On December 29, 1860, the first British oceangoing ironclad warship, the HMS Warrior, was launched, but she was not the first such ship in World History.
Digging Deeper
Contrary to popular misconception that the US Navy USS Monitor and the Confederate States Navy CS Virginia (rebuilt from the Union wooden ship, USS Merrimac) were the first ironclad warships, iron armored floating batteries had already seen combat during the Crimean War, and the French ship, the Gloire, in service since 1859 was the world’s first ocean going warship. In fact, the Monitor and Virginia were actually designed for coastal work and not the open ocean.
Warrior was a 40 gun steam driven ship, the first of a class of 2 armored frigates, and was designed using the plans of a wooden steamship as the basis for the hull. Considered a “broadside ironclad,” Warrior‘s guns were arrayed on a single gun deck protected by an armored box structure with half the guns facing each side of the ship.
