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The time had run out for the mighty Monitors, and Norway started to get rid of many old vessels in the navy after the First World War. This was also the plan for the old Monitor Thor, but instead of being transformed to nails and other helpful metal junk she became a popular wreck in Vestfold. The monitor stranded on the SW of Hoftø outside Verdens Ende in Vestfold county during a storm 7. Mars 1919. Thor was being towed, but during the journey the cable broke and the vessel stranded on the island and sank later on. It was later salvaged on the wreck, but the wreck itself was primarily let alone. The crew of two men lost their lives in this accident. There is only two diveable wrecks of monitors in the hole world, where one of them is the USS Monitor on sixty meters depth, and the monitor Thor, which lies on a more comfortable depth og eight to fourteen meters. The wreck of Thor can be located on the southwest side of the island. Bow and stern are the best intact parts of the wreck, and still you can see the gun emplacement and parts of the hull. A boat and nice weather is necessary to get a dive on Thor...
GPS: N 59 03.226 E 010 30.664
Underwaterpictures: Dag Deberitz
A short history of the first Monitor,
USS Monitor; USS
Monitor was the first ironclad ship to be commissioned into the U.S.
Navy. Built during the Civil War in response to the Confederate Navy's
ironclad CSS Virginia, Monitor played an integral role in the transformation
of military vessels from wood to iron. On August 3, 1861, Union Secretary
of the Navy Gideon Welles published an announcement calling on designers
to submit plans for ironclad warships to the Navy Department. With
the support of Cornelius Bushnell, who controlled several railroads
in Connecticut and had entered the world of naval architecture, renowned
engineer John Ericsson submitted his plans for an "impregnable
iron battery" to the Navy's Ironclad Board. Ericsson's design
was chosen along with two others. He was awarded a contract in the
amount of $275,000 to build his planned ironclad and charged with
doing so in one hundred days. USS Monitor was launched on January
30, 1862. Under the command of Lieutenant John L. Worden, Monitor
was ordered to Hampton Roads, Virginia, where she fought the Confederate
ironclad CSS Virginia in the first battle between ironclad ships.
The two ships engaged each other for nearly four hours with neither
inflicting serious damage on the other. The battle ended in a draw,
although both sides claimed victory. On December 31, 1862, while in
tow by USS Rhode Island to Beaufort, North Carolina, Monitor sank
during a severe storm off the coast of Cape Hatteras. Four officers
and twelve crewmen lost their lives. Information from www.wikipedia.org Monitor was one of three ironclad warships ordered by the U.S. Navy, after Galena and New Ironsides. Designed by the brilliant but choleric Swedish engineer John Ericsson, Monitor was described as a "cheesebox on a raft", consisting of a heavy, round iron turret on the deck housing two large Dahlgren cannon. The armored deck was barely above the waterline. Aside from a small, boxy pilothouse, a detachable smokestack and a few fittings, the bulk of the ship was below the waterline to prevent damage from cannon fire. Monitor's hull was constructed at the Continental Iron Works in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn, New York, and the ship was launched there on January 30, 1862. Monitor was innovative in construction technique as well as design. Parts were forged in nine different foundries and brought together to build the ship, with the entire process taking less than 120 days. In addition to the "cheesebox", its rotating turret, Monitor was also the first naval vessel to be fitted with Ericsson's marine screw. Ericsson anticipated some aspects of modern submarine design by placing all of Monitor's features except the turret and pilothouse underwater, making it the first semi-submersible ship. In contrast, Virginia was a conventional wooden vessel covered with iron plates and bearing fixed weapons. Virginia attacked the Union blockading squadron in Hampton Roads, Virginia, on March 8, 1862, destroying USS Cumberland and Congress and forcing Minnesota aground before withdrawing. That night, Monitor, under command of Lt. John L. Worden, arrived under tow from Brooklyn. When Virginia returned the next day, March 9, 1862, to finish off Minnesota and the rest of the U.S. fleet, Monitor sailed forth to stop her. The ironclads fought for about four hours, neither one sinking or seriously damaging the other. Although the battle was essentially a draw, it was a tactical victory for Monitor. Virginia had failed in her mission to destroy the U.S. fleet and raise the blockade, while Monitor succeeded in defending the fleet. The ironclads never again fought each other. USS Monitor became the prototype for the monitor warship type. Many more were built, including river monitors and deep-sea monitors, and they played key roles in Civil War battles on the Mississippi and James rivers. Some had two or even three turrets, and later monitors had improved seaworthiness. Just three months after the famous Battle of Hampton Roads, the design was offered to Sweden, and in 1865 the first Swedish monitor was being built at Motala Warf in Norrköping; she was named John Ericsson in Honor of the engineer. She was followed by 14 more monitors. One of them, Sölve, is still preserved at the marine museum in Gothenburg. The last U.S. Navy monitor-class warship was struck from the Navy List in 1937. |
Edited 29.06.2007 |