Matt's Model Boats

CSS Chicora participated in the naval engagement that occurred between the night of the 30th of January and the morning of the 31st of January, 1863, while John Randolph Tucker is known to have commanded the ironclad during the battle. CSS Chicora and CSS Palmetto State , between half-past eleven in the evening at four 'o clock in the morning, proceeded towards the gunboats that were blockading Charleston Harbor. Two fighting vessels were captured by the Charleston rams, which were sisters, during the engagement of the 31st of January but neither of the ironclads were able to secure their prize. USS Keystone State , after attempting to ram CSS Chicora , was struck by a series of projectiles and was unable to continue the fight. William E. Leroy, after it was determined that the gunboat that he commanded had been deprived of its its means of locomotion and was no longer able to defend itself against the mail-clad fighting vessel, decided to surrender to the iron-cased ram. USS Key...

USRC Naugatuck , which was attached to the United States Revenue Marine, was an ironclad that served alongside USS Galena and  USS Monitor  during the American Civil War. Captain David C. Constable, while he held the rank of First Lieutenant, commanded the revenue-cutter while it provided assistance to the United States Army and the United States Navy. Sewell's Point, in the April of 1862, was bombarded by the United States Navy and by the United States Revenue-cutter Service.  USRC Naugatuck , during the Bombardment of Sewell's Point, was engaged in an armed confrontation with CSS Virginia  but it appears that two fighting vessels did not launch their projectiles at one another. A second meeting of CSS Virginia  and USRC Naugatuck , which occurred in the May of 1862, resulted in an exchange of fire between the ironclads.  USRC Naugatuck , according to James Fowler Rusling, was equipped with a gun that fired 250-pound projectiles while Mark Trafton cla...

CSS Atlanta was an ironclad whose battery, which was comprised of between four and six rifled guns, was installed in a broadside arrangement. It should be noted the American Civil War was one of the few conflicts in which ironclads fought one another for the supremacy of the rivers, estuaries and seas. CSS Atlanta , which fought USS Nahant and USS Weehawken on the 17th of June, will be remembered as one of the few iron-plated fighting vessels to exchange fire with ironclads. It should be remembered that the iron-cased ram, which had been known as CSS Fingal  before it was converted into a warship, began its career as a blockade-runner. Rear-admiral Samuel Francis Du Pont was in command of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, to which the Passaic -class monitors belonged, during the Battle of Warsaw Sound. A detachment of ironclads, in the April of 1863, had been repulsed by the sea-coast batteries that defended Charleston Harbor and the defeat had tarnished the reputatio...

USRC Naugatuck , which was also known as USRC Stevens , was an ironclad that Edwin Augustus Stevens donated to the Treasury Department of the United States of America. Salmon Portland Chase, who had been Secretary of the Treasury at the time in which USRC Naugatuck  was delivered to the United States Revenue-cutter Service, re-named the gunboat in honour of the industrialist. It is possible, however, to mistake USRC Stevens  for the larger Stevens Battery  that was under construction at Hoboken.  USRC Naugatuck  had been built to provide the Treasury Department, which Chase had asked for half-a-million dollars, with a working model of the design principles which were embodied in the larger ironclad. Ballast tanks, protective iron plates, steam-engines, twin screws and a gun which could have the muzzle of its barrel depressed were among the features that were included in the revenue-cutter. Robert Livingstone Stevens, who was the older brother of E...