Combat· Second Seminole War
USS Otsego skirmish, east coast of Florida
A small action of the kind that filled the final years of the Seminole war, fought by the riverine flotilla that did much of the work in Florida's roadless interior.
The schooner USS Otsego was part of Lieutenant John McLaughlin's "Mosquito Fleet," the Florida Squadron of shallow-draft vessels, boats, and canoes that carried Marines and sailors into the swamps and waterways where larger forces could not operate. On 16 April 1840 a party from the Otsego had a skirmish of about three hours along the Florida coast, the kind of brief, inconclusive brush with Seminole bands that characterized the campaign in its later phase. No casualties were suffered. Actions like this rarely produced a decisive result, but the constant pressure of the flotilla's patrols, denying the Seminoles rest and supplies in their last refuges, was the method by which the long war was slowly ground toward its end.
Podcast episodes on Second Seminole War
Record no. 310