Between the days of the "Finis Belli" and the coming of the first ironclads there were numerous projects of inventors. In 1805 a Scotchman, named Gillespie, proposed the mounting of guns and "ponderous mortars" in revolving armoured turrets, both in fortifications on shore and on floating batteries. Two years later Abraham Bloodgood, of New York, designed a floating battery with an armoured turret. During the war between England and the United States in 1812 an American engineer, John Steevens, who was a man in advance of his time, proposed the construction of a steam-propelled warship, with a ram-bow, and with her guns protected by shields. He prepared a design, but failed to persuade the Navy Department that it was practicable. His son, Robert L. Steevens, improved the design, made experiments with guns, projectiles, and armour plates, and at last in 1842 obtained a vote of Congress for the building of the "Steevens battery," a low-freeboard ram, steam-propelled, and armed with eight heavy guns mounted on her centre-line, on turntables protected by armoured breastworks. The methods of the American navy were very dilatory, professional opinion was opposed to Steevens, whose project was regarded as that of a "crank," and the ship was left unfinished for years. She was still on the stocks when the Civil War began. Then other types came into fashion, and she was broken up on the ways. The man who introduced the armour-clad ship into the world's navies was the Emperor Napoleon III, the same who introduced rifled field artillery into the armies of the world. Like other great revolutions, this epoch-making change in naval war began in a small way. What forced the question upon the Emperor's attention was the failure of the combined French and English fleets in the attack on the sea-forts of Sebastopol on 17 October, 1854. The most powerful ships in both navies had engaged the sea-forts, and suffered such loss and injury that it was obvious that if the attack had been continued the results would have been disastrous. Some means must be found of keeping explosive shells out of a ship's gun-decks, if they were ever to engage land batteries on anything like equal terms. Under the Emperor's directions the French naval architects designed four ships of a new type, which were rapidly constructed in the Imperial dockyards. They were "floating batteries," not intended to take part in fleet actions, but only to be used against fortifications. Their broad beam, heavy lines, rounded bows, and engines of only 225 horsepower, condemned them to slow speed, just sufficient to place them in firing position. They were armoured with 4-inch iron and armed with eighteen 50-pounder guns. The port-holes had heavy iron ports, which were closed while the guns were reloading.