When the waters had calmed after the dramatic battle between the Monitor and the Virginia (ex-Merrimac) at Hampton Roads in March 1862, the Union Navy Department boasted that the iron-hulled and turreted Monitor could smash the mightiest fort in an hour and that Fort Sumter would be reduced to a brickpile. Attention in the North turned away from the Virginia battlefield to Charleston, the hot bed of secession, the city of treason, the city which had triggered the Civil War. “On to Charleston!” thundered from the press, pulpit, and Congress. The Lincoln government awarded contracts to “Big Swede” Ericsson, Monitor's inventor, for six more just like her and to other
builders for an additional four similar ships.
Naval hopes to pull the Union up from the slough of despondency during the winter of 1862-63 by the early capture of Charleston sank with the Monitor on 30 December, when the news flashed that she had been pounded by a gale off the Carolina coast and had gone under with twenty-six of her crew. Critics of the monitors complained that the government had squandered money on monstrosities, ships that broke to pieces in a gale.
Meanwhile, in New York, the newly launched monitor, Weehawken, Captain John Rodgers commanding, got under way for Hampton Roads. Out at sea in tow of the steamer Boardman, the Weehawken headed into a storm of hurricane proportions in January 1863. Trembling and lurching, she wallowed in the trough of the sea while dog-tired seamen worked ceaselessly with the pumps. The night wore on and the pounding continued. Rodgers cast off the line to the Boardman for her own safety.
Finally the storm cleared, and the battered Weehawken steamed triumphantly into Hampton Roads. The New York Times ran an extra, “The Seagoing Qualities of our Monitors Proved!” From Washington, the Navy Department telegraphed Rodgers, “Your act has been of more use to us than a victory.”
Patched up and convoyed by the steamer Ladona, the Weehawken departed on 1 February and arrived at Port Royal, South Carolina, and reported to the South Atlantic Squadron, whose main responsibility was the blockade of Charleston.
Months slipped by while Charleston girded for action. Out in the channel eight Union monitors weighed anchors on 7 April 1863. The Weehawken, her decks cleared for action, led the battle line of monitors and moved in toward Fort Sumter.
Guns from Sullivan’s Island, Morris Island, and Fort Sumter blazed at the Union armada. Caught in a murderous crossfire, unfamiliar with their ship’s capabilities, hesitant to smash through the mine obstructions, the monitors turned, backed engines, and became hopelessly entangled. Turrets jammed and guns failed. Veering, zigzagging, and scraping each other’s sides, the monitors moved to within 550 yards of Fort Sumter.
Rebel cannon mauled the Weehawken. Fifty-three shots crashed into her, mangling the deck, knocking bolts loose, splintering the side armor. The Confederates fired fast. The Keokuk, hit ninety times, sank in the channel with no lives lost. With one ship destroyed and the others viciously drubbed, the monitors withdrew from action. The attack was not renewed.
News of the monitor failure exploded throughout the North. Congress demanded an investigation and the press tormented the administration. The Confederacy was naturally jubilant. “The prestige of the monitors’ invulnerability is gone,” announced the Charleston Mercury.
While the South celebrated, mechanics in Savannah had converted the British-built steamer Fingal into the Confederate ironclad ram Atlanta. In the early morning mist, 17 June 1863, the Atlanta got under way. Meanwhile the Weehawken lay at anchor in Wassaw Sound. Startled out of a sound sleep by a lookout, Rodgers went out on deck and noticed a vessel built like the Merrimac coming down river. He beat to quarters, slipped the anchor chain, and steamed toward the target. The Union monitor Nahant stayed clear.
A shot screamed over the Weehawken. The monitor maneuvered to within 400 yards and fired. The Atlanta went aground. The first shot from the Weehawken struck the ironclad’s casemate, scattering wood and iron splinters across the gun deck. A second shot crashed into the pilothouse. The Atlanta fired eight shots, but they all missed. With the Atlanta stuck in the mud and her guns unable to bear, the Confederates hoisted the surrender flag.
The defeat of the Union monitors at Charleston had lowered their prestige as well as the prestige of the Union Navy. The Weehawken’s victory over the Atlanta transformed opinion in the North and justified to the public the Navy Department’s determination in behalf of the iron ships, the turret system, and the monitors’ 15-inch guns. Perhaps the monitors could not crash through the obstructions and gain Charleston, but the Weehawken had confirmed public belief that the monitors could whip any vessel and make American waters safe from foreign men-of-war.
Rodgers became a national hero overnight and was recalled to New York to take command of the mammoth new monitor, Dictator.
The Weehawken, meanwhile, under a new skipper, participated in the subsequent attacks on Fort Sumter. On 6 December 1863, with the wind blowing a moderate gale, the heroic Weehawken, her colors flying, sank in Charleston harbor with thirty-one of her crew. Injuries received by Weehawken in the Charleston service had so strained her that the rivets were loose on the bottom plates. The rough sea was sufficient to open them.
First to prove the seaworthiness of monitors, the first to fire her cannon at Fort Sumter, and first to demonstrate the superiority of monitors over ironclads, the Weehawken takes her place proudly alongside the gallant ships of the U. S. Navy.