Thursday, September 3, 2026
Museum Hours: 5:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m. | Presentation: 6:00 p.m.–7:30 p.m.
Join the American Heritage Museum for a special History After Hours presentation exploring one of the most consequential encounters in American naval history—a story with important origins here in Massachusetts.
The Boston Navy Yard in Charlestown, located approximately 30 miles from the museum, designed, built, and supported many notable American warships. Among them was the USS Merrimack, one of six steam frigates ordered by the U.S. Navy in 1854. Combining traditional sails with a coal-fired steam engine and propeller, these vessels represented an important transition between the Age of Sail and the age of mechanized naval warfare.
The Merrimack began the Civil War as a United States Navy vessel, but she would later enter Confederate service under a new name: CSS Virginia. How could the same ship serve both sides during the same conflict?
Senior Docent Michael Manning will reveal the remarkable chain of events that transformed the Merrimack into a Confederate ironclad and brought the CSS Virginia face-to-face with the revolutionary USS Monitor at the Battle of Hampton Roads in March 1862.