He then discovered that the Navy Department had become entirely under the influence of what might be called the “Monitor craze,” which absolutely dominated the councils of the Department and of Congress in respect to armor-clad vessels.
A combination, or “ring,” was formed, with head-quarters in New York, to prevent the construction of any type of iron-clad vessel except monitors, and it had sufficient power to carry its determination into effect.
A sudden halt was made in the development of the armored sea-going type which originated during the Crimean War. France had finished the construction of “La Courunne,” “La Gloire,” and several others, one of which had made a voyage to Vera Cruz before our Civil War, and certain lessons derived from that ship during the voyage were utilized in the construction of the “New Ironsides.” Both England and France were proceeding slowly in the development of the very complete type of battleship of the present day. While they built several vessels of an improved monitor type and adopted the turret on a roller base, in many cases they adhered to the course first laid out. The late British battleships have fixed barbettes and shields for their heavy guns.
The old Timby turret is practically a revolving barbette extending above the guns, which had to be loaded at the muzzle and the rammer being jointed, eleven minutes being occupied in loading and firing.
In the operations before Charleston, the Confederates would leave their bomb proofs after a shot was fired, and prepare for the next one during the eleven minutes and retire unharmed, ready to renew the contest. Under these conditions, the defence became a system of guns in a casemate connecting with a bomb proof.
The old-fashioned monitor, viewed simply as a floating battery for use in smooth water, was serviceable. It was not in any sense a sea-going vessel, and it was always in danger of foundering as it crept along the coast from harbor to harbor. Besides this, it was almost intolerable to its officers and men in the living sense. In fact, service in the monitors developed a new and distinct disease known in the war-time pathology as the “monitor fever.” Whenever one was torpedoed, as for example the “Tecumseh” in Mobile Bay, she sank immediately; so quickly, in fact, that her crew below deck were unable to escape. The torpedo which the “New Ironsides” resisted practically without injury would have instantly sunk any monitor then existing. The “Ironsides,” on the contrary, was a sea-going vessel of the best and stanchest type, capable of any length of voyage with comfort and perfect safety to her officers and crew.