Maine 2nd Volunteer Cavalry (Union)

Mobile Bay

In the late summer of 1864, a Union combined Army-Navy force began operations to close Mobile Bay to blockade-running vessels from the port city of Mobile, Alabama. On August 3, infantry and cavalrymen under Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger landed on Dauphin Island and laid siege to Fort Gaines west of the main ship channel. Two days later, Rear Admiral David G. Farragut's fleet of eighteen ships, including four ironclad monitors, entered Mobile Bay and received devastating fire from both Fort Gaines and Fort Morg…READ MORE

Fort Blakeley

Although the harbor of Mobile Bay had been closed to blockade running traffic since mid-summer 1864 with Admiral David G. Farragut's victory there, the port city of Mobile still remained in Confederate control. In late March 1865, two Federal infantry columns converged on the defenses of the city at Fort Blakeley and Spanish Fort. One force of 13,000 Union soldiers commanded by Gen. Frederick Steele moved west from Pensacola with orders to take Blakely from the rear. Union Gen. Edward R.S. Canby's Sixteent…READ MORE