 To give an incentive in the absence of valuable cargoes of merchant vessels that could be sold for profit, the law provided for fixed monetary awards for capturing or destroying ships of the US Navy, with the size of the awards to be based on the numbers in the crews and the value of the ships taken or destroyed.This provision was never applied, as no Union warships were destroyed by privateers.A near exception was provided by the armored ram "CSS Manassas", which started as a privateer at New Orleans by riverboat Captain John A. Stevenson.