My original post was about a article in The Charlotte Observer dated Oct 6, 1902. The article was about one of the last surviving crew members of the Merrimac (CSS Virginia) named Wm. R. Tetterson who is my wife's 2nd great grandfather. The article read that Tetterton reported aboard the ship at Brooks Station, nine miles south of Fredericksburg. Found out on this message board that Brooks Station is not 9 miles south of Fredericksburg. Thankyou John Carter for replying to my post. Even if it was, the ship was never 9 miles south of that city. Everything I've read about the Merrimac is that when it was fitted with iron making it a ironclad ship it never sailed beyond Hampton Roads. For 13 years I worked on submarines at Norfolk Naval Shipyard. Drydock 2 is one of the drydocks used to repair nuclear subs. It is located next to drydock one which is where the Merrimac was fitted with iron. I was there from 1972 to 1984 and we worked out of very old buildings, some of them were there during the civil war. A punch machine used to punch holes in Merrimac's iron plate was still being used in the shipyard until the 1950's.