During the American Civil War the Confederate Navy faced an iron shortage and armored its ships with cotton bales. These cottonclads were steam-powered riverboats reinforced with layers of 500-pound bales that absorbed enemy cannonballs. In the Battle of Galveston on January 1 1863 Confederate Commander John B. Magruder used vessels like the CSS Bayou City and the CSS Neptune to recapture a vital Texas port. Though not as formidable as true ironclads these makeshift ships showcased remarkable in

The French ironclad Marceau looks weird due to a combination of a unique "diamond" main gun arrangement, an extreme "tumblehome" hull design, and the constraints of being an outdated design by the time it was completed. The diamond layout, with guns on the centerline and in wing positions, allowed for heavy broadsides and a strong chase/retreat fire arc. However, the long construction delays meant the Marceau class was obsolete upon commissioning, superseded by new pre-dreadnoughts, which explai