Editing Ship of the line (section)

===Decline===
[[File:The Fighting Temeraire, JMW Turner, National Gallery.jpg|thumb|[[J. M. W. Turner|Turner]]'s depiction of {{HMS|Temeraire|1798|6}}, hero of the [[Battle of Trafalgar]], ignominiously towed by a little steamship]]

In the [[Crimean War]], six line-of-battle ships and two frigates of the Russian [[Black Sea Fleet]] destroyed seven Ottoman frigates and three corvettes with explosive shells at the [[Battle of Sinop]] in 1853.<ref>Lambert, Andrew D, ''The Crimean War, British Grand Strategy Against Russia, 1853–56'', pub Manchester University Press, 1990, {{ISBN|0-7190-3564-3}}, pages 60–61.</ref>

In the 1860s unarmoured steam line-of-battle ships were replaced by [[ironclad warship]]s. In the [[American Civil War]], on March 8, 1862, during the first day of the [[Battle of Hampton Roads]], two unarmoured [[Union Navy|Union]] wooden frigates were sunk and destroyed by the [[Confederate States Navy|Confederate]] ironclad {{ship|CSS|Virginia}}.

However, the power implied by the ship of the line would find its way into the ironclad, which would develop during the next few decades into the concept of the [[battleship]].

Several navies still use terms equivalent to the "ship of the line" for battleships, including the [[German Navy|German]] (''Linienschiff'') and [[Russian Navy|Russian]] (''lineyniy korabl`'' (лине́йный кора́бль) or ''linkor'' (линкор) in short) navies.