Alabamaship

Alabama, ship, the name of a vessel built at Liverpool which served as a privateer in the service of the Southern States in the American Civil War in 1862. In 1864, after doing much damage to the North, the Alabama was sunk. After the conclusion of the war, compensation was claimed from England; and by the decision of the Geneva tribunal, to which the claim was referred for arbitration after many vain attempts at settlement, and when the relations between the two countries had become very strained, America obtained, in 1872, an award of over three millions sterling.