H.l. Hunley
Hunley was a submarine of the Confederate States of America that demonstrated both the advantages and the dangers of undersea warfare. The Hunley was the first submarine to sink an enemy warship, although the submarine was also lost following the successful attack.
The submarine was renamed after the death of her inventor, Horace Lawson Hunley, and some time after she had been taken into the Confederate forces at Charleston, South Carolina.
H. Hunley, almost 40 feet (12 m) long, was built at Mobile, Alabama, launched in July 1863, and shipped by rail to Charleston, SC on August 12, 1863.
Over 136 years later, on August 8, 2000, the wreck was recovered, and on April 17, 2004, the DNA-identified remains of the eight Hunley crewmen were interred in Charleston's Magnolia Cemetery, with full military honors.
History
Hunley and two earlier submarines were privately developed and paid for by Horace Lawson Hunley, James McClintock, and Baxter Watson.
Predecessors to Hunley
Hunley, McClintock, and Watson first built a small submarine named Pioneer at New Orleans, Louisiana. Pioneer was tested in February 1862 in the Mississippi River, and was later towed to Lake Pontchartrain for additional trials, but the Union advance towards New Orleans caused the men to abandon development and scuttle Pioneer the following month.
John Confederate Submarine may have been constructed about the same time as the Pioneer.
The three inventors moved to Mobile and joined with machinists Thomas Park and Thomas Lyons. Their efforts were supported by the Confederate States Army; Lieutenant William Alexander of the 21st Alabama Infantry Regiment was assigned oversight duty for the project.
American Diver was ready for harbor trials by January 1863, but proved too slow to be practical. One attempted attack on the Union blockade was made in February 1863, but was unsuccessful.
In both cases, the Confederate Navy salvaged the vessel and returned her to service.
Armament
Hunley was originally intended to attack by means of a floating explosive charge with a contact fuse (a torpedo in Civil War terminology) towed behind it at the end of a long rope. Hunley would approach an enemy vessel, dive under it, and surface beyond.
The spar torpedo as originally designed used a mechanical trigger attached to the attacking vessel by a cord, so that as the attacker backed away from her victim, the torpedo would explode. In response to this order, an iron pipe was attached to the bow of the submarine and angled downwards so the explosive charge would still be delivered under sufficient depth of water to make it effective.
A drawing of the iron pipe spar, confirming its "David" type configuration, was published in several early histories of submarine warfare.
Attack on the Housatonic
Hunley made her first attack against a live target on the night of February 17, 1864. In an effort to break the naval blockade of the city, Lieutenant George E.
Dixon and a crew of seven volunteers attacked Housatonic, successfully embedding the barbed spar torpedo into her hull. The possibility must be considered the torpedo was not detonated on command, but rather malfunctioned due to damage incurred during the attack.
However, witnesses aboard Housatonic uniformly stated it detonated at no more than about one hundred feet, and possibly as close as seventy-five.
There is convincing evidence Hunley actually survived as long as an hour after the attack (which took place at approximately 8:45 PM). The signal was received at approximately 9:00 PM - fifteen minutes after the Housatonic had sunk - and came from a blue carbide gas signal lantern to the base at Fort Moultrie on Sullivan's Island.
The signal was also seen by crew members of Housatonic, who were in the ship's rigging awaiting rescue. The reports are quoted in the official enquiries of both Federal and Confederate Governments and in the Official Records of the war.
Cold and immersion would have killed the crew relatively quickly.
Her crew perished, but H.L. Hunley, suspended from a crane during its recovery from Charleston Harbor, August 8, 2000.
Naval Historical Center.)
The Hunley discovery is claimed by two different individuals. Hunley's placement on that list was officially approved on December 29, 1978. Spence's book Treasures of the Confederate Coast, which had a chapter on his discovery of Hunley and included a map complete with an "X" showing the wreck's location, was published in January of 1995.
Diver Ralph Wilbanks claims to have found the wreck in April 1995 while leading a NUMA dive team funded by novelist Clive Cussler, who announced the find as a new discovery and first claimed that it was in about 18' of water over a mile inshore of the Housatonic, but later acknowledged that was incorrect.
The submarine was resting on her starboard side at about a 45-degree angle and was covered in a ¼- to ¾-inch encrustation of ferrous oxide bonded with sand and seashell particles. This is an ongoing dispute involving allegations of political manipulation, official misconduct and other questionable behavior.
Archaeological investigation and excavation culminated with the raising of Hunley on August 8, 2000.
Once the on-site investigation was complete, harnesses were slipped underneath the sub and attached to a truss designed by Oceaneering, Inc. Spence's accuracy turned out to be within the length of the recovery barge.
the sub broke the surface for the first time in over 136 years, greeted by a cheering crowd on shore and in surrounding watercraft. Douglas Owsley, a physical anthropologist working for the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History examined the remains and determined that four of the men were American born, while the four others were European born, based on the chemical signatures left on the men's teeth and bones by the predominant components of their diet.
Identifying the European crew members has been more problematic, but was apparently solved in late 2004. A crowd estimated at between 35,000 and 50,000, including 10,000 period military and civilian reenactors, were present for what some called the 'Last Confederate Funeral.'
The Hunley remains at the "Lasch" conservation center for further study and conservation.
He had the gold coin engraved, and carried it as a lucky charm.
In popular culture
The first episode of the 1963 TV series, The Great Adventure (TV series), featured a dramatization loosely based on the events leading up to the Hunley's final day.