Skirmish at Pass Christian, 1862

   Ryan hosted an Ironclads game today, a recreation of an action at Pass Christian, Mississippi in April 1862. Ryan, Bill and I commanded four Union ships, including one armed troop transport, moving upriver to land the 9th Connecticut at a pier; Josh and Dan commanded three Confederate vessels trying to prevent the invasion. All of these were wooden ships, relatively small guns balanced by light armor.
   The Union plan was that New London, our advance ship, would fall back until our other two fighting ships came down and joined her, whereupon they would advance; our transport, Henry Lewis, would hang behind. The Rebel plan was for one ship to go up the west channel, guarding the landing site, while the other two took the central channel. These plans lasted about one turn.
   I had command of New London and Henry Lewis. I decided to keep Henry close behind Ryan's ship Hatteras instead of staying back; I sent New London on ahead to tangle with Pamlico, the Rebel guarding the piers, since he seemed far enough away from the other Confederates that they couldn't support each other. Let's get it started--I tried to ram, barely missed but got a point blank rake which was nearly as good. Hatteras followed New London into close action but got caught between CSS Pamlico and Josh's CSS Carondelet and set afire. Shortly afterwards Carondelet was set afire.
   CSS Oregon, steaming up the east side of the river, made a navigational error. Turning west would have put her closer to the action, but she'd bounce off a cliff; she turned east and went aground on the mud flats along the eastern riverbank, which kept her out of action for most of the game.
   With Oregon hors de combat and the other two Confederates in the eastern channel, I realized I could send Henry Lewis up the central channel without risk of being intercepted. Carondelet shot at her but Lewis was moving at high speed, and Carondelet's crew was busy putting out their fire; Lewis escaped unscathed.
Pamlico attempted to ram Bill's ship USS J P Jackson. At the last moment, Jackson's guns boomed, hitting Pamlico's magazine and destroying her in one tremendous blast.
   Carondelet, fighting alone now, shot in all directions.  She set New London ablaze and crippled Jackson, but missed Lewis as she sped by. Carondelet set off in pursuit; New London, with fires burning out of control, moved in to intercept. The two ships collided bow to bow, putting them both dead in the water. Moments later, New London's fires reached her boilers. She exploded and sank as Carondelet backed away from the blast. Ryan's Hatteras staggered off, burned to the waterline and sank.
   Oregon worked her way out of the mud bank and joined Carondelet in trading shots with Jackson and the distant Henry Lewis, which was approaching the landing zone. A lucky long range shot managed to start a small fire on Henry Lewis, but Lewis's crew quickly extinguished the blaze. She came in, anchored, and landed her troops.
   It was a hard fought battle. The Union lost two ships, with a third crippled and facing two to one odds, while the fourth achieved the scenario victory condition. The Confederates lost one, with a second heavily damaged. I'd call it a tactical victory for the South; it was a strategic victory for the North, but could easily have gone the other way.
The historical result was that the Union squadron landed 1200 troops at Pass Christian, where they destroyed a Confederate camp before moving on to Louisiana.