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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 Civil War Miscellaneous Ships 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:4594…

CSS Selma was one of many civilian craft that were converted for use with the Confederate States Navy (CSN) during the American Civil War (1862-65). Selma's conversion made her unique and visually distinctive, as you can see in the above preview piccy and with surviving drawings and etchings from the era along with other various modern reconstructed model efforts. She stared out life as the packet steamer Florida, built in 1856 at Mobile, Alabama for service with the Mobil Mail Line in both inland waterways and the Gulf of Mexico. On 22 April 1861 she was purchased by the fledgling Confederacy for use with the CSN and spent most of the rest of the year being converted into an armed and armored gunboat for coastal defense. She was "cut down" by having most of her upperworks removed and her hull shortened somewhat, and then her new form was reinforced by two hog frames mounted on her topsides to prevent her new form from warping and breaking. Those are the weird-looking girder-like structures you see in all image of her new appearance. Ugly, yes, and folks said so at the time, but the added hog frames were very effective for their purpose. She was apparently reboilered at this time, with her original high pressure boilerss replaced with low pressure models for both greater fuel economy and increased safety in battle. Her upper decks were also given 3/8-inch armor plating mainly to protect her vitals, such as her boilers and propulsion machinery. Armament consisted of two 9-inch smoothbore cannon (one each fore and aft), one 8-inch smoothbore forward, and one 6.4 inch Brooke rifled cannon aft. Some accounts of the day also give her a collapsible two-mast sailing rig (basically a forward jib and an aftsail), although almost all images from the time show her without it. She was in service by November of 1861 under her original name of Florida per the records of the day, but was recommissioned as CSS Selma in July of 1862

CSS Selma spent most of the war bottled up in Mobile along with other various and sundry CSN craft due to the Union blockade of all major Confederate sea ports. That's not to say she didn't see any action, because she wound up being one of the more active of the CSN's non-ironclad craft (perhaps "tinclad" would be appropriate in this case, nudge-nudge) early in the war. She tangled with Union warships twice in late 1861 before her name change, both times to her advantage, significantly damaging the Union steamer USS Massachusetts with one hit from her rifled cannon the first time and successfully forcing the heavier armed but badly commanded USS Montgomery to beat a hasty retreat in the face of superior gunnery the second time. After her renaming there was little for Selma to do, because by this time the Union Navy had gotten its act together and the blockade of Southern ports became well nigh impossible to break. Her only big battle as Selma was the Battle of Mobile Bay on 5 August 1864, during which she was one of three other CSN gunboats that desperately tried to assist the new ironclad CSS Tennessee (see separate entry) against a formidable 15-ship Union Navy armada, including four ironclads, commanded by Rear Admiral David G. Farragut. She got on Farragut's bad side early in the battle when she showered his flagship USS Hartford with long range raking fire, so he ordered the heavier armed and faster Union gunboat USS Metacomet to "cast loose" from the battle and take Selma out. That Metacomet did in a one-on-one running fight separate from the main battle that lasted for about an hour, but in the end Selma was the last CSN ship left still fighting in the bay (all others had been sunk or surrendered, including the once-mighty Tennessee) and she simply couldn't get away from Metacomet no matter what she did. CSS Selma was the last CSN warship to strike her colors and raise the white flag of surrender on that day, and her surrender marked the official end of the Battle of Mobile Bay.

Selma was still in fairly good shape after the battle, so Admiral Farragut pressed her into the Union Navy on the spot and she remained in service with the Union for the rest of the Civil War. She was formally decommissioned on 16 July 1865 and auctioned off the same day for transferal and reconversion to civilian merchant service. Three years later she foundered and sank during a storm off the coast of Galveston, Texas near the mouth of the Brazos River.

This model is missing many of the finer details of the original. That's because this was originally created for use as a small naval war gaming miniature. I for my part only added the lower hull structure, the missing paddlewheels, the flagpoles, and the aft-mounted flag. 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.

ASIDE - This one's a weird one even for her time, but you know how I like weird warships (grin). One of the more notable of the CSN's non-ironclad fighting craft by all accounts. A very unusual ship but with a good crew who knew their ship and she had the war record to prove how good the both of them were. I can just see Selma being offered as a premium in any World of Warships type setup for American Civil War fighting vessels. She'll take some getting used to given how she's built and configured, not to mention being a paddlewheel steamer instead of a screw steamer, but if the CSN could do as well as they did with her in spite of her limitations then surely modern video gamers can too. XD

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 Civil War Miscellaneous Ships 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:4594…

CSS Selma was one of many civilian craft that were converted for use with the Confederate States Navy (CSN) during the American Civil War (1862-65). Selma's conversion made her unique and visually distinctive, as you can see in the above preview piccy and with surviving drawings and etchings from the era along with other various modern reconstructed model efforts. She stared out life as the packet steamer Florida, built in 1856 at Mobile, Alabama for service with the Mobil Mail Line in both inland waterways and the Gulf of Mexico. On 22 April 1861 she was purchased by the fledgling Confederacy for use with the CSN and spent most of the rest of the year being converted into an armed and armored gunboat for coastal defense. She was "cut down" by having most of her upperworks removed and her hull shortened somewhat, and then her new form was reinforced by two hog frames mounted on her topsides to prevent her new form from warping and breaking. Those are the weird-looking girder-like structures you see in all image of her new appearance. Ugly, yes, and folks said so at the time, but the added hog frames were very effective for their purpose. She was apparently reboilered at this time, with her original high pressure boilerss replaced with low pressure models for both greater fuel economy and increased safety in battle. Her upper decks were also given 3/8-inch armor plating mainly to protect her vitals, such as her boilers and propulsion machinery. Armament consisted of two 9-inch smoothbore cannon (one each fore and aft), one 8-inch smoothbore forward, and one 6.4 inch Brooke rifled cannon aft. Some accounts of the day also give her a collapsible two-mast sailing rig (basically a forward jib and an aftsail), although almost all images from the time show her without it. She was in service by November of 1861 under her original name of Florida per the records of the day, but was recommissioned as CSS Selma in July of 1862

CSS Selma spent most of the war bottled up in Mobile along with other various and sundry CSN craft due to the Union blockade of all major Confederate sea ports. That's not to say she didn't see any action, because she wound up being one of the more active of the CSN's non-ironclad craft (perhaps "tinclad" would be appropriate in this case, nudge-nudge) early in the war. She tangled with Union warships twice in late 1861 before her name change, both times to her advantage, significantly damaging the Union steamer USS Massachusetts with one hit from her rifled cannon the first time and successfully forcing the heavier armed but badly commanded USS Montgomery to beat a hasty retreat in the face of superior gunnery the second time. After her renaming there was little for Selma to do, because by this time the Union Navy had gotten its act together and the blockade of Southern ports became well nigh impossible to break. Her only big battle as Selma was the Battle of Mobile Bay on 5 August 1864, during which she was one of three other CSN gunboats that desperately tried to assist the new ironclad CSS Tennessee (see separate entry) against a formidable 15-ship Union Navy armada, including four ironclads, commanded by Rear Admiral David G. Farragut. She got on Farragut's bad side early in the battle when she showered his flagship USS Hartford with long range raking fire, so he ordered the heavier armed and faster Union gunboat USS Metacomet to "cast loose" from the battle and take Selma out. That Metacomet did in a one-on-one running fight separate from the main battle that lasted for about an hour, but in the end Selma was the last CSN ship left still fighting in the bay (all others had been sunk or surrendered, including the once-mighty Tennessee) and she simply couldn't get away from Metacomet no matter what she did. CSS Selma was the last CSN warship to strike her colors and raise the white flag of surrender on that day, and her surrender marked the official end of the Battle of Mobile Bay.

Selma was still in fairly good shape after the battle, so Admiral Farragut pressed her into the Union Navy on the spot and she remained in service with the Union for the rest of the Civil War. She was formally decommissioned on 16 July 1865 and auctioned off the same day for transferal and reconversion to civilian merchant service. Three years later she foundered and sank during a storm off the coast of Galveston, Texas near the mouth of the Brazos River.

This model is missing many of the finer details of the original. That's because this was originally created for use as a small naval war gaming miniature. I for my part only added the lower hull structure, the missing paddlewheels, the flagpoles, and the aft-mounted flag. 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.

ASIDE - This one's a weird one even for her time, but you know how I like weird warships (grin). One of the more notable of the CSN's non-ironclad fighting craft by all accounts. A very unusual ship but with a good crew who knew their ship and she had the war record to prove how good the both of them were. I can just see Selma being offered as a premium in any World of Warships type setup for American Civil War fighting vessels. She'll take some getting used to given how she's built and configured, not to mention being a paddlewheel steamer instead of a screw steamer, but if the CSN could do as well as they did with her in spite of her limitations then surely modern video gamers can too. XD