IRONCLAD EVIDENCE
Stories from the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia

On December 31, 1862, the USS Monitor sank in a storm sixteen miles off the coast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. The discovery of the wreck of the USS Monitor in 1973 and the eventual recovery of some of the most significant parts of that ship have shed new light on the Civil War Union ironclad and renewed attention to its worthy opponent, the Confederate ironclad, CSS Virginia.

In 1975, the wreck of the USS Monitor was designated America’s first National Marine Sanctuary. The site is protected and managed by the National Marine Sanctuary Program of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), an agency of the US Department of Commerce.

Due to evidence that the Monitor’s hull was rapidly deteriorating, NOAA and the US Navy conducted large scale diving operations between 1998 and 2002 that shored up the Monitor’s collapsing hull and recovered hundreds of artifacts, including the propeller, engine, gun turret, and guns.

This exhibition uses a select group of these artifacts, together with documentary evidence to tell the stories of the unique vessels that engaged in the first naval battle between two ironclad warships, the CSS Virginia and the USS Monitor.