Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 22.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

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Zzzbroke the blockade.

January 31, 1863, your ironclads, Palmetto State and Chicora, broke the blockade at Charleston, S. C., dispersed the Federal fleet, and secured the surrender of two ships, the Mercedita and Keystone State, but the victory was shorn of its triumphs by the ability of these vessels, subsequently, to elude the pursuit of our slow steaming ships.

August 5th, 1864, when Farragut had passed Forts Morgan and Gaines, guarding the entrance to Mobile Bay, his fleet of four monitors and fourteen ships, mounting 159 guns, engaged the Confederate armament, composed of the ironclad Tennessee and three river steamers, mounting twenty-one guns. The latter were quickly placed hors de combat, leaving, the Tennessee alone, to meet the whole force of the enemy.

Attacked on all sides by the three monitors and fourteen ships, rammed time and again, run into abeam, at full speed, hammered with steel shot of 440 pounds weight thrown from the heavy guns of the monitors at 200 yards distant, in vain endeavoring to ram her adversaries, but each time frustrated by their superior speed, the Tennessee waged this unequal contest until her rudder chains were shot away, and thus unmanageable, crippled and leaking, she was surrendered to the enemy. [95]

Her casemates (at an angle of 45 degrees, covered with two feet of solid wood and five inches of iron), had been pierced by the heavy shot fired by the Monitor. The turrets of these vessels were impenetrable to the shot of the Tennessee, and after four hours of fruitless contest the issue had become that of further disaster and further fearful carnage.