Admiral David D. Porter, The Naval History of the Civil War.

[139] tons, to draw six feet of water, to be plated with two and a half inch iron, and steam nine knots. They were to be each 175 feet long and 51 1/2 wide, their sides at an angle of 35 degrees from the water line, their gun decks being but a foot above the surface of the water. The bow and stern were at an angle of 45 degrees, and the wheel for propelling the vessels was placed in the stern. Of course these vessels had many imperfections, as we were new in the business of building iron-clads, and seem to have had very little idea what thickness of iron plating was necessary to turn the heavy shot of the enemy.

The iron-clads carried four thirty-two pounders on each side, three nine or ten-inch guns in their bow ports, and two lighter

U. S. Gun-boats Taylor and Lexington.

guns in the stern. A casemate enclosed the wheel at the stern, and there was a conical pilot-house forward covered with iron. The writer is particular in describing these vessels, as they performed such remarkable service all through the war, and notwithstanding their defects and the vicissitudes they experienced, no vessels in the Navy engaged in so many successful battles or made such a record for their commanding officers.

Within two weeks after the contract with Eads was signed, four thousand men were busily engaged in constructing the vessels. The work was pushed night and day, and on the 12th of October, 1861, the St. Louis was launched at Carondelet, Missouri, forty-five days after her keel was laid. When this vessel was transferred with the others to the Navy Department, her name was changed to Baron deKalb. as there was already a St. Louis in the Navy. In the course of the succeeding twenty days the Carondelet, Cincinnati, Louisville. Mound City, Cairo and Pittsburg followed in rapid succession. An eighth vessel, the Benton, superior in every respect to the above, was undertaken. She was originally a wrecking boat, purchased by General Fremont and sent to Mr. Eads, whose ideas developing as he went on building, he produced from this wrecking boat an iron-clad of remarkable strength.

Thus in one hundred days this energetic man constructed a squadron of iron-clad gun-boats, aggregating five thousand tons, ready for their armament of one hundred and seven heavy guns. Such a performance needs no eulogy, and even had Mr. Eads done no more in the cause of the Union, he would have been entitled to the thanks of the nation. Since then he has gone on executing great works, and his reputation as a civil engineer is world-wide.

A ninth powerful vessel, the Essex, was afterward added to this formidable flotilla. She carried nine heavy guns, and though built in later fashion was not equal to the Benton.

When Flag-officer Andrew H. Foote took command of the Western Flotilla in September, 1862, it consisted of these nine “iron-clads” (so-called), three wooden gunboats, the Taylor Lexington and