A combination of three-decker and ironclad ram was the French warship Magenta, constructed in 1862. She had an enormous ram like the Taureau and carried eighty guns, and was barquentine rigged.
In England, Captain Coles began in 1859 to urge the construction of vessels of the cupola or turret type, and after the lesson of the famous contests in America between the two ironclads, the British Admiralty decided to try Captain Coles’ boats experimentally. He advocated the cutting down of the three-deckers into one-deck ships, carrying on this one deck one or more turrets or cupolas in which the guns should be placed. These turrets were capable of being turned so that the guns in them could be fired in any direction, and he proposed that a portion of the bulwarks should be hinged in order that they could be let down when it was required to fire the guns, and thus form a sort of additional protection to that portion of the ship’s side above the water-line, while when raised they would add to the seaworthiness of the vessels by keeping the water off their decks. Vessels built according to Captain Coles’ plans, it was contended, would be floating defences “which would be at once thoroughly manageable, impervious to shot, movable with ease, and seaworthy. Nor would they be so monstrous and unsightly to a nautical eye as the inventions of our American cousins. They would be fitted with masts and yards, having the one peculiarity of being made of one uniform size, so that ships of all classes abroad could be furnished at depots, in case of accident, or ships meeting each other could exchange with or supply their comrades,” to quote from one of the descriptions published at the time. Another advantage was that the conversion of heavy frigates and line-of-battle ships into iron-plated vessels, fitted with the Coles shield, could be effected at a comparatively moderate cost. Experiments with the cupola were tried on the Trusty and Hazard with success. The standardisation of masts and rigging was another point on which Captain Coles laid stress. The cupola system had so much to recommend it that Sir William Armstrong wrote to the Times endorsing it as solving the problem of working the heaviest guns. Could shipbuilding have stood still at that period the system would have been an unqualified success, but the rivalry between armour-makers and gunmakers was so intense that no sooner did an armour-plate maker produce a plate impenetrable to existing guns and projectiles than the gunmakers set to work to produce a gun and projectile which should smash the armour plate.
Photo. G. West & Son.
H.M.S. “Devastation.”
Photo. G. West & Son.
H.M.S. “Thunderer.”
The steam corvette Pallas, launched at Woolwich in 1865, differed materially from any other vessel hitherto constructed. She was originally intended to be built of iron, but as the necessary machinery was not then in existence at Woolwich, she was constructed of wood and iron-plated, and had a belt of armour to protect the most important parts. She was rigged as a ship so that she might keep at sea for a considerable time, the sails enabling her to economise her fuel. In order to increase her seaworthiness she was made high above the water, her fixed bulwarks being eighteen feet above the water-level. She was also designed to be able to fight end on. The engines were of 600 horse-power, and, to counteract the enormous strains the screw propeller was expected to impose, a new system of stern construction was adopted whereby the sternposts and deadwood were connected with the sides by internal iron bulkheads, decks, and flats, and external brass castings. The Pallas was 2372 tons burden, and was intended to be a faster vessel than any wooden frigate in the Navy. The fastest wooden frigate afloat and complete then was the Mersey, which once got up to 13¹⁄₄ knots an hour. The Pallas was provided with Mr. Reid’s new bow, known as the U bow from its shape. This bow gave considerable buoyancy where it was needed to support the ram, but its shape created a wave forward and thus militated against the vessel’s speed.
H.M.S. Minotaur, launched in 1865, was almost the last of the great sailing warships carrying a ram and having powerful auxiliary machinery. She had five square-rigged masts, and all five topsails were on the divided principle.