Ironclads

The Mississippi River system was the highway of the western part of the Confederate and United States. At the beginning of the war, the South controlled the Mississippi from Cairo, Illinois, where the Ohio emptied into the Mississippi, to New Orleans. There were several important rebel strongholds along the Mississippi, including Memphis, Island Number Ten, on the Tennessee-Kentucky border, and Vicksburg, Mississippi. The Union realized that controlling the Mississippi River system was essential to their …

…Confederacy. The reason that the Union ironclads had more impact lies both in their greater numbers and their greater quality, and the results of these advantages are shown in the Union victories due to ironclads, like Island Number Ten and Memphis, and the lack of Southern victories due to ironclads. Although ironclad ships did not dominate every battle in which they were used, they were essential to determining the outcome of the American Civil War.