The partial failure of the navy to co-operate successfully with the land-forces, so far as bombardment was concerned, during the Crimean war, has had much to do with the adoption of the costly ironclad floating fortresses, armed with enormously powerful guns, of the present day. The earliest form, indeed, was adopted during the above war, but not used to any great extent or advantage. The late Emperor of the French15 saw that the coming necessity or necessary evil would be some form of strongly-armoured and protected floating battery that could cope with fortresses ashore, and this was the germ of the ironclad movement. The first batteries of this kind, used successfully at Kinburn, were otherwise unseaworthy and unmanageable, and were little more than heavily-plated and more or less covered barges.

The two earliest European ironclads were La Gloire in France and the Warrior in England—the latter launched in 1860. Neither of these vessels presented any great departure from the established types of build in large ships of war. The Warrior is an undeniably fine, handsome-looking frigate, masted and rigged as usual, but she and her sister-ship, the Black Prince, are about the only ironclads to which these remarks apply—every form and variety of construction having been adopted since. As regarded size, she was considerably larger than the largest frigate or ship of the line of our navy, although greatly exceeded by many ironclads subsequently built. She is 380 feet in length, and her displacement of more than 9,100 tons was 3,000 tons greater than that of the largest of the wooden men-of-war she was superseding. The Warrior is still among the fastest of the iron-armoured fleet. Considered as an ironclad, however, she is a weak example. Her armour, which protects only three-fifths of her sides, is but four and a half inches thick, with eighteen inches of (wood) backing, and five-eighths of an inch of what is technically called “skin-plating,” for protection inside. The remote possibility of a red-hot shot or shell falling inside has to be considered. Her bow and stern, rudder-head and steering-gear, would, of course, be the vulnerable points.

From this small beginning—one armoured vessel—our ironclad fleet has grown with [pg 19]the greatest rapidity, till it now numbers over sixty of all denominations of vessels. The late Emperor of the French gave a great impetus to the movement; and other foreign nations speedily following in his wake, it clearly behoved England to be able to cope with them on their own ground, should occasion demand. Then there was the “scare” of invasion which took some hold of the public mind, and was exaggerated by certain portions of the press, at one period, till it assumed serious proportions. Leading journals complained that by the time the Admiralty would have one or two ironclads in commission, the French would have ten or twelve. Thus urged, the Government of the day must be excused if they made some doubtful experiments and costly failures.

The Southerners had, when the strife commenced, seized and partially burned the Merrimac, a steam-frigate belonging to the United States navy, then lying at the Norfolk Navy-yard. The hulk was regarded as nearly worthless,16 until, looking about for ways and means to annoy their opponents, they hit on the idea of armouring her, in the best manner attainable at the moment; and for awhile at least, this condemned wreck, resuscitated, patched up, and covered with iron plates,17 became the terror of the enemy. She was provided with an iron prow or ram capable of inflicting a severe blow under water. Her hull, cut down to within three feet of the water-line, was covered by a bomb-proof, sloping-roofed house, which extended over the screw and rudder. This was built of oak and pine, covered with iron; the latter being four and a half inches thick, and the former aggregating twenty inches in thickness. While the hull was generally iron-plated, the bow and stern were covered with steel. There were no masts—nothing seen above but the “smoke-stack” (funnel), pilot-house, and flagstaff. She carried eight powerful guns, most of them eleven-inch. “As she came ploughing through the water,” wrote one eyewitness of her movements, “she looked like a huge half-submerged crocodile.” The Southerners re-christened her the Virginia, but her older name has clung to her. The smaller vessels with her contributed little to the issue of the fight, but those opposed to her were of no inconsiderable size. The Congress, Cumberland, [pg 20]Minnesota, and Roanoake were frigates carrying an aggregate of over 150 guns and nearly 2,000 men. They, however, were wooden vessels; and although, in two cases in particular, defended with persistent heroism, had no chance against the ironclad, hastily as she had been prepared. There is little doubt that the officers of the two former vessels, in particular, knew something of the nature of the “forlorn hope” in which they were about to engage, when she hove in sight on that memorable 8th of March, 1862. It is said that the sailors, however, derided her till she was close upon them—so close that their laughter and remarks were heard on board. “That Southern Bugaboo,” “that old Secesh curiosity,” were among the milder titles applied to her.

The Merrimac commenced the action by discharging a broadside at the Congress, one shell from which killed or disabled a number of men at the guns, and then kept on towards the Cumberland, which she approached with full steam on, striking her on the port side near the bow, her stem knocking two of the ports into one, and her ram striking the vessel under the water-line. Almost instantaneously a large shell was discharged from her forward gun, which raked the gun-deck of the doomed ship, and killed ten men. Five minutes later the ship began to sink by the head, a large hole having been made [pg 21]by the point of the ram, through which the water rushed in. As the Merrimac rounded and rapidly came up again, she once more raked the Cumberland, killing or wounding sixteen more men. Meantime the latter was endeavouring to defend herself, and poured broadside after broadside into the Merrimac; but the balls, as one of the survivors tells us, bounced “upon her mailed sides like india-rubber, apparently making not the least impression except to cut off her flagstaff, and thus bring down the Confederate colours. None of her crew ventured at that time on her outside to replace them, and she fought thenceforward with only her pennant flying.”18 Shortly after this, the Merrimac again attacked the unfortunate ship, advancing with her greatest speed, her ram making another hole below the water-line. The Cumberland began to fill rapidly. The scene on board is hardly to be described in words. It was one of horrible desperation and fruitless heroism. The decks were slippery with human gore; shreds of human flesh, and portions of the body, arms, legs, and headless trunks were scattered everywhere. Below, the cockpit was filled with wounded, whom it would be impossible to succour, for the ship was sinking fast. Meantime the men stuck to their posts, powder was still served out, and the firing kept up steadily, several of the crew lingering so long in the after shell-room, [pg 22]in their eagerness to pass up shell, that they were drowned there. The water had now reached the main gun-deck, and it became evident that the contest was nearly over. Still the men lingered, anxious for one last shot, when their guns were nearly under water.

The word was passed for each man to save himself. Even then, one man, an active little fellow, named Matthew Tenney, whose courage had been conspicuous during the action, determined to fire once more, the next gun to his own being then under water, the vessel going down by the head. He succeeded, but at the cost of his life, for immediately afterwards, attempting to scramble out of the port-hole, the water suddenly rushed in with such force that he was washed back and drowned. Scores of poor fellows were unable to reach the upper deck, and were carried down with the vessel. The Cumberland sank in water up to the cross-trees, and went down with her flag still flying from the peak.19 The whole number lost was not less than 120 souls. Her top-masts, with the pennant flying far above the water, long marked the locality of one of the bravest and most desperate defences ever made

The Cumberland being utterly demolished, the Merrimac turned her attention to the Congress. The Southerners showed their chivalric instincts at this juncture by not firing on the boats, or on a small steamer, which were engaged in picking up the survivors of the Cumberland’s crew. The officers of the Congress, seeing the fate of the Cumberland, determined that the Merrimac should not, at least, sink their vessel. They therefore got all sail on the ship, and attempted to run ashore. The Merrimac was soon close on them, and delivered a broadside, which was terribly destructive, a shell killing, at one of the guns, every man engaged except one. Backing, and then returning several times, she delivered broadside after broadside at less than 100 yards’ distance. The Congress replied manfully and obstinately, but with little effect. One shot is supposed to have entered one of the ironclad’s port-holes, and dismounted a gun, as there was no further firing from that port, and a few splinters of iron were struck off her sloping mailed roof, but this was all. The guns of the Merrimac appeared to have been specially trained on the after-magazine of the Congress, and shot after shot entered that part of the ship. Thus, slowly drifting down with the current, and again steaming up, the Merrimac continued for an hour to fire into her opponent. Several times the Congress was on fire, but the flames were kept under. At length the ship was on fire in so many places, and the flames gathering with such force, that it was hopeless and suicidal to keep up the defence any longer. [pg 23]The national flag was sadly and sorrowfully hauled down, and a white flag hoisted at the peak. The Merrimac did not for a few minutes see this token of surrender, and continued to fire. At last, however, it was discerned through the clouds of smoke, and the broadsides ceased. A tug that had followed the Merrimac out of Norfolk then came alongside the Congress, and ordered the officers on board. This they refused, hoping that, from the nearness of the shore, they would be able to escape. Some of the men, to the number, it is believed, of about forty, thought the tug was one of the Northern (Federal) vessels, and rushed on board, and were, of course, soon carried off as prisoners. By the time that all the able men were off ashore and elsewhere, it was seven o’clock in the evening, and the Congress was a bright sheet of flame fore and aft, her guns, which were loaded and trained, going off as the fire reached them. A shell from one struck a sloop at some distance, and blew her up. At midnight the fire reached her magazines, containing five tons of gunpowder, and, with a terrific explosion, her charred remains blew up. Thus had the Merrimac sunk one and burned a second of the largest of the vessels of the enemy.

But about nine o’clock that evening Ericsson’s battery, the Monitor,20 arrived in Hampton Roads, and hope revived in the breasts of the despondent Northerners. She was not a very formidable-looking craft, for, lying low on the water, with a plain structure amidships, a small pilot-house forward, and a diminutive funnel aft, she might have been taken for a raft. It was only on board that her real strength might be discovered. She carried armour about five inches thick over a large part of her, and had practically two hulls, the lower of which had sides inclining at an angle of 51° from the vertical line. It was considered that no shot could hurt this lower hull, on account of the angle at which it must strike it. The revolving turret, an iron cylinder, nine feet high, and twenty feet in diameter, eight or nine inches thick everywhere, and about the portholes eleven inches, was moved round by steam-power. When the two heavy Dahlgren guns were [pg 24]run in for loading, a kind of pendulum port fell over the holes in the turret. The propeller, rudder, and even anchor, were all hidden.

“The officers of the Monitor at this time had gained such confidence in the impregnability of their battery that they no longer fired at random nor hastily. The fight then assumed its most interesting aspect. The Monitor went round the Merrimac repeatedly, probing her sides, seeking for weak points, and reserving her fire with coolness, until she had the right spot and the right range, and made her experiments accordingly. In this way the Merrimac received three shots.... Neither of these three shots rebounded at all, but appeared to cut their way clear through iron and wood into the ship.”21 Soon after receiving the third shot, the Merrimac made off at full speed, and the contest was not renewed. Thus ended this particular episode of the American war.

But although this, the original Monitor, was efficient, if not omnipotent, in the calm [pg 026]waters at the mouth of the James River, she was, as might be expected with her flat, barge-like bottom, a bad sea-boat, and was afterwards lost. Her ports had to be closed and caulked, being only five feet above the water, and she was therefore unable to work her guns at sea. Her constructor had neglected Sir Walter Raleigh’s advice to Prince Henry touching the model of a ship, “that her ports be so laid, as that she may carry out her guns all weathers.” She plunged heavily—completely submerging her pilot-house at times, the sea washing over and into her turret. The heavy shocks and jars of the armour, as it came down upon the waves, made her leaky, and she went to the bottom in spite of pumps capable of throwing 2,000 gallons a minute, which were in good order and working incessantly.

Since the conclusion of the American war, the ironclad question has assumed serious aspects, and many facts could be cited to show that they have not by any means always confirmed the first impressions of their strength and invulnerability. Two recent cases will be fresh in the memories of our readers. The first is the recent engagement off Peru between the Peruvian ironclad turret-ship Huascar and the British unarmoured men-of-war Shah and Amethyst. With the political aspect of the affair we have nothing, of course, to do, in our present work. It was really a question between the guns quite as much as between the vessels. The Huascar is only a moderately-strong armoured vessel, her plates being the same thickness as those of the earliest English ironclad, the Warrior, and her armament is two 300-pounders in her turret, and three shell-guns. On the other hand, the Shah, the principal one of the two British vessels, is only a large iron vessel sheathed in wood, and not armoured at all; but she carries, besides smaller guns, a formidable armament in the shape of two 12-ton and sixteen 6½-ton guns. An eyewitness of the engagement states22 that, after three hours’ firing, at a distance of from 400 to 3,000 yards, the only damage inflicted by the opposing vessels was a hole in the Huascar’s side, made by a shell, the bursting of which killed one man. “One 9-in. shot (from a 12-ton gun) also penetrated three inches into the turret without effecting any material damage. There were nearly 100 dents of various depths in the plates, but none of sufficient depth to materially injure them. The upper works—boats, and everything destructible by shell—were, of course, destroyed. Her colours were also shot down.” According to theory, the Shah’s two larger guns should have penetrated the Huascar’s sides when fired at upwards of 3,000 yards’ distance. The facts are very different, doubtless because the shots struck the armour obliquely, at any angles but right ones. The Huascar was admirably handled and manœuvred, but her gunnery was so indifferent that none of the shots even struck the Shah, except to cut away a couple of ropes, and the latter kept up so hot a fire of shells that the crew of the former were completely demoralised, and the officers had to train and fire the guns. She eventually escaped to Iquique, under cover of a pitchy-dark night. The same correspondent admits, however, that the Shah, although a magnificent vessel, is not fitted for the South American station, since Peru has three ironclads, Chili two, and Brazil and the River Plate Republics several, against which no ordinary English man-of-war could cope, were the former properly handled.

The recent story of the saucy Russian merchantman,23 which not merely dared the Turkish ironclad, but fought her for five hours, and inflicted quite as much damage as she received, will also be remembered, although it may be taken just for what it is worth. One Captain Baranoff, of the Imperial Russian Navy, had, in an article published in the Golos, of St. Petersburg, recommended his Government to abandon ironclads, avoid naval battles, and confine operations at sea to the letting loose of a number of cruisers against the enemy’s merchantmen. Where a naval engagement was inevitable, he “preferred fighting with small craft, making up by agility and speed what they lacked in cuirass, and if the worst came to the worst, easily replaced by other specimens of the same type.” The article created much notice; and at the beginning of the present war, the author was given to understand by the Russian Admiralty that he should have an opportunity of proving his theories by deeds. The Vesta, an ordinary iron steamer of light build, was selected; she had been employed previously in no more warlike functions than the conveyance of corn and tallow from Russia to foreign ports. She was equipped immediately with a few 6-in. mortars, her decks being strengthened to receive them, but no other changes were made. On the morning of the 23rd of July, cruising in the Black Sea, Captain Baranoff encountered the Turkish ironclad Assari Tefvik, a formidable vessel armoured with twelve inches of iron, and carrying 12-ton guns, and nothing daunted by the disproportion in size and strength, immediately engaged her. Both vessels were skilfully manœuvred, the ironclad moving about with extraordinary alertness and speed. She was only hit three times with large balls; the second went through her deck, “kindling a fire which was quickly extinguished;” the third was believed to have injured the turret. Meantime, the Vesta was herself badly injured, a grenade hitting her close to the powder-magazine, which would have soon blown up but for the rapid measures taken by her commander. Her rudder was struck and partially disabled, but still she was not sunk, as she should have been, according to all theoretical considerations. She eventually steamed back again to Sebastopol—after two other vessels had come to the ironclad’s assistance—covered with glory, having for five hours worried, and somewhat injured, a giant vessel to which, in proportion, she was but a weak and miserable dwarf.

It will be obvious that from neither of the above cases can any positive inferences be safely drawn. In the former case, the weaker vessel had the stronger guns, and so matters were partially balanced; in the second example, the ironclad ought to have easily sunk the merchantman by means of her heavy guns, even from a great distance—but she didn’t. The ironclad question will engage our attention again, as it will, we fear, that of the nation, for a very long time to come.