That was an incredible handicap- especially if Alabama's guns were superior as you claim..
I never claimed that Alabama's guns were superior. She had more guns but as I said the 32 pounders on each side were not worth much at the range fired. In fact against wooden warships I claim that the US 11 inch was superior to the British 68 pounder and the 110 pound rifle on Alabama. Also I did say that the anchor chain hung over the side of the Kearsarge was protecting against contact explosions of shells but would not keep out the 68 pounder or 110 pounder rifle if they did not explode on contact. And even without the chains contact explosions on the side of wooden warships were often not very damaging.
As to crew and powder, Alabama was in port, she got some more crew and why did she not get new powder if the captain knew it was bad?
I still say that the Alabama/Kearsarge fight was one of the most evenly matched in history
No surprise
The ships were physically pretty evenly matched considering that they were built in different countries.
Alabama was in port and could get more supplies and crew if she wanted.
Alabama chose when to leave port
There was no weather or trick maneuvers involved
The crews on both ships had plenty of time to get trained in their jobs.
The crew of the Alabama was in port where they could rest and in every other ship encounter long experience at sea was counted as a plus not a negative. So I don't see where being "tired" was a factor. Though maybe the crew of mostly non-Americans were fine with capturing merchant ships for pay and prize money but found that a battle with a warship was something that made them "tired". This was not unusual with privateers of all countries who were in it for the money and often not willing to go head to head with a warship. The captain and his officers were mostly American fighting for southern independence but the crew was a privateers crew.
