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The First Battle of Sabine Pass (September 24–25, 1862), also known as the Bombardment of Fort Sabine, was the first American Civil War bombardment by the United States Navy of a Confederate fort below Sabine City (now Sabine Pass, Texas.) It was the apex in a series of naval and land skirmishes around the mouth of the Sabine River, Texas, and preceded by four weeks the Union Navy's first armed entry into Galveston Bay called the Battle of Galveston Harbor. Besides strengthening the Union naval blockade of the Texas coastline, the shelling and capture of Sabine Pass was to deter Confederate ground forces from moving southwestward on the Texas coast to augment Galveston's defense. It was intended to open the way for the Union invasion of Texas, which almost a year later was attempted by a combined force of Union naval and army forces at the Second Battle of Sabine Pass.