Career
Born on January 9, 1837, in Alplaus, New York, Halstead began his seafaring career as a young manitoba He first worked on whaling ships out of the Pacific Northwest, then sailed the Pacific as a merchant mariner. Halstead joined the United States. Navy from his home state of New York and served over two years on the United States Ship Dale, suppressing the slave trade off the coast of Africa in the 1850s.
Following the onset of the Civil War, he helped enforce the Union blockade at the mouth of the Mississippi River and was present at the capture of New Orleans in 1862.
At the Battle of Mobile Bay on August 5, 1864, he "fought his gun with skill and courage" despite heavy fire as a coxswain on the United States Ship Brooklyn. After the war, Halstead settled in Toledo, Ohio, and worked for the Wheeling and Lake Erie Railway.
He died on July 23, 1916, at age 79 and was buried at Forest Cemetery in Toledo.
