Classic Fond 5/ClassicFond05_nopass.iso/STRATEGI/CIVILWAR.RAR/DBDATA/NAVTACT.ENG

Text File | 1995-07-04 | 3KB | 57 lines

~sNAVAL TACTICS~

At the beginning of the war the United States navy had about
90 ships. Some were very old wooden sailing line-of-battle
ships, two of the frigates being over 60 years old.
Others were quite modern steamers driven by screw or paddle
wheel.

The Confederacy had ~bno~ navy at all at the start of the war.

By the end of the war the Union had well over 500 armed
vessels, while the Confederates had commissioned 130 warships,
river vessels and various small craft.

The U.S. Navy was organized into squadrons. In December 1862
these were the North Atlantic, South Atlantic, East Gulf and
West Gulf squadrons, all operating as blockaders. The Mississippi
squadron operated along the rivers in the west, while the
Pacific squadron and the East India squadron (disbanded in
October 1864) hunted Confederate raiders.

Blockaders were Union warships of all shapes and sizes whose
task was to block the harbors, coastal inlets and rivers to
prevent ships entering or operating in them.

Blockade-runners, also of all shapes and sizes, sought to get
through the blockade. They carried not only military stores, but
also civilian luxury goods. They were not Confederate warships,
and although some were operated by the Confederate government,
most were private commercial ventures operating for profit.

Commerce raiders were Confederate warships whose task was to
cruise the high seas and sink any merchantmen flying the Union flag.
Many were built to order in Britain and had British crews. They
tended to be lighter and faster than normal warships, but were still
bigger and stronger than the merchantmen they hunted.

Privateers were a special case of commerce raider. They were
not government warships but private commercial vessels sailing
for loot. Technically, they weren't pirates, but sailed under "letters
of marque". This was a commission from the government to operate
against the enemy's merchantmen. The practice had been outlawed
by the 1865 Declaration of Paris, but because the United States had
not signed the Declaration, the South had recourse to such tactics.

While many of the Union's warships were used as blockaders
and to hunt down the commerce raiders and privateers, they
escorted their own merchantmen and protected the whaling fleet.

This was a period of rapid evolution in the war at sea. The French
ironclads of the "Gloire" class had made all wooden ships obsolete,
while the British "Warrior" was not merely armored with iron, but
entirely built from it. By 1862 nearly 100 armored ships were in
commission or under construction in Europe. While the Union and
the Confederacy each built ironclad warships, they did so in a great
hurry, and some were very experimental in design.@@@