 The city was taken by U.S. Army forces on April 25, 1862.Because a large part of the population had Union sympathies (or compatible commercial interests), the U.S. government took the unusual step of designating the areas of Louisiana then under U.S. control as a state within the Union, with its own elected representatives to the U.S. Congress.For the latter part of the war, both the U.S. and the Confederacy recognized their own distinct Louisiana governors.