CASEMATE

A 'casemate' is a heavy duty structure, originally a vaulted chamber in a fortress. Today the military use the term for a fortified gun emplacement. In civilian use a casemate may be a tunnel cut into a rock face with armoured doors, used for storing volatile goods.
In naval gunnery a casemate is a vertical armour plate with openings for guns. It is less protected than a gun turret and allows for a smaller field of fire. It is however much cheaper in terms of money and far lighter in weight for a given level of armor protection.
The American Civil War saw the use of casemate ironclads: steel-built or armored steamboats with a very low freeboard and their guns on the main deck ('Casemate deck') protected by a sloped armored casemate. Although both sides of the civil war used casemate ironclads, the ship is mostly associated with the southern confederacy, the north more relying on turretted monitors. The most famous naval battle of the war being the duel at Hampton Roads between the Union turretted ironclad USS ''Monitor'' and the Confederate casemate ironclad CSS ''Virginia'' (AKA the ''Merrimack'')
In 20th century battleships, casemates were used to mount secondary guns for defending the ship against torpedo boats.
In architecture, a 'casemate' is a hollow moulding.

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★ Bunker