Ironclad Gulf drainage basin riverine operations

atlantis

Sergeant Major
Joined
Nov 12, 2016
That whole river system that flows into the gulf out of Mississippi an Alabama, how suitable for union riverine operations.
 
That whole river system that flows into the gulf out of Mississippi an Alabama, how suitable for union riverine operations.
They would have been very useful for the Union, and the Confederates were well aware of their value and weaknesses. To get to the main river of value, the Alabama, you had to get past the Mobile forts. It would only make sense to then take Mobile, before heading up the rivers. Two sets of batteries had been constructed above Mobile, one at Choctaw Bluff and one near Mount Vernon, to prevent river ascent, but they would have only worked if there had been a ground force to protect them from being cut off.

Up the Alabama River was Montgomery and river travel from Mobile to Montgomery was heavy and very important. It is unlikely that the Union would need to use this route to take Montgomery, some 250+ miles up river. Selma, with its railroad connections and iron works, was also up river, some 60 miles before reaching Montgomery.

The other river system was the Apalachicola/Chattahoochee River up to Columbus. This could have interrupted corn shipments to Richmond and destroyed the factories in Columbus, but again, you had a 250 mile trip to get there. Also, the lower reaches of the river were very shallow much of the year. In fact, there was no steamboat travel on the lower reaches in 2 of the years just before/early in the war.
 
They would have been very useful for the Union, and the Confederates were well aware of their value and weaknesses. To get to the main river of value, the Alabama, you had to get past the Mobile forts. It would only make sense to then take Mobile, before heading up the rivers. Two sets of batteries had been constructed above Mobile, one at Choctaw Bluff and one near Mount Vernon, to prevent river ascent, but they would have only worked if there had been a ground force to protect them from being cut off.

Up the Alabama River was Montgomery and river travel from Mobile to Montgomery was heavy and very important. It is unlikely that the Union would need to use this route to take Montgomery, some 250+ miles up river. Selma, with its railroad connections and iron works, was also up river, some 60 miles before reaching Montgomery.

The other river system was the Apalachicola/Chattahoochee River up to Columbus. This could have interrupted corn shipments to Richmond and destroyed the factories in Columbus, but again, you had a 250 mile trip to get there. Also, the lower reaches of the river were very shallow much of the year. In fact, there was no steamboat travel on the lower reaches in 2 of the years just before/early in the war.
What about the pearl river any potential there.
 
Not that I can see -- no target to head to and too shallow.
Wow you look at a map and you see a vast drainage network and yet in reality because of depth issues not much use to the union. By the same token it doesn't seem if the confederates had the means to transform the network into an effective supply system .
 
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