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Ironclads and Blockade Runners
Of the American Civil War
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![[USS Essex]](Essex.jpg)
USS Essex near Baton Rouge, 1863
![[USS (ex-CSS) Atlanta]](Atlanta.jpg)
USS Atlanta (ex-CSS Atlanta) on the James River, 1864
Last updated on 10 January 2003.
The combat of the Merrimac and the Monitor made the greatest change in sea-fighting since cannon fired by gunpowder had been mounted on ships...
—Winston Churchill, History of the English-Speaking Peoples
For the navies, the American Civil War began on 12 April 1861 when Fort Sumter was fired upon, and it ended on 23 June 1865 with the official raising of the blockade. However, the first shots of the war were really those fired at the steamer Star of the West as she approached Charleston Harbor on 9 January 1861; and the cruiser CSS Shenandoah did not finally haul down her flag until 7 November 1865.
In between these dates occurred more naval actions than in the rest of the world combined in the period between 1815 and 1914. Usually thought of as a land war, the American Civil War was also by far the largest naval war of the era. Action occurred in the English Channel, in the Indian Ocean, and the Bering Sea, as well as along the Southern and Northern coasts and up the rivers. Some hardly qualified as skirmishes; some were wholesale battles with major strategic consequences.
At the junction of naval warfare and industrial technology were two very special types of ship, the likes of which had hardly ever been seen before in the world. The ironclads were the advent of the modern armored, self-propelled warship, and the blockade runners took wholesale smuggling to new technological heights. Under the immense pressure of war, technology advanced at a breakneck pace. These pages are dedicated to these fascinating ships, their designers, and the valiant crews of both sides who sailed and fought them.
Moved the page... hope I didn't lose too many people! As always, the information in this site is as good as possible, and derives from research utilizing the sources listed in the Bibliography. Errors, though I hope they are few, are mine.
Suggestions, comments, and friendly insults are welcome; write to Mark F. Jenkins .
![[Robert E. Lee]](Relee.jpg)
USS Fort Donelson, formerly the blockade runner Robert E. Lee
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![[Wreck]](Wreck.gif)
The fate of an unsuccessful blockade runner
(This might have been the Colt)
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- Links
- The Monitor: History and Legacy
 - from the Mariners' Museum
- The Denbigh Project - Investigating a blockade runner
- Investigations of the Ivanhoe - A blockade runner wreck survey (FSU)
- CSS Virginia Home Page - It wasn't the Merrimack; find out why!
- Brooklyn History: The USS Monitor
- The CSS Albemarle - the ironclad built in a cornfield that terrorized the Union Navy
- Confederate States Navy page - A must-see if you had ancestors in the CSN
- Battle between the Monitor and the Virginia
- Navies in the Civil War
- Brown Water Navy: The Union Navy on the Western Rivers Link MIA as of 9/15/02
- The Civil War @ Charleston - The Hunley, blockade runners, Fort Sumter, and much more
- Information about the CSS Phoenix - Ironclad wreck in Mobile Bay (FSU)
- The Monitor National Marine Sanctuary - official site for the preservation of the Monitor
- The Legacy of the Monitor - more about the Monitor
- The Blockade Runners - fiction by Jules Verne
- USS Harvest Moon Home Page
- The American Civil War - Naval War - Nice collection of facts 'n' stuff
- St. Louis' Ships of Iron - from The American Local History Network of St. Louis
- Yazoo Afloat - the Yazoo Naval Preservation Foundation
- Pre-Dreadnought Preservation - Slightly later in time, but good stuff
- Virtual tour of HMS Warrior
- Raising the Civil War Gunboats - Efforts to preserve the remains of the Johnsonville "tinclads"
- www.css-alabama.com - see the latest efforts to conserve artifacts from the CSS Alabama.
- The Diplomacy of the American Civil War
- American Coast Defense Forts - Terrific detail on US coastal fortifications
- Save Ohio's only Civil War battlefield!
- Buffington Island Battlefield Archaeological Project - My alma mater (Heidelberg College) is leading the way
- Battle Summary: Buffington Island
- Ohio Historical Society: Buffington Island
- Buffington Island Preservation Message Board - sound off!
- Buffington Island (91st OVI)
- My article on the Operations of the Mississippi Squadron during Morgan's Raid - now illustrated
- Reenactment Organizations:
- The Pook Turtle Project - Building a replica of a western rivers ironclad gunboat
- Union Naval Historical Society / Western Gunboat Flotilla
- The Kearsarge Afterguard and Marine Detachment
- Museums and Historical Organizations:
- USS Cairo Gunboat and Museum - The best-preserved of the raised Civil War warships
- The CSS Neuse State Historic Site
- The Mariners' Museum, Hampton Roads VA - Artifacts from the Monitor and Virginia plus much more
- The Monitor Center - Part of the Mariners' Museum site, specific info on Monitor preservation efforts
- Hampton Roads Naval Museum, Norfolk VA
- Port Columbus/CSS Jackson - Formerly the Confederate Naval Museum
- Smith's Master Index of North American Maritime Museum Resources
- Friends of the Hunley - I'm not all that crazy about the Hunley, but if you are, this is a good site
- The collapse of HMVS Cerberus - British ironclad hulk in peril
- American Battlefield Protection Program (National Park Service)
- San Francisco Maritime National Park Association
- Navy League of the United States
- The United States Naval Institute
- Naval Historical Foundation
- Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War
- Sons of Confederate Veterans
- Documents and images:
- U.S. Civil War Navies - articles, muster rolls and images
- Civil War Album - Collection of photos, reports, and maps
- Civil War Maps and Charts - Listed by state
- US Navy ship images of the National Archives
- Navies in Transition
- US Navy Naval Historical Center
- US Military Academy Department of History Civil War Maps
- Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships (DANFS) Online
- Civil War Naval Forces Index
- Treasurenet Naval Images
- Treasurenet Naval Officers Images
- Selected Civil War Photographs - Library of Congress
- Images at the Naval Historical Center
- Orin's Gallery - Computer images of Civil War warships
- War Times Journal, Civil War Navies
- Confederate naval personnel card index
- Official Records, Armies (OR) online - at eHistory site
- US Navy officers, 1 Jan 1865 (Naval Historical Center)
- US Navy 1864 uniform regulations (Naval Historical Center)
- Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant (online) - not Navy, but what the heck
- Admiral David Glasgow Farragut - an online biography
- Memoirs of Service Afloat - by Raphael Semmes, complete text online
- Running the Blockade - by Thomas E. Taylor, complete text online
- Narrative of a Blockade Runner - by John Wilkinson, complete text online
- First Fight of Iron-clads - Century Magazine article by John Taylor Wood
- In the Monitor Turret - Century Magazine article by Samuel D. Greene
- Watching the Merrimac - Century Magazine article by R.E. Colson
- Recollections of Foote and the Gun-Boats - Century Magazine article by James B. Eads
- Operations of the Western Flotilla, Part I - Century Magazine article by Henry Walke
- Operations of the Western Flotilla, Part II - Century Magazine article by Henry Walke
- Gaming, books, etc. (Listing does not necessarily mean endorsement of commercial sites):
- The Naval Wargames Society
- Naval Wargames
- WRM Graphics (Civil War naval art and models)
- Civil War Gunboat Ship Paintings and Prints by C. Ron Virts
- Bonegames (Sovereign Seas Lite)
- A Hotter Fire (miniature rules)
- Canis Publishing - Smoke on the Water (miniature rules)
- Thoroughbred naval miniatures
- Peter Pig naval miniatures (UK)
- Langton Miniatures (UK)
- Hobbyland Stores
- Civil War Times Illustrated (magazine) Link MIA as of 9/15/02
- Morningside Books
- Broadfoot Publishing
- The Naval Institute Press
- Civil War Books Online
- Navy books at Shamrock Hill Books
- Guild Press (Official Records, Navies on CD-ROM)
- Ship plans from the National Archives for sale
- The Mariners' Museum - Soon coming out with collections of ship plans and blueprints
- My review of Harry Harrison's alternate-history novel Stars & Stripes Forever.
- Onscreen (Listing does not necessarily mean endorsement of commercial sites):
- Lincoln's Secret Weapon - Recent "Nova" program on the Monitor
- Ironclads (TV Movie, 1991) - Shaky but interesting; see a review
- Civil War navy related videos at Amazon.com:
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- Index Sites:
- American Civil War (Dakota State University) - Jim Janke's great index page
- The Civil War Center - One of the best
- American Civil War
- United States Civil War
- Civil War Interactive - premier Web Civil War magazine, great articles
- Civil War Battlefields/Battlefield Vacations - maps, descriptions, history
- John's Nautical and Boatbuilding Page - Includes the "Mother of All Maritime Links" list
- Haze Gray & Underway - A tour de force site on the history of the Navy
- Maritime History Research on the Internet
- The World Wide Web Virtual Library: Naval and Marine
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1997 Site Award
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1997
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2001
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I'd like to thank all visitors to this site (over 60,000 now, which surpasses the number of visits to the old AOL address I used to have). Due to differences of opinion with the counter service I was using, I'm no longer tracking hits.
Some graphics courtesy of http://www.mccannas.com
This website is optimized for 800x600 resolution.
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