Details of Confederate ironclads

[Hudsonduster]

Originally Posted by jmr248

I have read that this railcar was made at the naval yard where the Virginia was built and that they both date from 1862. This car was supposedly used in the 7 Days Battles around Richmond.

While slogging through John M. Coski's great in-depth study Capital Navy, I ran across the following clip, set after the Battle of Drewry's Bluff in May '62:

"As Lee prepared a strategy to drive McLellan away from Richmond, he solicited the assistance of Mallory's department. 'Is there a possibility of constructing an iron-plated battery, mounting a heavy gun, on trucks, the whole covered with iron, to move along the York River Railroad?' Lee asked the army's ordnance chief on June 5. 'Please see what can be done. See the Navy Deparment and officers,' Lee suggested. Within three weeks, naval ordnance chief George Minor wrote Lee that the iron-plated battery was completed. Designed by John Brooke, the railroad battery had sloped sides--not unlike the casemate of an ironclad vessel--plated with iron rolled at Tredegar and originally intended for the C.S.S. Richmond. The battery was armed with a single 32-pound rifled gun, mounted and equipped by Brookes' assistant, Lt. Robert Minor. This unique railroad battery saw action in the Battle of Savage's Station, which occurred along the York River Railroad east of Richmond on June 29, 1862. The army officer in command of that part of the battlefield noted 'the dedicated success of the experiment' with a prototype of armored land warfare."

'Duster