 The scant damage inflicted by the guns of Monitor and Virginia at Battle of Hampton Roads and the spectacular but lucky success of the Austrian flagship SMS Erzherzog Ferdinand Max sinking the Italian Re d 'Italia at Lissa gave strength to the ramming craze . From the early 1870s to early 1880s most British naval officers thought that guns were about to be replaced as the main naval armament by the ram . Those who noted the tiny number of ships that had actually been sunk by ramming struggled to be heard . 
