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Later Classes of Monitors:
Introduction
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Vulcan arming Neptune
From the Collections of The Mariners' Museum
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Though Ericsson's original monitor is
well known, it is not commonly understood that it served as
a prototype for several other monitors built during the Civil
War. In all, including the original Monitor, sixty monitor
type ships were constructed during the war, and of these thirty-seven
were actually commissioned.
This new batch of monitor-type ships,
designed by Ericsson are classed into two classes of vessel:
the Passaic Class and the Canonicus Class monitors.
Both of these classes were improved and enlarged designs of
the original Monitor. The differences that mark these
classes are as follows:
The Passaic class monitor was
the result of flaws noticed in the original Monitor.
In the aftermath of the March 9, 1862, battle between the Monitor
and the Virginia, Commodore Joseph Smith, who had served
on the ironclad board that had approved the building of the
first monitor, suggested alterations to the ship's design. He
wanted thicker hull plating, larger guns, better steering, and
an improved pilot house design. Ericsson responded with the
plans for a new monitor, called the Passaic. On the exterior,
this new monitor varied from the original in several ways. The
new monitor was larger than the original, measuring 200 feet
by 45 feet in the beam. The hull, was designed with shiplike
lines, a departure from the original monitor's, near flat bottom.
Most noticeably, the pilot house was enlarged to six feet in
diameter and was mounted on top of the turret. The turret was
enlarged to twenty-one feet in diameter and the armor thickness
increased to eleven inches. The Passaic was also originally
designed to carry two fifteen inch Dahlgren guns. However, production
problems slowed the manufacture of these large guns and most
Passaic class monitors carried a lop-sided combination
of one eleven inch Dahlgren and one fifteen inch Dahlgren. A
"impregnable smoke pipe" or stack was also added, made of six
one inch plates, the stacks were designed to withstand considerable
abuse. Later, following the action at Fort Sumter, where the
Passaic's turret was disabled by a shot denting the base
of the turret, an iron collar was placed around the base of
the turret to protect it from damage.
On the interior, the Passaic
monitors had improved boilers and ventilation systems and reinforcing
bulkheads to support the turret area. During the course of the
war ten Passaic class monitors were built (Passaic,
Montauk, Catskill, Patapsco, Lehigh, Sangamon, Weehawken, Nantucket,
and Camanche). As a class the Passaic's were remarkably
durable, and many saw continued naval service off and on during
the remainder of the 19th century.
The second series of Ericsson monitors
built during the Civil War was the Canonicus class ship. This
class was again an improvement in design based on experience
gained by both the original Monitor and the Passaic.
The Canonicus was slightly longer measuring 225 feet
in length, but slightly narrower than the Passaic. This
was done to give the new monitors greater performance. Ventilation,
always a problem aboard monitors, particularly when on duty
in the South was improved by the installation of more powerful
blowers. In armament the Canonicus carried two massive
fifteen inch smooth bore Dahlgrens. In all, nine Canonicus
class monitors were built: Canonicus, Catawba, Mahoptac,
Manayunk, Manhattan, Oneota, Saugus, Tecumseh and the Tippicanoe.
Because of the similarity of the exteriors
of these monitors, visual identification of individual monitors
was not always easy. To make identification easier, it was common
practice to paint the turrets of the monitor with unique patterns
colored stripes.
A third class of monitor was also developed
during the Civil War, but proved to be largely unsuccessful.
This class of monitor were the light draft monitors commonly
called the Casco class. The Casco class monitors
were developed to meet the needs of the navy to operate along
the shallow waters of the Mississippi River and it various tributaries.
The Casco monitors were to have a draft of only six feet,
and a freeboard of fifteen inches and were to be lightly armored
compared to their larger cousins the Passaic and the
Cononicus. John Ericsson drew the original plans, which
were altered by naval chief engineer Alban Stimers. Stimers's
alterations included redesigning the class to have a draft of
only four feet, but at the same time increased the armor on
the decking and turret. Additional weight was also added to
the Cascos by the placement of internal ballast tanks
designed to be flooded to lower the ship's silhouette when going
into battle, and improved heavier engines. Unfortunately the
added weight to the design sank the vessels into the water until
they had less than three inches of freeboard. Leakage and seeping
of water in the vessels made them nearly useless. The only way
to make the ships serviceable was to build the deck up with
an additional twenty-two inches of decking that only added an
additional 130 tons of displacement to the already too heavy
vessels. Though fifteen Casco class monitor were constructed,
only eight were eventually reconstructed to make them serviceable,
and none of these saw action on the western rivers. Overall,
the class was a tremendous failure.
A note on the names of these vessels
seems in order. Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles directed
that new vessels being built should illustrate the pride of
the American nation by having distinctly American names. As
a result, many of the monitors received names of American rivers,
lakes, mountains, cities or Indian tribes. This practice created
a list of names that in some cases proved nearly unpronounceable.
The practice nevertheless remained in place until 1869, when
the new Secretary of the Navy, Adolph A. Borie, ordered the
wholesale renaming of ships, often adopting new names based
on classical Greek figures or gods. This practice has somewhat
complicated for many the tracing of these Civil War era ships.
Go to Main Category:
Historic Legacy of the Monitor
Go to other documents in this category:
Timeline of Later Monitors
Later Classes of Monitors
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