USS Roanoke: От винтовой фрегаты к броненосцу

Merrimack class screw frigate

USS Roanoke was a wooden hulled screw frigate built for the United States Navy in the mid 1850s. She served as flagship of the Home Squadron in the late 1850s and captured several Confederate ships after the start of the American Civil War in 1861. The ship was converted into an ironclad monitor during 1862–63; the first ship with more than two gun turrets in history. Her conversion was not very successful as she rolled excessively, and the weight of her armor and turrets strained her hull. Her deep draft meant that she could not operate off shallow Confederate ports and she was relegated to harbor defense at Hampton Roads, Virginia for the duration of the war. Roanoke was placed in reserve after the war and sold for scrap in 1883.

Roanoke was 263 feet (80 m) long between perpendiculars and had a beam of 51 feet (16 m). The ship had a draft of 23 feet (7 m) and a depth of hold of 26 feet (8 m). She displaced In 1861, the ship's armament consisted of one smoothbore Dahlgren pivot gun, twenty eight Dahlgren guns and fourteen Dahlgren guns.

Roanoke, named after the Roanoke River, was laid down at the Norfolk Navy Yard in May 1854 and launched on 13 December 1855. The ship sank when launched and had to be refloated before she could be completed. Welles accepted their recommendation and Roanoke began her reconstruction at the Brooklyn Navy Yard when she arrived in New York City on 25 March. received a contract in early April to shape and mount all of her metal work. To save weight the number of turrets was reduced to three and her deck armor to Each turret was virtually identical to those of the s and consisted of eleven layers of plates. The forward two turrets were surmounted by a stationary pilothouse with armor nine inches thick. An auxiliary boiler was added to provide steam for the engines that powered the turrets, fans and steering and little to nothing was done to reinforce the hull to withstand the weight of her armor and turrets. The deck beneath each turret was reinforced by a series of stanchions that transferred their weight to the ship's bottom, which was not reinforced to handle their weight. The stress caused Roanoke to leak around 1.5 feet (0 m) per day by the end of the war. In her new configuration, her crew numbered 347 officers and men. Roanoke was armed with two muzzle loading smoothbore 15 inch Dahlgren guns, two Dahlgren guns and a pair of eight inch, 150 pounder Parrott rifles. The forward turret mounted one 15 inch Dahlgren and a 150 pounder Parrot rifle, the middle turret was fitted with 15 and 11 inch Dahlgrens and the aft turret with one 11 inch Dahlgren and a 150 pounder rifle. Shortages of the 15 inch Dahlgren forced the substitution of two 11 inch Dahlgrens. Each of the former guns weighed approximately They could fire a shell up to a range of at an elevation of +7°. The 11 inch Dahlgren weighed and could fire a shell up to a range of at +5° elevation. The 150 pounder Parrot rifle weighed and fired eight inch shells that weighed
Roanoke was also fitted with an ax shaped ram. It was formed from two 4.5 inch plates that projected past her bow and presumably was the height of a single plate, .

The ship was accepted by the Navy on 16 April 1863 although she was not recommissioned until 29 June, Her rear turret required nearly 5 minutes to make a full rotation. Captain Guert Gansevoort replaced Sands in command of the ship later in 1863. He was succeeded by Captain Augustus Kilty. Roanoke arrived back in New York on 27 April 1865. She was decommissioned and placed in reserve on 20 June at New York Navy Yard. On 5 August 1882, the ship was struck from the Navy List and subsequently sold for scrap on 27 September 1883.