USS Nipsic, an 836-ton Kansas class screw steam gunboat, was built at the Portsmouth Navy Yard, Kittery, Maine. Commissioned in September 1863, she served with the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron during the remainder of the Civil War. In later 1863 and early 1864, Nipsic participated in operations against Murrells Inlet and Georgetown, South Carolina. In June 1864, she captured a sailing blockade runner.

Following the Civil War, Nipsic operated off South America and in the West Indies area. In about 1869, she was rerigged from two masts to three and otherwise altered to improve sailing qualities. In 1870, she participated in survey operations along the Central American coast. Nipsic was decommissioned in 1873 and subsequently broken up, though officially she was "rebuilt" as a new, and rather larger, Adams class gunboat.