The U.S. Navy's Three Headed Monster-USS Roanoke

One perceived flaw in the design of the original USS Monitor was its lack of firepower. With only two XI-inch guns, many in the U.S. Navy felt the need to upgrade the design. Many engineers felt this could be solved by putting a bigger gun in the turret, or by adding a second turret. USS Monitor's original designer, John Ericsson, was not in favor of a second turret as he saw no need for it.  He also believed the turrets would get in the way of the line of fire.

USS Roanoke as a Merrimack-class steam frigate, 1855

John Lenthall, the Navy's long time chief of the Bureau of Construction and Repair, decided that two turrets were insufficient. Shortly after the Battle of Hampton Roads, Lenthall got the idea in his head that if the Confederacy could convert a ship like Merrimack into an ironclad, the U.S. Navy could do the same.

With the Secretary's approval, Lenthall sent shipyards and ironworks in New York City plans to convert Roanoke into an ironclad monitor-type warship with three turrets. Lenthall's design called for the turrets to be armored with single iron plates each twenty-two feet long, 4 1/2-inches thick, and weighing four tons. Each turret housed either XV-inch Dahlghrens or a 150-pounder Parrott Rifle. If that was not enough firepower, Lenthall wanted a "huge axe" on the bow of the ship in order to ram.

USS Roanoke underway in smooth seas as imagine by an artist.

The Common Council of New York City saw the ship and lobbied the Navy hard to assign the vessel as a harbor defense ship for New York harbor. As it usually did to local government requests, the Navy rejected the idea and pencil the ship in for fort suppression duty off of the coast of Charleston.

The conversion was a remarkable feat of American engineering. Iron forges in four different states provided the huge plates to the Novelty Iron Works in New York City. Each plate then had to be heated and bent to correct curvature. In all, workers placed 1,000 additional tons of armor.

 While she was a marvel of engineering, the brains at Scientific American magazine were skeptical of Lenthall's design. "If she makes nine knots, we shall be agreeably disappointed," they wrote. "As the Roanoke will sit very low in the water, we hope that proper arrangements will be made for ventilation on the main deck. The defects of the Galena and Monitor, so clearly pointed out in the Scientific American of last week, by an intelligent correspondent, will be reproduced in the Roanoke. [This will render] her very deficient as a 'sea boat,' unless this advice is heeded."

The advice was not taken. The Navy charged forward and Roanoke put to sea as the most powerful warship in the world. Sent to Hampton Roads, her captain quickly discovered what Scientific American writers predicted. Monitor-type ships in general did not have very good sea-keeping traits to begin with, and Roanoke had the worst of them all.

USS Roanoke tied up as she spent most of her career.

First, she lacked speed. Scientific American was hoping for nine knots. Captain Sanders, however, reported to Secretary Welles that the ship would not go more than five knots. He concluded that he could "not consider the Roanoke adapted to fighting a battle at sea, on account of her rolling render her guns unserviceable and exposing her to shot below her iron plating."

All Sanders could recommend was that the ship serve as a coastal defense vessel. Welles agreed, but did not assign the ship to New York City. Once the ship arrived in Hampton Roads, she remained there for the rest of the war.

Destruction of a Blockade Runner

It’s characteristically the larger or more significant engagements that make it into the history books and articles on the Civil War Navies, but I’ve always thought that for every big event, there are dozens of small ones that don’t attract notice, and yet played a role in the ultimate outcome of the war. On 15 October 1861, Capt. John Marston of the steam frigate USS Roanoke, on blockade off Charleston, SC, reported sighting a “large sail.” He dispatched the steam gunboats USS Flag and USS Monticello to chase down this unknown vessel, and was subsequently joined by the sail sloop USS Vandalia. The Monticello reported back that it was the blockade runner Thomas Watson, which had run aground on Stono Reef as she tried to evade the pursuing blockaders and get into Charleston Harbor. The runner was found abandoned by boat crews from the Roanoke, Monticello and Vandalia. Intelligence reports had suggested that Watson was carrying arms, but a thorough search of the entire ship indicated that she was carrying “salt, blankets, flannel, a few smaller articles.” Marston’s orders to the cutting out party were to attempt to free the Watson from the reef, but she was stuck fast, so his orders included burning the ship after removing as much of the cargo as possible. This was completed by 16 October 1861. Illustration source: Library of Congress "Civil War Drawings" collection online.

The Steam Screw Frigates

When it comes to the Civil War Navies (really, any Navy), no doubt one of the main “stars of the show” are the ships. Over the past year, we of the CWN150 have enjoyed introducing you to some of the ships of the US Navy in the Civil War, including the “Timberclads” (posts by Craig on 22 Sept 2010 and Caleb on 16 June 2011), the “90-day gunboats” (post by Gordon on 12 July 2011), and the “fighting ferryboats” (post by yours truly on 14 Oct 2010). In time, we will also present overviews of the ships of the Confederate Navy.


The largest class of warships in the US Navy in the war were the “Merrimack” class steam screw frigates. These warships were propelled by a combination of sail (square-rigged) and steam power and were the first US Navy ships to be driven by a “screw” (a propeller on a shaft projecting through the stern). They displaced 3,000+ to 4,000+ tons and ranged in length from 256’10.5” to 264’8.5”. The US Congress authorized construction of these in 1954. All were completed and commissioned before the war began. In keeping with the ship building philosophy of the US Navy (as with the Constitution-class of sailing frigates), these ships were to be larger and heavier-armed than similar ships in their class and be fast enough to outrun anything larger. The USS Merrimack, Wabash, Roanoke, and Colorado were
all named for US rivers; the Minnesota was named for the territory at the time (not yet a state). All were armed with 24 to 28 IX inch Dahlgren smoothbore shell guns on the main gun deck. These were supplemented with 8-inch shell guns in broadside and a 10-inch gun (typically mounted forward) on the spar deck.

At the time they were built, these were among the most formidable warships in the world, although they were somewhat slow (generally not able to exceed 8 knots under steam), and their deep draft proved to be a considerable handicap in the shallow inshore waters and bays of the southeastern US and Gulf coasts during the war. The Wabash saw service in the South Atlantic blockading squadron, serving as DuPont’s and Dahlgren’s flagship. The Merrimack was burned at the start of the war in the Washington Navy Yard and as we know, was resurrected as the ironclad CSS Virginia. The Minnesota was the flagship of Flag Officer Stringham in the Atlantic blockading squadron, and remained Goldsborough’s flagship when he took command of the North Atlantic blockading squadron. Both Minnesota and Roanoke were present at Hampton Roads during that first clash of the ironclads; the Minnesota was driven aground by the Virginia, which would have returned the next day to destroy her if not for the defense by USS Monitor.
The Roanoke was present offshore of Hampton Roads that day and could not enter the harbor because of her draft, although even if she did, she couldn’t have done anything to help her sister ship against the Virginia. The USS Colorado began her war service in the Gulf blockading squadron, serving off the Mississippi River and Mobile Bay; she ended the war in the North Atlantic squadron and was a participant in the assault on Fort Fisher.

A sixth ship in this class was the USS Niagra (named after Fort Niagra, captured from the British by American forces in the War of 1812). Designed by George Steers, he envisioned a warship with the lines and speed of a clipper ship and an armament comparable to the other frigates in her class. To accomplish this, he had to make her immense, displacing in excess of 5,000 tons and over 300’ in length. Despite her size, she did turn out to be a very fast ship, making 10-11 knots under steam and up to16 knots when under sail power. Initially she was armed only with weapons on her spar deck; XI inch Dahlgren guns on pivots. In the middle of the war she was refitted with twenty XI inch Dahlgrens in broadside on her main gun deck, along with the spar deck armament, but the weight of this gunnery made her main deck gunports dangerously low along the waterline and the main deck broadside guns were removed. She was a participant in two historic events prior to the war: helping to lay the first transatlantic cable and transporting the first Japanese delegation to the US back home to Japan. In the Civil War, she saw service in both Atlantic and Gulf squadrons and in the latter half of the war was deployed overseas keeping tabs on Confederate warships being constructed in European shipyards.

RESOURCES

Canney, Donald L. Lincoln’s Navy. The Ships, Men and Organization, 1861-65. London: Conway Maritime Press, 1998.

Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships: http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/index.html