NAVY, UNITED STATES. 



607 



the object sought, only so far as needful to 

 point the guns upon the enemy ; in the latter, 

 the revolution is indispensable, as well as 

 nearly continuous a condition that must in- 

 volve important difficulties in practice. So 

 long as it revolves properly, the Ericsson tur- 

 ret serves to keep an enemy continually under 

 fire, in spite of changes of position. In this 

 \vay, two guns become supposing no necessity 

 of delay from their heating equal in effective 

 force to at least eight mounted on stationary 

 carriages. 



Earliest American Iron-clad Vessels. "It so 

 happens," Admiral J. A. Dahlgren very appo- 

 sitely remarks in his Report supplementary to 

 the Report of the Secretary of the Navy, Nov. 

 22, 1862, "that circumstances impose on Eng- 

 land and France the necessity of grappling with 

 the most difficult solution of the problem [that 

 of armoring ships], their shores being washed 

 by the deep waters of the ocean ; therefore 

 their iron clads must be more than mere float- 

 ing batteries, and be possessed of the best nau- 

 tical qualities. With the United States the case 

 is, happily, different the depth of water on 

 the coast being generally adapted to vessels of 

 light or moderate draught, and only a few of 

 our ports being at all accessible to heavy iron 

 clads like those of France and England. The 

 solution of the question is, therefore, in its im- 

 mediate requirements, comparatively easy and 

 inexpensive for us. Vessels of the Monitor and 

 Ironsides class are likely to serve present pur- 

 poses sufficiently well, and to give time to ob- 

 tain, from our own and the experience of others, 

 better data than can now be had for advancing 

 to a more perfect order of vessels." The facts 

 here stated in respect to the general character 

 of the coast navigation, Atlantic and Gulf, of 

 this country, as also the great extent to which 

 naval operations may require to be carried on 

 in navigable sounds, bays, and rivers, but which 

 are not always of great depth, have been kept 

 in view in all the earlier attempts here made in 

 the way of armoring vessels with the single 

 exception, indeed, of the first of them all. the 

 Stevens Battery, the proposed draught of which 

 is 21 feet. (For a full description of this bat- 

 tery, as well as of Capt. Ericsson's first iron-clad 

 battery, the Monitor, the plan of which was 

 one of the three first adopted by the United 

 States Government, in 1861, see the preceding 

 volume of the CYCLOPEDIA.) Of these three 

 patterns of iron-clad vessels, and the draught of 

 which ranged from 10 to 13 feet, all were in 

 fact mainly new in conception, differing from 

 the earlier French and English batteries in be- 

 ing intended to realize independent navigation 

 and fair speed, and from the Gloire and Warrior 

 styles in being of much less dimensions, while 

 also nearly or quite completely mailed. The 

 most original in principle of the three, and the 

 one that has come to be regarded as peculiarly 

 the American style of iron-clad vessel, was the 

 Monitor a name that is now employed as dis- 

 tinctive of the growing class of vessels involv- 



ing the same general construction. The Moni- 

 tor was built at the Continental Works, Green- 

 point, L. I., by Mr. J. F. Rowland, under the 

 direct supervision of Capt. Ericsson, and deliv- 

 ered to the Government, March 5, 1862. The 

 vessels completed in accordance with the other 

 two of the three contracts, were, for that with 

 the firm of Merrick & Sons, Philadelphia, the 

 New Ironsides, and for that with S. C. Bushnell 

 and Co., of New Haven, Conn., the Galena. 



The experiments preceding the inception of 

 the Monitor had already determined that, since 

 very hard and brittle plates are proportionally 

 more liable to crack, and very soft ones to be 

 simply punched er penetrated, for armoring in 

 the modes thus far adopted, neither steel or 

 hard cast iron on the one hand, nor copper or 

 the softest wrought iron, on the other, should 

 be employed, but in fact an iron possessing fair 

 forging and rolling qualities, and having along 

 with moderate hardness also a high degree of 

 absolute strength or tenacity. In the case, 

 however, of armor applied, not in a single 

 thickness or plate, but in a succession of thin- 

 ner plates (laminated armor), a harder iron or 

 steel is said to be used with advantage. It 

 will be remembered that the armor of the tip- 

 per hull of the Monitor consisted of 5 inches 

 of rolled iron (1-inch) plates; that of the tur- 

 ret generally of 9, and that of the deck of 2 

 inches of similar plating. Of course, though 

 in England there is an apparently open avowal 

 and discussion of all information acquired in 

 respect to penetration of projectiles and quali- 

 ties of armor indicated, it is probably true that 

 in all the leading countries now interested in 

 this question, as is evident in the case of the 

 Government of the United States, there is nev- 

 ertheless a degree of reticence in respect to im- 

 portant results, and especially as to certain 

 points in the construction, armament, and 

 working of iron-clad vessels. Hence, there 

 are portions of information in regard to these 

 subjects which can only become public after 

 the lapse of a few years, or under a condition 

 of national questions different from that which 

 now exists. An account of the experiments 

 in the way of testing the relative capacities of 

 the most recent and improved ordnance and 

 iron armor, with the bearing of the results on 

 the questions of thickness, kind, quality, and 

 extent of armor protection for vessels, as well 

 as of the modes in which the plates are pre- 

 pared for being applied, will be given farther 

 on. 



The First Clats Monitors (Smallest Size). 

 The course and result of the engagement be- 

 tween the Monitor and Merrimac. in Hampton 

 Roads, March 9, 1862, having established the 

 suitableness and success of the Ericsson form 

 of battery, both for purposes of defence (at 

 lesst. against guns of the power there employed) 

 and of attack, orders were speedily issued by 

 the U. S. Government for the construction of 10 

 similar batteries, one or more of which, indeed, 

 must have been at the time already com- 



