The Sassacus rode the ram for more than 10 minutes. One Union sailor remembered: 'I saw the port of the ram not ten feet away. It opened; and like a flash of lightning I saw the grim muzzle of a cannon, the straining of the gun's-crew naked to the waist and blackened with powder; then a blaze, a roar and rush of the shell as it crashed through, whirling me round and dashing me to the deck.' The cannonball struck the Sassacus's boilers, and scalding steam filled the vessel. One sailor was killed, and many more were horribly burned. Amid the chaos, the Albemarle managed to slide from beneath the Union ship.

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Unable to penetrate the Albemarle's iron plating, the remaining six Federal ships played out a net to foul the ram's propellers, but a line parted and the ploy failed. An attempt to sink the ram with a torpedo also failed. In several hours of desperate combat, only a single Southerner had been lost; this unfortunate Confederate had carelessly stuck his head out one of the ram's gunports to watch the battle, and a Union pistol shot had ended his life.

The Albemarle remained afloat, but she had taken a pounding. Her smokestack was riddled with holes and some of her iron plates were beginning to peel from her sides. The warship's aftergun had broken off 18 inches from the end, but the undaunted Southerners had continued to fire it.

At dusk, as the Albemarle returned to Plymouth for repairs, it seemed that the Confederacy's new war machine was achieving everything its owners had hoped it would. Union operations in eastern North Carolina had to be suspended until the ram could be dealt with effectively. Acting Rear Admiral Samuel Lee, who commanded the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, believed a daring raid undertaken by a daring leader was the only way to defeat the Albemarle. A young Union navy lieutenant came to mind; Lee had read of William Cushing's commando-style exploits behind enemy lines and his bold but unsuccessful attempt to capture Confederate Brigadier General Paul Hébert early in 1863. The rear admiral barked to an aide: 'Get Lieutenant Cushing!'

The brother of the late Lieutenant Alonzo Cushing, killed while heroically commanding a Union battery at Gettysburg, William Cushing had been a close friend of the late Lieutenant Commander Flusser of the Miami. The mission Lee offered was dangerous, but Cushing jumped at the chance to avenge his friend's death.

First, Cushing headed to New York City to find the right sort of vessel for navigating the Roanoke River. He learned that the navy was tinkering with steam launches outfitted with torpedoes. Small and maneuverable, these boats were less than 50 feet long with a draft of about three and a half feet, and two of them had been completed by the time Cushing arrived in New York. Each launch had been fitted with a small davit, and upon each davit hung a torpedo. The davit allowed the bomb to be lifted over the side and hurled forward a few feet toward an enemy ship. After the torpedo was released, a tug on a line caused a ball inside the torpedo to fall onto a percussion cap. The resulting spark detonated the bomb's explosives. It was a tricky device that required dexterity and daring of the user, but Cushing ran the launches through several successful trials in New York Harbor and decided they would be adequate for the mission.

As Cushing made his way south by rail, the two steam launches traveled through inland waterways toward North Carolina. On the Chesapeake Bay, however, they became separated, and one blundered into Rebel-held territory in Virginia and was captured. The second launch rendezvoused with Cushing at Norfolk, Virginia. Although the young commander was distressed by the loss of one of his launches, he continued the expedition. 'Impossibilities are for the timid,' he later commented. 'We determined to overcome all obstacles.'

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