Completed the following year, they used propulsion machinery taken from steamboats, and were intended to be armored with 4 inches (102 mm) of wrought iron and armed with four cannons.

CSS Tuscaloosa was an ironclad warship that served in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War.

Both Tuscaloosa and her sister ship CSS Huntsville were found to be too slow for practical use, and were relegated to service as floating batteries.

The city lay on the northern edge of Mobile Bay, which opened into the Gulf of Mexico.

[7] The contract, in the amount of $100,000, called for the vessel to be completed by July 1, 1862, and iron armor, cannon, and boilers were intended to be supplied by a developing foundry at Selma.

[10] Confederate naval constructor John L. Porter created an alternate design of ironclad known as the "diamond hull".

[10] The Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships (DANFS) agrees with Silverstone's figures for length and beam, and with Bisbee's 10.5-foot depth of hold, but gives draft as 8 feet (2.4 m).

[10] The new foundry in Selma had come to naught, and pig iron was scarce, making armored plate hard to come by.

Tuscaloosa received her iron plate in December 1862 and January 1863, it was produced by the firm of Scofield & Markham in Atlanta, Georgia.

[19] The ship's crew found conditions aboard so bad that they slept on shore in a cotton warehouse for part of the year.

Another attempt at using coal, which was in limited supply, instead of wood and installing forced draft fans to improve ventilation and speed did not lead to substantially better results.

[21] Buchanan reported that the ship's machinery worked well,[17] and Bisbee attributes most of the speed problems to the nonstandard hull.

In mid-February, the ironclad CSS Tennessee was launched, but when trying to get past the bar, became stuck due to insufficient water levels until May.

While Tennessee was stuck at the bar, Tuscaloosa was sent to the lower part of the bay to aid in the defenses there.

[30] She had defective engines that were obtained from a river steamer and an incomplete armament, so was assigned to guard the waters around Mobile.