USS Roanoke (1857)

USS Roanoke (1857) was a wooden-hulled screw frigate built for the United States Navy in the 1850s that saw major service during the American Civil War and underwent experimental conversions into ironclad monitors. Commissioned from the Portsmouth Navy Yard and named for the Roanoke River, she served on stations ranging from the Mediterranean Sea to the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron before being retired and sold in the 1880s.

Construction and design

Laid down at Portsmouth Navy Yard in Kittery, Maine, Roanoke was ordered under the naval expansion prompted by tensions with Great Britain and the growth of steam power in the 1850s, drawing on design influences from Isaac Smith and contemporaneous frigates such as Merrimack and Minnesota. Her wooden hull measured about 275 feet in length with a 50-foot beam and displaced roughly 3,000 tons, combining a full ship rig with a two-cylinder steam engine and a screw propeller, echoing propulsion arrangements of Susquehanna and Wabash. The original design emphasized long-range cruising for diplomatic presence alongside possible squadron actions, paralleling deployments of earlier frigates and reflecting doctrines advocated by Matthew C. Perry and Benjamin F. Isherwood on steam engineering.

Service history

Following commissioning in 1857, Roanoke deployed to the Mediterranean Sea and visited ports connected to Barbary Coast interests, joining squadrons that included Hartford and St. Lawrence. In the late 1850s she returned to the Norfolk Navy Yard for overhaul amid rising sectional tensions between United States regions, then joined the North Atlantic Squadron at the outbreak of the American Civil War. During wartime she served alongside flagships like Cumberland and Congress before being selected for conversion to ironclad service under the direction of Gideon Welles and naval engineers influenced by John Ericsson and Joseph Smith.

Armament and modifications

Originally armed as a frigate with a broadside battery that included ninety-pounder and sixty-four pounder guns similar to fittings on Hartford and Minnesota, Roanoke underwent extensive refit as naval ordnance evolved during the Civil War. Under programmatic shifts endorsed by Abraham Lincoln and overseen by Gideon Welles, she was cut down and her hull converted first into a casemate ironclad and later into a triple-turret monitor configuration; these conversions paralleled experiments on Monitor designs by John Ericsson and on USS New Ironsides by Benjamin F. Isherwood. Her modified battery saw heavy smoothbore and rifled guns removed in favor of large-caliber Dahlgren guns and later Parrott rifle types, with armor plating added using rolled iron plates patterned after armor on CSS Virginia (ex-Merrimack) and Union monitors at Fort Sumter and Norfolk Navy Yard.

Civil War operations

After conversion attempts, Roanoke’s role shifted from cruising frigate to experimental ironclad and harbor defense asset within the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, supporting operations against Confederate States of America positions at Hampton Roads, Norfolk, Virginia, and the James River. Her presence was connected to the aftermath of the battle between Monitor and Virginia at Battle of Hampton Roads, influencing Union decisions to armor existing hulls such as USS Roanoke (1857) and to commission monitors like Dictator and Amphitrite. Although plagued by stability and propulsion limitations similar to those experienced by retrofitted ironclads in New Orleans and Charleston, Roanoke contributed to blockade enforcement alongside vessels like Susquehanna, Wabash, and gunboats modeled on Kewanee.

Postwar disposition and fate

Following the American Civil War and the demobilization overseen by Gideon Welles and later secretaries, Roanoke saw sporadic recommissioning for coastal service and Atlantic squadron duties, including stationing at Norfolk Navy Yard and periods laid up at Philadelphia Navy Yard. Technological advances in ironclad construction and armored steamers like Monitor successors, along with the development of steel hulls championed by engineers such as John Ericsson and industrialists like Andrew Carnegie, rendered many retrofits obsolete. Roanoke was finally decommissioned and struck from the Navy List under postwar reductions, sold in the 1880s, and broken up, a fate shared with contemporaries such as Merrimack (converted to Virginia) and other transitional steam frigates.

Category:Ships of the United States Navy Category:American Civil War naval ships of the United States Category:1857 ships