The Battle of Hampton Roads, 8-9 March 1862, was instrumental in both the Civil War and future of naval warfare. It was the first battle in history between ironclads: the Union’s USS Monitor and the Confederacy’s CSS Virginia (not the Merrimack).
Week 1 is a 2-hour classroom lecture on the path that led to war, construction of the two ships, the battle, and its aftermath. Week 2 is a 2-hour guided tour of the USS Monitor Center at the Mariners’ Museum in Newport News.
Suggested reading: Our Little Monitor: The Greatest Invention of the Civil War (Kent State University Press, 2018) by Anna Gibson Holloway and Jonathan W. White; The Monitor Boys, The Crew of the Union’s First Ironclad (History Press, 2011) by John V. Quarstein
