As Bil R and Mark F. Jenkins know, I am a bit obsessed with the
Manassas. I has always been my favorite CS ironclad, so I tried to collect as much reference material concerning that ship as was possible (mind the fact that I live in Poland, so no real access to NA or the like). Anyway, with help of friends from the States and with my own humble efforts I have a lot of illustrations of that ironclad and documents describing her career.
The exact configuration is still a mystery, but there are numerous period illustrations (some of them by eye-witnesses), which show the ship with two stacks. The most important are these drawn by witnesses and these are:
The sketch posted here by Tim
Daniel Nestell's drawings:
http://cdm16099.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15241coll4/id/297/rec/2
http://cdm16099.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15241coll4/id/291/rec/33
Sketch of a sinking
Manassas apparently made by an eye-witness (similar to G. Riddell's drawing):
http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/10481456
William Waud's drawing (on the left close to the center of the page):
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2004661364/
Another William Waud's illustration:
http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypl...bel=&lword=&lfield=&imgs=20&pos=130&snum=&e=w
Sketch published in the ORN:
http://www.digitalvaults.org/record/494.html?page=1
There is also a drawing of the damaged
Manassas as she looked shortly before sinking made by George Riddell (another eye-witness), but I'm not at liberty to post this one.
There are also other contemporary newspaper illustrations that also show her with two stacks, like the one from New York Tribune, April 8, 1862 (attached). A simple Google search will produce some of those. Here are some links for the lazy ones (some illustrations also show a single stack):
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-us-cs/csa-sh/csash-mr/mansas-k.htm
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-us-cs/csa-sh/csash-mr/mansas-m.htm
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-us-cs/csa-sh/csash-mr/manassas.htm
The single stack version was made popular by the wash drawing made by R. G. Skerrett:
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/h00001/h00608.jpg
This is the best know image of the
Manassas, as it has been published almost everywhere.
Well, now we could say, that she must have had two stacks, since the eye-witnesses depicted her that way. Unfortunately, it is not that obvious. To make things even more confusing, I have a sketch made by J. Horry Dent in 1862 that I received from Bob Holcombe a few years ago and it shows her with a single stack (it's a port side view). Bob also mentioned a letter written by an engineer who served on the
Manassas, in which he states that she had one stack.
As you can see, it's not an easy ironclad to research.
All the best,
Kaz