French Weapons in The American Civil War - Ironclads

Ironclads

As the Confederacy struggled against the North, it attempted to purchase one of the latest ironclads from France, the Stonewall (later to be acquired by Japan after the end of the war). The ship, built in Bordeaux, France by the L'Arman shipyard in 1864, was an ironclad ram warship. However, the French government embargoed the sale of the ship to the Confederacy in February 1864 (prior to her launch in June 1864), and then sold the ship to the Royal Danish Navy as the Stærkodder. However, L'Arman and the Danish Navy could not agree on a price for the ship, and sometime shortly after January 7, 1865 the vessel took on a Confederate crew and was commissioned the CSS Stonewall while still at sea; L'Arman had secretly resold her to the Confederacy.

The arrival of the "formidable" Stonewall in America was dreaded by the Union, and several ships tried to intercept her, among them the USS Kearsarge and the USS Sacramento. In February and March, the USS Niagara and the Sacramento laid up at Ferrol, Spain, to prevent Stonewall from departing, but the much more powerful Confederate ship was able to make good her escape.

After an eventful crossing of the Atlantic Ocean, she eventually arrived in North American waters near the end of the American Civil War, too late to have a significant effect. (By the time of her October 1864 commissioning the Confederacy was in disarray and near defeat, its navy disintegrating, along with most other Confederate institutions.) To avoid surrendering the vessel, Captain Page sailed her into Havana harbor and turned her over to the Captain General of Cuba for the sum of $16,000.

The vessel was then turned over to United States authorities in return for reimbursement of the same amount. She was temporarily de-commissioned, stationed at a US Navy dock, until she was offered for sale to the Japanese government of the Tokugawa shogunate.