[1] On 7 December 1863, the U.S. War Department transferred to the Navy two wooden-hulled, side-wheel rams then being built at New Albany, Indiana, for the Army's Mississippi Marine Brigade.

On that day, as he was reporting having taken possession of these still-unfinished vessels, Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter—who then commanded the Mississippi Squadron—suggested that they be named Avenger and Vindicator.

Completed late in February 1864, this ram dropped down the Ohio River and was commissioned at Cairo, Illinois, on the 29th of that month, Acting Volunteer Lt. Charles A. Wright in command.

However, when Avenger reached a point only some six miles below Cairo, Illinois, she encountered an upward-bound merchant steamer whose pilot attempted to pass her on the wrong side of the stream.

The Union warships ascended that tributary as high as Ouachita City and confiscated some 3,000 bales of cotton; liberated 800 negroes; and burned the courthouse at Monroe, Louisiana, the railroad depot there, and a bridge over the stream.

However, at Memphis he learned that, after pillaging Fort Pillow, the dreaded Southern raider had abandoned the fallen Union stronghold and retired inland.

On 21 November 1864, after spotting a skiff crossing the river at Bruinsburg, Mississippi, Avenger shelled the area and sent a landing party ashore which found contraband concealed in the undergrowth.

Sold at public auction there on 29 November 1865 to Cutting & Ellis, the former ram was documented as Balize on 16 April 1867 and began service out of New Orleans as a merchantman.