ABSTRACT
The American Civil War, then, came at a time when the oceans were about to be dominated by a new kind of warship, unthinkable a generation earlier, steam-powered, propeller-driven, armour-plated, firing explosive shells from rifled guns mounted in revolving turrets. The Confederates, too, did their best to improvise some kind of river defence fleet to resist Northern incursions, and, more than once, ironclads which they had managed to construct, despite immense handicaps, threatened to upset Union dominance in the river war. In the second half of the war there was no possibility of British intervention as a deliberate and calculated decision – and the British attitude was crucial in shaping French policy, too. The war on the high seas was most threatening when it impinged on the world of statecraft. Storms on the high seas were most dangerous when they surged into diplomatic channels.
