[Illustration: %Remodeling the Merrimac%]
[Illustration: %The U.S. steamer Merrimac%]
%461. The Merrimac or Virginia.%—When Sumter was fired on and the war began, the United States held the great navy yard and naval depot at Portsmouth, Va., where were eleven war vessels of various sorts, and immense quantities of guns and stores and ammunition. But the officer in charge, knowing that Virginia was about to secede, and fearing that the yard would be seized by the Confederates, sank most of the ships, set fire to the buildings, and abandoned the place. The Confederates at once took possession, raised the vessels, and out of one of them, a steamer called the Merrimac. made an ironclad ram, which they renamed the Virginia and sent forth to destroy the wooden vessels of the United States then assembled in Chesapeake Bay.
Well knowing that he could not be harmed by any of our war ships, the commander of the Merrimac went leisurely to work and began (March 8, 1862) by attacking the Cumberland. In her day the Cumberland had been as fine a frigate as ever went to sea; but the days of wooden ships were gone, and she was powerless. Her shot glanced from the sides of the _Merrimac _like so many peas, while the new monster, coming on under steam, rammed her in the side and made a great hole through which the water poured. Even then the commander of the Cumberland would not surrender, but fought his ship till she filled and sank with her guns booming and her flag flying. After sinking the Cumberland, the Merrimac attacked the Congress, forced her to surrender, set her on fire, and, as darkness was then coming on, went back to the shelter of the Confederate batteries.
[Illustration: Monitor, side and deck plan]
%462. The Monitor.%—Early the next day the Merrimac sailed forth to finish the work of destruction, and picking out the Minnesota, which was hard and fast in the mud, bore down to attack her. When lo! from beside the Minnesota started forth the most curious-looking craft ever seen on water. It was the famous Monitor, designed by Captain John Ericsson, to whose inventive genius we owe the screw propeller and the hot-air engine. She consisted of a small iron hull, on top of which rested a boat-shaped raft covered with sheets of iron which made the deck. On top of the deck, which was about three feet above the water, was an iron cylinder, or turret, which revolved by machinery and carried two guns. She looked, it was said, like "a cheesebox mounted on a raft."
[Illustration: HAMPTON ROADS]
The Monitor was built at New York, and was intended for harbor defense; but the fact that the Confederates were building a great ironclad at Norfolk made it necessary to send her to Hampton Roads. The sea voyage was a dreadful one; again and again she was almost wrecked, but she weathered the storm, and early on the evening of March 8, 1862, entered Hampton Roads, to see the waters lighted up by the burning Congress and to hear of the sinking of the Cumberland. Taking her place beside the Minnesota, she waited for the dawn, and about eight o'clock saw the Merrimac coming toward her, and, starting out, began the greatest naval battle of modern times. When it ended, neither ship was disabled; but they were the masters of the seas, for it was now proved that no wooden ships anywhere afloat could harm them. The days of wooden naval vessels were over, and all the nations of the world were forced to build their navies anew. The Merrimac withdrew from the fight; when the Confederates evacuated Norfolk, they destroyed her (May, 1862). The Monitor sank in a storm at sea while going to Beaufort, N.C. (January, 1863).[1]
[Footnote 1: Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Vol. I., pp. 719-750.]
[Illustration: %An encounter at close range%]