The New Orleans Squadron or the New Orleans Station was a

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Navy A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral zone, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and ...

squadron Squadron may refer to: * Squadron (army), a military unit of cavalry, tanks, or equivalent subdivided into troops or tank companies * Squadron (aviation), a military unit that consists of three or four flights with a total of 12 to 24 aircraft, ...

raised out of the growing threat the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

posed to

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

during the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States of America and its indigenous allies against the United Kingdom and its allies in British North America, with limited participation by Spain in Florida. It bega ...

. The first squadron consisted of vessels and was mostly defeated during the war. Afterward, new ships were stationed at

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

which engaged in counter-piracy operations for over twenty years. The New Orleans Squadron was eventually merged with the

Home Squadron The Home Squadron was part of the United States Navy in the mid-19th century. Organized as early as 1838, ships were assigned to protect coastal commerce, aid ships in distress, suppress piracy and the Atlantic slave trade, make coastal surveys, ...

History

War of 1812

Originally commanded by Daniel Patterson in 1814, the squadron consisted of fifteen vessels, including the

schooner A schooner () is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than the mainmast. A common variant, the topsail schoon ...

s USS ''Carolina'' and USS ''Sea Horse'', the two small

sloops-of-war In the 18th century and most of the 19th, a sloop-of-war in the Royal Navy was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. The rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above; thus, the term ''sloop-of-war'' enc ...

USS ''Alligator'' and USS ''Tickler'' along with several Jeffersonian class

gunboat A gunboat is a naval watercraft designed for the express purpose of carrying one or more guns to bombard coastal targets, as opposed to those military craft designed for naval warfare, or for ferrying troops or supplies. History Pre-steam ...

s. On December 13, 1814, the ''Sea Horse'' fought with seven British longboats from a British flotilla of 42 armed longboats which was heading to

Lake Borgne Lake Borgne (french: Lac Borgne, es, Lago Borgne) is a lagoon of the Gulf of Mexico in southeastern Louisiana. Although early maps show it as a lake surrounded by land, coastal erosion has made it an arm of the Gulf of Mexico. Its name comes fro ...

. The next day, the longboat flotilla defeated the squadron's five gunboats under

Thomas ap Catesby Jones Thomas ''ap'' Catesby Jones (24 April 1790 – 30 May 1858) was a U.S. Navy commissioned officer during the War of 1812 and the Mexican–American War. Early life and education Thomas ap Catesby Jones was born on 24 April 1790 in Westmor ...

at the

Battle of Lake Borgne The Battle of Lake Borgne was a coastal engagement between the Royal Navy and the U.S. Navy in the American South theatre of the War of 1812. It occurred on December 14, 1814 on Lake Borgne. The British victory allowed them to disembark their tro ...

, and USS ''Alligator''Roosevelt (1900), p.74 and USS ''Tickler'' were also captured and scuttled. As result of this action, the British gained control of the lake which was then used as the landing zone for their army that marched on New Orleans. On December 27, as part of the

Battle of New Orleans The Battle of New Orleans was fought on January 8, 1815 between the British Army under Major General Sir Edward Pakenham and the United States Army under Brevet Major General Andrew Jackson, roughly 5 miles (8 km) southeast of the French ...

, the ''Carolina'' was badly damaged by enemy artillery fire and abandoned by her crew. She later exploded when fire reached her powder magazine. Although

Jean Lafitte Jean Lafitte ( – ) was a French pirate and privateer who operated in the Gulf of Mexico in the early 19th century. He and his older brother Pierre spelled their last name Laffite, but English language documents of the time used "Lafitte". Th ...

would later fight for America at New Orleans in January 1815, the squadron had operated against his pirates until ultimately being evicted from their base at Barataria on September 16, 1814 by Commodore Patterson. Six of his pirate ships were captured without a fight and around $500,000 worth of valuables were taken as prize.

Anti-Piracy Operations

Between the War of 1812 and 1830,

piracy Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, v ...

in the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...

flared up again, prompting the United States to take more serious action against the

outlaw An outlaw, in its original and legal meaning, is a person declared as outside the protection of the law. In pre-modern societies, all legal protection was withdrawn from the criminal, so that anyone was legally empowered to persecute or kill them ...

s. By 1818,

commanded a fleet of ships pirating out of

Galveston, Texas Galveston ( ) is a coastal resort city and port off the Southeast Texas coast on Galveston Island and Pelican Island in the U.S. state of Texas. The community of , with a population of 47,743 in 2010, is the county seat of surrounding Galvesto ...

; so the New Orleans Squadron began operations against him. About this time Lafitte suffered a significant distraction from his activities; a hurricane hit Galveston in September 1818, leaving his base in ruins, and one of his newest ships was captured by the squadron. In 1821, the USS ''Enterprise'', under

Lieutenant A lieutenant ( , ; abbreviated Lt., Lt, LT, Lieut and similar) is a commissioned officer rank in the armed forces of many nations. The meaning of lieutenant differs in different militaries (see comparative military ranks), but it is often sub ...

Lawrence Kearny Commodore Lawrence Kearny (30 November 1789 – 29 November 1868) was an officer in the United States Navy during the early nineteenth century. In the early 1840s he began negotiations with China which opened that country to U.S. trade and poin ...

, arrived at Galveston and demanded Lafitte's departure, which was accomplished without bloodshed. (The revenue cutters USRC ''Alabama'' and USRC ''Louisiana'' captured another one of Lafitte's ships in 1819. Both cutters were temporarily serving with the New Orleans station at the time.) On the other side of the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an oceanic basin, ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of ...

, and in the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...

, attacks on American

merchant ship A merchant ship, merchant vessel, trading vessel, or merchantman is a watercraft that transports cargo or carries passengers for hire. This is in contrast to pleasure craft, which are used for personal recreation, and naval ships, which are u ...

s by

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

and

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

n pirates increased. Over the course of the next decade, thousands of attacks on merchant vessels by West Indies pirates were reported; many of the victims were American ships. In 1821, the first U.S. Navy fleet created specifically to fight piracy in the Caribbean became known as the West Indies Squadron. When this squadron was deployed, piracy in the New Orleans region began to decline for good. By 1838, the

was created and was used for protecting the American coastline until the outbreak of

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

in 1861.

References

Citations Bibliography * * * Wombwell, James A., The Long War Against Piracy: Historical Trends(2009) pg.# 40-41 {{US Squadrons Ship squadrons of the United States Navy *