Vol. 2 - July - No. 35
Ironclads
Because of inadequate shipbuilding facilities, the Confederate navy was never able to challenge Union sea-power where it counted most - along the coasts and rivers of the South. But it was not for lack of trying. Though plagued by shortages on every hand, the Confederate Navy Department demonstrated great skill and innovation. Southern engineers developed "torpedoes" (mines) that sank or damaged Union warships in southern bays and rivers. Even more innovative (though less successful) was the building of ironclad "rams" to sink the blockade ships. The idea of iron armor for warships was not new; the British and French navies had prototype ironclads in 1861. But the Confederacy built the first one to see action. It was the C.S.S. Virginia, commonly called (even by southerners) the Merrimack because it was rebuilt from the steam frigate U.S.S. Merrimack, which had been burned to the waterline by the Union navy at Norfolk when the Confederates seized the naval base there in April 1861. Ready for its trial-by-combat on March 8, 1862, the Virginia steamed out to attack the blockade squadron at Hampton Roads. She sank one frigate with her iron ram and another with the firepower of her eleven guns. Other Union ships ran aground trying to escape, to be finished off (Confederates expected) the next day. Union shot and shells bounced off the Virginia's armor plate. It was the worst day the United States Navy would have until December 7, 1941.Panic seized Washington and the whole northeastern seaboard. But almost in Hollywood fashion, the Union's own ironclad sailed into Hampton Roads in the nick of time and saved the rest of the fleet. This was the U.S.S. Monitor, which had been completed just days earlier at the Brooklyn navy yard. Much smaller than the Virginia, with two eleven-inch-guns in a revolving turret (an innovation) set on a deck almost flush with the water, the Monitor looked like a "tin can on a shingle." It was a formidable warship, though. It presented a small target and was capable of concentrating considerable firepower in a given direction with its revolving turret. Next day, the Monitor fought the Virginia in history's first battle between ironclads. It was a draw, but the Virginia limped home to Norfolk never again to menace the Union fleet. Although the Confederacy built other ironclad rams, some never saw action and none achieved the initial success of the Virginia. By the war's end, the Union navy had built or started fifty-eight ships of the Monitor class (some of them double turreted), launching a new age in naval history that ended the classic "heart of oak" era of warships.
photo at left: crew on deck of the Monitor from a photograph by Matthew Brady in the L.C. Handy Collection, Washingtonlearn more about this fascinating subject:
Hampton Roads: The Battle of Ironclads
Online Library of U.S. Naval Ships
Cyberessay: Civil War, Monitor vs. Merrimack
The Hampton Roads Naval Museum
Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-Tunnel (I-664)
