24. Tricking the Confederates Into Destroying A Valuable Captured Ship
During the Civil War, the Union’s USS Indianola ironclad river gunboat served in the Western Theater with the US Navy’s Mississippi Squadron, operating in the Mississippi and Yazoo rivers. She ran past Confederate batteries in Vicksburg to reach the Red River and help block Confederate supplies from sailing down its waters. However, once she got there she was attacked by Confederate rams on the night of February 24th, 1863, ran aground and was captured.
The Indianola’s capture derailed Union plans to blockade the Red River, and its presence in Confederate hands was too great a threat to Union operations in the region to be endured. So plans were made to recapture the ironclad, or destroy it so as to deprive the enemy of its use. That set in motion one of the war’s most successful deception operations.