Monitor aground with exposed hull: USS Weehawken's precarious September 8

With the news of the Confederate evacuation of Morris Island on September 7, 1863, both Rear-Admiral John Dahlgren and Brigadier-General Quincy Gillmore set their eyes on the next objective - Fort Sumter. Transitioning from a protracted siege, the Army was not in position to react quickly. Heavy guns were easy to traverse, but needed to properly task organize to mount an effective assault on Fort Sumter. On the other hand, the Navy was in position, and much expected, to do something about Fort Sumter. Dahlgren already had his ironclads and supporting ships inside the bar on September 7, anticipating an operation in conjunction with the Army's last assault on Battery Wagner. Now with that fortification falling without resistance, Dahlgren could turn on Fort Sumter. In the hope that General P.G.T. Beaureagard would concede Fort Sumter, Dahlgren sent a demand for the fort's surrender. When that came back negative, Dahlgren begain preparations to seize the fort:

I immediately designed to put in operation a plan to capture Fort Sumter, and as a preliminary ordered the Weehawken to pass in by a narrow channel, winding about Cumming's Point, so as to cut off all communication by that direction....

In addition, Dahlgren ordered up the other ironclads to test the batteries on Sullivan's Island. Now free from any fires from Morris Island, and only token resistance from Fort Sumter, the Federal sailors could concentrate on Fort Moultrie and supporting batteries. And while conducting that sortie, Dahlgren's captains could survey the obstructions in the main ship channel. All this was preparation for a night effort that would include boat landings on Fort Sumter. Sounded like a good plan. But as will often happen, unanticipated events upset this plan. Captain Edmund Colhoun took the USS Weehawken inshore that morning according to instructions. By 8:30 a.m. the monitor was between Cumming's Point and Fort Sumter, having marked a channel with buoys. However an hour later a flood tide pushed the Weehawken onto a shoal where she touched bottom. At high tide, the monitor got off the shoal, but Colhoun encountered more problems:

... when the tide had risen sufficiently to float her, I got underway, in obedience to your order, "to return to my anchorage near the New Ironsides," but in consequence of the shoal water she steered very badly, taking "a rank sheer" to port; she brought up on the bank in 11 feet water. In the afternoon, at high water, I failed to get her off, as also on the following morning, though every effort was made, by taking coal and shot out, with one tug to assist us.

Stuck in shallow waters, the Weehawken sat in plain view of the Confederate gunners on Sullivan's Island. While the Weehawken lay grounded on September 7, her sister monitor, USS Lehigh anchored in the main ship channel in front of Fort Moultrie to act as a shield. The USS Montauk and USS Nahant also took station to engage the Confederate batteries. The tug USS Daffodil moved up to assist with unloading coal and solid shot.

USS Montauk and Lehigh laid up after the war

At night, the tug USS O.M. Pettit attempted to pull the Weehawken off the shoal. But the monitor remained stuck fast. Early on the morning of September 8, Major Stephen Elliot commanding Fort Sumter observed,

The monitor near Cumming's Point is evidently around. Her deck is now 4 feet above water and will be some 2 feet higher at low water. Fire should be opened on her, as the thin part of her hull is probably exposed.

The Confederate batteries soon responded to this opportunity. Colonel William Butler, commanding the artillery on Sullivan's Island, opened with a slow fire. In addition to 10-inch columbiads, the 7-inch triple-banded Brooke opened on the Weehawken. In addition to Fort Moultrie, Battery Bee, Battery Beauregard, and Battery Marion, the batteries on the east end of James Island also opened on the stranded monitor. Captain John Mitchel, 1st South Carolina Artillery commanding at Fort Johnson and Battery Simkins reported:

I first turned on it the 8-inch naval shell gun on the right of Battery Simkins, and then the three 10-inch sea-coast mortars, which, with the 10-inch columbiad, had been previously keeping a steady fire on Morris Island.

Fearing the weakened carriage of the 8-inch gun would give way, Mitchel ordered the embrasure of the 10-inch columbiad modified to allow it to fire on the ironclad. He also ordered a 6.4-inch Brooke rifle mounted in Fort Johnson so as to bear on the target. Although that work was accomplished late in the day, the Brooke did fire four rounds at the Weehawken. However, the stranded ironclad was not defenseless. Firing on Fort Moultrie, the second shot from the Weehawken's XV-inch gun hit an 8-inch columbiad in the fort. The projectile then struck a stack of boxed shells. The resultant explosion killed fifteen and wounded twelve. The confusion in the aftermath of this rather lucky shot eased some of the pressure on the Weehawken.
 

While the Confederates were drawing a bead on the stranded Weehawken, Dahlgren moved up the rest of his ironclads to protect it. In the early morning mist, the USS New Ironsides and five monitors moved into the main ship channel to stand between the Weehawken and Sullivan's Island.



The contest now resembled that of April 7 when the ironclads had first tested the main ship channel. But unlike the spring battle, the New Ironsides featured prominently in the fight. The broadside ironclad fired 483 times and in return received 70 hits while standing directly between Fort Moultrie and the Weehawken. Two 10-inch columbiad solid shots from Sullivan's Island hit in close proximity damaging one of the iron plates.



Otherwise, damage was limited to shutters, stringers, and chains.

The same could not be said of the USS Patapsco. One of three hits on that monitor shot away the smokestack. With that damage, the monitor's engine could not function properly. So after firing eighteen XV-inch shells, eleven shrapnel, one stand of grape, and thirty Schenkle projectiles from her 8-inch Parrott, the Patapsco gave way to allow the Montauk to take a better position. The Montauk received 43 hits wile firing back twenty-eight XV-inch shells and seven stands of grape. The USS Passaic labored in the channel with damage from earlier action which hindered steerage and turret traverse. Yet Lieutenant-Commander Edward Simpson managed to hold her in line to fire nineteen XV-inch shells and thirty 8-inch Schenkle shells. In return the Passaic was hit 51 times, mostly from Battery Bee. Simpson summarized the damage:

Her side armor is broken through in several places, and the plates are spring off some inches from the overhang; she has now seven holes thorugh the deck, all of which make bad leaks; several hard hits on the ring around the base of the turret cause it to chafe against the deck plates under it, making it difficult to revolve the turret; several deck plates are started, and the armor at the stern is sprung apart 6 inches.

Yet, Simpson felt if required he could keep the Passaic in action. Also in the thick of the fight, the USS Nahant fired fifty-four XI-inch shells and eighteen XV-inch shells, while receiving four hits. The Lehigh fired twenty-two shells and received twenty-nine hits. Meanwhile, on the Weehawken, Colhoun refocused efforts to get his ship afloat. Right in the middle of the engagement, he sent his men to breakfast. Afterwards he ordered fires on Fort Sumter just to show the monitor was still in the fight, even if aground. Colhoun later tallied the score:

We were hit twenty-four times, doing no very serious damage; one shot struck the lower part of the overhang, passed under, made a hole about 3 inches, afterwards ascertained to be about 7 inches in diameter, and fractured the iron from the angles; the leak was soon stopped. We fired at Moultrie and Battery Bee 36 shell, at Sumter, 46; total 82.

The hit on the hull described by Colhoun may have come from the 7-inch Brooke at Fort Moultrie. However it was among the last shots ever fired from the gun. Lieutenant R.Y. Dwight, commanding that gun's section, recalled firing eleven shots at the Weehawken before receiving orders to fire on the other ironclads "with 20-pounder charges and wrought-iron bolts." After five or six of these shots, the bands on the gun cracked. In addition to that gun, two others on Sullivan's Island were disabled - the 8-inch columbiad damaged by the Weehawken and a rifled 32-pdr with a trunnion shot away.

By 1:30 p.m., Dahlgren signaled his ironclads to pull back. The tide was coming back in and he didn't wish to risk another running aground. Furthermore the tide should free the Weehawken. The withdrawal was by unit with the Lehigh remaining to cover her grounded sister. At 4:30 p.m. the Weehawken floated off the shoal and moved out into the channel.

This particular drama on September 8 thus concluded. But another was about to start. Dahlgren held to his plan to have a boat landing force assault Fort Sumter that night.

(Citations from ORN, Series I, Volume 14, pages 549, 551, 556, and 557. OR, Series I, Volume 28, Part II, Serial 46, pages 714 and 723.)

"So Here is a Nice Mess:" The Navy Shells Wagner and Sumter from Land and Sea at Charleston



This watercolor, titled "View of Charleston Harbor and its Defenses," shows the Navy and Army siege lines
on Morris Island.  The Navy Battery is on the left and the ironclads can be seen on the far right.

Having failed to take Fort Wagner by direct assault, Brigadier General Quincy Gilmore elected to start a formal siege operation against Confederate defenses. His plan was to blast the Confederate out of their positions in a similar manner to siege operations conducted against Vicksburg and Port Hudson. He also expanded the target list to include Fort Sumter. The problem Gilmore faced was the same problem faced by Union ground forces out West: a lack of heavy guns.  Like the sieges of Port Hudson and Vicksburg, the Navy came to the Army's aid.

Rear Admiral John Dahlgren furnished the necessary resources. He provided two English-made 70-pounder Whitworth Rifles (captured from a blockade runner), two 200-pounder Parrott Rifles, and five 100-pounder Parrott Rifles. In addition, sailors and soldiers dragged ten mortars into position (an excellent discussion on the Naval battery's particular guns and the batteries can be found at Craig Swain's "Marker Hunter" blog).

Navy gun crews with the Whitworth Rifles

Dahlgren assigned Commander Foxhall Parker, Jr. to oversee the newly designated "Naval Battery" and "Naval Brigade." Parker served as Dahlgren's adjutant for the squadron aboard USS Wabash and gave the commander leeway in finding the necessary sailors and marines to man and protect the guns. In a major concession to Army-Navy cooperation, naval units on shore fell under Gilmore's command.

This is not to say Dahlgren and his ships would stand idly by. The admiral assigned two monitors, Passaic and Patapsco, to take aim at Fort Sumter from 2,000 yards out. Four other Union monitors (Weehawken, Catskill, Montauk, and Nahant) took aim at Fort Wagner, with New Ironsides and several wooden gunboats in reserve.

Harper's Weekly's Theodore Davis' interpretation of
the Navy Battery firing at Fort Sumter. 

The bombardment from land and sea on Forts Wagner and Sumter began on August 17th and last through the 24th. Dahlgren and Gilmore were cordial during the first four days of the bombardment. Things went a little sour on the 21st when Gilmore asked the monitors to suppress Wagner's sharpshooters.  Dahglren frequently stated to Gilmore that he could have the monitors at any time.  In this case, however, Dahlgren explained the finer points of tides and currents to the general and concluded that his ships could not simply charge in whenever needed.

Dahlgren's sketch of the position of his ironclads during the August
17th bombardment of Fort Wagner and Battery Gregg.

Surprisingly, Gilmore was not offended.  He changed his tune when he asked Dahlgren to leave Wagner alone, and go all in with all his ironclads at Fort Sumter at close range. Once again, Dahlgren hesitated and explained the difficulties of attacking Sumter, namely the shallow waters around the fort. He finally decided on releasing two monitors, Passasic and Weehawken, to assault Sumter at close range. Both monitors ran aground during their attack.

But, Gilmore would change his mind several times about where he wanted the Navy's resources. Though Army-Navy cooperation had improved since Du Pont left, Dahlgren expressed major frustrations with his Army counterpart. It seemed that every time Dahlgren prepared to send his monitors at Sumter, Confederate sharpshooters from Fort Wagner would take aim at Gilmore's sappers.  Angered, Gilmore would demand the monitors to return. One telegram provided proof of Dahlgren's frustration. Gilmore signaled Dahlgren during the operation to "Send [the monitors] back, they are inspecting us with their spyglasses."

The end result of the seven day bombardment looked impressive. Several sections of the brick and mortar of Fort Sumter were smashed. Yet Sumter and Wagner remained in control of their respective garrisons. Dahlgren recalled several monitors for repairs caused by Confederate guns. The Catskill in particular took several critical hits. Wagner's guns struck Catskill seven times near the pilot house, which resulted in her commanding officer Commander George Rogers' death. In his final report on the operation to Secretary Welles, Dahlgren believed that he did not have enough ironclads to attack Sumter, suppress Wagner's guns, and perform other duties in Georgia. Thus, the operation ended in failure.

The Naval Battery recorded mixed results as well. Parker reported that his four gun battery fired 703 Parrott shells, 373 of which struck Sumter.  Over two hounded solid shots came from the Whitworth rifles. More shots would have come from the Whitworths if it wasn't for one that exploded, killing four sailors. A shell exploded after it became jammed half into the barrel. Sailors attempted to ram the shot further into the gun.

When Dahlgren heard that Passaic ran aground, he wrote in his diary, "So here is a nice mess."  It should have been his final conclusion for this particular operation.

Ironclads on the Georgia Coast - Monitor vs. Fort II

Ironclads USS Passaic, Patapsco and Nahant bombarding Ft. McAllister. Note monitor Montauk hanging back with the wooden gunboats.

 

Admiral S. F. DuPont was determined to take out Ft. McAllister, guarding the entrance to the Ogeechee River, Georgia. He decided that if one monitor could not do it, he would send in three, accompanied by other gunboats. He sent the USS Passaic, Patapsco, and Nahant (under the overall command of Capt. Percival Drayton of the Passaic). All three were the newer Passaic Class of ironclad monitor gunboats. Passaic and Nahant were armed with XV and XI inch Dahlgren guns. Patapsco had a XV inch Dahlgren and a 200 pdr Parrott rifle. Each gunboat was painted in a different color scheme so they could identify one another. Capt. John Worden in the USS Montauk (another Passaic Class monitor) went along as a supporting vessel, but was ordered by DuPont to avoid action. There was concern that Montauk’s XV inch Dahlgren might be close to the end of its lifespan, because it had already been fired almost 300 times in the prior engagements. DuPont wanted to spare Montauk for use in the upcoming attack on Charleston harbor.

The morning of 3 March 1863, the four turreted ironclads, accompanied by the wooden gunboats Seneca, Dawn, Wissahickon, Flambeau, and Sabago and the mortar schooners C. P. Williams, Norfolk Packet and Para (towed by a steam tug) got steam up and headed up the river towards the fort. The mortar schooners were placed and the three new monitors approached the confederate fort. The fort had recently received some additional heavy guns and its garrison watched the approaching ironclads, ready to use them. About 8:30 AM Ft. McAllister opened fire, initiating the third “ironclad vs. fort” engagement. The Union gunboats returned fire. The gunners in the fort knew by now they couldn’t damage or sink the ironclads just by hitting them. They waited until the turrets of the monitors turned to fire at the fort and tried to aim for the open gunports, hoping a lucky shot would go through.

The firefight continued all that morning and into the afternoon. The fort scored numerous hits on the ironclads (mostly concentrating on Passaic), and the naval gunnery burst around and within the fort. A number of the larger confederate guns were disabled by shots from the ironclads. During the fight, Drayton stepped out onto the top of Passaic’s turret with his telescope to survey the scene. Suddenly musket balls went whizzing by, and he was hit, but uninjured, by an apparent ricochet. Prior to the battle, a squad of sharpshooters had been sent out from the fort, under the command of CSA Lt. Elijah Ellarbee, to establish an outpost to try to pick off USN gunners through the open gunports of the monitors’ turrets as they turned away from the fort to reload. They were so close to the Passaic that Ellarbee later said he could hear the orders of the gun captains to the crews in the turret as they went through their drill.

By mid-afternoon, about 3:30, Drayton ordered the flotilla to withdraw due to the falling tide. The three mortar schooners were left to continue lobbing shells at the fort in hopes of interfering with repair efforts. Both Passaic and Nahant experienced mechanical problems during the battle. When he surveyed the damage to his ship after the fight, Drayton noted that Passaic seemed to suffer much more damage to her armor than did Montauk in her prior two engagements with the fort, apparently due to deficiencies in the bolts used to anchor the iron plating and problems with the iron itself. DuPont ordered the installation of an additional layer of iron plating on the decks of the monitors. As would become evident in the upcoming attack on Charleston, the monitor gunboats simply could not bring to bear the overwhelming firepower that a “broadside” type warship could, and that this is what was needed to defeat shore fortifications.

For the soldiers in Ft. McAllister, not a single man was killed or injured by the massive naval bombardment. The biggest tragedy was the loss of their beloved mascot “Tom Cat”, who was killed by the shellfire as he ran in panic around the fort during the bombardment. Poor old Tom cashed in all of his nine lives that day.

USS Passaic.  Source of images - Naval History and Heritage Command.

The Loss of USS Monitor/Rhode Island's Rescue, December 31, 1862

On the evening of January 3, 1863, Acting Rear Admiral Sydney Phillips Lee, commanding officer of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, dictated a telegram to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles.  As it was a telegram and not a hand written letter, Lee wrote a very matter-of-fact note that lacked any sort of emotional loss.

"Fort Monroe, VA., January 3, 1863

USS Rhode Island's Ordinary Seaman
John Jones was a member of the ship's
rescue teams. After saving several
of Monitor's sailors, his cutter
was blown out to sea.  After riding out
gale force winds for several hours,
a passing schooner saved them.
The Navy latter awarded Jones the
Medal of Honor. 

  The State of Georgia reports that the Monitor foundered on Tuesday night south of Cape Hatteras, with the loss of two officers and twenty-eight men (names not received) belonging to Monitor or Rhode Island or to both.  The Passaic is at Beaufort; all reports received will be mail to-day."

By 9:30 p.m., Welles received the preliminary report of what happened to Monitor.  Namely, after several hours fine weather, squalls hit Monitor and the steamer Rhode Island, which had the ironclad in tow. He also received a more detailed report of causalities: sixteen men loss from Monitor's company and  eight men from Rhode Island, who drowned during the rescue mission. 

Upon seeing Monitor in trouble, Rhode Island's commanding officer immediately ordered all of his ships' small boats to put into the water.  One of Rhode Island's officers, Acting Master's Mate D. Rodney Browne and his team, made three trips between the two ships.  It was on the third trip that a squall turned the cutter over and they were all believed to be lost.

A few days later, the Acting Master Mate Browne and his team turned up alive.  Their boat had not tipped over as suspected, but rather blown out to sea.  The sailors roughed out in the heavy seas for 24 hours, before a passing leaky schooner operating under an Army contract called A. Colby picked them up.  Unfortunately, the schooner ran aground at Diamond Shoals. Good fortune continued, however, as the gunboat USS Miami saw the schooner's distress signal and towed it into Beaufort. Due to men like Browne, many of Monitor's sailors were saved.

 When Lee had time to digest the loss, he composed a hand written note to Welles that started with the words "Sir: I have the painful duty to perform of reporting the loss of the Monitor at sea..."  Lee's compilation of reports of all ships involved on the lost can be read here.

USS Passaic-Bringing a Bigger Gun to the Fight




USS Passaic testing her XV-inch Dahlgren towards the Palisades.

When asked by a Congressional panel investigating the outcome of the Battle of Hampton Roads and the U.S. Navy response to future Confederate ironclads, Assistant Secretary of the Navy Gustavus Fox simply replied, "build a bigger gun." Indeed, a bigger gun had been built: the XV-inch Dahlgren.  At the time, there was no platform to use it on.  Fortunately, engineer/inventor John Ericsson provided one. 

Inside Passaic's turret, the XV-inch gun is on the far side.

While USS Monitor was a wonder of engineering, she did have flaws exposed during the Battle of Hampton Roads.  Ericsson sought to fix that with his next generation of "monitor"-type ironclads.  The first of the new generation of monitors was Passaic.  Named for the town of Passaic, New Jersey, the ship displaced 400 more tons than the original Monitor.  It housed a larger engineering plant and a wider hull for better sea keeping traits.  The pilot house was constructed on top of the turret, instead of the front like the Monitor.  With the bigger ship, workers placed one 42,000-pound XV-inch Dahlgren in the turret, along side one XI-inch Dahlgren.  Firing a 352-pound shell, the gun itself was one of the largest weapons ever deployed during the war. 

The new gun did have its problems.  The barrel was purposely built short to protect the muzzle from being exposed to enemy fire.  This led to the issue of smoke from each shot fired building up inside the turret.  To deal with this issue, Ericsson designed a special "smoke box" to protect the gunners.  While it worked, the box did slow down the rate of fire.

After launching at the Contential Iron Works (same builder as Monitor), Passasic steamed up the Hudson river to the Palisades cliffs, north of New York City, in early November 1862.  Here, to a booming echo up and down the river, gunners test-fired the monster XV-inch gun with increasing amounts of gunpowder (topping out at forty-five pounds of gunpowder per shooting) and shot.  Observers deemed each test a success, and determined Passaic was ready for action.  The Passaic soon set sail for Hampton Roads to join up with Monitor.  The Northern press boldly and brashly claimed that the Navy finally had its weapon against the forts of Charleston.