#css virginia

Sinking of the USS Cumberland, 8 March 1862, by James Gurney

Operation Paperclip brought over a lot of people and vehicles, so when Horst Wessel was brought over, he wasn't even a blip on anyone's radar. It doesn't hurt that he was actively sorry for being built by the Nazis in the first place, and he very quickly adopted the new name Eagle in an effort to fit in. He's integrated well, and other than his Hamburg Accent when speaking German, you'd never know he wasn't always a proud American.

1862 Hampton Roads - Monitor vs Virginia - Howard Gerrard

March 8, 1862. The Battle of Hampton Roads begins as CSS Virginia and two other wooden warships sail into Hampton Roads to confront the Union squadron of five wooden frigates. Virginia takes a heavy toll, ramming and sinking the USS Cumberland before turning her guns on USS Congress. After an hour and a half of combat, Congress surrendered. Though the battle would continue the next day, culminating in the famous clash of the ironclads, the first day proved the superiority of ironclad warships over wooden ones and sent mass panic through Washington, D.C.

Oh, here’s success to Erricson, a Union man is he,

 And for his little Monitor, she's the champion of the sea! 

And for all of her “Blue Jackets”, wherever they may be,

I’ve always harbored a deep, personal fascination with the ironclads of the American Civil War. If you look at historical sketches or models of the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia, they hardly look like ships at all. With their incredibly low profiles and sheer metal surfaces, they almost resemble early submarines riding just barely above the waterline. They were revolutionary, brutal, and…