J. M. Chapman

J. M. Chapman, a 90-ton schooner, was purchased in 1863, by Asbury Harpending and other California members of the Knights of the Golden Circle in San Francisco to outfit as a Confederate privateer.

[1] Harpending's plan to capture Pacific Mail Steamship Company ships along the Pacific coast carrying gold and silver shipments to Panama.

The plan attempt was detected and a boarding party made up of crew from the United States Navy sloop-of-war USS Cyane, revenue officers, and San Francisco Police Department officers seized the ship and its crew on the night of their intended departure.

[2][3] The ship was lost in December 1864 on a voyage between Shoalwater Bay in Queensland, Australia, and San Francisco.

This article about a specific ship related to the American Civil War is a stub.