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19 ironclads for savannah May–July 1862 up the river, hidden away at Purrysburg, the brothers Tift were working on the Fingal. They began buying tools—carpenters squares and rules, wedges, chisels, augers and bits, several big grind stones, carpenters’ hammers and sledge hammers and caulking mallets and spare handles for them all, caulking irons, rip saws and crosscut saws and hacksaws, water buckets and dippers, cotton and manila rope, kegs of nails and spikes, bar iron and steel, time books, and a half barrel of grease. They contracted for timber. They ordered eight tons of stove bolts and washers from the naval storehouse in Montgomery. They were veteran shipbuilders now, and knew what they needed. soon they had sheds up, and the riverbank began to look like a shipyard. They ordered padlocks and door locks, two trucks, more augers, another big grind stone, two dozen more caulking irons, caulking mallets, and blacksmiths’ tools—fourteen smiths hammers, four sets blacksmiths tongs, and a 103-pound vice.1 converting the merchantman to an ironclad was a different process than building the Mississippi from scratch, but it was more complex than they originally imagined. James reilly’s crew took over four weeks to strip the Fingal. They began by dismantling her cabins and upper works. That uncovered surprises below that required rethinking and changes of plans. everywhere that bracing and strengthening was needed, there seemed to be structures in the way.2 The Tifts hired a draftsman, John Kendall, to draw plans for the Fingal ’s armored casemate.3 The brothers had him design it along the same easy-to-build plan they had for the Mississippi—straight lines and simple angles. at least they wouldn’t have to wait on engines: an excellent steam plant already resided in the ship.4 and the brothers had an armor supplier in the Gate city iron ironclads for savannah / 147 Works in atlanta. it was the Tifts, after all, who put the atlanta firm (with great reluctance) in the armor plate business.5 summer had come. The heat was oppressive—so stifling it made mere movement an effort. Dr. Gibbes said, “We live in a state of slow combustion.” river fevers were rampant again and the squadron’s surgeons were busy, but most of his patients , Gibbes noted, “have yielded very successfully to proper diet, quinine and fowler’s solution of ‘arsenic.’” Dr. Gibbes missed Paul Jones, still in richmond for commodore Tattnall’s court-martial. But the young midshipmen, captain holmes and lieutenant cameron of the marines, oscar Johnston and Pelot and Porcher—even Kennard—were a pleasant group of gentlemen. Gibbes still visited town about twice a week, staying with bachelor officers at naval headquarters or at the Pulaski house. over the past year he had become a regular in Bishop elliott’s circle and had been frequenting Dr. Miller Kollock’s parlor, for he had lost his heart to commodore Tattnall’s niece Maria, Kollock’s eldest daughter.6 When the family left to summer in sleepy hollow, Gibbes pined for her. young Paul hamilton Gibbes came to visit his navy brother. When the citadel ’s student body enlisted and the school closed, he was still too young for the army and at loose ends, so he came to savannah. he caught the steamer Ida to fort Jackson, then a supply boat brought him to the Savannah. no one questioned the propriety of a civilian coming aboard: officers frequently had guests. surgeon John sandford was on sick leave, so Gibbes gave his brother Dr. sandford ’s cabin.7 at Purrysburg, two smitheries were up. Their substantial brick chimneys lent an air of permanence to the growing little shipyard. The Tifts bought a blacksmith’s bellows, another big anvil, and a second screw vice. They hired some local semiskilled labor, five machinists from augusta, and a crew of machinists and boilermakers from alvin Miller’s shop.8 heavy timbers and pine planking came in, and armor began to arrive from atlanta. The Tifts cut the Fingal down to her main deck and widened her six feet for a distance of about 150 feet on each side. The widened section was a buttress of timbers that sloped upward and outward from a point several feet below the waterline to the level just below the gun deck. on this was built a casemate, its sides and ends sloping in at an angle of approximately thirty degrees. The casemate walls were fifteen inches of pine...

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