It works in theory

One of the odder sections of the marginalia of Burnished Rows of Steel - a timeline with plenty of odd sections - is when TFSmith attempts to argue that US naval design was almost as good as British with regard to ships. The means he chooses to do so, however, is (predictably) a double standard on several levels.




As part of a discussion, he states:

Yep; comparing a potential "designed for the purpose" version of Roanoke-as-monitor with, say, HMS Royal Sovereign suggest the US was not that far behind the curve, certainly not conceptually; the British had advantages in metallurgy and engineering, but there could have been ways around that

This makes no sense. Even if you understand the terms, it makes no sense.

In the first place, TFSmith's point of comparison for the US is to take a failed vessel (the Roanoke being so unstable it was difficult for her to safely leave harbour, and which dismounted half her guns during the first test firing) and to imagine a successful version of her.

In the second place, his point of comparison for the British is a second-class ironclad which had started life as a sailing ship of the line, and then been converted into a steam liner while under construction. Once launched, she was then converted again into an ironclad turret ship and was, while unremarkable, able to ride out storms and to cruise happily up and down the British coast.

In the third place, he imagines comparing an American ship designed for the purpose of being a monitor (instead of the real one converted from an existing ship) with a British turret ironclad converted from an existing ship; anyone with an ounce of sense would say comparing the real Roanoke with the real Royal Sovereign, both conversions from wooden ships, was at least fair.

In the fourth place, TFSmith's argument is still pointless. It argues that the US was not far behind the curve "conceptually"; dismissing as unimportant the minor matters of metallurgy and engineering. In reality in the 19th century metallurgy and engineering were what separated a successful maritime power from a failed one .
Anyone could imagine a revolutionary new design, but the matters of engineering were what turned a new design into an effective ship - or into a harbour queen unable to successfully fire her guns without dismounting them.

One wonders what "ways" could have been found around British advantages in metallurgy and engineering when constructing ironclads. Historically the Union approached a deficiency in the production of single thick pieces of armour by the expedient of producing multiple layers of thinner armour to reach a similar degree of protection, even though this meant more than double the total armour weight; such an inefficiency does not appear to exist in BROS.


Perhaps little better exemplifies the author's attitude towards the British than that he invents a fictional Union ship to compare with a real British one, then uses it as evidence that the British could easily be matched by the Union in a highly technical field. It may well be that a hypothetical, Monitor-designed Roanoke could have been the equivalent of the twice-converted Royal Sovereign, but real American monitor designs (including the white elephant Casco class) might suggest otherwise.