|
|
|
|
Battle of Hampton Roads
|
| |
|
| |
The Battle of Hampton Roads, often referred to as the Battle of Monitor and Merrimack (or Merrimac), was the most noted and arguably the most important naval battle of the American Civil War from the standpoint of the development of navies. It was fought over two days, 8–9 March 1862, in Hampton Roads, a roadstead in Virginia where the Elizabeth and Nansemond Rivers meet the James River just before it enters Chesapeake Bay.
Discussion
Ask a question about 'Battle of Hampton Roads' Start a new discussion about 'Battle of Hampton Roads' Answer questions from other users |
Encyclopedia
The Battle of Hampton Roads, often referred to as the Battle of Monitor and Merrimack (or Merrimac), was the most noted and arguably the most important naval battle of the American Civil War from the standpoint of the development of navies. It was fought over two days, 8–9 March 1862, in Hampton Roads, a roadstead in Virginia where the Elizabeth and Nansemond Rivers meet the James River just before it enters Chesapeake Bay. The battle was a part of the effort of the Confederacy to break the Union blockade, which had cut off Virginia's largest cities, Norfolk and Richmond, from international trade.
The significance of the battle is that it centered on a new class of warship, the ironclad. The Confederate fleet consisted of the ironclad ram CSS Virginia and several supporting vessels. On the first day of battle, they were opposed by several conventional, wooden-hulled ships of the Union Navy. On that day, Virginia was able to destroy two ships of the Federal flotilla and threaten a third, USS Minnesota, which had run aground. The action was halted by darkness and falling tide, so Virginia retired to take care of her few wounded — which included her captain, Flag Officer Franklin Buchanan — and repair her minimal battle damage.
Determined to complete the destruction of Minnesota, Catesby ap Roger Jones, acting as captain in Buchanan's absence, returned the ship to the fray the next morning, 9 March. During the night, however, the ironclad USS Monitor had arrived and had taken a position to defend Minnesota. When Virginia approached, Monitor intercepted her. The two ironclads fought for about three hours, with neither being able to inflict significant damage on the other. The duel ended indecisively, Virginia returning to her home at the Gosport Navy Yard for repairs and strengthening, and Monitor to her station defending Minnesota. The ships did not fight again, and the blockade remained in place.
The battle received worldwide attention, and it had immediate effects on all navies. The preeminent naval powers, Great Britain and France, halted further construction of wooden-hulled ships, and they were copied by all others. They produced a new type of warship, the monitor, based on the principle of the original. The use of a small number of very heavy guns, mounted so that they could fire in all directions, first demonstrated by Monitor, soon became standard in warships of all types. Shipbuilders also incorporated rams into the designs of warship hulls for the rest of the century.
Preliminaries: the blockade at Norfolk
On 19 April 1861, shortly after the outbreak of hostilities at Charleston Harbor, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a blockade of all ports in the seceded states. On 27 April, after Virginia and North Carolina had also passed ordinances of secession, the blockade was extended to include their ports also. Even before the extension, local troops seized Norfolk and threatened the Gosport Navy Yard. The commandant there, Captain Charles S. McCauley, though loyal to the Union, was immobilized by advice he received from his subordinate officers, most of whom were in favor of secession. Although he had orders from (Union) Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles to move his ships to Northern ports, he refused to act until 20 April, when he gave orders to scuttle the ships in the yard and destroy its facilities. Nine ships were burned, among them the screw frigate USS Merrimack, may be any one of several ships commissioned in the United States Navy and named after the Merrimack River....
. One (the old frigate Cumberland) was towed away successfully. Merrimack burned only to the waterline, however, and her engines were more or less intact. The destruction of the navy yard was mostly ineffective; in particular, the large drydock there was relatively undamaged and soon could be restored. Without firing a shot, the advocates of secession had gained for the South its largest navy yard, as well as the hull and engines of what would be in time its most famous warship. They had also seized more than a thousand heavy guns, plus gun carriages and large quantities of gunpowder.
With Norfolk and its navy yard, the Confederacy controlled the southern side of Hampton Roads. To prevent Union warships from attacking the yard, they set up batteries at Sewell's Point and Craney Island, at the juncture of the Elizabeth River with the James. (See map.) The Union retained possession of Fort Monroe, at Old Point Comfort on the Peninsula. They also held a small man-made island known as the Rip Raps, on the far side of the channel opposite Fort Monroe, and on this island they completed another fort, named Fort Wool. With Fort Monroe went control of the lower Peninsula as far as Newport News.
By strength of Forts Monroe and Wool, the Union forces controlled the entrance to Hampton Roads. The blockade, initiated on 30 April 1861, cut off Norfolk and Richmond almost completely. To further the blockade, the Union Navy stationed some of its most powerful warships in the roadstead. There, they were under the shelter of the shore-based guns of Fort Monroe and the batteries at Hampton and Newport News and out of the range of the guns at Sewell's Point and Craney Island. For most of the first year of the war, the Confederacy could do little to oppose them.
Birth of the ironclads
When steam propulsion began to be applied to warships, naval constructors renewed their interest in armor for their vessels. Experiments had been tried with armor during the Crimean war, just prior to the American Civil War, and the British and French navies had each built armored ships and were planning to build others. In 1860, the French Navy commissioned La Gloire, the world's first ocean-going ironclad warship. Great Britain followed a year later with HMS Warrior. The use of armor remained controversial, however, and the United States Navy was generally reluctant to embrace the new technology.
CSS Virginia
When the Civil War broke out, Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen R. Mallory was an early enthusiast for the advantages of armor. As he saw it, the Confederacy could not match the industrial North in numbers of ships at sea, so they would have to compete by building vessels that would be individually superior to those of the Union. The edge would be provided by armor. Mallory gathered about himself a group of men who were able to put his vision into practice, among them John M. Brooke, John L. Porter, and William P. Williamson.
When Mallory's men searched the South for factories that could build engines to drive the heavy ships that he wanted, they found no place to do it immediately. At the best facility, the Tredegar works in Richmond, building engines from scratch would take at least a year. Upon learning this, Williamson suggested taking the engines from the hulk of Merrimack, recently raised from the bed of the Elizabeth River. His colleagues promptly accepted his suggestion and expanded it, proposing that the design of their projected ironclad be adapted to the hull. Porter produced the revised plans, which were submitted to Mallory for approval. On 11 July 1861, the new design was accepted, and work began almost immediately. The burned-out hull was towed into the graving dock that the Union Navy had failed to destroy. During the subsequent conversion process, the plans were further modified to incorporate an iron ram fitted to the prow. The armor plating, originally meant to be 1 inch (25 mm) thick, was replaced by plates 2 inches (50 mm) thick. The revisions, together with the usual problems associated with the transportation system of the South, resulted in delays that pushed back the launch date until 3 February 1862, and she was not commissioned until 17 February, bearing the name CSS Virginia.
USS Monitor
Federal Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles waited for Congress to meet until he asked them for permission to consider building armored vessels. Congress gave the permission he asked on 3 August 1861, and Welles then appointed a commission of three senior naval officers to choose among several designs that were submitted for consideration. The three men, to be known as the Ironclad Board, were Captains Joseph Smith and Hiram Paulding, and Commander Charles Henry Davis. The board considered 17 designs, and chose to support three. First of the three to be completed, although she was far and away the most radical in design, was Swedish engineer and inventor John Ericsson's USS Monitor.
Ericsson's Monitor, which was built at Ericsson's yard on the East River in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, incorporated many new and striking design features, the most significant of which were her armor and armament. Instead of the large numbers of guns of rather small bore that had characterized warships in the past, Ericsson opted for only two guns of large caliber. These were mounted in a cylindrical turret, 20 feet (6 m) in diameter, 9 feet (2.7 m) high, covered with iron eight inches (20 cm) thick. The whole rotated on ball bearings, and was moved by a steam engine that could be controlled by one man. A serious flaw in the design was the pilot house from which the ship would be conned, a small structure forward of the turret on the main deck. Its presence meant that the guns could not fire directly forward, and it was isolated from other activities on the ship. Despite the late start and the novelty of construction, Monitor was completed and ready for service only a few days after her counterpart Virginia.
Battle
First day: Virginia wreaks havoc on wooden Union warships
The battle began when the large and unwieldy CSS Virginia steamed into Hampton Roads on the morning of 8 March 1862. Captain Franklin Buchanan had tried to lead everyone but a trusted few to believe that this was merely a shakedown run, but most of the crew were aware that he intended to attack if at all possible. Virginia was accompanied from her moorings on the Elizabeth River by Raleigh and Beaufort, and was joined at Hampton Roads by the James River Squadron, Patrick Henry, Jamestown, and Teaser. When they were passing the Union batteries at Newport News, Patrick Henry was temporarily disabled by a shot in her boiler that killed four of her crew. After repairs, she returned and rejoined the others.
Virginia headed directly for the Union squadron. The battle opened when Union gunboat Zouave fired on the advancing enemy, and Beaufort replied. None of this preliminary skirmishing had any effect. Virginia did not open fire until she was within easy range of USS Cumberland. Return fire from Cumberland and Congress, which was nearby, bounced off the iron plates without penetrating. Virginia rammed Cumberland below the waterline and she sank rapidly, "gallantly fighting her guns as long as they were above water," according to Buchanan. She took 121 seamen down with her; those wounded brought the casualty total to nearly 150.
Ramming Cumberland nearly resulted in the sinking of Virginia as well. The ram on her bow got stuck in the enemy ship's hull, and as Cumberland listed and began to go down, she almost pulled the ironclad down with her. The ram broke off, however, and Virginia broke free.
Buchanan next turned the Virginia on USS Congress. Seeing what had happened to Cumberland, Lieutenant Joseph B. Smith, captain of Congress, ordered his ship grounded in shallow water. By this time, the James River Squadron, commanded by John Randolph Tucker, had arrived and joined the Virginia in the attack on Congress. This lasted for an hour, after which the badly-damaged Congress surrendered. While the surviving crewmen of Congress were being ferried off the ship, a Union battery on the north shore opened fire on Virginia. In retaliation, Buchanan ordered Congress fired upon with hot shot. Congress caught fire and burned throughout the rest of the day. Near midnight, the flames reached her magazine and she exploded. Personnel losses included 110 killed or missing and presumed drowned, with another 26 wounded — of whom another 10 would die within days.
Although she had not suffered anything like the damage she had inflicted, Virginia was not completely unscathed. Shots from Cumberland, Congress, and Union troops ashore had riddled her smokestack, reducing her already low speed. Two of her guns were disabled and several armor plates had been loosened. Two of her crew were killed, and several others were wounded. One of the wounded was Captain Buchanan, whose left thigh was pierced by a rifle shot.
Meanwhile, the James River Squadron had turned its attention to USS Minnesota, which had left Fort Monroe to join in the battle and had run aground. After Virginia had dealt with the surrender of Congress, she joined the James River Squadron despite her damage. Because of her deep draft and the falling tide, however, Virginia was unable to get close enough to be effective, and darkness prevented the rest of the squadron from aiming their guns to any effect. The attack was therefore suspended. Virginia left with the expectation of returning the next day and completing the task. She retreated into the safety of Confederate-controlled waters off Sewell's Point for the night.
Second day: Monitor engages Virginia
Both sides used the respite to prepare for the next day. Virginia put her wounded ashore and underwent temporary repairs. Among the wounded was Captain Buchanan, so command on the second day fell to his executive officer, Lieutenant Catesby ap Roger Jones. Jones would prove to be no less aggressive than the man he replaced. While Virginia was being prepared for renewal of the battle, and while Congress was still burning, USS Monitor, commanded by Lieutenant John L. Worden, arrived in Hampton Roads. The Union ironclad had been rushed to Hampton Roads in hopes of protecting the Union fleet and preventing Virginia from threatening Union cities. Captain Worden was informed that his primary task was to protect Minnesota, so Monitor took up a position near the grounded Minnesota and waited.
The next morning, at dawn on 9 March 1862, Virginia left her anchorage at Sewell's Point and moved to attack Minnesota, still aground. She was followed by the three ships of the James River Squadron. They found their course blocked, however, by the newly arrived Monitor. At first, Jones ignored the strange craft, not realizing the nature of his opponent. Soon, however, it was apparent that he had no choice but to fight her.
After fighting for hours, mostly at close range, neither could overcome the other. The armor of both ships proved adequate, and neither ship was able to inflict significant damage. The battle finally ceased when a chance shell from Virginia struck the pilot house of Monitor and exploded, driving fragments through the viewing slits into Worden's eyes and temporarily blinding him. As no one else could see to conn the ship, Monitor was forced to draw off. The executive officer, Lieutenant Samuel Dana Greene, took over, and Monitor returned to the fight. In the period of command confusion, however, the crew of Virginia believed that their opponent had withdrawn. Although Minnesota was still aground, the falling tide meant that she was out of reach. Furthermore, Virginia had suffered some damage that would require extensive repair. Convinced that his ship had won the day, Jones ordered her back to Norfolk. At about this time, Monitor returned, only to discover her opponent apparently giving up the fight. Convinced that Virginia was quitting, with orders only to protect Minnesota and not to risk his ship unnecessarily, Greene did not pursue. Thus, each side misinterpreted the moves of the other, and as a result each claimed victory.
Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen Mallory wrote to Confederate President Davis of the action:
The conduct of the Officers and men of the squadron … reflects unfading honor upon themselves and upon the Navy. The report will be read with deep interest, and its details will not fail to rouse the ardor and nerve the arms of our gallant seamen.
It will be remembered that the Virginia was a novelty in naval architecture, wholly unlike any ship that ever floated; that her heaviest guns were equal novelties in ordnance; that her motive power and obedience to her helm were untried, and her officers and crew strangers, comparatively, to the ship and to each other; and yet, under all these disadvantages, the dashing courage and consummate professional ability of Flag Officer Buchanan and his associates achieved the most remarkable victory which naval annals record.
In Washington, belief that Monitor had vanquished Virginia was so strong that Worden and his men were awarded the Thanks of Congress:
Resolved . . . That the thanks of Congress and the American people are due and are hereby tendered to Lieutenant J. L. Worden, of the United States Navy, and to the officers and men of the ironclad gunboat Monitor, under his command, for the skill and gallantry exhibited by them in the remarkable battle between the Monitor and the rebel ironclad steamer Merrimack.
Spring 1862 — a standoff at Hampton Roads
Virginia remained in drydock for almost a month, getting repairs for battle damage as well as some minor modifications to improve her performance. On 4 April she was able to leave drydock. Buchanan, still recovering from his wound, had hoped that Catesby Jones would be picked to succeed him, and most observers believed that Jones's performance during the battle was outstanding. The seniority system for promotion in the Navy scuttled his chances, however, and the post went to the 67-year old Commodore Josiah Tatnall. Monitor, not severely damaged, remained on duty. Like his antagonist Jones, Greene was deemed too young to be kept as captain, so he was replaced. The day after the battle, he was relieved by Lieutenant Thomas O. Selfridge; two days later, Selfridge was in turn relieved by Lieutenant William N. Jeffers.
Each side considered how best to eliminate the threat posed by its opponent, and after Virginia returned each side tried to goad the other into attacking under unfavorable circumstances. Both captains declined the opportunity to fight in water not of their own choosing; Jeffers in particular was under positive orders not to risk his ship. Consequently, each vessel spent the next month in what amounted to posturing. Not only did the two ships not fight each other, neither ship ever fought again at all.
The end came first for Virginia. Because the blockade was unbroken, Norfolk was of little strategic use to the Confederacy, and preliminary plans were laid to move the ship up the James River to the vicinity of Richmond. Before adequate preparations could be made, the Confederate Army under Major General Benjamin Huger abandoned the city on 9 May, without consulting with anyone from the Navy. Virginia's draft was too great to permit her to pass up the river, which had a depth of only 18 feet (5.5 meters), and that only under favorable circumstances. She was trapped and could only be captured or sunk by the Union Navy. Rather than allow either, Tatnall decided to destroy his own ship. He had her towed down to Craney Island, where the crew were taken ashore, and then she was set afire. She burned through the rest of the day and most of the following night; shortly before dawn, the flames reached her magazine, and she blew up.
Monitor likewise did not survive the year. She was ordered to Beaufort, North Carolina on Christmas Day, to take part in the blockade there. While being towed down the coast (under command of her fourth captain, Lieutenant John P. Bankhead), the seas began to build up and she took on water. Soon the water in the hold gained on the pumps, and then put out the fires in her engines. The order was given to abandon ship; most men were rescued by USS Rhode Island, but 16 went down with her when she sank in the early hours of 31 December 1862.
Who won?
The victory claims that were made by each side in the immediate aftermath of the Battle of Hampton Roads, based as both were on misinterpretations of the opponent's behavior, have been dismissed by present-day historians. They agree that the result of the Merrimack-Monitor encounter was victory for neither. As the combat between ironclads was the primary significance of the battle, the general verdict is that the overall result was a draw. All would acknowledge that the Southern fleet inflicted far more damage than it received, which would ordinarily imply that they had gained a tactical victory. On the other hand, the blockade was not seriously threatened, so the entire battle can be regarded as an assault that ultimately failed.
Evaluation of the strategic results is likewise disputed. The blockade was maintained, even strengthened, and Virginia was bottled up in Hampton Roads. Because a decisive Confederate weapon was negated, some have concluded that the Union could claim a strategic victory. Confederate advocates can counter, however, by arguing that Virginia had a military significance larger than the blockade, which was only a small part of the war in Tidewater Virginia. Her mere presence was sufficient to close the James River to Federal incursions. She also imposed other constraints on the Peninsula Campaign then being mounted by the Union Army under General George B. McClellan, who worried that she could interfere with his positions on the York River. Although his fears were baseless, they continued to affect the movements of his army until Virginia was destroyed.
Impact upon naval warfare
Both days of the battle attracted attention from all the world's navies. USS Monitor became the prototype for the monitor warship type. Many more were built, including river monitors, and they played key roles in Civil War battles on the Mississippi and James rivers. The US immediately started the construction of ten more monitors based on Ericsson's original larger plan, known as the Passaic class monitors. However, while the design proved exceptionally well-suited for river combat, the low profile and heavy turret caused poor seaworthiness in rough waters. Russia, in fear of being drawn into the American Civil War, launched ten sister ships, as soon as Ericsson's plans reached St. Petersburg. What followed has been described as "Monitor mania".
The vulnerability of wooden hulls to armored ships was noted particularly in Britain and France, where construction of wooden-hulled warships was promptly halted. Another feature that was emulated was not so successful. Impressed by the ease with which Virginia had sunk Cumberland, naval architects began to incorporate rams into their hull designs. This persisted down almost to the outbreak of World War I, despite the improvements in gunnery that made close action between ships almost suicidal if not impossible.
Heritage of the two famous ironclads
More than 10 years after the end of hostilities, on 30 May 1876, the wreck of the Virginia was raised and transported back to the ship yard at Portsmouth where it was broken up.
Portions of the Virginia, including her armor, anchor, and guns, have been displayed for many years at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth and the Mariners' Museum in Newport News. The anchor of the Virginia sits on the lawn in front of the Museum of the Confederacy, established in Richmond in 1890.
Commemorating the battle
Historical names
The name of the warship which served the Confederacy in the famous Battle of Hampton Roads has been a continuing source of confusion. She was originally a screw frigate in the United States Navy, and as such was named USS Merrimack, When her conversion into an ironclad ram was almost complete, her name was officially changed to Virginia. Despite the official name change, Union accounts persisted in calling the Merrimack by her original name. Confederate sources used either Virginia or Merrimac(k). The alliteration of Monitor and Merrimack has persuaded most popular accounts to adopt the familiar name, even while it is acknowledged to be technically incorrect.
A CSS Merrimac did actually exist. She was a paddle wheel steamer named for the victor (as most Southerners saw it) at Hampton Roads. She was used for running the blockade until she was captured and taken into Federal service, still named Merrimac. Her name was a spelling variant of the river, namesake of USS Merrimack. Both spellings are still in use around the Hampton Roads area.
Confederate ironclad
A small community in Montgomery County near the location where the iron for the Confederate ironclad was forged is now known as Merrimac, Virginia. Some of the iron mined there and used in the plating on the Confederate ironclad is displayed at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth. Other pieces are on display at the Mariners' Museum in Newport News and the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond, where the anchor has resided for many years.
USS Monitor rediscovery and display
After resting undetected on the ocean floor for 111 years, the wreck of Monitor was located by a team of scientists in 1973. The remains of the ship were found 16 miles (26 km) off Cape Hatteras, on a relatively flat, sandy bottom at a depth of about 240 feet (73.2 m). Monitors hull lies upside down, with her deck resting on her displaced gun turret. In 1987, the site was declared a National Historic Landmark, the first shipwreck to receive this distinction.
Because of Monitors advanced state of deterioration, timely recovery of remaining significant artifacts and ship components became critical. Numerous fragile artifacts, including the innovative turret and its two Dahlgren guns, an anchor, steam engine, and propeller, have been recovered. They were transported back to Hampton Roads to the Mariners' Museum in Newport News, Virginia, where for several years they were treated in special tanks to stabilize the metal.
The new USS Monitor Center at the Mariners' Museum officially opened on 9 March 2007, and a full-scale replica of USS Monitor, the original recovered turret, and many artifacts and related items are now on display. Some artifacts from CSS Virginia are also on display.
External links
- , online text with an entire chapter on the battle.
- – Its 'revolutionary' gun turret has been raised from the ocean floor.
- has a larger, more detailed, color map of the events of the battle.
- First Edition Report on the
|
| |
|
|
