The board members, themselves a collection of shipbuilders and engineers, were unsure about the radical design submitted by Ericsson for the blueprint represented no other ship built up to that point in history. He was known as a difficult man to deal with but he gained respect by being the recorded inventor of the screw propeller. Ericsson maintained a history with the Navy Department, feeling that he had been cheated out of payment for work completed in the past.
Three were chosen: a casemate design like the French Gloire, eventually to become the USS New Ironsides a small armored gunboat to be named the USS Galena and a turreted ironclad to become the USS Monitor, this design brought forth by one John Ericsson. Secretary Welles charged the board to review ironclad plans and propose to the Navy Department the most promising of these designs. Secretary Welles, an accomplished politician, was able to acquire the funding for building Northern ironclads within days and then created the "Ironclad Board" to oversee construction. Then Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles, confessed his fears that the reborn Merrimack would break through the imposed blockade at Hampton Roads, Virginia, and then steam up the Potomac River to shell the White House itself.
Northern spies reported to the US War Department that the Merrimack was being rebuilt as an ironclad.
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