Books with title Duel of the Ironclads: The Monitor Vs. the Virginia

On March 9, 1862, two unusual-looking iron-clad warships faced each other inbattle and changed naval warfare forever. When the American Civil War began, warships were still made of wood. Early in the war the Southern Confederates salvaged the sunken Union ship Merrimack, built an iron structure on the deck, and renamed her the CSS Virginia. When they were finished she was a brand new kind of warship-an ironclad. The Northern Union had also been secretly racing to build their own ironclad, the USS Monitor. The two ships were born almost simultaneously and met just one day after the unstoppable Virginia single-handedly destroyed two of the Union's mightiest wooden warships. By the time their historic showdown was through, the age of wooden warships was shattered forever.

America's first arms race reached a blazing conclusion on May 9, 1862, when the CSS Virginia charged its full 275 foot length of ironclad momentum toward the USS Monitor. On the shores, crowds waited for the explosive collision between the two bulwarks of the sea. The clash of these mighty military machines, destined to fight each other for the first and last time in the second year of the American Civil War, instantly brought the age of wooden naval ships to an end.Using vivid paintings, cross-section diagrams, and technical drawings, Patrick O'Brien unfurls the story of the battle that immediately changed the course U.S. naval warfare.