CSS Arkansas

CSS Arkansas in a period sepia wash drawing by R.G. Skerrett. From the U.S. Naval Historical Center
History
Confederate States of America
Name:	Arkansas
Namesake:	State of Arkansas
Ordered:	24 August 1861
Laid down:	October 1861
Launched:	24 April 1862
Fate:	scuttled by crew 6 August 1862
General characteristics
Displacement:	approximately 800 tons
Length:	165 ft (50 m)
Beam:	35 ft (11 m)
Draft:	11.5 ft (3.5 m)
Speed:	8 knots (15 km/h; 9.2 mph)
Complement:	232 officers and men
Armament:	Total of 10 guns (3 on broadside, and 2 forward and 2 aft). Cast Iron Ram at the bow 2 × 8 in (203 mm) Columbiads in bow ports, 2 × 6.4 in (163 mm) Brooke Rifles in stern ports 2 × 6.4 in (163 mm) Brooke Rifles, 2 × 8 in (203 mm) Dahlgren smoothbores and 2 × 32 lb (15 kg) smoothbores in broadside ports.
Armor:	Casemate: railroad iron over wood and compressed cotton. Pilothouse: 2 in (51 mm). Top: 1 in (25 mm). Stern: boiler iron only

CSS Arkansas was a Confederate Ironclad warship which served during the American Civil War in the Western Theater. Arkansas ran through a U.S. Navy fleet at Vicksburg, Mississippi, on 15 July 1862, in a celebrated action in which she inflicted more damage than she received. She was later destroyed by her crew to prevent capture by Union forces.

Her keel was laid down at Memphis, Tennessee, by J.T. Shirley in October 1861. In April 1862, Arkansas was removed to Greenwood, Mississippi on the Yazoo River to prevent her capture when Memphis fell to the Union Navy. Her sister ship, CSS Tennessee, was burned on the stocks because she was not near enough to completion to be launched.

In May 1862 Capt. Isaac N. Brown of the Confederate States Navy received orders at Vicksburg from the Navy Department in Richmond, Virginia, to proceed to Greenwood, and there assume command of Arkansas. His orders were to finish and equip the vessel. When Captain Brown arrived, he found a mere hull, without armor, engines in pieces, and guns without carriages. Supplies of railroad iron, intended as armor for the ship, were lying at the bottom of the river. A recovery mission was ordered, and the armor was pulled up out of the mud. Captain Brown then had Arkansas towed to Yazoo City, where he pressed into service local craftsmen, and also got the assistance of 200 soldiers from the Confederate Army as construction crews. After five strenuous weeks of labor under the hot summer sun, the ship had to leave due to falling river levels. She had been fully outfitted, except for the curved armor intended to surround her stern and pilot house. Boiler plate was stuck on these areas "for appearances' sake".