Editing CSS Albemarle (section)

==Construction==
On 16 April 1862, the Confederate Navy Department, enthusiastic about the offensive potential of armored rams following the victory of their first ironclad ram {{ship|CSS|Virginia}} (the rebuilt USS ''Merrimack'') over the wooden-hulled [[United States|Union]] [[blockade]]rs in [[Hampton Roads]], Virginia, signed a contract with nineteen-year-old detached Confederate Lieutenant [[Gilbert Elliott]] of [[Elizabeth City, North Carolina]]; he was to oversee the construction of a smaller but still powerful gunboat to destroy the Union warships in the North Carolina sounds. These men-of-war had enabled Union troops to hold strategic positions that controlled eastern North Carolina.

Since the terms of the agreement gave Elliott freedom to select an appropriate place to build the ram, he established a primitive shipyard, with the assistance of plantation owner Peter Smith, in a cornfield up the [[Roanoke River]] at a place called Edward's Ferry, near modern [[Scotland Neck, North Carolina]]; Smith was appointed the superintendent of construction. There, the water was too shallow to permit the approach of Union [[gunboat]]s that otherwise would have destroyed the ironclad while still on its [[Slipway|ways]]. Using detailed sketches provided by Elliott, the Confederate Navy's Chief Constructor [[John L. Porter]] finalized the gunboat's design, giving the ram an armored [[casemate]] with eight sloping, 30-degree angle sides. Within this thick-walled bunker were two {{convert|6.4|in|mm|adj=on}} Brooke pivot rifles, one forward, the other aft, each capable of firing from three different fixed positions. Both cannons were protected on all sides behind six exterior-mounted, heavy iron shutters. The ram was propelled by twin 3-bladed screw propellers powered by two steam engines, each of {{convert|200|hp|abbr=on}}, and built by Elliott.

[[File:Building the Albemarle.jpg|thumb|left|Building the ''Albemarle'']]
Construction of the ironclad began in January 1863 and continued on during the next year. Word of the gunboat reached the Union naval officers stationed in the region, raising an alarm. They appealed to the [[United States Department of War|War Department]] for an overland expedition to destroy the ship, to be christened ''Albemarle'' after the body of water into which the Roanoke emptied, but the [[United States Army|Union Army]] never felt it could spare the troops needed to carry out such a mission; it was a decision that would prove to be very short-sighted.