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Description

Ported to OBJ, textured, and further modified from the STL format low poly tabletop war gaming model created by Patrick Woodard. Preview picture posed in XNALara XPS. You can download Mr. Woodard's original STL model as part of his Confederate Ironclads Pack at the link below but be warned! STL models normally come untextured because they're made for use with 3D printers, with the end user expected to hand paint the 3D printed model. Furthermore I've added extra parts to this one in order to soup it up a bit and make it look somewhat better. If you want this to look the way it does in the above picture (or even better if you have the skill), then you'll have to round up your own textures and extra parts and do the job yourself, just like I did. Here's that link:

www.thingiverse.com/thing:3179…

CSS Arkansas, named after my home state (grin), was the lead ship in the two ship Arkansas class of ironclads built for the Confederate States Navy (CSN) during the American Civil War (1862-65). They were designed by John Shirley with help from noted Confederate ironclad designer John Porter (creator of the Richmond class), and were very different from the typical CSN ironclad ram type in that they followed a traditional keeled hull design, most likely for better seakeeping in the Gulf of Mexico. Their construction was intended to help keep the Mississippi River free of Union warships and gunboats. Details about the Arkansas class are lacking and sources conflict on how these were armed (or were to be in Tennessee's case), although most agree that Arkansas was modified to carry a total of 10 guns by the time she finally entered CSNservice. She had two 8-inch smoothbore Columbiads for bow guns and diverse kinds of 6-inch and 32-pounder (6.4 inch) guns completing her total battery. Given the severe shortage of armor plate in that part of the Confederacy, the Arkansas class used a combination of iron railroad ties or "T-iron" overlaid with thin iron sheets and mounted on top of compressed cotton in an attempt at a cushioning effect against heavy Union shot. As designed both of them were fitted with two steam engines fired by four boilers taken from existing riverboats and driving two shaft-mounted screws for propulsion, although two more boilers were later fitted to Arkansas in an unsuccessful effort to correct her being underpowered. She was also fitted with a bow ram just below her waterline like many CSN ironclads

Construction on both ironclads began just outside of Memphis, Tennessee in October of 1861 but work proceeded very slowly due to material shortages. The Union knew of the building of the two ironclads and took a number of preventative measures against them to prevent their launch, but the key moment came when Union forces took Island Number 10 just below Memphis on 8 April 1862. Arkansas had already been launched by then but she was still fitting out and did not yet have her full gun battery, and Tennessee was still incomplete and had not yet been launched. Arkansas was moved to Yazoo City to prevent her capture along with a barge full of everything else still to be fitted, while the incomplete Tennessee was set on fire and burned where she was to prevent capture The name Tennessee was subsequently reassigned to a different CSN ironclad, and that's the one familiar to most of you Civil War buffs from the Mississippi River theater, but I digress. Arkansas got away safely but the barge with the rest of her stuff sank short of the city, and to make matters worse Yazoo City had even less resources available to finish her than had Memphis. She was eventually "mostly completed" with a lot of local Confederate military strong-arming and the retrieval of most of her sunken extra gear with the help of a diving bell, although work on her armor was never completed, her engines were problematic (like most CSN ironclads), and certain mechanical issues with them often caused her to get stuck turning a circle. Nevertheless Arkansas was evenually made as battleworthy as all of this and more allowed and unofficially joined the war in early summer of 1862. On 15 July 1862 she engaged a small Union naval squadron led by the ironclad Carondelet a few miles from the mouth of the Yazoo River and both won the engagement and came close to crippling the Union ironclad in the process. Arkansas herself took a fair amount of damage in turn but won that rather uneven fight and was able to make her way to Vicksburg, Mississippi, where she ran smack into the middle of the main body of Union Admiral David Farragut's own fleet. Only one of the Union ships had its boilers lit due to a shortage of coal; nevertheless all of them that could opened fire on Arkansas as it passed them by and as their own guns came to bear. She ran the gauntlet and survived, although by its end she couldn't make steam and was merelydrifting with the current; however, her armor protected her and she wreaked a lot of damage among Farragut's wooden-hulled and ironclad vessels alike in her passing. Arkansas was given a hero's welcome when she finally arrived at Vicksburg but she was in no condition to fight again without major repairs, and most of her crew left her either to return to their homes upriver or to aid the defense of Vicksburg. She lay under the protection of the city's river forts until August, when her captain was ordered to take her downriver to attack the Union-held city of Baton Rouge, Louisianna. Her captain protested in vain that Arkansas was in no shape to fight but was overruled. On 5-6 August 1862, Arkansas had steamed within sight of Baton Route when one engine broke down and then the other did also by the time the first was repaired (which took all night), leaving the ailing Arkansas immobilized. By that time local Union forces were well aware of her presence and the Cities class river ironclad USS Essex, a sister ship to the aforementioned Carondelet, was dispatched to deal with her. Realizing his situation was hopeless, the captain of the CSS Arkansas order his crew to scuttle their own vessel and abandon ship. The burning Arkansas was allowed to drift downstream out of harm's way, blowing up and then sinking around noon. Her remains were rediscovered in 1981 buried deep under a levee (built decades later) at Free Negro Point.

This model can be used for either of the Arkansas class CSN ironclads, CSS Arkansas or (the original unfinished) CSS Tennessee, although it is missing many of the finer details of the originals. That's because this was originally created for use as a small naval war gaming miniature. All I did was give it a basic texture job and add the missing guns. That said I think this is still decent for what it is, and it will do nicely as a placeholder for now. I hope you have fun with it too once you download it and start playing with it yourselves. XD

For non-profit, non-commercial use only. If you use, mod, re-release in original or modded form or do anything else with Mr. Woodard's models, please give him credit for his original handiwork, okay? Thank you.

Description

Ported to OBJ, textured, and further modified from the STL format low poly tabletop war gaming model created by Patrick Woodard. Preview picture posed in XNALara XPS. You can download Mr. Woodard's original STL model as part of his Confederate Ironclads Pack at the link below but be warned! STL models normally come untextured because they're made for use with 3D printers, with the end user expected to hand paint the 3D printed model. Furthermore I've added extra parts to this one in order to soup it up a bit and make it look somewhat better. If you want this to look the way it does in the above picture (or even better if you have the skill), then you'll have to round up your own textures and extra parts and do the job yourself, just like I did. Here's that link:

www.thingiverse.com/thing:3179…

CSS Arkansas, named after my home state (grin), was the lead ship in the two ship Arkansas class of ironclads built for the Confederate States Navy (CSN) during the American Civil War (1862-65). They were designed by John Shirley with help from noted Confederate ironclad designer John Porter (creator of the Richmond class), and were very different from the typical CSN ironclad ram type in that they followed a traditional keeled hull design, most likely for better seakeeping in the Gulf of Mexico. Their construction was intended to help keep the Mississippi River free of Union warships and gunboats. Details about the Arkansas class are lacking and sources conflict on how these were armed (or were to be in Tennessee's case), although most agree that Arkansas was modified to carry a total of 10 guns by the time she finally entered CSNservice. She had two 8-inch smoothbore Columbiads for bow guns and diverse kinds of 6-inch and 32-pounder (6.4 inch) guns completing her total battery. Given the severe shortage of armor plate in that part of the Confederacy, the Arkansas class used a combination of iron railroad ties or "T-iron" overlaid with thin iron sheets and mounted on top of compressed cotton in an attempt at a cushioning effect against heavy Union shot. As designed both of them were fitted with two steam engines fired by four boilers taken from existing riverboats and driving two shaft-mounted screws for propulsion, although two more boilers were later fitted to Arkansas in an unsuccessful effort to correct her being underpowered. She was also fitted with a bow ram just below her waterline like many CSN ironclads

Construction on both ironclads began just outside of Memphis, Tennessee in October of 1861 but work proceeded very slowly due to material shortages. The Union knew of the building of the two ironclads and took a number of preventative measures against them to prevent their launch, but the key moment came when Union forces took Island Number 10 just below Memphis on 8 April 1862. Arkansas had already been launched by then but she was still fitting out and did not yet have her full gun battery, and Tennessee was still incomplete and had not yet been launched. Arkansas was moved to Yazoo City to prevent her capture along with a barge full of everything else still to be fitted, while the incomplete Tennessee was set on fire and burned where she was to prevent capture The name Tennessee was subsequently reassigned to a different CSN ironclad, and that's the one familiar to most of you Civil War buffs from the Mississippi River theater, but I digress. Arkansas got away safely but the barge with the rest of her stuff sank short of the city, and to make matters worse Yazoo City had even less resources available to finish her than had Memphis. She was eventually "mostly completed" with a lot of local Confederate military strong-arming and the retrieval of most of her sunken extra gear with the help of a diving bell, although work on her armor was never completed, her engines were problematic (like most CSN ironclads), and certain mechanical issues with them often caused her to get stuck turning a circle. Nevertheless Arkansas was evenually made as battleworthy as all of this and more allowed and unofficially joined the war in early summer of 1862. On 15 July 1862 she engaged a small Union naval squadron led by the ironclad Carondelet a few miles from the mouth of the Yazoo River and both won the engagement and came close to crippling the Union ironclad in the process. Arkansas herself took a fair amount of damage in turn but won that rather uneven fight and was able to make her way to Vicksburg, Mississippi, where she ran smack into the middle of the main body of Union Admiral David Farragut's own fleet. Only one of the Union ships had its boilers lit due to a shortage of coal; nevertheless all of them that could opened fire on Arkansas as it passed them by and as their own guns came to bear. She ran the gauntlet and survived, although by its end she couldn't make steam and was merelydrifting with the current; however, her armor protected her and she wreaked a lot of damage among Farragut's wooden-hulled and ironclad vessels alike in her passing. Arkansas was given a hero's welcome when she finally arrived at Vicksburg but she was in no condition to fight again without major repairs, and most of her crew left her either to return to their homes upriver or to aid the defense of Vicksburg. She lay under the protection of the city's river forts until August, when her captain was ordered to take her downriver to attack the Union-held city of Baton Rouge, Louisianna. Her captain protested in vain that Arkansas was in no shape to fight but was overruled. On 5-6 August 1862, Arkansas had steamed within sight of Baton Route when one engine broke down and then the other did also by the time the first was repaired (which took all night), leaving the ailing Arkansas immobilized. By that time local Union forces were well aware of her presence and the Cities class river ironclad USS Essex, a sister ship to the aforementioned Carondelet, was dispatched to deal with her. Realizing his situation was hopeless, the captain of the CSS Arkansas order his crew to scuttle their own vessel and abandon ship. The burning Arkansas was allowed to drift downstream out of harm's way, blowing up and then sinking around noon. Her remains were rediscovered in 1981 buried deep under a levee (built decades later) at Free Negro Point.

This model can be used for either of the Arkansas class CSN ironclads, CSS Arkansas or (the original unfinished) CSS Tennessee, although it is missing many of the finer details of the originals. That's because this was originally created for use as a small naval war gaming miniature. All I did was give it a basic texture job and add the missing guns. That said I think this is still decent for what it is, and it will do nicely as a placeholder for now. I hope you have fun with it too once you download it and start playing with it yourselves. XD

For non-profit, non-commercial use only. If you use, mod, re-release in original or modded form or do anything else with Mr. Woodard's models, please give him credit for his original handiwork, okay? Thank you.