Oh yes! The ball is still sitting in the Anglo-Canadian court for now, but the Union sure isn't out of the game yet. And we're not even at halftime!
Wrapped in Flames: The Great American War and Beyond
- Thread starter EnglishCanuck
- Start date
Oh yes! The ball is still sitting in the Anglo-Canadian court for now, but the Union sure isn't out of the game yet. And we're not even at halftime!
The first Confederate hit with a mine was IIRC in December 1862 when the USS Cairo was sunk in the Mississippi. However, they had deployed mines as early as February, but their awful position on the river and poor construction made them not particularly useful.
The thing to remember here though, is the US is now waging a defensive war, and mines are inherently a defensive weapon. The changed priorities make looking in to such weapons a necessity rather than a curiosity.
They have experience with mines, but mine clearing takes time. The offensive would by necessity halt while they underwent mine clearing operations before the navy goes in again.
Warrior is probably the only vessel which could suffer such damage, as she had the unarmored bow. I don't think the Union would have developed a mine powerful enough to sink her, but if she was hit that would certainly give any admiral pause. These weapons are also more powerful than those which were deployed by the Russians in 1854, which means they're sure to cause casualties at some point.
Saphroneth
Banned
Doesn't wash, the gunboats can still get through to threaten that battery. They have 7" rifles, which is new (and they can offload their guns onto Mackworth Island).
In any case, I specified gunboats and sloops - sloops can surely slip through, indeed I wouldn't be surprised if frigates could at high spring tide (that 10 foot spring tidal sweep is the key, and as it happens 13 May is the full moon). Sloop level support is what they had in the Crimea.
The gunboats have plenty of manoeuvring room to the N of the forts. In any case, they have rifles which outrange any of the Union defending guns - this is one of the major changes.
As for the Chinese, they pinned the gunboats on obstructions recently emplaced (this is the key, they blew the obstructions the previous night but the Chinese replaced them in time) in shallow water with literally hundreds of guns firing on the gunboats, for hours. (The Chinese sank about one gunboat per half hour)
He does also note that no further improvements have been made - this after Trent. It may be of course that Portland would get the full complement of required guns, but one has to ask which states don't get them... and that even fully armed the defences don't have anything that could hurt an ironclad. (It's simply too early for the 15" Rodman gun.)
A day or two at most. This is the historical scale of the delay imposed the first time they ran into mines.
Perhaps, but what it means is that the whole mine system has been deployed extremely fast, since nobody in the US navy has any real experience with them and they'd not made an effort to get that experience - and they didn't see it as an effective thing that they should take precautions with.
I understand the urge to implement it for story reasons, but it's very much a Damascene conversion for the USN.
Depends on the nature of the obstructions in the channel. If there are mines covered by guns they certainly can't slip up the channel. Booms, logs, ect all would require to be cleared under fire. Simply running the guns will be difficult not just from the interlocking fields of fire and torpedoes, but obstacles which will force vessels into fields of fire which will be in the defenders advantage. Totten himself mentions such floating obstacles in his first letter in January.
This can be overcome, but all these items in conjunction will take a while to clear.
These are after Trent, but there was no looming threat of foreign war immediately after the affair, and increasing spending on the fortifications in New England would be a tetriary concern in comparison. So that's not a completely germane example since his historic priorities are much different than they would be in a short of war scenario.
For purely mines maybe. But with all the other obstructions this can be more strenuous. It will take time.
Extremely fast? As per your own source:
And
Even despite the navy not being interested in the early 40s, the test information and the interest from Delafield (who as per TTL is involved in planning the national defences) is present. Which means that should the need arise one can hardly say it would be too fast. Look at how quickly the Confederacy was able to muster its limited resources for torpedoes. The Union could probably manage to draw on the greater depth of resource and experience in such matters available to them and create fields by spring.
Hardly a Damascene-esque conversion to using the tactic for defensive purposes when it has proponents at high levels.
Saphroneth
Banned
Wrong channel again. I'm talking about the ones off to the east - my argument has been that it's possible to attack the forts through the "back doors" in the east, and frankly it's impossible to mine these channels as they're dry (well, mud) at low tide.
Yes, but Colt's dead and his mine system died with him. You've got one proponent, and you've got to overcome a lot of institutional inertia - and while I'd agree the Union could get a field or two deployed in time if they did all get behind it and push (though they'd be unreliable to say the least as all hastily deployed systems are), I rather assume that they fortified the Potomac, the Delaware, New York and Portsmouth first (as these are the bases of their naval and trade power). This is a "second stage priority" area at best.
Mines are simply not that quick to develop from a standing start, not with no institutional knowledge whatsoever. The Confederates had mine experts experimenting in England to gain institutional understanding and it still took them many months to get something workable.
If the defenders don't see the need for fortifications maybe, but which channels precisely? If boats aren't using them then there's a reason. If they're dry you can install obstacles which would rise with the tide.
He died in January 1862, and unless he burned all his files or Congress doesn't have the records, then the design still exists and has verification that it worked. There's also Delafields limited information on the Russian mines.
Saphroneth
Banned
They have the basic design, but they don't have the manufacturing setup in place. This is part of the difference between theoretical knowledge and practical implementation - it's why mining attempts by the Union in the Spanish-American war were so inconsistent in their achievement, and that's with hundreds of people actually available who took a course on mine emplacement during their military education.
These ones:
Counting all the straits which aren't the main channel (Mainland-Cousins, Littlejohn - Chebeague, Chebeague-Long, Long-Peaks), there's at least 3km worth of aggregate width to cover at their narrowest points. And since none of these are under the fire of any forts, the obstacles can be destroyed without loss - unless, of course, you build entirely new forts.
Which gets back to my original line:
As for the reason why boats aren't using them... because they're not the most direct route, and they're not the most well known route, and they're not the deepest route. They are, however, alternate routes which are quite viable for ships specifically designed to be shallow draft (unexpectedly shallow draft, by design - gunboats draw 1-3 feet less than the sweep of tide here) to get past the main forts without in most cases being in even theoretical range and without in any case being in arc.
Of course, it's also possible that the Union might have, say, missed this. Certainly they did in other places, where their forts did not cover all the channels and there's no indication that they realized this.
The Confederates had neither, and they did rather well with their efforts. It would take some exceptional evidence to show that the Union is incapable of using their technical knowledge to construct minefields with the data they have available from both previous tests and observations made on the Russian methods used in the Crimean War. The Delafield Commission has its weaknesses, but it shows an impressive amount of technical knowledge on certain subjects.
I'm skeptical that the Union would be as impaired as you imagine, considering one could argue they would have a better starting point from with which to begin a large torpedo program.
If I decided to give them torpedo boats after six months that would be a stretch, but with technical research and institutional understanding of torpedoes and a proponent at the highest levels of strategy, I'm fairly sure such measures could be devised.
Ah I see what you're suggesting now. I can also see that it would not work for two main reasons.
The first is, the channels you are suggesting, are not full time channels and are not used precisely because they (by and large) cannot transit large ships. The route you are suggesting, which is gunships moving up past Long and Chebeague islands to the north then west towards Portland. This is problematic since once around the channels there they serve no military purpose and may have a hazardous time retreating if they don't thread these channels perfectly.
The second reason is that doing so would serve no military purpose. Once around the fortifications, to threaten anything of value they must move south, either towards the port at Portland (covered by the previous fortifications) or else mill around in the bay. The geography of Portland itself, which rises 200 feet above sea level, means that the city can't be attacked from the north. To attack the harbor you must go around Hog Island, and then put yourself at the mercy of the guns there and those of Fort Preble, and any floating batteries or obstacles erected at the mouth of the Fore River. If you want to attack Hog Island, you again have to go around to where you can target the batteries on the south side of the island, negating any reason for moving north in the first place.
Essentially, such a detour is pointless due to geography.
As an aside we are at last at the end of the month of May for TTL, and so despite some chapters flashing back to play a bit of catch up, we're mostly moving briskly forward into summer 1862.
The next three chapters will largely catch up other fronts with the rest of TTL. Mainly in the west, on the Potomac, and on the high seas. Chapter 24 will hopefully be up and running sometime next week.
The next three chapters will largely catch up other fronts with the rest of TTL. Mainly in the west, on the Potomac, and on the high seas. Chapter 24 will hopefully be up and running sometime next week.
Chapter 24: Celerity
Chapter 24: Celerity
“Without a decisive Naval force we can do nothing definitive - and with it, everything honorable and glorious.” - George Washington to Marquis de Lafayette, 15 November 1781
“When the war had opened in February 1862, the United States Navy was in the midst of one of the most audacious attempts at blockade undertaken in that century. Taking up the blockade of some 3,500 miles of Southern coastline and concentrating on 12 major ports, and numerous smaller points of entry along shores impassable to large warships. To do this they had, by January 1862, assembled a fleet of roughly 264 warships. However, many of these were converted merchantmen or sail vessels, and so not suited to the rigors of modern naval warfare, and found themselves rapidly decommissioned or sunk when war with Britain commenced.
In response, the Union had fallen back on what was seen as the traditional strategy, a robust defense of the primary ports and rivers, while engaging the British where they were most vulnerable, their commercial interests at sea. In this they had something of an advantage with the numerous converted merchantmen at hand. Those deemed suitable for duty were stocked and armed and sent cruising days after the initial declaration of war. Many of these were old paddle steamers or even sailing ships, which although completely defenceless against a modern screw warship, could more than easily handle the burning of Britain’s merchant ships. Most of these “first wave” commerce raiders were rapidly run to ground, and their effectiveness wad dulled by the Admiralty’s orders for all ships travelling to North America and the West Indies to move in convoy. However, when the “second wave” of steamers, modern screw vessels, sortied in early March and April, they were able to sweep out to all corners of Britain’s commercial empire.
However, this was not a war winning strategy. It had not been one in 1775-83 nor in 1812-15. Even half a century or a century later, in a world of oil burning ships and submarines, it would have at best mixed results when attempted by the Entente or Pact navies. The American planners in 1862 were just as aware of this deficiency, and so they would attempt to correct it by weakening the British as much as possible in asymmetric warfare in the littorals.
In this the Americans differed from the Russian Navy in 1853-56. Whereas the Russians had largely fled to port to preserve their ships, the Union sought to match their ships against those of the Royal Navy. Though purely ship to ship action was, rightly, seen as tantamount to suicide, the United States Navy was more than willing to take a school of hard knocks in littoral warfare.
In spite of the destruction wrought in the Gulf of Mexico in February from New Orleans to the Florida Keys, the USN had managed to escape the opening blows of the Royal Navy largely intact, and had proved it would not sit idly by in a series of sharp individual actions throughout March and the spring. Whether it was the destruction of the sloop Rosario, or the pouncing on of the gunship Trinculo, a series of short sharp actions buoyed the public, spirit, and made the British fume…”– To Arms!: The Great American War, Sheldon Foote, University of Boston 1999.
Blockade running would become essential to the Union war effort
“When planning for war in December, the British had considered blockade their most effective weapon of war against the Union. The way to carry out this plan though, was a matter of considerable debate amongst those in Whitehall and the Admiralty. Somerset, in contrast to many of his peers, felt blockade was the only viable strategy, and had only reluctantly endorsed the campaign in Maine. The blockade was though, the first thought on British minds when it came to shaping their overall strategy. This was informed not the least by the casual contempt amongst the British politicians and officer class for American morale and economy, but by half a centuries’ understanding of being the dominant naval power, and the success of the navy in the late Russian War.
They faced a considerable challenge though. In carrying out the chosen strategy they were faced with the daunting prospect of enforcing a blockade along 1,260 miles of coastline against seven principal ports, two major inlets, and numerous smaller ports and river inlets. As early as December 15th however, a rough strategy had been laid out under the advice of Captain John Washington, the Chief Hydrographer, who in the absence of a proper naval staff, served in the ad-hoc capacity of a staff officer for the Admiralty. He had devised a plan in his report “List of the Chief Ports of the Federal Coast of the United States” giving within an approximate number of ships estimated necessary in the blockade.
He concluded that in order to maintain a successful blockade, there would need to be squadrons placed off of the major ports and shipyards at Portland, Portsmouth, Boston Bay, New York (both the upper and lower bays), the Delaware, and the Chesapeake. In addition he recommended smaller squadrons for the Penobscot Bay, Kennebec River, Cape Ann and environs, and finally Narragansett Bay and environs. To do this, Washington estimated a force of roughly 40 ships for the principal ports, and a further twenty for the lesser ports and inlets. Thus when war was looming in late December and Milne had 45 ships on hand Somerset wrote to Milne and declared he had more than enough vessels on hand to carry out the blockade.
Milne however, disagreed. In response to Somerset he declared that Washington’s numbers were “utterly inadequate” for the operations at hand. He suggested that for the blockade of the major ports alone he would require 65 ships, much less the operations against minor ports and inlets. His own calculations estimated a force of at least 90 vessels[1] for a secure blockade, or almost a third of the Royal Navy’s ships currently on active duty. The realities of war however, ensured that he would end up carrying out his mission with far fewer than he would need.
Though the number of ships available and necessary was discussed and debated right up to the declaration of war, Milne had on hand, in the opinion of Whitehall, enough ships come February to carry out operations against the American coast. The true number of ships employed in North America, would eventually top 100 as the Admiralty became further committed to the blockade strategy.
On the outbreak of war though, the 60 odd vessels under Milne’s command proved enough to smash the remaining blockading squadrons on duty, and deliver a victory at the Battle of the Keyes. From there Milne began moving his ships to their various blockade stations. By the start of March he had 50 vessels employed on the blockade. While others were available, many vessels had been scooped up to take part in the campaign against Maine, and the contests on the rivers and lakes of North America, as well as convoy vessels across the Atlantic and hunt American commerce raiders, which had sortied as early as February despite Milne’s best efforts.
This first state of the blockade proved less than effective. Milne’s vessels were simply not numerous enough to patrol the whole coast line, and carry out the other duties necessary to protect British commerce and war materials. The case thus became one of attrition, numerous gunboats were lost in small inconsequential actions in the spring as the USN pounced on unwary vessels, and commerce raiders took advantage of local knowledge to slip past the blockade, either escorting runners, or simply breaking loose to wreak havoc.
The first wave of raiders managed, in less than a month, to destroy or capture, over 50 British flagged vessels leading to pointed questions in London. This lead to the unpopular, but effective, Convoy Order of April 5th 1862, wherein all ships going to and from North America and the West Indies were to travel in convoy under escort from a warship. Though unpopular, it cut British losses immensely in the summer months. But as targets became more difficult in the North Atlantic, many raiders moved on to richer pastures…
…the blockade in the early months, was undeniably leaky, and even Milne himself wrote that it was at best only partially effective. He also bemoaned that the Admiralty assigned to his squadrons many battleships, which although fine to act as flagships in the myriad of squadrons, were perfectly useless in the commerce war Britain found herself engaged in. Milne wrote to Somerset: “In this war there is a great want of Frigates and Corvettes. In the large service I have before me the Line of Battleships are of no great consequence, and I can scarce see on what service I can employ them. They do not stand the gales and sea off the American coast. As to attacking Forts it must never be done by anchoring ships but by passing and repassing in rotation so as not to allow a steady object to the enemy. Ships with larger draft of water are unfit for this task and you need not build any more.”[2]
However, he proved excellent at establishing a system of logistics for his vessels, and one of his first acts in early March was to seize the island of Martha’s Vineyard to act as a coaling station for his vessels. He established coaling depots at the Confederate base at Norfolk, and the port at Port Royal, with factory ships established in the Chesapeake and at Martha’s Vineyard. Though the work of keeping American ports shut did not proceed smoothly at first, his job in keeping his ships supplied and stocked, did. His strategy needed time however…”– Troubled Waters: The Anglo-American War at Sea, Michael Tielhard, Aurora Publishing, 2002
The rigors of blockade
“Commanding what had become the Home (or Atlantic) Squadron of the United States Navy based in New York was Flag Officer David Glasgow Farragut. The 60 year old Tennessee born naval officer had grown up in the South, first in Tennessee then Louisiana, but despite suspicions about his loyalties, he had moved his family from Virginia to New York, making it clear to all who knew him he regarded secession as treason. Thanks to the actions of his adoptive father, Captain David Porter, Farragut had been commissioned into the navy in 1810. He took part in the 1812-15 war, serving in the capture of HMS Alert in 1812 and the Battle of Valparaíso in 1813 where he was wounded and captured commanding a prize ship. Following his service against the British he had commanded in the West Indies against pirates aboard the USS Ferret, and then taken command of the USS Saratoga in the Mexican War blockading Tuxpan. During that war he established the United States naval station on Mare Island. Though originally selected to command the Gulf Squadron, he had been held back in New York as the crisis with Britain deepened after the departure of Lord Lyons at the end of January.
Upon the outbreak of war he had been placed in command of all those ships available in New York. He worked tirelessly with the commander of the Department, Major General John E. Wool, in order to make America’s largest port secure from attack. The fortifications in the Upper and Lower Bays were, as much as possible, armed and brought to readiness. The main channels were obstructed with booms and torpedoes where possible. However, Farragut was determined to do more than simply sit behind his defences and as he said to Fox shortly after his appointment; “Everything that can be done must be done immediately. I believe in celerity.”
To that end he organized the ships he had on hand. The three large screw sloops Hartford(28)[Flag], Pensacola(25), and Richmond(22), and the two smaller sloops Oneida(10), and Dacotah(8) which had been at the center of the action with Terror in November. They were supported by a dozen new build gunboats, Chippewa, Istaca, Cayuga, Katahdin, Pinola, Kineo, Kennebec, Wissahickon, Sciota, Owasco, and Winona, as well as the sidewheel gunboats, Octorora(8) and Port Royal(8). Alongside the regular warships were the converted steamer Varuna(10) and the converted gunboats Clifton(7), Jackson(6), and Westfield(6). Just as important were the ironclad vessels in the squadron, the USS Monitor(2), which had made her debut in March, and her sisters USS Montauk(2) and USS Catskill(2). There was also the new broadside ironclad the USS Galena(6) which rounded out the Home Squadron.
Despite the presence of the British squadrons off both Upper and Lower Bay, Farragut believed in getting his crews drilled, even with the prospect of a skirmish, which he felt would only be advisable as “The more you hurt the enemy the less he will hurt you.” To that effect he would drill his squadrons in the waters of Upper Bay and pounce on unwary British blockaders, managing to sink two gunboats in early April in such a fashion, forcing the British, in conjunction with the menacing of the ironclads, to move further out to sea.
Farragut attempted to keep the British off balance. Making repeated feints to wear the British down, or pounce on unwary single blockaders. He would feint against the British squadrons in the Lower Bay to clear the way for a raider or runner to escape, and harass the British warships. It prevented an easy routine…” – The First Admiral: The Life and Battles of David Glasgow Farragut
Flag Officer David Farragut
“The British blockade of New York was divided into two squadrons, each operating independent of one another due to the constraints of distance. By June they had been reinforced by two British ironclads to counter the American ironclads in service, HMS Trusty(14) and HMS Thunder(14).
The overall command of the blockade was under Rear-Admiral John Kingcome. He had joined the Royal Navy in 1808 and had served in the Anglo-Burmese War from 1824-26. Promoted to Captain in 1838 he commanded the Belleisle in 1841 during the First Opium War and then commanding the Royal William in the Baltic Sea during the Crimean War. He was selected to command the blockade off of New York, a difficult task. He had two squadrons under his command in the region:
Long Island Sound: Conqueror(101)(Flag), Phaeton(51), Challenger(21), Greenock(12), Charger(4), Hasty(5), Julia(4), Fervent(4), Insolent(4), Thunder(14)
New York: St. George(Flag)(89), Ariande(26), Jason(21), Chanticleer(17), Peterel(11), Mullet(5), Hyena(4), Osprey(4), Trusty(14)
Split between Long Island Sound and Lower Bay to cover both entrances to New York, a task which proved more complex than the Admiralty had anticipated due to geography, the advantages of steamships versus sail, and the audacity of Farragut. Kingcome broke his flag in St. George and remained responsible for the Lower Bay, covering the broader channel and moving as far north as Sandy Hook in his patrols, attempting a regular route to catch ships attempting to sortie. After the appearance of Monitor in March, he had his gunboats travel in pairs, shepherded by one of his corvettes, while Trusty would remain close inshore waiting for the signal an American ironclad had arrived. He established this system to keep his smaller boats safe from the unpredictable feints by Farragut, and to attempt to preserve as much coal as possible.
Commanding the blockade of Long Island Sound was Commodore Edward Sotheby. The 49 year old had only recently been promoted to commodore for his string of victories over the American squadrons in the Gulf, and with that promotion had come greater responsibilities. This was seen as reasonable however as his naval career had been, by all accounts, competent. He had entered the navy in 1828, serving in the Mediterranean and fighting in the Syrian Crisis of 1840 where he received his promotion to commander. From there he commanded the sloop Racehorse in New Zealand and China before taking on the command of the corvette Pearl in the East Indies. With the outbreak of the Indian Mutiny he commanded the Naval Brigade in the Oudh, and was mentioned in the dispatches 13 times and received the thanks of both houses of Parliament, the governor general of India, and the Admiralty.
He was faced with the difficult prospect of keeping all the smaller ports and inlets in Long Island Sound closed. He formed an “Inshore Squadron” around Thunder and the gunboats who patrolled the littoral harbors, while his frigates operated as far west as Huntington Bay fearing a sudden sortie by Farragut. Sotheby was in constant contact with Milne asking for more gunships, as he could not possibly operate with fewer with such a large American squadron nearby. More vessels were available, but were either operating in Canada and Maine, or fitting out and building come the summer of 1862.
So it was they went to battle with the fleet they had…”– Troubled Waters: The Anglo-American War at Sea, Michael Tielhard, Aurora Publishing, 2002
Little Gull Island
“…Farragut had been long trying to use his local knowledge to his advantage. He had studied the British patrol patterns with interest, and of particular note had been their laying of buoys to warn off ships from entering channels where the shoals or reefs were too thick for them. After a number of weeks of observation he was determined to use this to his advantage.
He would discover though that attempts to remove the buoys brought about a strong response by the British fleet on both channels. He found this unsatisfactory for an assault, and though such attempts produced limited skirmishing, it did not interfere with British navigation. So instead, Farragut simply decided to move the buoys. On the night of June 3rd he ordered his gunboats out to move the buoys over unsafe waters, and instructed the blockade runners to attempt to draw British ships near there.
This would pay off on June 22nd when the blockade runner Quaker City, pursued by the British frigate Phaeton, in league with the gunboat Hasty, came steaming in to The Race, the entrance to Long Island Sound that warm summer evening. Quaker City, a paddle wheel steamer which had originally been launched in 1854 for the soon defunct Collins Line had been sold to appease her creditors. She had been taken on lease by the government and commissioned into the navy in early 1861 under the command of James M. Frailey who had commanded her as a blockader just days after the declaration of the blockade of the South in 1861, where he had scooped up 9 vessels. Originally he had an armament of 9 guns (one 20pnd Parrott Rifle and 8 32pnd guns), but her sidewheel paddle and her commendable speed of 13 knots meant she would be put to use as an armed blockade runner. Shedding all but three of her guns she had run the blockade in early March, making her way to Brest where she took on a cargo of French rifles purchased by American merchants, and making a run home to New York. She sortied again in April, capturing and burning the brig Jessie in the Bay of Fundy before making a trip through the Baltic to pick up a supply of Prussian powder and again running through the British blockade. Her third sortie at the end of the month had been south to St. Thomas to acquire a supply of Prussian muskets circuitously bought through Danish merchants. From there she raced back to New York, when she was finally spotted by Phaeton.
USS Quaker City
Running at full steam Frailey came into sight of Phaeton just as he was coming around Montauk Point. With his steam up he streamed past the frigate as the British attempted to get their own engines up to speed, and soon the big ship was sending up signals and giving chase. Steering close to the shallow water where the big frigate could not follow, Frailey remained in water deep enough for him to maneuver, but much more hazardous for the frigate, he maneuvered towards Gull Island. This would pay off as at 6:33pm Phaeton, twice the size and tonnage of Frailey’s 1400 ton vessel, hit the shoals off Little Gull Island with a resounding crash, and beached herself. Hasty immediately broke off her pursuit in an attempt to aid her larger consort. Phaeton’s commander, Captain Edward Tatham was no fool, with experience in the blockade from the Russian War and years of coastal experience with the coast guard, he had been running his ship carefully. However, Farragut’s simple moving of the buoys had paid dividends and he ended up resolutely stuck and calling for aid.
Frailey ran into New York harbor and was quick to relate the news of the frigates beaching to Farragut, while Hasty was just as quick to send word to Sotheby.
Farragut, wasted no time in bringing his forces together. Desiring to face one only foe at a time he sent the ironclads Monitor and Catskill, with the steamers Richmond and Oneida, and half his gunboats, to sortie against Kingcome’s squadron to prevent them from interfering while he took the remainder of his vessels to capture or destroy the British frigate.
By the afternoon of June 23rd Sotheby aboard Conqueror had arrived, with the protection of the Inshore Squadron with Thunder, Hasty, Julia, and Fervent, as well as the Challenger. All were angling to take Phaeton off of her unfortunate perch. However, their efforts had been unsuccessful thus far, and when Farragut’s vessels appeared they were in the process of attempting to haul Phaeton off the rocks.
Farragut led from the deck of Hartford, leading the charge with the big sloop alongside Pensacola, Dacotah, and Varuna. The ironclads came up behind, while his gunboats, shepherded by Octorora and Port Royal, brought up the rear. The sight of the big battleship however, caught Farragut off guard. He had been expecting that the British would not risk the large ship in potentially shallow waters, and expected to be able to catch the smaller British vessels and sink them in detail. Despite his numeric superiority, Farragut brought only 111 guns to the battle, all told the British had 149. This is when his famous phrase was first uttered.
Contrary to William Abernathy’s cutlass flailing shouting portrayal in 1962’s The First Admiral, the phrase was most likely uttered in response to a comment made by Captain Drayton.
According to witnesses Drayton, upon seeing the big ship said: “I don’t like those odds sir.”
In response Farragut replied “Damn the odds. Go ahead, four bells Captain Drayton.”
Much milder than the wildand more dramatic version most Americans remember, but history can sometimes be tamer than we imagine. The resulting battle was not.
Upon sighting Farragut’s ships Sotheby immediately signaled for his ships to form up for engagement. The gunboats split off from the ironclad to consort with Challenger, while Conqueror attempted to place herself in waters which would allow her room to maneuver. Thunder, broke off to engage the American ironclads.
Thus began the first battle between ironclad warships in history.
Though Thunder was outnumbered, she far outweighed her opponents in armament. Monitor carried only two 11inch Dahlgren guns in her turrets, while Galena carried four 9inch smoothbore Dahlgren guns and two Parrott rifles. Thunder carried fourteen 68pnd cannon. Monitor held an advantage with her turret, but her slow rate of fire negated that effect, and Galena held no advantage whatsoever.
Galena was sunk after two salvoes from Thunder’s broadside, shredding her 3inch armor as though it did not exist. Monitor, with her thicker armor, fared better. Her armament was insufficient to pierce Thunder’s shell, but Thunder in turn did not possess the type of ammunition it was later reckoned would pierce ironclad armor. Their gunnery duel lasted an hour, until both Monitor’s turrets were battered shut, and Thunder took serious damage to her smokestack, but Monitor would withdraw first, towards the safety of the torpedoes and forts of New York Harbor.
The remainder of the action though, did not play out in the Royal Navy’s favor.
Despite her advantage in firepower, Conqueror was severely limited in her maneuverability by her deep draft in the shallow waters, and as such spent more of the fight maneuvering that contributing to the battle itself. The gunboats of the Inshore Squadron, shorn of the ironclad protection, entered a swirling melee with their American counterparts. Julia was sunk after veering too far from her consorts for support, and Hasty fell when overpowered by the sheer weight of American guns. Only the timely intervention of Thunder saved Fervent from meeting her sisters’ fates.
Challenger tried in vain to protect Phaeton, but with the big American sloops concentrating their energy on her, she fell to numbers. Phaeton would end up burned by her crew as they withdrew under the cover of Thunder and Conqueror’s guns, but it was an inglorious day for the Royal Navy.
The battle of Little Gull Island ended with a heavy toll for the British. Two gunboats, a frigate, and a sloop sunk, in exchange for three American gunboats, the converted warship Varuna, and an American ironclad sunk. Farragut, though he had failed in his goal of capturing the British ship, returned to port to great acclaim, and the blockade of Long Island Sound was severely weakened for crucial months as the British moved ships from convoy duty and coastal patrol to stop up the gaps. Farragut was on his way to earning his just fame alongside the likes of Tegetthoff, Brown and Grau in 19th Century naval warfare.
All in all it would provide a valuable lesson to both sides in the nature of modern war at sea…”– The First Admiral: The Life and Battles of David Glasgow Farragut
-----
1] This comes from a reading of Milne’s own comments, and the various prospective plans drawn up by Washington and Milne on the issue of the blockade. What is clear though is that no major consensus of what was truly necessary was reached in the time between the seizure of the Trent and when Lincoln decided to release the commissioners. My own assumptions stem from thoughts by modern scholars, and those put to paper by people at the time. Some fascinating reads on the matter from modern scholars can be found in Kenneth Bourne’s article British Preparations for War with the North, 1861-1862, Howard Fuller’s Clad in Iron: The American Civil War and the Challenge of British Naval Power, and No Need of Glory: British Navy in American Waters, 1860-64 by Regis Courtenmanche.
2] Letter from Milne to Somerset quoted in Fuller’s Clad in Iron, but slightly edited to suit my purposes. Amusingly the original goes on to say “Their days are numbered except against France…if she ever gets up a Navy.”
Last edited:
RodentRevolution
Banned
Well I thought I would give someone else a chance to comment but winter is passing so...
Another beautifully rendered instalment EnglishCanuck. I like the contrasting styles of the various historians, I also quite like the way Farragut wins a battle in which he only loses an ironclad...wait what...I have read more than a few histories like that. Certainly it feels like the opposing navies are going to learn or rather relearn the realities of a long grinding struggle.
Another beautifully rendered instalment EnglishCanuck. I like the contrasting styles of the various historians, I also quite like the way Farragut wins a battle in which he only loses an ironclad...wait what...I have read more than a few histories like that. Certainly it feels like the opposing navies are going to learn or rather relearn the realities of a long grinding struggle.
Saphroneth
Banned
Of course you knew I was going to weigh in.
Okay, so firstly the Montauk and Catskill are probably showing up a little bit early unless they're pure 11" designs, as the 8" rifle and the 15" smoothbore as naval weapons are a ways in the future (though I admit to being guilty of that one myself!) Either way they're soaking up a lot of the existing resources which OTL went to the Passaic class, which might not be the best approach for the Union to take... probably realistic though.
Secondly, the Galena is probably being sunk too easily, as Thunder's broadside can pierce but only with shot (and Galena has backing on her iron so spall is not too serious). A sloop would not be sunk by a couple of dozen iron balls, even ones that large, though she might be rendered hors d'combat if it takes out her three guns on one broadside.
Thirdly, the Monitor here is enduring far too much damage. Monitor may or may not be vulnerable to a single penetration at very close range (it depends on a number of things including whether she's been up-armoured and the temperature of the armour and shot), but she does not have any backing and so the spall will simply have killed her turret crew. Here you have her enduring roughly 420 shots fired at her, and even if most of those miss (unlikely at close range) those which hit will have done so much damage to her turret that she'll be utterly unfightable long before an hour has gone past.
I'm afraid it's the question of "terminal effects" - that is, what does the shot do behind the armour? (Thunder is one of the first generation "Aetna" ironclads, so she has timer backing; Monitor does not have timber backing on the turret, and of course she's being hit with so much shot that it wouldn't take too long for a shot to hit where a previous one has already. If Monitor takes two hits on the same or similar places at close range, then she is getting pierced; the iron's so brittle and sandy that a hit will be shattering plates.)
Also, Monitor has one two-gun turret, and I don't think she had proper gunport shutters - in pictures there's no sign of them, unless they hinge upwards to the inside.
RodentRevolution
Banned
I think the danger here is that you are forgetting you are reading other people's histories and not necessarily the 'truth' of what happened according to EC. I would point out we have all read a few history books which have left us scratching our heads over certain incidents and wondering what exactly the author drinking when he read the historical records?
Saphroneth
Banned
I'm aware of that, but nevertheless - well, frankly, the only way I could see Monitor not legging it after half that long is if Thunder had only loaded shell that day, and if so she shouldn't have been able to sink Galena either.
The disparity is significant enough that I thought I'd weigh in. If I read a history book which implied that Monitor sank Virginia with her third salvo it'd raise the same kind of questions
RodentRevolution
Banned
I'm aware of that, but nevertheless - well, frankly, the only way I could see Monitor not legging it after half that long is if Thunder had only loaded shell that day, and if so she shouldn't have been able to sink Galena either.
The disparity is significant enough that I thought I'd weigh in. If I read a history book which implied that Monitor sank Virginia with her third salvo it'd raise the same kind of questions
Well Galena certainly had something bad happen to her...maybe a Queen Mary moment? Monitor may have simply gotten lucky that Thunder faced Galena first. Shifting a five ton gun is definitely the kind of activity that slows down a bit as you progress into the action.
Saphroneth
Banned
True, though frankly if I had to pick which one would last the hour it'd be Galena. (I don't think either of them would last long, mind - I just think that Galena is the one more likely to last for half an hour or more without either being rendered completely unfightable or being sunk, because of a combination of more reserve bouyancy, better backing and more surface area so the vital points are more spread out.)
Oh, and for the record the 68-lber is six tons with carriage. There's a reason it had an assigned crew of eighteen men...
As the Galena is basically lightly armored gunboat (as it is about 1/3 the size of the Brooklyn) it doesn't seem unreasonable that a couple of hits in the right circumstances would sink her. For that matter the Monitor is really just an armored gunboat.
Last edited:
Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed it, I thought it was decently written at least! Though I confess I'm always leery of writing naval installments since they are the most difficult for me. I thought Farragut was the one who should really inflict the first real defeat suffered by the RN in this war, he always impressed me with his aggressive nature and outside the box thinking when it came to naval tactics.
Well I do enjoy the challenge of the debates you represent
They are both basically carbon copies of the Monitor, like their sisters mentioned back in Chapter 23 they are constructed like that for expedience sake. The lessons of Monitor's weaknesses aren't quite learned until this battle here.
Galena's armor was very weak under heavy shellfire even from a distance. The 8inch guns in Fort Darling at Drewey's Bluff pierced the armor 13 times. I think that at closer range a 68pnder could easily demonstrate more lethal effectiveness against 3inch armor. Thunder being lower in the water, I imagine the shots could manage to fill her with holes pretty quickly.
Part of that hour includes time where Thunder was engaged with Galena (and a bit longer), but a little is shorthand.
Hmm I'll look that up, but I felt that her pilot house was too thick to be pierced by even concentrated 68pnder shot. She's also absurdly low in the water, meaning that even at close range lots of shots from a broadside will simply sail over her.
Well being honest, I don't really use reliable narrators in TTL, as should be obvious with some of the writing by my "historical domain" authors. I hit on all the important details that TTL's historians would largely agree upon, but there's just too much detail to cram into these chapters to hit all the relevant facts. I try and allude to some on and off, but largely I'm just trying to tell the story from an outsiders perspective and the flawed understanding of the people on the ground at the time.
That was my thinking. Galena didn't really have good armor either, which meant she might not really stand up in a real knock down fight, and Monitor isn't a great design, but she's certainly an effective stop gap boat.
Saphroneth
Banned
In that case then they should be pretty weak ships, but they'd be possible to build by that point.
I'd be surprised if shell could pierce 3" armour before the days of the Palliser. I'm sure Galena was penetrated by shot - in fact, it's expected - but you should note that Galena was able to fire off all her ammunition at Drewry's Bluff and retire in good order. This is because the shot pierced, but that still makes it less effective than a cannonball fired into an unarmoured sloop - and a dozen such cannonballs couldn't really render a sloop into a sinking condition, it's only a few 8" diameter holes and her crew is materially intact.
Actually, Monitor is not absurdly low in the water. Her freeboard is low, but her turret is actually quite high - as high as the sides of a typical ship - and the pilot house is similar. And only a couple of dozen hits on her turret is more than she can endure and retain any kind of fighting capability (out of about 3-400 shots fired at her).
Neither the turret or the pilot house is backed. The resistance is between 10 and 20 foot-tons per inch, and the 68-lber simply has too much energy density to be adequately stopped. Even allowing for the inevitable underperformance of guns in battle as opposed to in tests, the 68-lber shot hitting anything of Monitor which is above the deck will be producing heavy spall and shattering multiple plates per hit.
Note that I don't argue that either ship would be put in a sinking condition - Monitor's waterline is very well protected - but that the exposed turret and pilot house of Monitor would actually be more vulnerable to damage than the exposed body of Galena shot-for-shot because the Galena has backed armour.
In short, Galena's weaker armour doesn't mean she should be rendered into a sinking condition so quickly, and Monitor's stronger armour doesn't mean she'd be able to last so long before deciding to retreat.
The problem Monitor has is simply that her armour is not thick enough to prevent "terminal effects" (i.e. damage to and behind the armour scheme) and that she has so little redundancy in her fighting capabilities above the freeboard (i.e. everything that sticks out of the deck is vital) so she'd be quickly disabled.
Heck, her turret shouldn't last more than half a dozen hits, they'd knock the turret spindle out of alignment and she'd be unable to turn it. Then she's vulnerable to being boarded, let alone hammered into surrender...
Last edited:
Well it's working with the understanding they had historically, and absent the understanding of Monitor's problems in March 1862, I don't think they would leap immediately on to the ideas for the Passiac Class. This would be within the Union's capabilities to build quickly.
Galena anchored 550 meters away from Fort Darling, and suffered 44 hits in 3 hours and suffered 13 penetrations of her armor, alongside 13 dead and 11 wounded. If that kind of damage can be accomplished from long range, at close range with a gun just as heavy (and more of them) I would say that damage dealt should be debilitating to such a bad armor scheme.
The damage might be enough, but that's assuming all good hits, and Monitor's very design does a good job of protecting her from a broadside. Lot's of wasted shot by Thunder, but eventually it will batter the ship into withdrawal.
Now I'm not good with mathematical equations, but with Monitor being a small target, and only a few of Thunder's guns able to hit anything of consequence on her, I would argue that statistically over an hour or so of fighting Monitor would suffer fewer hits than you imagine, even in ideal conditions. Over time though these hits will add up and force the ship out of action. I don't think though, that it is possible to predict such a thing with any degree of certainty.
Galena, being a larger and more vulnerable target, is in a much worse position. She's got a better profile for a broadside to hit, and her armor is too thin to prevent penetration on most of those shots. A few hits at or below the waterline and that's all she wrote.
Sinking her would be harder, since the turret can't really sink, and if its bashed out of joint the ship will just withdraw, and Thunder can't really pursue in this instance. I don't quite think that with her design a broadside boat is going to be able to cause as much damage, and the scenario in this battle precludes any pursuit if she withdraws.