USS Lodona, a 861-ton (burden) iron screw gunboat, was originally the blockade running steamship of the same name. She was built at Hull, England, in 1862 and captured in Ossabaw Sound, South Carolina, on 4 August of that year by USS Unadilla. The Navy purchased her in September 1862 and, following conversion, placed her in commission in early January 1863.

Lodona was assigned to the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron from then until the end of the Civil War. During this time she participated in the blockade of the South Carolina and Georgia coasts, capturing three sailing vessels. In mid-1863 she also bombarded Confederate fortifications in the Charleston Harbor area. Sent north late in April 1865, the ship was decommissioned in May and sold in June. Her subsequent employment, as the merchant vessel Lodona, lasted until she was lost at the end of May 1879.

This page features the only view we have of USS Lodona (1863-1865).

Photo #: NH 51415 USS Lodona (1863-1865) Sketch by Commander Edmund R. Colhoun, from his letter book of 1865-1885 in the Naval Historical Foundation's Colhoun Collection. He was Lodona's Commanding Officer during the Civil War. Courtesy of the Naval Historical Foundation, Washington, D.C.