EC, TFS121 - as the reigning experts on the Trent War in these forums and the local equivalent of the Lion & the Unicorn (honestly, you make Gladstone and Disraeli look like the Tom and Jerry!*), might one ask if you have ever considered working out a Wargame that would allow you to pursue your purely-Academic debates down a more entertaining avenue?
I'm not arrogant enough to think this will actually SETTLE your disagreement (and as a sometime Academic myself I know that a good dispute is the very life-blood of Historical scholarship, preventing it from becoming a mere dry & dusty assertion of dogma), but I honestly want to see what the two of you could come up with if your scholarships combined in the noble cause of Fun!
After all, wouldn't it be more Sporting to hazard a little pride and put your theories into practice at the mercy of Dame Fortune than to perpetually agree to disagree?
I have played a lot of the old table top (commercial) wargames since the 1970s but I don't recall a Trent War scenario in any of them on an operational or strategic scale. There were rules in the old Yaquinto game "Ironclads" that allowed you to introduce British warships into a scenario (possibly French too) but I can't be sure as I haven't seen the game since 1981. I suspect any naval miniatures rules covering that era would allow scenario building to at least cover ship to ship actions.
In terms of wargaming ground combat I feel reasonably confident that miniature rules would allow tactical combat in many of the various rules that are out there. Nice thing about those kind of rules sets, if you don't want to invest in the models, cardboard counters work just fine.
I am not aware of any computer games out there with this option. The closest might be "Operational Art of War" (which I play a lot) which has scenario building rules and has a scenario to play the Great War from Turtledoves universe. It works less well with 19th Century combat however.
So bottom line, probably would require designing something.