page_title: Unadilla-class gunboat
section_title: Launch and commission
hierarchical_section_title: Unadilla-class gunboat / Construction and design / Launch and commission
caption_attribution_description: English: USS Unadilla under construction in 1861 at the yard of John Englis in New York.
context_page_description: The Unadilla class was a class of gunboat built for the Union Navy at the outbreak of the American Civil War. Ships of the class were also known as "90-day gunboats" due to their rapid construction. The class was designed to be fully oceangoing while having a light enough draft to be able to operate close inshore, for blockade duty or other operations in shallow waters.
  Unadilla-class gunboats took part in many coastal and river operations, most notably as the bulk of the fleet which captured the vital Confederate port of New Orleans in April 1862. As blockade ships, the 23 vessels of the class captured or destroyed no fewer than 146 enemy blockade runners during the war— about 10 percent of the total number of Confederate blockade runners so neutralized.
  The Unadilla class was sold off quickly by the Navy at the end of the war, most of them going into merchant service. Little is known about their subsequent careers.
context_section_description: The first vessel of the class, Unadilla, was launched on 17 August 1861, barely two months after the signing of the contract. The rest rapidly followed, with another three being launched in August, four in September, fourteen in October and the last one, Penobscot, in November. Unadilla was again first to be commissioned, on 30 September, just 93 days after the laying of her keel. A total of eleven were commissioned before the end of the year, and another eleven by February 1862. Marblehead was the last ship of the class to enter commission, on 8 March. 
  Though popularly known as the "90-day gunboats" then, only the first four vessels of the class were commissioned in anything like 90 days. The rest took an average of about three months just to launch. Overall, the ships averaged a little under six months from signing of the contract to commission.
caption: USS Unadilla under construction at the yard of John Englis, New York
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