Era No. 5

History
Confederate States
Launched	1860
Chartered	1863
United States
Captured	14 February 1863
General characteristics
Displacement	115 long tons (117 t)
Propulsion	Stern wheel steamer

Era No. 5 — a shallow-draft steamer built in 1860 at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania — was chartered by the Confederates early in 1863 to transport corn from the Red River to Camden, Arkansas.

As the steamer — laden with 4,500 bushels of corn — proceeded to her destination on 14 February 1863, she rounded a sharp bend 15 mi (24 km) above the mouth of the Black River, came upon and was captured by the USS Queen of the West.^[1] After Queen of the West was lost the same day, her crew fled to Union positions in the Era No.5.^[2] Era No. 5 was then assigned to Colonel Charles R. Ellet's river fleet, fitted out with protective cotton baling and used by the Union as a dispatch boat and transport in the Mississippi River.

Notes

1. Queen of the West in DANFS.
2. Spencer Tucker, Blue and Gray Navies: the Civil War Afloat, Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2006. ISBN 1-59114-882-0, p.223

References

 This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.