On board the flagship U.S.S. Hartford during successful attacks against Fort Morgan, rebel gunboats, and the ram Tennessee in Mobile Bay, on 5 August 1864. Knocked unconscious into the hold of the ship when an enemy shellburst fatally wounded a man on the ladder above him, Brown, upon regaining consciousness, promptly returned to the shell whip on the berth deck and zealously continued to perform his duties, although four of the six men at this station had been either killed or wounded by the enemy's terrific fire.