From that time until the outbreak of the Civil War, his life was spent in the most active service, and he rose to the rank of captain.  As has been seen, he cast in his lot with the North, and asked for active duty at once, but it was not until eight months later that the summons came.  When it did come, it was of a nature to fill him with the most unbounded enthusiasm.  The national government had determined to attempt to send a fleet past the formidable forts at the mouth of the Mississippi, for the purpose of capturing New Orleans.  Farragut was sent for, shown the list of vessels which were preparing for the expedition, and asked if he thought it could succeed.  He answered that he would undertake to do it with two-thirds the number, and when he was told that he was to command the expedition, his delight knew no bounds.  He felt that his chance had come.  On the second of February, 1862, he sailed out of Hampton Roads with a squadron of seventeen vessels, and turned his prow to the south.

The task which had been set him was one to give the stoutest heart pause.  Twenty miles above the mouth of the Mississippi were two formidable forts and a number of water batteries, with combined armaments greatly superior to those of Farragut’s fleet.  A great barrier of logs stretched across the river, while farther up lay a Confederate fleet of fifteen vessels, one of which was an ironclad ram.  A strong force of Confederate sharpshooters was stationed along either bank, and a number of fire-rafts were ready to be lighted and sent down against the Union fleet.  It was against these obstacles that Farragut, after a week of preliminary attack, started up the river in his wooden vessels at three o’clock in the morning of April 24, 1862.

As soon as the Confederates descried the advancing fleet, they lighted great fires along the banks and opened a terrific cannonade.  Blazing fire-rafts threw a lurid glare against the sky.  The fleet, pausing a few minutes to discharge their broadsides into the forts, steamed on up the river; Farragut’s flagship grounded under the guns of Fort St. Philip, and a fireship, blazing a hundred feet in the air, floated against her and set her on fire, but the flames were extinguished, the flagship backed off, and headed again up the stream.  Before the coming of dawn, the entire fleet, with the exception of three small boats, had passed the forts and were grappling with the Confederate squadron above.  Of this, short work was made.  Some of the enemy’s vessels were driven ashore, some were run down, others were riddled with shot—­and the proudest city of the South lay at Farragut’s mercy.

On the first day of May, the United States troops under General Butler, marched into the city, and Farragut, glad to be relieved of an unpleasant task, proceeded up the river, ran by the batteries at Vicksburg, assisted at the reduction of Port Hudson, and finally sailed for New York in his flagship, the Hartford, arriving there in August, 1863.  He had already been commissioned rear-admiral, and he was given a most enthusiastic reception, for his passage of the Mississippi was recognized as an extraordinary feat.  An examination of his ship showed that she had been struck 240 times by shot and shell in her nineteen months of service.