149 years ago today, on June 24th, 1864, Confederate artillery and cavalry forces captured USS Queen City, a converted "tinclad" river gunboat, while she was off Clarendon, Arkansas on the White River.

The gunboat had originally been built as a commercial ferry, but was acquired by the Navy soon after she was built.  The Navy converted her to a gunboat and commissioned her on April 1st, 1863.  Her armament varied during her career.  Originally armed with six guns, by October 1863, she carried nine - two 30-pound Parrott rifles (probably the two guns visible forward), two 32-pound smoothbore cannon, four 24-pound howitzers and a 12-pound gun.

She was intentionally destroyed by Confederate forces on the same day she was captured, when another Federal gunboat, USS Tyler, approached in an effort to recapture the ship.

Photographs courtesy of the Naval History and Heritage Command, Washington, DC.