The first CSS Tennessee was an ironclad ram, built for the Confederate States Navy

Confederate States Navy

The Confederate States Navy was the naval branch of the Confederate States armed forces established by an act of the Confederate Congress on February 21, 1861. It was responsible for Confederate naval operations during the American Civil War...

.

Tennessee was begun by John T. Shirley and Company, at Memphis, Tennessee

Memphis, Tennessee

Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the 4th Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi rivers....

, under fixed price contract for $76,920. Chief constructor of the twin-screw ironclad was a Mr. Prime Emerson.

In correspondence with Major General Leonidas Polk

Leonidas Polk

Leonidas Polk was a Confederate general in the American Civil War who was once a planter in Maury County, Tennessee, and a second cousin of President James K. Polk...

, CSA

Confederate States Army

The Confederate States Army was the army of the Confederate States of America while the Confederacy existed during the American Civil War. On February 8, 1861, delegates from the seven Deep South states which had already declared their secession from the United States of America adopted the...

, throughout January 1862, seeking Army workmen from Columbus, Kentucky

Columbus, Kentucky

Columbus is a city in Hickman County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 229 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Columbus is located at .According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all of it land....

, Secretary Stephen Mallory

Stephen Mallory

Stephen Russell Mallory served in the United States Senate as, Senator from Florida from 1850 to the secession of his home state and the outbreak of the American Civil War. For much of that period, he was chairman of the Committee on Naval Affairs...

 promised for Tennessee and her sister, Arkansas

CSS Arkansas

The CSS Arkansas was a Confederate Ironclad warship during the American Civil War. Serving in the Western Theater, the vessel ran through a U.S. Navy fleet at Vicksburg, Mississippi, on 15 July 1862, in a celebrated action in which she inflicted more damage than she received...

, building at Shirley's yard, that "with such aid as mechanics under your command can afford, they may be completed, I am assured, in 60 days." The desired "shipwrights, carpenters and joiners in the Army" were refused—"on furlough or otherwise" —although the general was reminded that, "One of them at Columbus would have enabled you to complete the annihilation of the enemy . . . Mr. Shirley," Mallory prophesied correctly, "will fail in completing them within the stipulated time entirely from the difficulty of obtaining workmen", although they "would be worth many regiments in defending the river."

Little more is known of the first Tennessee, which was never completed. She was burned on the stocks by order of the provost marshal, 5 June 1862, to escape capture.

See CSS Tennessee for other ships of this name.