Initial plans called for four turrets on the new monitor, but only three were placed. Her masts, rigging and everything except smokestack was removed above the gundeck. Little to nothing was done to reinforce the hull which proved to be a major problem.
Those three turrets, however, mounted some really heavy pieces of artillery: two muzzle loading 15-inch Dahlgren, two 11-inch Dahlgrens and two eight inch 150-pdr. Parrott rifles. No turret had two of the same two caliber guns, however.
Commissioned 29 June 1863.
Her initial commander as an ironclad was Captain Benjamin F. Sands (who was also at the battles of Fort Fisher while in command of the USS Fort Jackson), He reported that on the trip from New York to Hampton Roads that the ship rolled heavily that it would be impossible to use its guns.
On 14 July, Sands test fired his guns for the first time and three of the guns dismounted because of the bad recoil. It was decided that the Roanioke would serve only as harbor defense for Hampton Roads, where she spent the rest of the war.
She was decommissioned in 1875 and sold for scrap in 1883.
--Old B-Runner
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