What do we know about the Confederate defence fleet at Memphis and Plum run . What did these gunboats look like . There are only photos of two of them and there are paintings and pen drawings of the others, some of which contradict the written evidence and the drawings themselves . Here is my assessment of these vessels , please feel free to put in your ideas.
All vessels were converted in New Orleans so we would expect to see some form of uniformity of construction.
The base vessels were mostly powerful towboats rather than the conventional Mississippi steamers of the Natchetz variety . The features of a tow boat would include exposed heavy wooden hogging timbers rather than chains and stays and a lot of these towboats had only one funnel and some had walking beam engines. The vessels would also likely have had one deck less than the Natchetz type as they wouldn't normally carry passengers.
So now for my interpretations of these vessels appearances
General Bragg , a coastal steamer with a walking beam engine and deck cabins whose appearance was known from photographs and dimensions recorded. It is interesting to note that the accuracy of contemporary drawings can be judged by the lack of a walking beam or a brig rigging when depicting general Bragg.
General Sterling Price . A northern built Mississippi tow boat with exposed hogging timbers and twin funnels and a large high positioned pilot house sited between the paddle boxes , this positioning was typical on a twin funnelled towboat in order to see the tow over the bow. Several photos exist of this vessel and the layout of its protective bulwarks can be taken as a pattern for the other conversions.
Now we get into the region of speculation.
Little rebel . As a screw tug she was an odd one out . Most representations use a convenient picture of a Union screw tug which has sides like a casemated ironclad and a pretty round and domed pilot house . This was not in keeping with the construction evidence so I have settled on a painting of her from Memphis in which you can see on more detailed photos a small tug in the background with squared wooden bulwarks protecting the machinery and a square pilothouse forward of a single funnel. Her dimensions are not known but she was undoubtedly smaller than the other ships. Her protection would have been minimal due to her limited displacement so I judge this picture as being pretty accurate.
General M Jeff Thompson . Two contemporary drawings in the Naval Historical Foundation NH 59054 and NH59053 show a single funnelled towboat with exposed hogging timbers and a pilot house sited well forward on the upper deck. Due to the fact that these two drawings are closely consistent with each other and also consistent with other drawings and paintings of this type of vessel I am prepared to accept this representation as accurate in the absence of any other contradictory evidence
General Beauregard . Most pictures of this vessel are show her being dramatically rammed by the Union ram Monarch at Memphis . Due to the consistency of all of these pictures and aspects of her construction matching what I would have expected than I am prepared to accept that this is a good interpretation of this vessel . The fact that she was known to displace 461 tons and was 161 feet long also feeds into the accuracy of these pictures .
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Colonel Lovell. In her former life Lovell was known as "Hercules" which would be a typical name given to a towboat of some power . Unusually it appears that despite the picture evidence to the contrary the Lovell had two funnels as in a contemporary account in Gun boats down the Mississippi "she is rammed by Queen of the West just forward of her wheel house ( paddle wheel house not pilot house ) and the smokestacks (plural) sagged forward over her bow". She was 162 feet long and as a Cincinnati built twin stacked towboat she would have had her pilothouse sited high on the upperdeck in a similar position to that on the General Price.
General Sumpter , Sumpters dimensions were known and according to Silverstone she was fitted with a low pressure beam engine. An account in Battles and Leaders states that at Plum Run she was fired at by the Union ironclad Carondelet whose shot was aimed at the centre of the vessel and struck just forward of the pilot house hitting the boilers causing steam to escape. This tells us that the Pilot house was not sited forward in front of the boilers like on most single funnelled towboats but was positioned high amidships , that being the case, to be consistent with towboat designs she must have had twin funnels .
General van Dorn, I have found no drawings or dimensions or descriptive evidence to support any theory of this vessels appearance so I would go for a single funnel vessel similar to Beauregard as a pattern when depicting her mainly due to the fact a lot of single funnel vessels are shown in the pictures in which she appears but not identified.
Based on this evidence I have made some 1:1200 scale models of these warships and will shortly selling a limited number of sets to interested parties.
To see some of my work you can visit the Riachuelo Warships thread on the Ironclads board on TMP.
