illustration ILLUSTRATED HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS NEW YORK AND LONDON MCMXII COPYRIGHT, 1912, BY HARPER & BROTHERS PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA PUBLISHED MARCH, 1912 Introduction...

This is the first-hand story of what was done and seen and felt on each side in the battle of the Monitor and the Merrimac . The actual experiences on both vessels are pictured, in one case by the commander of the Monitor , then a lieutenant, and the next in rank, Lieutenant Greene, and in the other by Chief-Engineer Ramsay of the Merrimac . Clearly such a record of personal experiences has a place by itself in the literature of the subject. It is quite unnecessary to dwell upon the various cont

I Told by Lieutenant Worden and Lieutenant S.D. Greene of the "Monitor" Some weeks after the historic battle between the Monitor and the Merrimac in Hampton Roads, on March 9, 1862, the former vessel came to the Washington Navy-yard unchanged, in the same condition as when she discharged her parting shot at the Merrimac . There she lay until her heroic commander had so far recovered from his injuries as to be able to rejoin his vessel. All leaves of absence had been revoked, the absentees had re

II Told by H. Ashton Ramsay, Major C.S.A., Chief Engineer of the "Merrimac" The Merrimac was built in 1856 as a full-rigged war-frigate, of thirty-one hundred tons' burden, with auxiliary steam power to be used only in case of head winds. She was a hybrid from her birth, marking the transition from sails to steam as well as from wooden ships to ironclads. I became her second assistant engineer in Panama Bay in 1859, cruising in her around the Horn and back to Norfolk. Her chief engineer was Alba

III By an eye-witness, Rear-Admiral E.W. Watson, U.S.N. On the 29th of December, 1862, nine months after her memorable combat with the Merrimac , the Monitor , Commander John P. Bankhead, left Hampton Roads in tow of the Rhode Island , commanded by Captain Stephen Decatur Trenchard, for Beaufort, North Carolina. The weather at the time of starting looked favorable for the trip, but on the following day, when nearing Cape Hatteras, the wind came out from the southeast and gradually freshened unti