USS Monticello's bombardment of the Sewell's Point battery was one of the earliest Union Navy actions against Confederate forces during the Civil War.

[A 2] While it has been suggested by some sources that the Monticello's action may have been the first gunfire by the Union Navy during the Civil War, a brief exchange of cannon fire between the U.S. gunboat USS Yankee and shore batteries manned by Virginia volunteer forces which had not yet been incorporated into the Confederate States Army at Gloucester Point, Virginia on the York River occurred on May 7, 1861.

On April 27, 1861, President Lincoln ordered the Union blockade of the Confederacy extended to the coasts of Virginia and North Carolina, which were already in the process of joining the Confederate States of America although they did not officially do so until May 1861.

On May 18, 1861, the Monticello fired on the unfinished Confederate battery at Sewell's Point, which commanded the entrance to the Elizabeth River and the harbor at Norfolk, Virginia but which had no guns yet in place, with little effect.

[15] When they arrived at Norfolk and Portsmouth, the Federal troops found that the Confederates had abandoned the batteries at Sewell's Point and other fortified positions in the vicinity.