An ironclad was a steam-propelled warship in the latter part of the 19th century, protected by iron or steel armor plates. The ironclad was developed as a result of the vulnerability of wooden warships to explosive or incendiary shells. The first ironclad battleship, La Gloire, was launched by the French Navy in 1859; she prompted the British Royal Navy to start building ironclads. After the first clashes of ironclads took place during the American Civil War, it became clear that the ironclad had replaced the unarmored ship of the line as the most powerful warship afloat. This type of ship would come to be very successful in the American Civil War. Ironclads were designed for several roles, including as high seas battleships, coastal defense ships, and long-range cruisers. The rapid evolution of warship design in the late 19th century transformed the ironclad from a wooden-hulled vessel which carried sails to supplement its steam engines into the steel-built, turreted battleships and cruisers familiar in the 20th century. The rapid pace of change in the ironclad period meant that many ships were obsolete as soon as they were complete, and that naval tactics were in a state of flux. Many ironclads were built to make use of the ram or the torpedo, which a number of naval designers considered the crucial weapons of naval combat.

Read the rest of this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ironclad_warship

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1204:

Alexios V fled Constantinople as forces under Boniface the Marquess of Montferrat and Enrico Dandolo the Doge of Venice entered and sacked the Byzantine capital, effectively ending the Fourth Crusade. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Crusade

1606:

A royal decree established the Union Flag to symbolise the Union of the Crowns, merging the designs of the Flag of England and the Flag of Scotland. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Flag

1861:

Confederate forces began firing at Fort Sumter in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina, starting the American Civil War. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Fort_Sumter

1927:

Chinese Civil War: A large-scale purge of communists from the nationalist Kuomintang began in Shanghai. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_massacre_of_1927

1961:

Aboard Vostok 3KA-2, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man to enter outer space, completing one orbit in a time of 108 minutes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri_Gagarin

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

jostle (v): 1. To bump into or brush against while in motion.

2. To move through by pushing and shoving. 3. To contend or vie in order to acquire something http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/jostle

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

The arts of power and its minions are the same in all countries and in all ages. It marks its victim; denounces it; and excites the public odium and the public hatred, to conceal its own abuses and encroachments. --Henry Clay http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Henry_Clay