[Footnote 2: So called by Ericsson because it would "admonish" the South, and also suggest to England "doubts as to the propriety of completing four steel-clad ships at three and one-half millions apiece.">[
The South in fact won the race in construction and got its ship first into action by a margin of just half a day. At noon on March 8, with the iron-workers still driving her last rivets, the Merrimac steamed out of Norfolk and advanced ponderously upon the three sail and two steam vessels then anchored in Hampton Roads.
In the Northern navy there had been much skepticism about the ironclad and no concerted plan to meet her attack. Under a rain of fire from the Union ships, and from share fortifications too distant to be effective, the Merrimac rammed and sank the sloop-of-war Cumberland, and then, after driving the frigate Congress aground, riddled her with shells. Towards nightfall the Confederate vessel moved dawn stream, to continue the slaughter next day.
About 12 o'clock that night, after two days of terrible buffeting on the voyage down the coast, the little Monitor anchored on the scene lighted up by the burning wreck of the Congress. The first battle of ironclads began next morning at 8:30 and continued with slight intermission till noon. It ended in a triumph, not for either ship, but for armor over guns. The Monitor fired 41 solid shot, 20 of which struck home, but merely cracked some of the Merrimac's outer plates. The Monitor was hit 22 times by enemy shells. Neither craft was seriously harmed and not a man was killed on either side, though several were stunned or otherwise injured. Lieut. Worden, in command of the Monitor, was nearly blinded by a shell that smashed in the pilot house, a square iron structure then located not above the turret but on the forward deck.
The drawn battle was hailed as a Northern victory. Imagination had been drawing dire pictures of what the Merrimac might do. At a Cabinet meeting in Washington Sunday morning, March 9, Secretary of War Stanton declared: "The Merrimac will change the course of the war; she will destroy seriatim every naval vessel; she will lay all the cities on the seaboard under contribution. I have no doubt that the enemy is at this minute on the way to Washington, and that we shall have a shell from one of her guns in the White House before we leave this room." The menace was somewhat exaggerated. With her submerged decks, feeble engines, and general awkwardness, the Merrimac could scarcely navigate in Hampton Roads. In the first day's fighting her beak was wrenched off and a leak started, two guns were put out of action, and her funnel and all other top-hamper were riddled. As was shown by Farragut in Mobile Bay, and again by Tegetthoff at Lissa, even wooden vessels, if in superior numbers, might do something against an ironclad in an aggressive mêlée.
Both the antagonists at Hampton Roads ended their careers before the close of 1862; the Merrimac was burned by her crew at the evacuation of Norfolk, and the Monitor was sunk under tow in a gale off Hatteras. But turret ships, monitors, and armored gunboats soon multiplied in the Union navy and did effective service against the defenses of Southern harbors and rivers. Under Farragut's energetic leadership, vessels both armored and unarmored passed with relatively slight injury the forts below New Orleans, at Vicksburg, and at the entrance to Mobile Bay. Even granting that the shore artillery was out of date and not very expertly served, it is well to realize that similar conditions may conceivably recur, and that the superiority of forts over ships is qualified by conditions of equipment and personnel.
Actually to destroy or capture shore batteries by naval force is another matter. As Ericsson said, "A single shot will sink a ship, while 100 rounds cannot silence a fort."[1] Attacks of this kind against Fort McAllister and Charleston failed. At Charleston, April 7, 1863, the ironclads faced a cross-fire from several forts, 47 smoothbores and 17 rifles against 29 smoothbores and 4 rifles in the ships, and in waters full of obstructions and mines.
[Footnote 1: Wilson, Ironclads in action, Vol. I, p. 91.]
The capture of Fort Fisher, commanding the main entrance to Wilmington, North Carolina, was accomplished in January, 1865, by the combined efforts of the army and navy. The fort, situated on a narrow neck of land between the Cape Fear River and the sea, had 20 guns on its land face and 24 on its sea face, 15 of them rifled. Against it were brought 5 ironclads with 18 guns, backed up by over 200 guns in the rest of the fleet. After a storm of shot and shell for three successive days, rising at times to "drum-fire," the barrage was lifted at a signal and troops and sailors dashed forward from their positions on shore. Even after this preparation the capture cost 1000 men. As at Kinhurn in the Crimean War, the effectiveness of the naval forces was due less to protective armor than to volume of fire.
Submarines and Torpedoes