Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 8, 2025
If we have to destroy what we have here, there will be material enough to build half a dozen iron-clads, and the Red River, which is now of no further dread to us, will require half the Mississippi squadron to watch it. I am apprehensive that the turrets of the monitors will defy any efforts we can make to destroy them.
The maximum effective fighting force of the Navy during the war, separated into classes, was as follows: Four battle ships of the first class, 1 battle ship of the second class, 2 armored cruisers, 6 coast-defense monitors, 1 armored ram, 12 protected cruisers, 3 unprotected cruisers, 18 gunboats, 1 dynamite cruiser, 11 torpedo boats; vessels of the old Navy, including monitors, 14.
On the voyage eastward from the naval base at Key West, which began on May 4, Admiral Sampson reports there was experienced endless trouble and delay because of the inefficiency of the two monitors accompanying the other ships, and which had to be taken in tow. Their coal supply was so small that it was at once evident that they must either frequently coal or be towed.
Turned out of his headship to give way to a fifth-form boy, turned down to the bottom of the monitors, poor Kenrick felt unspeakably degraded; but he was forced to endure a yet more bitter mortification. Before going to Dr Lane he had received a message that he was wanted in the sixth-form room, and, with a touch of his old pride, had answered, "Tell them I won't come."
Key West, after the outbreak of war, had two chief centers of interest and excitement: first, the harbor, between Fort Taylor and the government wharf, where lay all the monitors, cruisers, and gunboats of the North Atlantic Squadron that were not actually engaged in sea service; and, second, the Key West Hotel, which was the headquarters of the war correspondents, as well as of naval officers assigned to shore duty, and visitors on all sorts of business from the North.
After all had retired to rest except the anxious President and one or two others, Lincoln gave utterance to his deep-seated apprehensions in the whispered query to his friend, "How many of our monitors will you wager are at the bottom of Charleston Harbor?" "I essayed," writes Mr. Brooks, "to give a cheerful view of the Charleston situation. But he would not be encouraged.
"Well, I daresay you will be hanged in the long-run," was the contemptuous reply; "but come, or else take the consequences." "Tracy," said Henderson, "I saw you throw a snowball which knocked off Power's hat. It was a hard one too. You come before the monitors with Harpour." "I shall be quaite delaighted," drawled out Tracy.
But why, you ask, didn't he tell the monitors? Unfortunately at Roslyn the monitorial system was not established. Although it was a school of 250 boys, the sixth form, with all their privileges, had no prerogative of authority.
One stroke of the bell means 'go ahead; two, 'stop; three, 'back; and four, 'go ahead as fast as possible. Leaning down through the shrouds to the officer on deck at the bell-pull, the admiral shouted, 'Four bells, eight bells, SIXTEEN BELLS! Give her all the steam you've got! The order was instantly transmitted, and the old ship seemed imbued with the admiral's spirit; and running past the "Brooklyn" and the monitors, regardless of fort, ram, gunboats, and the unseen foe beneath, dashed ahead, all alone, save for her gallant consort, the 'Metacomet."
I content myself, therefore, with putting you from your present place to the lowest on the list of monitors a public mark of my displeasure, which I am sure you will feel to be just; and I must also remove you from the headship of your house a post which I grieve to know that you have very grievously misused.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking