Battle of the Ironclads


Book Description

Examines the construction, battles, and technological and historical impact of the Civil War battleships, the Monitor and the Merrimac.




The Battle of the Ironclads


Book Description

Battle of the Ironclads brings to life the dramatic events which occurred in Hampton Roads on March 8 and 9, 1862. This first battle between armored vessels, often called the Monitor-Merrimack engagement, is perhaps the most significant naval event of the entire Civil War. This thrilling history is the first volume to offer a comprehensive pictorial interpretation of the men and ships that forever changed naval warfare. Over 150 images, including photographs, engravings, paintings, and sketches, have been gathered from museums, archives, and private collections to chronicle the exciting story of the U.S.S. Monitor and the C.S.S. Virginia (Merrimack). While Battle of the Ironclads is a visual history of the first battle between armored ships, it is also a saga of uncommon valor and leadership epitomized by Franklin Buchanan, George U. Morris, Samuel Dana Greene, and John Taylor Wood. The brilliant innovations of John Mercer Brooke and the farsighted inventions of John Ericsson made this showdown in Hampton Roads a death for wooden sailing ships. Battle of the Ironclads is indeed an epic tale that tells how steam-powered iron vessels not only influenced the Civil War, but more importantly, how the two ironclads echoed the dawn of modern navies.




Duel Between the First Ironclads


Book Description

One was called "a tin can on a shingle"; the other, "a half-submerged crocodile." Yet, on a March day in 1862 in Hampton Roads, Virginia, after a five-hour duel, the U.S.S. Monitor and the C.S.S. Virginia (formerly the U.S.S. Merrimack) were to change the course of not only the Civil War but also naval warfare forever. Using letters, diaries, and memoirs of men who lived through the epic battle of the Monitor and the Merrimack and of those who witnessed it from afar, William C. Davis documents and analyzes this famous confrontation of the first two modern warships. The result is a full-scale history that is as exciting as a novel. Besides a thorough discussion of the designs of each ship, Davis portrays come of the men involved in the building and operation of America's first ironclads-John Ericsson, supreme egoist and engineering genius who designed the Monitor; John Brooke, designer of the Virginia; John Worden, the well-loved captain of the Monitor; Captain Franklin Buchanan of the Virginia; and a host of other men on both Union and Confederate sides whose contributions make this history as much a story of men as of ships and war.




Dignity of Duty


Book Description

Published 117 years after his death, the journals of the American soldier Erasmus Corwin Gilbreath provide a compelling vantage point by which to view contemporary American history. They tell, first and foremost, a tale of war in which there is no glory—only carnage and death. Through Gilbreath’s firsthand accounts we get a sense of what life was like during the Civil War, the Indian Wars, and the War with Spain from an accomplished field officer, rather than from high command. Gilbreath illuminates the true horrors of war in the 19th Century for soldiers—boredom, fatigue, death, and crude medical care for the wounded—and their families, as Gilbreath’s wife and children followed him wherever his orders would lead, enduring the primitive conditions they found along the way. From his instrumental role in raising a company that would become part of the 20th Indiana Volunteer Infantry, to his death while serving with the 11th U.S. Infantry in Puerto Rico at the tail end of the Spanish–American War, Gilbreath’s life exemplifies the dignity of his service and the importance he placed on duty to his nation. In his journals, Gilbreath paints a vivid picture of the turmoil and change that was 19th Century America. Passages such as the lyric firsthand account of the Battle of the Ironclads or his reconnecting with a fellow Gettysburg veteran in Chicago 21 years after the battle are beautifully written, and carry a personal and emotional gravity that are found in the best literary works. Gilbreath is one of America’s sons, a proud citizen soldier who helped to forge the United States, and we are truly fortunate that his legacy lives on in these pages.




Confederate Ironclad Vs Union Ironclad


Book Description

The Ironclad was a revolutionary weapon of war. Although iron was used for protection in the Far East during the 16th century, it was the 19th century and the American Civil War that heralded the first modern armored self-propelled warships. With the parallel pressures of civil war and the industrial revolution, technology advanced at a breakneck speed. It was the South who first utilized ironclads as they attempted to protect their ports from the Northern blockade. Impressed with their superior resistance to fire and their ability to ram vulnerable wooden ships, the North began to develop its own rival fleet of ironclads. Eventually these two products of this first modern arms race dueled at the battle of Hampton Roads in a clash that would change the face of naval warfare. Fully illustrated with cutting-edge digital artwork, rare photographs and first-person perspective gun sight views, this book allows the reader to discover the revolutionary and radically different designs of the two rival Ironclads - the CSS Virginia and USS Monitor - through an analysis of each ship's weaponry, ammunition and steerage. Compare the contrasting training of the crews and re-live the horrors of the battle at sea in a war which split a nation, communities and even families.




Reign of Iron


Book Description

At the outbreak of the Civil War, North and South quickly saw the need to develop the latest technology in naval warfare, the ironclad ship. After a year-long scramble to finish first, in a race filled with intrigue and second guessing, blundering and genius, the two ships -- the Monitor and the Merrimack -- after a four-hour battle, ended the three-thousand-year tradition of wooden men-of-war and ushered in "the reign of iron." In the first major work on the subject in thirty-five years, novelist, historian, and tall-ship sailor James L. Nelson, acclaimed author of the Brethren of the Coast trilogy, brilliantly recounts the story of these magnificent ships, the men who built and fought them, and the extraordinary battle that made them legend.




Duel of the Ironclads


Book Description

A description of the construction, battles, and historical impact of the Civil War battleships, the Monitor and the Virginia, known to Union forces as the Monitor and the Merrimack, focuses on the Battle of Hampton Roads, where it was evident that the age of wooden warships was gone forever. Reprint.




Iron Coffin


Book Description

The USS Monitor famously battled the CSS Virginia (the armored and refitted USS Merrimack) at Hampton Roads in March 1862. This updated edition of David A. Mindell's classic account of the ironclad warships and the human dimension of modern warfare commemorates the 150th anniversary of this historic encounter. Mindell explores how mariners—fighting "blindly," below the waterline—lived in and coped with the metal monster they called the "iron coffin." He investigates how the ironclad technology, new to war in the nineteenth century, changed not only the tools but also the experience of combat and anticipated today’s world of mechanized, pushbutton warfare. The writings of William Frederick Keeler, the ship’s paymaster, inform much of this book, as do the experiences of everyman sailor George Geer, who held Keeler in some contempt. Mindell uses their compelling stories, and those of other shipmates, to recreate the thrills and dangers of living and fighting aboard this superweapon. Recently, pieces of the Monitor wreck have been raised from their watery grave, and with them, information about the ship continues to be discovered. A new epilogue describes the recovery of the Monitor turret and its display at the USS Monitor Museum in Newport News, Virginia. This sensitive and enthralling history of the USS Monitor ensures that this fateful ship, and the men who served on it, will be remembered for generations to come.




Big Bad Ironclad! (Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales #2)


Book Description

In author-illustrator Nathan Hale’s Big Bad Ironclad, uncover the story of the American Civil War’s ironclad warships with this Hazardous Tale in the New York Times bestselling graphic novel series! “These books are, quite simply, brilliant. . . . Thrilling, bloody, action-packed stories from American history.” —New York Times Ships are great for transport, but when they are made of wood they tend to start leaking when cannons fire upon them. But what if the ship is covered with iron? Assuming it doesn’t sink to the bottom of the ocean, wouldn’t it be stronger and better than any other ship out there? This is the question that begins a race between the North and the South to come up with the biggest, best ironclad warships. Here is the story of the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia (also called the Merrimack), two of the world’s first ironclad ships, and their fascinating role in the Civil War. Through their ironclad battle, you will get a wider perspective to the war. Meet Abraham Lincoln and his cabinet. Learn about General Winfield Scott’s Anaconda Plan to cut off the South from any outside support. And meet Gideon Welles, Lincoln’s “Father Neptune” and secretary of the Navy. Sail back in time and learn of a battle that changed warfare, and a war that changed history. Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales! Read them all—if you dare! One Dead Spy: A Revolutionary War Tale (#1) Big Bad Ironclad!: A Civil War Tale (#2) Donner Dinner Party: A Pioneer Tale (#3) Treaties, Trenches, Mud, and Blood: A World War I Tale (#4) The Underground Abductor: An Abolitionist Tale about Harriet Tubman (#5) Alamo All-Stars: A Texas Tale (#6) Raid of No Return: A World War II Tale of the Doolittle Raid (#7) Lafayette!: A Revolutionary War Tale (#8) Major Impossible: A Grand Canyon Tale (#9) Blades of Freedom: A Tale of Haiti, Napoleon, and the Louisiana Purchase (#10) Cold War Correspondent: A Korean War Tale (#11) Above the Trenches: A WWI Flying Ace Tale (#12)




Ironclads of the Civil War


Book Description

Details the era of the ironclad from it's official beginnings at Hampton Roads through it's use during the Civil War.