Monitors
Monitors were riverine and coastal warships chiefly characterized by a flat deck fore to aft, very low freeboard, and the presence one or more turrets housing two guns each.
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Monitor class
- Type: Single-turret ironclad monitor
- Commission: February 25, 1862
- Fate: Sunk in gale, December 31, 1862
Ship in class:
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Passaic class
- Type: Single-turret ironclad monitor
- Commission: Between October 1862 and May 1865
- Fate: Two sunk; remaining scrapped
Ships in class:
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Roanoke class
- Type: Triple-turret ironclad monitor
- converted Merrimack class frigate
- Commission: June 29, 1863
- Fate: Scrapped
Ship in class:
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Canonicus class
- Type: Single-turret ironclad monitor
- Commission: Between April 1864 and February 1866
- Fate: One sunk; remaining scrapped
Ships in class:
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Onondaga class
- Type: Twin-turret ironclad monitor
- Commission: March 24, 1864
- Fate: Sold to France; scrapped
Ship in class:
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Miantonomoh class
- Type: Twin-turret ironclad monitor
- Commission: Between October 1864 and October 1865
- Fate: Scrapped
Ships in class:
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Milwaukee class
- Type: Twin-turret ironclad monitor
- Commission: Between April and August, 1864
- Fate: Lead ship sunk; remainder scrapped
Ships in class:
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Dictator class
- Type: Single-turret ironclad monitor
- Commission: November 11, 1864
- Fate: Scrapped
Ship in class:
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Puritan class
- Type: Single-turret ironclad monitor
- Originally-planned for two turrets
- Not commissioned
- Fate: Broken up at the shipyard
Ship in class:
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Casco class
- Type: Shallow water single turret monitor / torpedo boat
- Commission: Between December 1864 and August 1865
- Fate: Scrapped
Ships in class:
- Built as torpedo boats:
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- Built as Monitors:
- USS Tunxis
- USS Squando*
- USS Suncock*
- USS Shawnee*
- Klamath, Never Commissioned
- Nausett, Never Commissioned
- Waxsaw, Never Commissioned
- Yazoo, Never Commissioned
- Koka, Never Commissioned
- Yuma, Never Commissioned
- Cohoes, Never Commissioned
- Etlah, Never Commissioned
- USS Iris*
- Wassuc, Never Commissioned
- Umpqua, Never Commissioned
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Kalamazoo class
- Type: Twin-turret ironclad monitor
- Not commissioned
- Fate: Never completed; broken up at the shipyard
Ships in class:
- Kalamazoo
- Passaconaway
- Quinsigamond
- Shackamaxon
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Broadside Ironclads
Large vessels loosely-based on the designs of traditional sloops and frigates.
- Type: Broadside Ironclad Frigate, Three Sailing Masts
- Commission: August 21, 1862
- Type: Experimental Ironclad Sloop, Two Sailing Masts
- Commission: April 21, 1862
Casemate Ironclads
Either built from the keel up or converted from wooden warships or river steamers via razing of the upper bulworks. Result is a low-freeboard vessel with broadside guns housed within an armored casemate.
- Type: Experimental Battery Ironclad
- Commission: Never
- Type: Seagoing Ironclad Frigate Ram
- Commission: Never
- Type: Twin Casemate Ram
- Commission: February 24, 1863
- Type: Casemate Ram (Captured C.S.S. Atlanta)
- Commission: Fall 1863
- Type: Casemate Ram (Captured C.S.S. Tennessee)
- Commission: August 19, 1864
(*) Did not see service until after the Civil War
| Monitors of the Union Navy |
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| | Lead ship | | | | Passaic class | | | | Canonicus class | | | | Miantonomoh class | | | | Milwaukee class | | | | Casco class | | | | Kalamazoo class | | | | Single-ship classes | | | Discuss Ironclads of the American Civil War at CivilWarTalk.com - The Naval War Forum |
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