CSS Palmetto State

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A wash drawing of Palmetto State by R. G. Skerrett
History
Confederate States
NamePalmetto State
NamesakeNickname of South Carolina
Laid downJanuary 1862
LaunchedSeptember 1862
CommissionedSeptember 1862
Fate
Scuttled
and burned, 18 February 1865
General characteristics
Class and type
ironclad
Length
  • 174 ft (53.0 m) (
    o/a
    )
  • 150 ft (45.7 m) (
    p/p
    )
Beam43 ft (13.1 m)
Draft12 ft (3.7 m)
Depth of hold12 ft (3.7 m)
Installed power2 × fire-tube boilers
Propulsion
Speed6–7 knots (11–13 km/h; 6.9–8.1 mph)
Complement120 officers and men
Armament
ArmorCasemate: 4 in (102 mm)

CSS[Note 1] Palmetto State was one of six Richmond class casemate ironclad rams built for the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War. Completed in 1862, she defended Charleston, South Carolina and was burnt in 1865 to prevent her capture by advancing Union troops.

Background and description

Confederate ironclads Chicora and Palmetto State in Charleston Harbor

The ship was built to a design by the Chief Naval Constructor,

abaft the funnel even though it blocked the pilot's forward vision.[5]

The propulsion systems of the Richmond-class ironclads were different for each of the ships, often depending on what could be sourced locally. Palmetto State's pair of single-cylinder, direct-acting steam engines were taken from the gunboat CSS Lady Davis serving in Charleston. They used steam provided by a pair of horizontal fire-tube boilers built by the locally based Cameron & Company to drive a 8-or-10-foot (2.4 or 3.0 m) propeller. The boilers were probably 11 feet (3.4 m) tall, 10 feet (3.0 m) long, and 6 feet 9 inches (2.1 m) wide. The ironclad had a speed of 6–7 knots (11–13 km/h; 6.9–8.1 mph)[6][7] and a crew of 120.[5]

Palmetto State was initially armed with one 7-inch (178 mm)

bow, a 6.4-inch (163 mm) Brooke rifle on a pivot mount in the stern, with two 8-inch (20.3 cm) muzzle-loading smoothbore guns on the broadside.[5] The ship was later equipped with a spar torpedo on her bow in 1863.[7] The Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships merely states that her armament consisted of two rifled guns and two smoothbore 9-inch (229 mm) guns.[3] Naval historian Raimondo Luraghi states that the ship was armed with two Brooke rifles and two smoothbores,[8] Naval historian Donald Canney says that a January 1865 report shows the ship equipped with ten 7-inch Brooke rifles, four on each broadside and one each in the bow and stern. He does not believe that it is accurate because the addition of so many additional guns would require rebuilding the casemate and would strain the ship's hull with so much extra weight.[5]

Her casemate armor was 4 inches (102 mm) thick, backed by 22 inches (559 mm) of wood, while 2 inches (51 mm) of iron armor was used everywhere else.

Construction and career

Attack on the U.S. Gunboat Mercedita by the Rebel Ram Palmetto State, off Charleston Harbor. New York Illustrated News

Named for the nickname of

laid down in January 1862 by Cameron & Company at their shipyard
in Charleston, South Carolina.

Before dawn on 31 January 1863 Palmetto State and her

Confederate government
, unsuccessfully advanced, that the blockade of Charleston had been broken.

Palmetto State also joined in the defense of Charleston during

Samuel Francis du Pont's unsuccessful 1–7 April 1863 attack on the harbor forts. Her officers and men were cited for rendering valuable services on the night of 6–7 September 1863 during the removal troops from Fort Wagner and Battery Gregg
.

Palmetto State was later set afire by the Confederates to avoid capture upon the evacuation of Charleston on 18 February 1865.

Notes

  1. ^ Confederate States Ship.[1]

Citations

  1. ^ Silverstone 2006, p. xviii
  2. ^ Canney, pp. 34, 40–42
  3. ^ a b Palmetto State
  4. ^ Silverstone 2006, p. 152
  5. ^ a b c d Canney, p. 42
  6. ^ Bisbee, pp. 98–99, 189–190
  7. ^ a b Holcombe, p. 17
  8. ^ Luraghi, p. 209
  9. ^ Silverstone 1984, p. 52

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to CSS Palmetto State.
  • Bisbee, Saxon T. (2018). Engines of Rebellion: Confederate Ironclads and Steam Engineering in the American Civil War. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: University of Alabama Press.
    ISBN 978-0-81731-986-1
    .
  • Canney, Donald L. (2015). The Confederate Steam Navy 1861-1865. Atglen, Pennsylvania: Schiffer Publishing.
    ISBN 978-0-7643-4824-2
    .
  • Koehler, R. B. & Sileo, Thomas (2008). "Question 40/43: Fates of Confederate Ironclads". Warship International. XLV (4): 276–277.
    ISSN 0043-0374
    .
  • "Palmetto State". Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. Naval History and Historical Command. Retrieved June 21, 2022.
  • Silverstone, Paul H. (2006). Civil War Navies 1855–1883. The U.S. Navy Warship Series. New York: Routledge.
    ISBN 0-415-97870-X
    .
  • Silverstone, Paul H. (1984). Directory of the World's Capital Ships. New York: Hippocrene Books.
    ISBN 0-88254-979-0
    .
  • Still, William N. Jr. (1985) [1971]. Iron Afloat: The Story of the Confederate Armorclads. Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina Press.
    ISBN 0-87249-454-3
    .

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