John Martin (1823-1904), a Bangor accountant and shopkeeper, drew the revenue gunboat Mahoning as it appeared on August 14, 1864 in Bangor.

Martin included the illustration on page 49 of a "Scrap and Sketch Book" he began writing in 1864. He wrote that it was the first gunboat in the Penobscot River. He said it brought a group of Congressmen on an excursion to Bangor and the Maine coast.

Martin described the boat and its guns. He wrote, "I took my son Junior & crossed to Brewer & sketched her from the Brick Wharf oposite Steam Boat wharf. I then went on board & examined her machinery guns & work generally which was all plain and of the very best material and painted & varnished and clean as a penny."