miami reached Ship Island on March 19 and headed for Pass a l'Outre where she entered the Mississippi River to join Commander David Dixon Porter's flotilla. During the next few weeks she was busy preparing for the assault. On April 13, Miami joined , , , and and steamed upstream. A Confederate steamer exchanged fire with Union ships before scurrying upriver to safety. Early in the morning, five days later, Miami towed three mortar schooners to predesignated positions below Fort St. Philip and Fort Jackson when the Union ships bombarded the Confederate works which guarded the approach to New Orleans. The shelling continued intermittently until it reached crescendo before dawn on April 24 as Admiral Farragut led his deep draft, salt water fleet up the Mississippi in a daring dash past the forts. Miami remained below with the mortar schooners providing covering fire for Farragut's ships as they ran the gauntlet. When the Federal vessels had reached safety, Miami turned to transporting U.S. Army troops to positions for launching an attack on the forts by land, and continued the task until the forts surrendered to the Navy on April 28. Farragut ordered the Mortar Flotilla to Ship Island on May 1 to prepare for action against Mobile, Alabama. Porter left Ship Island with his steamers and on May 7 for Mobile Bay to prepare for an attack. After planting buoys to mark safe channels for Farragut's deep-draft ships, the steamers returned to Ship Island. On May 10 Porter, who had remained off Mobile on blockade duty, reoccupied Pensacola, Florida after it bad been burned and abandoned by Confederate troops. Although most military and naval installations in the area had been destroyed or severely damaged by thorough Southern demolition work, Porter recognized the strategic advantages of Pensacola as a naval base and shifted his flotilla there from Ship Island. Vicksburg Campaign Meanwhile, Farragut, upon returning