Warships and their story

by R. A. Fletcher

THE “MONITOR”-“MERRIMAC” DUEL.

From a Photograph of a Contemporary Drawing supplied by the U.S. Navy Department.

Up to the last Ericsson was bothered by the government officials. Had he been left to himself the ship would not have had such a narrow escape from going to the bottom. They interfered with the turret-bearings, with the result that when the sea washed over the low deck, the water poured into the hold from all round the turret and put out the fires in the engine room, when the fumes drove the engineers out of their quarters and nearly poisoned everybody in the turret through which all the outgoing ventilation had to be made. However, the tugs got the vessel safely into smoother water, the furnace was set going again, and the pumps were restarted, and by the time Hampton Roads was reached the vessel was labouring along as best it could under its own steam and with the aid of a couple of tugs. The narrow escape the Monitor had from foundering on this voyage served to stimulate the chorus of disapproval, and there were not wanting many on the northern side as well as on that of the south to predict the failure of “Ericsson’s folly.”

Ericsson had confidence in his ship. He had never forgiven the British Admiralty for its rejection of the screw propeller, nor for ignoring his suggestions in regard to the Princeton, and one reason why he chose the name of the Monitor, as he told the writer and others more than once, was that it should be a perpetual reminder to the British Admiralty of the chance it had lost.

In the turret were two 11-inch Dahlgren smooth-bores which fired solid iron shots weighing 135 to 136 lb. each with charges of 15 lb. of powder, and were even more powerful than his own gun. Solid iron stoppers closed the ports when the guns were run in. The deck had five projections besides the turret. Right forward was a small square pilot-house measuring four feet, and constructed of bars of iron nine inches thick, and provided with a flat iron roof two inches thick. In the sides of the pilot-house were narrow slits as sight holes. The other projections were two small chimneys six feet high, removable before an engagement, and two intake ventilators.

Neither side on the morrow shirked the coming duel. From the outset the Monitor was the better prepared. Her guns fired solid shot; the Merrimac had only shell and grape, neither of which was calculated to do much harm to the Monitor’s turret, whereas the blow of the Monitor’s shot upon the sloping sides of the Merrimac’s battery was bound to be delivered with terrific force, even though the blows were slanting. For another thing, the southern vessel was built of wood and had already suffered severely in the hard contest at short range with the battleships the previous afternoon; her engines were shaky, and her steering gear worked worse than before; and the experiences of some of her crew, coupled with the wounding of her commander, had not been such as to leave their confidence unshaken. The Merrimac was now commanded by Commodore Tatnall, the hero of the episode in the Anglo-American attack some years before upon the Chinese forts at Peiho, when he justified the participation of the Americans by the famous remark that “blood is thicker than water.” Tatnall proved himself a worthy successor to Buchanan.

When the Merrimac sallied forth the next morning intending to complete the destruction of the northern warships, she found the Monitor waiting for her. Notwithstanding the inferiority of his ammunition, Tatnall never hesitated for a moment. The firing between the two ships was mostly at short range, and by the time the battle was over both vessels had had enough of it. Neither side admitted defeat, but neither side had succeeded in destroying the other. The Monitor was struck twenty-two times, and in return she fired forty-one shots. Precisely how many of these were effective on the southern ship is not known, but including the fight of the previous day, she was found afterwards to have no fewer than ninety-seven indentations on her armour. Her layers of plating were shattered, and the heavy wooden backing was splintered, but not one of the heavy shots of the Monitor succeeded in penetrating the Merrimac. The backing only splintered where the heavy shot had struck direct blows. Nine of the Confederate shells struck the turret, and the pilot-house was struck twice, and the other projections and the deck also showed marks of the enemy’s fire. The result of the battle was that the Monitor was able to resume hostilities and the Merrimac was so badly crippled that she could not do so.

The steering gear and anchor of the Monitor were protected by the overhanging deck, and were out of reach of the Merrimac’s fire. This arrangement was repeated with modifications in most of the northern monitors afterwards built, and greatly puzzled the Confederates until they discovered the method by which the vessels could be anchored or lift anchor without anyone appearing on deck.

It should be remembered that the Merrimac had to contend not only against the Monitor, but also against the gunboats of the northern fleet, which fired upon her whenever they had a chance.

The subsequent fate of these two typical ironclads is interesting. The Monitor was sent to sea in weather she could never hope to contend against, and went to the bottom. When the fortunes of war drove the Confederates away from the positions they had occupied at Hampton Roads, the Merrimac was scuttled by her commander to prevent her falling into the hands of the Federals. Both sides went on building ironclads of the types they had introduced. The Federals rapidly acquired a fleet of monitors, because they were convinced of the superiority of that type of vessel, and had almost unlimited resources. The South built a few more broadside ironclads because it had no option in the matter. It was a case of taking wooden steamers and plating them as best it could with rolled-out railway metals, boiler plates, and, in fact, anything metallic that could be bolted on.