alternatehistory.com

19 May

The French consul at Guadeloupe respectfully informs Mississippi's captain that his ship will be unable to recoal again in Guadeloupe - it would be a breach of French neutrality to allow an American ship to recoal there so frequently when the same facility is not offered to British ships.
Of course British ships do not require recoaling at French ports - they have their own - but it is a pointed reminder to Mississippi that she is imposing overmuch on the hospitality of the French Caribbean. This is a major concern as Mississippi has already overstayed her welcome at Havana, and indeed rather unpleasant conversations have been taking place regarding her pre-Trent captures of Forest King and Empress (both British ships carrying cargoes of coffee, a substance with no particularly justifiable military value).

The captain of the Mississippi determines to sail further afield, preceding on sail alone to some suitable coaling port, and then sail back north in order to use steam strictly in a tactical sense.


20 May
With the British heavy Armstrong guns delayed to the east, Pennefather continues a waiting game approach for the most part. His riflemen occasionally pick off a Union soldier who shows himself for too long - the forward pickets are only a few hundred yards from the Union positions on the other side of the river.

Meanwhile, near Detroit, it is noticed that a substantial number of the small-arms collected from the field where the Battle of Moulin Rouge took place are clearly substandard - while some percussion rifles are present, there are many percussion smoothbores as well.

Replacement gunners arrive in Ann Arbor, granting the Union troops there use of their artillery once more - fortunately for them, the pieces were all recovered after the battle.


21 May

The Wachusett sallies from the Hudson, and engages in battle with a gunboat of the Royal Naval blockading squadron (the Sparrow). Larger and somewhat better armed, the American sloop wins the duel after about twenty minutes, though is forced to scuttle Sparrow rather than tow her in as a capture when the Princess Royal comes steaming over. After a long chase, Wachusett retires successfully upriver - though the addition of a shallow-draft corvette to the close section of the blockade suggests she will not be permitted to get away with it twice.
The victory over Sparrow is hailed as a great one in the US, which has little enough to celebrate.



Evaluation of the bombardment of Vera Cruz has been completed, and the French are quite pleased with the performance of Gloire. She took some fire and a few casualties from the many heavy guns of San Jose de Ulua, but was able to stay outside the range any of the guns could pierce her and as such suffered no major injury. As such, the conclusion of the French admiral is that Gloire is quite equal to any British ironclad.

At about the same time, in the United Kingdom, the first Palliser shells are successfully tested. Blunt nosed, chilled iron projectiles with a small gunpowder cavity inside pierce through the armour of the Warrior target at a range of 100 yards, and burst in the wooden backing.
This is the first armour-piercing shell in the world, and it is agreed that they should be rushed into service - they effectively obsolete the old shot or solid shot, and only specialized cast-steel bolts are now required (to penetrate thick armour) with everything else being shell.
A point of curiosity is that these shells have no fuze as such - the friction of penetration causes the gunpowder to explode.



(Something I can't find out is whether these Palliser tests - OTL summer 1862! - were with the 7" Armstrong gun or a 7" RML gun. The former would mean that a non-armour-piercing piece had been upgraded to AP by this new shell, the latter would mean that the RN put a completely new weapon into service in a very short space of time.
While I'm at it, the French confidence in Gloire is a little misplaced - her guns and her armour are both less potent than those of Warrior, though she's certainly a fine ship by most standards of the time.)