David Dixon Porter brought a flotilla of mortar schooners towed by steam gunboats for the attack below New Orleans. Royal Navy bomb vessels had often used converted colliers because their strong hulls could withstand the pounding of mortar fire. The United States had many schooners under construction for merchant service and fewer suitable colliers available to take over. Schooner hulls were less able to endure repeated mortar recoil, but their availability and lower cost let the Navy acquire the numbers it needed. The comparison concerns the structural demands of firing the weapon as well as the supply of vessels.
Notable Point · 2:12:51-2:14:30
Porter turns available schooners into mortar vessels
Porter's mortar schooners traded resistance to repeated firing stresses for merchant hulls the US Navy could acquire in sufficient numbers.