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Chronicling America is a searchable digital collection of historic newspaper pages through 1963 sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress.
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Also, see the Directory of U.S. Newspapers in American Libraries, a searchable index to newspapers published in the United States since 1690, which helps researchers identify what titles exist for a specific place and time, and how to access them.
“There is now building at the Continental Iron Works a formidable iron battery, which will probably prove a novel and efficacious implement of war,” reported the December 24, 1861 Cincinnati Daily Press. The iron-clad proved to be a novel invention indeed as it displaced the wooden warships of previous years and ushered in a new era of naval warfare. Iron-clads were key in the various naval engagements of the Civil War. Read more about it!
The information in this guide focuses on primary source materials found in the digitized historic newspapers from the digital collection Chronicling America.
The timeline below highlights important dates related to this topic and a section of this guide provides some suggested search strategies for further research in the collection.
| October 12, 1861 | One of the first iron-clads deployed in combat, the CSS Manassas, fights Union warships on the Mississippi River at the Battle of the Head of Passes. |
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| December 1861 | Continental Iron Works begins the construction of a new iron-clad, by the design of Swedish inventor John Ericsson, which would later be named the USS Monitor. |
| March 9, 1862 | The first battle between iron-clads, mainly the USS Monitor of the Union and the CSS Virginia (formally known as the USS Merrimack) happens at the Battle of Hampton Roads. |
| May 15, 1862 | Battle at Fort Darling where 5 Union ships, including the USS Monitor sail up the James to test Richmond defenses. Gun batteries at Fort Darling force the ships to retreat. |
| April 15, 1863 | Union ironclads attack Charleston but are turned back. At least one is sunk. |
| May 1864 | A reported 20 European ironclads, built by the French and British, will arrive by late June in the South. |
