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Civil War Interactive Discussion Board > Civil War Talk > Civil War Museums > American Civil War Center/Mariners Museum |
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Civil War Interactive Discussion Board > Civil War Talk > Civil War Museums > American Civil War Center/Mariners Museum |
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| American Civil War Center/Mariners Museum | Rate Topic |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 6th, 2006 11:06 pm |
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1st Post |
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Doc C Member 
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While in the Richmond area visiting Cold Harbor, Gaines Mill and Malvern Hill, I drove over to Richmond to see Tredegar Iron Works. Learned that the American Civil War Center just opened early last month. Was impressed with the facility and the way the information was presented beginning with the 1600's throught the civil war. 3 views were shown - slaves/soldiers/civilians. Would be interested in others opinions of the museum. On a more important note, we stopped by the Mariners Museum in Newport News on our way home. The U.S.S. Monitor's turret and 2 guns are on display in the restoration section there. A new section is planned to open dedicated entirely to the monitor and virginia next spring. The museum offers many other interesting maritne exhibits but the monitor torret is well worth the visit itself. Doc C
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| Posted: Tue Nov 7th, 2006 02:18 am |
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2nd Post |
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susansweet Member 
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Doc thanks for the information. Hopefully in the next year or two I will get there. I would love to see both . The west coast is soooooo far to travel to battlefields and museums of the Civil War .
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| Posted: Tue Nov 7th, 2006 11:14 am |
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3rd Post |
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Widow Member
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I, too, thought the Mariners Museum in Newport News is a fascinating place. I went there in July 2006 specifically to see the Monitor's turret. I'd read so much about how it changed naval warfare forever, that I just had to lay eyes on it. The museum is building a huge addition to house the Monitor artifacts, and is still under construction. I took a "hard-hat tour" of the facility after the construction workers left for the day. Because the Monitor had sunk some 140 years ago, all the iron had absorbed salt. Before the artifacts can be exhibited in open air, the salt has to be leached out by soaking in fresh water. The turret is in a huge tank, slowly giving up its salt; it may take ten years. When it sank off the North Carolina coast on 31 Dec 1862, the top-heavy Monitor rolled over and settled upside down. Therefore, to protect the turret from possible damage, it is upside down in its fresh-water tank. The water was cloudy, so the only visible part of the turret was the rim, and only about a third of that. Still, it was the real thing, and at last I got an idea of just how big - or small - it is. Right beside it is another tank with the two Dahlgrens, one on top of the other. They're huge! One of the Monitor's deck plates has been specially treated and is on exhibit in open air. It's a single piece of iron, four feet wide by ten feet long by two inches thick. Around the edge are the holes for riveting it down. The deck plate is flat on the floor, so that you can put your hands on it. I put my hand on the deck plate. In fact, I put BOTH hands on it and let my imagination go. Just think, time travel back to 9 Mar 1862. Steaming into Hampton Roads, just looking for a fight. I'm standing on one of the deck plates, waiting for orders to go below. The Cumberland was rammed and sunk the day before. The Minnesota had got into shallow water at low tide and was stuck, helplessly waiting for the Virginia to come out and finish her off. We move near the Minnesota to protect her. Here comes the Virginia, she's enormous! The Monitor is much smaller, draws much less water, and can literally run rings around the Virginia. With our revolving turret we don't have to be broadside in order to hit her. We whang away at each other, I'm going deaf from the noise and concussions in the turret, but we save the Minnesota. I'm pretty busy and don't have time to think about history in the making. From that day on, all wooden navies are obsolete. Naval warfare has entered the Iron Age.
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| Posted: Tue Nov 7th, 2006 11:22 am |
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4th Post |
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Doc C Member
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We just lucked out that the tank holding the monitor turret was drained when we were there. Supposedly it's going to take 10 years (???) to finish restoring the torret. Disney has also come in to make a full scale model of the turret as is was when they brought it up from it's resting place off North Carolina. Haven't looked for it, but does anyone know where if at all the virginia's artifacts are located? Doc C
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| Posted: Tue Nov 7th, 2006 11:36 am |
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5th Post |
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Widow Member
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I think the Virginia's artifacts are also at the Mariners Museum. I saw a few on display, but I don't know if the museum is the official home of the Virginia. All the Monitor's crew was expected to provide their own eating utensils, so each knife, fork, and spoon was monogrammed for easy identification. Some of them have been recovered. One of the members of the "hard-hat tour" group was a man who is a direct descendant of a sailor rescued when the Monitor sank. He knew that the sailor's fork had been recovered, and said he'd waited forty years to see it. It wasn't on display, however, so he asked the tour guide if it would be possible to see the fork and maybe have his picture taken with it. The man's eyes were watery with emotion. The guide answered that he would check at the front desk. I don't know the outcome, but I hope he got his wish. Widow
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| Posted: Tue Nov 7th, 2006 02:01 pm |
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6th Post |
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David White Member 
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Doc: Not much left of the Virginia anymore and what is left is scattered. I know the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond has the anchor and chain sitting in front of the museum.
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| Posted: Tue Nov 7th, 2006 05:47 pm |
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7th Post |
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TimHoffman01 Member 
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The Anchor and Drive shaft of the CSS Virginia are at the MOC (actually in front of the MOC). The anchor chain actually belongs to the USS Cumberland. Unfortunately after the war the Virginia was used as a source of salvage iron, causing what was left to be brocken up and scattered. No one recorded pulling its ram out of Cumberland though. I know Clive Cussler actually has conducted two searches (I think it was two...more than one anyhow) looking for it. I talks about the Virginia and is search for the CSS Arkansas and USS Carondelet in his non-fiction books (the Sea Hunters I & II). If you are interested, they have expedition descriptions at his web site: http://WWW.Numa.net/expeditions.
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| Posted: Tue Nov 7th, 2006 08:56 pm |
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8th Post |
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Doc C Member
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Tim What's your opinion on the American Civil War Center? Doc C
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| Posted: Wed Nov 8th, 2006 05:06 pm |
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9th Post |
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TimHoffman01 Member
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Unfortunately I haven't been able to get down there to see it yet. Between stuff with my son's scout troop, Graduate school, and things around my house going to heck in a handbasket (amazing how everything seems to start wearing out at once!) I haven't had the time that seems necessary to really get a good look and let it sink in. I have some time off coming up in December and I'm hoping of getting down there SOMETIME that week. I will be going to visit my in-laws over Thanksgiving and I might be able to talk my mom-in-law into coming with me and the kids to the Mariner's museum and Ft. Monroe. I know we'll enjoy it, and she loves watching me try to explain all this to my son (7). If he can actually see and touch something he always seems to get more out of it. (Even if the simulated bullets swishing past in the breeze at Pamplin Park south of Petersburg did send him running....or maybe it was that lady's scream?) I recently read to him a little bit from the book Ironclad (obviously about the Monitor). I told him I knew of where he could go to actually see it and he really seemed interested and asked me questions for about 45 minutes. Long enough to get us both in trouble with my wife since it was a school night and I was supposed to be putting him to bed. She says he's too young to get any of it. I tend to disagree about that to some degree. I got interested in the generar subject after my parents took me to Manassas...and there was less to see there then than now, and a lot less than at some of the modern museums.
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| Posted: Wed Nov 8th, 2006 06:04 pm |
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10th Post |
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Doc C Member
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Was really wanting to know what serious c.w. individuals felt about the american civil war center next to the tredegar iron works. Doc C
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