wooden ships

MikeyB

Sergeant
Joined
Sep 13, 2018
Quick question for the experts. At the outset of the war, how should I think about the split between sailing ships and steam propulsion ships? Were effectively all wooden warships still all sailing ships, and propulsion was another revolutionary consequence of the ironclads? Or were there wooden ships that had already transitioned or were making the transition?
 
The U.S. Navy, like others, had pretty fully adopted steam propulsion by 1860 for its new construction, although there were plenty of older ships remaining active in the fleet that were pure sailers. Experience during the war, particularly on the blockade, showed that steam propulsion, for all its expense and complexity, was really essential for any active operations. The war accelerated the universal adoption of steam propulsion, but that had already been going on for a while.

gloiregd.gif


The adoption of iron armor had been going on in other navies before the war, too, and is really a parallel trend with steam propulsion, rather than a consequence of it. One of the earliest major ironclads, the French Gloire of 1859, was a wooden, steam-powered warship with armor added. HMS Warrior used timber backing in its armored casemate, and even the famous USS Monitor used a large amount of timber backing behind its hull armor.
 
At the beginning of the war the U.S. Navy possessed a relative handful of steam-powered vessels to augment its largely sail-powered fleet. As the war progressed, the service increasingly depended on steamers, particularly for blockading and raiding campaigns being fought in shallow coastal waters of the Southern states. As historian William H. Roberts described the U.S. forces, “they began the war with a sailing navy that contained a few steamers and built a technologically up-to-date steam navy that had some leftover sailing ships.” In stark numbers, the U.S. Navy began with 37 steam vessels of 90 total ships and ended the war with 124 sailing vessels of 650 total. In other words, steam ships had increased from 41% to 81% of the U.S. naval fleet, while sailing vessels were reduced from 59% to 19% of the total.
 
The underlying phenomenon was the growing ability of industry to manufacture all sorts of products out of iron, and soon steel: engines, armor, heavy guns, railroad equipment, etc.

The one combination that doesn't seem to have occurred was wooden sailing ships with armor - though in this group, I won't be surprised if someone comes up with an example :wink: Armor seems to have required steam.
 
Stupid question, but how did ships move in rivers, against the currents before the age of steam? Did everyone get an oar?
 
Stupid question, but how did ships move in rivers, against the currents before the age of steam? Did everyone get an oar?

Several ways, rowing was certainly one, or poling in shallow water. Kedging or warping was another, a small boat would take an anchor upstream as far as the cable allowed, drop it, and the crew would haul the ship up to the anchor using the capstan or windlass. Of course you'd need to stay anchored so as not to lose ground; meanwhile the boat would be taking a second anchor further upstream for the next step. A variant was to tie a line to a tree or solid object on shore.

In a tidal river, one could simply float upstream with the tide, anchor when the tide turned, and wait out the ebb. The crew might choose to wait for the next flood tide in a handy tavern, rowing ashore in what came to be called the "jolly boat".

And of course you might get lucky with the wind. I understand that in Egypt the prevailing winds on the Nile were upriver, so one could sail up and float back down.

p.s. there are no stupid questions, but there are stupid answers :wink:
 
The underlying phenomenon was the growing ability of industry to manufacture all sorts of products out of iron, and soon steel: engines, armor, heavy guns, railroad equipment, etc.

The one combination that doesn't seem to have occurred was wooden sailing ships with armor - though in this group, I won't be surprised if someone comes up with an example :wink: Armor seems to have required steam.
How about the Korean "Turtle Ships"?
 
And of course you might get lucky with the wind. I understand that in Egypt the prevailing winds on the Nile were upriver, so one could sail up and float back down.

To the extent that the determinative hieroglyph for 'going upstream' was a boat with a sail up, and the one for 'going downstream' was a boat with its sail down! Fact.

(Upstream also meant "south" and downstream "north"... natural along the north-south Nile... but which caused some linguistic trouble when trying to describe the southeast-flowing Euphrates... something like "the river that flows upstream when flowing downstream"!)
 
Quick question for the experts. At the outset of the war, how should I think about the split between sailing ships and steam propulsion ships? Were effectively all wooden warships still all sailing ships, and propulsion was another revolutionary consequence of the ironclads? Or were there wooden ships that had already transitioned or were making the transition?

All from wiki...

Ironclad
The ironclad became technically feasible and tactically necessary because of developments in shipbuilding in the first half of the 19th century. According to naval historian J. Richard Hill: "The (ironclad) had three chief characteristics: a metal-skinned hull, steam propulsion and a main armament of guns capable of firing explosive shells. It is only when all three characteristics are present that a fighting ship can properly be called an ironclad."[4] Each of these developments was introduced separately in the decade before the first ironclads.

Here...

The use of iron instead of wood as the primary material of ships' hulls began in the 1830s; the first "warship" with an iron hull was the gunboat Nemesis, built by Jonathan Laird of Birkenhead for the East India Company in 1839. There followed, also from Laird, the first full-blown warships with metal hulls, the 1842 steam frigates Guadelupe and Montezuma for the Mexican navy.[10][11] But a thin iron skin, while not being susceptible to fire or lethal splintering like wood, was not the same thing as providing iron armor calculated to stop enemy gunfire.

Here...

In 1843, the United States Navy launched its first iron warship, USS Michigan, on the Great Lakes. This pioneering iron-hulled, steam-powered ship served for 70 years in the relatively peaceful region.
 
Here a Note on the Mexican ship Guadelupe ... and specs...

https://threedecks.org/index.php?display_type=show_ship&id=11583

Building and carreer
In 1842, the first iron-clad ships came into American waters in the form of two Mexican ironclad frigates; the "Montezuma" and the "Guadalupe." These ships were built by the British to a French design and sold to the Mexican Navy in retaliation (in probability) for the U.S. vs. British "Oregon" dispute. These ironclads were paddle-driven steamships mounting heavy ordnance. The "Montezuma" (1,164 tons) carried a 68pdr. pivot gun and six 32pdrs. The "Guadalupe" (775 tons) carried two 68pdrs. Both ships were manned by English crews and commanded by British Officers "on leave" from the British Royal Navy. Although these ironclads had the attention of the naval authorities in Washington D.C. and caused a great deal of worry at that place, Commodore Moore did not seem overly concerned with their presence.
According to Commodore Moore they were still the Texas Navy when on April 30, 1843 they attacked the Mexican Fleet then lying off Campeche, Yucatan. This Mexican Fleet was commanded by Don Thomas Marin and featured two schooners, two brigs, the armed steamer "Regenerator" and the two previously described ironclads under the command of Captains Cleaveland, and Charlewood (RN). This first attack was a draw and the fleets separated.
The next event was orchestrated by the Moore and his "Texians" who lured the Mexican Forces into a narrow roadstead, and used his forces to pound the Mexican Ironclads to junk. The battle toll came out as; "Austin" (three dead), "Wharton" (two dead), "Montezuma" (forty dead), and "Guadalupe" (forty-seven dead). The Mexican Fleet was effectively destroyed
Building and carreer
The first ship of this dual threat, by name the "Guadeloupe", was being constructed from French Naval Plans in the British shipyard of Jonathan Laird in Birkenhead, England and was specifically designed to operate in the shallow waters of the Gulf.
She drew only 10 feet of water and was further designed to be fully dependent upon steam power for movement, and her weapons battery was as modern as her propulsion. She was of 788 tons displacement, 183 feet in length, and had the means within her propulsion system to develop a full 180 HP.1 She had two 32 pdr. long guns and two 68 pdr swivel Paixhan's pivots--"the guns with the explosive shells as large as good-size pumpkins."2 Ultimately this was armament that would render all other weapons of the period obsolete. "Guadeloupe" was the first iron steam warship in the world to be launched and when she was launched, the largest iron vessel ever built. A further feature that was unusual for the period was her construction in the use of watertight compartmentation throughout. Although not accepted into the Royal Navy, the British Admiralty maintained a careful surveillance of this vessel and her performance throughout her seafaring career and added many of her particular features to later vessels built for seaborne warfare.
 
The first ship of this dual threat, by name the "Guadeloupe", was being constructed from French Naval Plans in the British shipyard of Jonathan Laird in Birkenhead, England and was specifically designed to operate in the shallow waters of the Gulf. She drew only 10 feet of water and was further designed to be fully dependent upon steam power for movement, and her weapons battery was as modern as her propulsion. She was of 788 tons displacement, 183 feet in length, and had the means within her propulsion system to develop a full 180 HP.1 She had two 32 pdr. long guns and two 68 pdr swivel Paixhan's pivots--"the guns with the explosive shells as large as good-size pumpkins."2 Ultimately this was armament that would render all other weapons of the period obsolete. "Guadeloupe" was the first iron steam warship in the world to be launched and when she was launched, the largest iron vessel ever built. A further feature that was unusual for the period was her construction in the use of watertight compartmentation throughout. Although not accepted into the Royal Navy, the British Admiralty maintained a careful surveillance of this vessel and her performance throughout her seafaring career and added many of her particular features to later vessels built for seaborne warfare.

Guadalupe NMM.jpg

Guadaloupe/Guadalupe, UK National Maritime Museum.


Laird was, at the time, probably the leading shipyard in the world working in iron construction. It was a cutting-edge thing in the 1840s and 1850s, and Laird built several iron-hulled steamers that were made in sections, shipped elsewhere (including to the Zambesi River in Africa), and reassembled there. There's even the remains of one here in Texas.

When Captain Nemo was having iron hull plates fabricated for the submarine Nautilus, he had then shipped from Lairds on the Mersey. The history books don't usually mention that, but it's true.
 
The reason that the US Navy wasn't converting to steam power more quickly in 1860 was that there hadn't been a war around here in a while, so it hadn't been a priority to the congress to spend big money on replacing sailing ships.
 
The reason that the US Navy wasn't converting to steam power more quickly in 1860 was that there hadn't been a war around here in a while, so it hadn't been a priority to the congress to spend big money on replacing sailing ships.
Yes... and no. The screw propeller only came into common use in the late 1840s and as pointed out, there was no real need for war ships by the US (although John Ericsson did launch the US's first steam warship, Princeton in 1843). The major shipbuilding projects were carried out in the mid-1850s (6 Merrimack-class steam frigates), mostly for international/diplomatic use in the Mediterranean and Asia, but all retained sails and masts because running steam full-time required large amounts of coal and the hi-pressure system was not yet in place, so steam was largely inefficient.
 
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