There is a chapter yet to be published upon iron-clad war-ships, as
introduced practically in the Civil War. To the Southerners is due the
innovation on a fair scale, though the experiments were not at all
profitably demonstrative. Upon rumors that the enemy were building the
novelties of iron-cased vessels, the Federal government responded by
voting money--and throwing it away upon a fiasco. Meanwhile, the others
had razeed a frigate, the _Merrimac_, and upon an angular roof laid
railroad-iron to make her shot-proof. Stories of her likelihood to be a
terror, especially as she was stated by spies to be seaworthy, inspired
the Americanized Swedish naval engineer, Ericsson, to build a
turret-ship. The Naval Construction Board unanimously rebuffed the
innovator. Luckily, President Lincoln became interested as a flat-boat
builder, in his youth. He took up the inventor and the design. He
scoffed at the idea that the man had not planned thoroughly, saying, as
to the weight of the armor sinking the hull:
"Out West, in boat-building, we figured out the carrying power to a
nicety."
His championship earned the _Monitor_ the name of Lincoln's "cheese-box
on a raft."
The assistant secretary of the navy, knowing all the facts, observes:
"I withhold no credit from Captain John Ericsson, her inventor, but _I
know_ the country is principally indebted to President Lincoln for the
construction of this vessel, and for the success of the trial to
Captain Worden."--(Captain Fox, Ericsson's adviser, confirms this
credit.)
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