13. CSS Virginia was built to break the Union blockade
Union troops abandoned the Gosport Navy Yard in Virginia early in the war, leaving behind the completed, though sunken, hull of the steam frigate Merrimack. The Confederates raised and repaired the hull, installed iron plating on its new superstructure, and renamed the ship CSS Virginia. Virginia was barely seaworthy, suitable for operations only in coastal waters, and those only when calm. It is often referred to as the world’s first ironclad warship, which it was not. It was the first to engage in battle when it used its guns and ram to attempt to break the Union blockade at Hampton Roads. The following day USS Monitor intervened.
Virginia demonstrated, in its battle with Monitor, that it was obsolete at the time it was built. The days of ships standing yardarm to yardarm, exchanging broadsides, were nearly over. Guns which could swing out to either side allowed smaller ships to carry fewer, but far heavier guns. They also soon fired heavier shells which pierced iron plate, and the iron chains with which many wooden ships protected their hulls. The Battle of Hampton Roads was the closest the Confederates came to breaking the Union blockade. From that point, Union warships were unbeatable in battle, and the blockade runners had to rely on their own wits.