6 June 2022: A few years back, we posted some pictures and the story of the U.S. Ironclad Monitor, the famed start of the "modern" navy - as far a ship construction is concerned. She fought the Confederate ironclad, CSS Virginia (nee Merrimack) in Hampton Roads VA during the American Civil War. Neither won but the concept of iron cladding a ship was proved beyond a doubt. Monitor, during a tow offshore in December of 1862, was overwhelmed with storm seas and was cut lose from her towing vessel as she began to sink. Here is some further info on the wreck following the recovery of her turret (which is on display in the Newport News (VA) maritime museum. It's from the Center Daily Times.
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One of the nation’s most revered military shipwrecks was
visited in May by a NOAA-backed team and they made a surprising discovery 16
miles off North Carolina. The Civil War ironclad USS Monitor is apparently
refusing to surrender to the forces of nature. Despite being on the seafloor
since 1862, the first-of-its-kind ship remains in “an excellent state of
preservation,” according to Tane Renata Casserley, resource protection and
permit coordinator at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Monitor
National Marine Sanctuary. That’s all the more surprising given Navy divers
made significant intrusions into the shipwreck in 2002, when they recovered the
highly prized turret and other artifacts for preservation, he said. “The wreck
is in an astounding condition after being on the seafloor for 160 years and
weathering all of the environmental conditions off Cape Hatteras, including
exceedingly strong currents and hurricanes,” Casserley told McClatchy News.
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Monitor's gun barrel, preserved in Newport News Maritime Museum
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“During those (2002) projects, it was necessary to cut into
the ironclad’s armorbelt, hull, and deck to gain access to the turret since the
shipwreck was on top of it. The question for us at NOAA was, did those cuts
into the shipwreck cause further deterioration? Would we see significant
changes caused by these actions today?” The answer to those questions “was a
resounding ‘No’,” he said. It’s a revelation that begs explanation, and
Casserley has a theory.
The USS Monitor was visited as part of the Valor in the
Atlantic expedition, which sent a remotely operated camera to explore multiple
ships sunk during the Civil War and World War II. The USS Monitor was the
oldest and most important of them, as the first U.S. warship built with a
revolutionary rotating gun turret, NOAA reports. Monitor sank on New Year’s Eve
in 1862, in a region off North Carolina known as the Graveyard of the Atlantic,
due to an estimated 2,000 shipwrecks. Sixteen U.S. sailors were lost in the
sinking, historians say. “The waves grew and the wind howled. With each pitch
and roll, shock waves ravaged the crew and the hull of the little ship,”
according to a NOAA report. “Leaks developed, flooding the engines and reducing
steam pressure needed for propulsion. The crew tried using pumps and even
bailing with buckets, but the distress was too great. ... The turret was the
only escape hatch from below and as the men attempted dashing across the deck
many of them were swept into the unknown by the treacherous waves.” The Monitor
was rediscovered in 1973 — “lying upside down in 230 feet of water” — by the
Duke University Research Vessel Eastward and efforts to protect the
first-of-its-kind vessel began almost immediately, NOAA reports. In 1975, the
USS Monitor site became “the nation’s first national marine sanctuary,” a move
that intends to protect and preserve it as an important part of the “nation’s
maritime heritage.”
The Valor in the Atlantic expedition May 15-25 counted as
“the first examination of the site” since 2002, and Casserley feared it would
show the turret recovery project led to advanced deterioration. Finding
otherwise has left the scientists looking for explanations, and Casserley
thinks the “robustness of Monitor’s construction” continues to defend it. “That
same iron armor that deflected cannonballs fired at point blank range and even
collisions ... has now contributed to its longevity on the seafloor,” Casserley
says. “That same iron hull and armorbelt built to withstand the rigors of war,
has now enabled Monitor to provide a stable habitat in its new role as an
island of life. It truly was incredible to see the transformation at the bottom
of the ocean. There was often so much marine life on Monitor it was difficult
to see the shipwreck itself.” A remotely operated camera examined only the
exterior, so questions remain about the what’s happening inside of the vessel,
he said. The expedition team, which partnered with the Global Foundation for
Ocean Exploration, left the wreck realizing much of it remains unaltered,
offering an extraordinary opportunity for marine archaeologists and historians.
“This area is a time capsule back to 1862 to learn more about how the crew
lived and worked aboard a prototype ironclad warship,” Casserley said. “In some
regards is in better structural shape than the majority of shipwrecks from the same
time period as well as extending to the WWII-era shipwrecks. The bottom line is
USS Monitor will be here for generations to come to share its stories of
heroism.”
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I have visited the museum and seen the artifacts - amazing to behold - and the reproductions of the two combatants. A site we can unequivocally recommend should you find yourself in or around Newport News. And as a "P.S.": the prefix USS (United States Ship) was not in common use until January, 1907 (Pres Theodore Roosevelt) and clearly, not during the Civil War as, obviously, the country was NOT the United States!
Until next time,
Fair Winds,
Old Salt
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