H. L. Hunley in Historical Context
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Hunley in Historical Context |
by Rich Wills, former Assistant Underwater Archaeologist,
Naval Historical Center.
Introduction
In the past century of naval warfare, the submarine
has emerged as one of the world's premiere weapons of
military combat and deterrence. However, it wasn't until
the end of the nineteenth century that the U.S. Navy
truly began to recognize the submersible vessel for
its potential as an undersea weapon and provided it
with an operational role within its strategic organization.
This enhancement of status was made possible by a series
of decisive events in which American technological and
tactical experimentation figured prominently. Significantly,
Americans were involved in the first use of a submersible
vessel in combat against an enemy warship (David Bushnell's
Turtle), the development of the first
practical navigable submersible vessel (Robert Fulton's
Nautilus), and the first successful
use of a submersible to destroy an enemy naval vessel
under combat conditions (James McClintock's H.L.
Hunley).
At the outset of the Civil War, the U.S. Navy and the
Southern Confederacy embarked on parallel paths of submersible
craft development which, while they may have differed
in the manner in which they were executed, in retrospect
essentially comprised a race of sorts to produce a successful
offensive submersible weapon. While vessels like Pioneer,
American Diver, H.L. Hunley,
and others were being built by enterprising individuals
within the struggling Southern Confederacy, similar
efforts were being undertaken within the Union in the
form of Brutus de Villeroi's Alligator,
and later the Intelligent Whale of
Scovel S. Meriam and Oliver Halstead (indeed, one of
the original missions outlined for Alligator
was for it to be transported to Hampton Roads in order
to face the ironclad CSS Virginia,
and if not for logistical problems, the history of the
Hampton Roads engagement may have borne itself out in
a quite different manner). But while the Federal efforts
did not prove themselves to be as successful as those
of the Confederates, they did capture a substantial
degree of official naval interest in terms of funding,
research, and development. By the late nineteenth century
the submersible vessel, once mated with the self-propelling
torpedo, finally achieved recognition as a viable (though
still often misunderstood) component of naval warfare.
The record of American Civil War submersibles on both
sides inspired the next generation of American submarine
visionaries, namely John Phillip Holland and Simon Lake,
and set the stage for the future emergence of an American
naval-industrial complex capable of designing and delivering
operational submarines to the U.S. Navy and foreign
navies, including those of Britain, Russia, and Japan.
Prelude: Antebellum American Submersible
Vessel Development
The concept of a vessel capable of submerged navigation
was not a new idea in America at the time the Civil
War began. Americans had previously attempted to use
submersible vessels to help fulfill military aims with
varying degrees of unsuccessful performance in both
the War for Independence (Abbot 1966; Morgan 1972, 1499-1511;
Roland 1978, 62-88) and the War of 1812 (Field 1908,
73-76; DeKay 1990, 131; Dudley 1992, 211-212). Nevertheless,
between the wars it was Robert Fulton's Nautilus
which successfully demonstrated that a stable platform
capable of controlled underwater navigation could be
constructed and employed to meet limited military objectives
(Parsons 1922, Hutcheon 1981).
However, before the concept of employing a manned submersible
vessel in combat could fulfill its potential, three
parallel concepts needed to reach maturity: the design
and construction of a submersible platform, the design
and construction of the weapon to be employed by the
platform, and the tactical system of weapon delivery.
The definition of the submersible's role relative to
the larger military and naval strategy within which
it was to be operated remained largely unchanged. That
is, such weapons were generally considered as compatible
with either riverine and coastal defense, or with attempts
to sink enemy blockading naval vessels, as had been
the objective of such vessels in both the War for Independence
and the War of 1812, and would be again in the Civil
War. Between 1814 and 1861, work to improve upon Fulton's
fundamentally sound design continued through the efforts
of the American shoemaker Lodner Phillips (Field 1908,
80-82; Gruse Harris 1982), the French engineer Brutus
de Villeroi (Luraghi 1996, 251), and others. The concepts
of air supply storage and replenishment, ballast arrangement
and regulation, configuration of movable surfaces for
steering and depth control, and instrumentation for
navigation and depth determination had all seen varying
levels of advancement in these intervening years.
Perhaps the greatest problem was the recurring inability
to devise a self-powered propulsion system capable of
operation while running submerged. Bushnell had designed
into his vessel the new innovation of hand powered "oar's]...based
upon the principle of the screw" (Morgan 1972,
1503). Significantly, this appears to have been the
earliest use of screw propulsion in watercraft (Abbot
1966, 44). Better means of propulsion than hand power
were subsequently sought, and although several dual
propulsion systems were experimented with (including
Fulton's auxiliary sail concept, and McClintock's electromagnetic
drive unit), hand power remained the primary means of
propulsion for the American vessels built before and
during the war.
During this time work also progressed considerably
in regard to weapons systems. Far-reaching advancements
on developing galvanically controlled underwater explosive
weapons were made by Samuel Colt in the 1840s, building
upon the work of Bushnell, Fulton, Elijah Mix, Moses
Shaw, Robert Hare, and their European contemporaries.
Among other things, Colt made progress in the development
of contact detonators, remote electrical fire control
systems, and multicell voltage storage batteries (Lundeberg
1974). In terms of tactical delivery of the explosive
weapon, three general methods were recognized as viable
delivery systems: the use of a time-delay explosive
charge (basically a limpet mine) carried on the outside
of the boat and manually attached to the hull of the
enemy vessel, such as was employed by Bushnell's Turtle;
the towing of a contact torpedo in the wake of the torpedo
craft in which the idea was to detonate the charge by
diving beneath the target in such a way that the charge
would collide with the target; and variations upon the
bow-mounted spar torpedo concept originated by Fulton.
McClintock's series of boats would utilize all three
of these methods at various stages of their progression.
The Circumstances Which Produced the H.L.
Hunley and its Predecessors
The American Civil War was the first major armed conflict
to significantly reap the benefits of the industrial
revolution on a large scale. It saw the practical utilization
of screw- propelled warships powered by steam, ironclad
warships, torpedo craft, underwater and subterranean
mines, rifled ordnance, rapid troop movements by rail
lines, telegraphic lines of communication, and reconnaissance
aviation. Additionally, this war has been succinctly
described by one historian as "the only occasion
in the course of history when at the beginning of a
conflict between two nations facing the ocean, one of
the two had incontestable and total dominion over the
waters" (Luraghi 1996, 61). To counter the
overwhelming naval presence arrayed before him, the
strategy ultimately formulated by C.S. Secretary of
the Navy Stephen Mallory was a four-fold one based upon
"technical surprise" which utilized
armored vessels, rifled naval guns, steam-driven commerce
destroyers, and submarine torpedoes, or what we today
would call mines (Luraghi 1996, 68). The development
of specialized vessels to act as offensive torpedo delivery
platforms can be categorized as a variation upon the
employment of submarine torpedoes. Three general classes
of such craft emerged, comprised of traditional surface
craft modified to some extent, steam-powered semi-submersible
boats (or "david boats"), and hand-powered
boats capable of complete submergence such as H.L.
Hunley.
Submersible efforts on both sides began as early as
1861. Whereas the U.S. Navy's submersible development
efforts were laboriously slow and generally less successful
than those of their Southern counterparts, within the
Confederate States there rapidly emerged a somewhat
more widespread and independent interest in submersible
construction which localized in a number of coastal
and riverine cities. One reason for this more rapid
progression might have been that while Federal development
efforts were burdened with conventional naval bureaucratic
processes of contracting and evaluation, the Confederate
efforts were able to benefit from a quick application
of private initiative, which was in turn met with swift
support from a government unburdened with the traditional
bureaucracy of the type extant in the North. This is
not to say that the Confederate Navy Department was
without involvement in such efforts; it initiated its
own program as well, centered at the Tredegar Iron Works
in Richmond, Virginia. However, the C.S. Navy's program
was not as successful as those projects which were initiated
with private funding.
The private Confederate initiatives were primarily
spurred by motives of both nationalism and profit. A
fading but still remembered tradition of government-sanctioned
privateering was revitalized through congressional legislation
providing for the issuance of letters of marquee by
the Confederate government. This feeling was further
encouraged by the actions of Southern corporations such
as John Fraser & Company, which placed individual
and blanket bounties on the warships of the U.S. Navy
blockading squadrons that were gradually gaining an
ever-tightening stranglehold on Confederate maritime
commerce. One of the approximately 50 Confederate privateers
ultimately authorized by the government was James McClintock
and Baxter Watson's New Orleans-built Pioneer,
which, while unable to fulfill its intended mission,
in hindsight can be seen to have essentially comprised
an experimental prototype for the H.L. Hunley.
The Pioneer also owned the distinction
of being the only submersible provided with a letter
of marquee and reprisal by the Confederate States. Some
Southern submersible efforts ultimately found cooperative
partner in the Confederate military. At least four Confederate
boats, American Diver, H.L.
Hunley, St. Patrick, and
the unnamed vessel or vessels constructed at the Tredegar
Iron Works, were either built at government facilities
or with the assistance of military personnel. However,
this cooperation may have later caused unforeseen ramifications
for the initial sponsors when some of the boats, namely
McClintock's Hunley and John P. Halligan's
St. Patrick, were subjected to complete
military seizure as a result of the military's disenchantment
and impatience with their civilian operators. The vessel
(or vessels) built at Tredegar appear to have been the
only boats constructed under a full-fledged Confederate
Navy Department building program, and they evidently
did not prove successful.
It is important to view the work of McClintock and
Watson's coalition within the larger context of such
projects undertaken within the Southern Confederacy.
Based upon our present understanding of historical records,
submersible construction efforts in that nation were
basically centered in four areas: at the Tredegar Iron
Works in Richmond, Virginia (Harper's Illustrated
Weekly, 2 November 1861; Pinkerton 1888, 395-403;
Dew 1966, 123; Coski 1996, 116-121), at the Leeds Foundry
in New Orleans, Louisiana (Robinson 1928, 166-167),
at the Park & Lyons Machine Shops in Mobile,
Alabama (Perry 1965, 96; Ragan 1995), and at the Confederate
naval facilities at Selma, Alabama (Schell 1992, 178-181).
The most successful of these initiatives would ultimately
prove to be the effort begun in New Orleans by McClintock,
Watson, and their core coalition of financial backers.
Upon the fall of New Orleans and the loss of their first
boat, some of the members of this group relocated to
Mobile where they built and lost a second boat, and
ultimately gained a tactical success off Charleston
at the expense of their third boat and some or all of
at least three crews.
One of the most valuable sources of information on
McClintock's submersible boat building activities has
turned out to be several documents and sketches recently
uncovered at the Public Record Office (PRO) in London
(the author was apprised of their existence by archaeologists
Peter Hitchcock and Brett Phaneuf during their 1996
research activities on the Intelligent Whale).
According to these records, in late October of 1872
McClintock journeyed from Mobile to Halifax, Nova Scotia
to attend a discreet meeting with Royal Navy officers
aboard the HMS Royal Alfred. The
purpose of the trip was to discuss his work in submarine
warfare and express his wish to build a submersible
torpedo vessel for the Royal Navy. Captain F. Nicholson,
RN and Chief Engineer J.H. Ellis, RN of the Royal
Alfred were instructed to meet with him, gather
information, and report their findings and recommendations
to the Admiralty in writing. The meeting was secret,
probably at least partly for McClintock's sake, as divulging
such sensitive technical information to a foreign power
could have been construed as treasonous (especially
if he had been required to swear an oath of allegiance
following Appomattox). In their subsequent report, Nicholson
and Ellis recorded that they were:
...thoroughly impressed with the
intelligence of Mr. McClintock, and with his knowledge
of all points chemical and mechanical connected with
torpedoes and submarine vessels...He is, I believe,
entirely self-taught, and was much employed by the Confederates
on torpedo work, on which he has much practical information
which he seems ready to communicate. He hates his countrymen,
Americans, and hopes to some day be a British subject
("Report on a submarine boat invented by Mr.
McClintock of Mobile, U.S. of America," PRO,
Adm. Series 1/6236, File 39455).
Accompanying the report and enclosures are three detailed
sketches showing different views of a boat of McClintock's
design (Figures 1 and 2). An obvious question to be
asked is, what is the identity of the particular vessel
depicted in this representation? It appears to have
the Hunley's overall dimensions,
but possess elements of the American Diver's
internal arrangements. Essentially, it comprises the
vessel McClintock desired to build, incorporating what
he considered as the best elements of all his boats.
Basically, McClintock admitted that his boats suffered
from three basic problems: the lack of a self-propelling
motive power, inaccurate compass readings, and an inability
to measure the horizontal movement while running submerged.
Nicholson and Ellis qualified the drawing as follows:
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Figure 1. One
of the 1872 drawings of McClintock's submarine
design, from the Public Record Office. This sketch
presents an external
elevation view of the boat (PRO Adm. Ser. 1/6236,
File 39455). |
The drawing we enclose is a representation
of the boat that effected this destruction [of USS Housatonic],
it is not drawn to scale, nor did the original boat
contain any engine, the only motive power then available
being manual labor...It will be seen by the enclosures
that the attempt to attain a proper motive power resulted
in failure, only about two knots being accomplished.
Mr. McClintock now proposes to use an engine [illegible,
possibly "driven"] by ammoniacal gas,
which he explained to us, and which he has seen in successful
operation as a propelling power for street cars in New
Orleans; as a very fair description of this invention
is given in "The Engineer" of "Aug
70" and "January 72"...One
difficulty which Mr. McClintock very frankly pointed
out was the uncertain action of the compass in such
a vessel...He also pointed out another requirement which
he had not succeeded in applying - rather from want
of means than from want of skill, or from any great
difficulty in the requirement [illegible]. He states
that when under weigh beneath the surface, it is quite
impossible to ascertain whether the vessel is progressing
as there are no passing objects by which to recognize
the fact of motion; on several occasions when experimenting
with his boat they continued working the crank while
all the time the boat was hard and fast in the mud ("Report
on a submarine boat invented by Mr. McClintock of Mobile,
U.S. of America," PRO, Adm. Series 1/6236,
File 39455).
|
Figure 2. Another
of the PRO drawings, this one showing the internal
plan view of the boat and a transverse cross-section
at the aft face of
the forward bulkhead. "The pilot is represented
looking through a bull's
eye, his right hand on the vertical steering control,
and his left on the
lever for working an ordinary stern rudder... The
depth being
constantly indicated on an ordinary mercurial siphon
gauge fixed
immediately opposite the pilot--one end of which
is open to the outside
water--each 1/2 inch of mercury represents about
one foot of
immersion." (PRO Adm. Ser. 1/6236, File 39455) |
Enclosed with their intelligence summary were copies
of McClintock's letters of endorsement from former Confederate
officers Matthew F. Maury, James E. Slaughter, J.D.
Johnstone, Raphael Semmes, and P. Murphey. But perhaps
the most valuable piece of historical evidence is the
four page narrative, written in McClintock's own hand,
describing the construction of the three boats he designed
and saw built during the war.
McClintock, Watson, their Coalition of Supporters,
and their Boats
The core of the submersible boat building program that
ultimately produced Pioneer, American
Diver, and H.L. Hunley
was formed by a coalition of New Orleans machinists
and businessmen probably motivated by both nationalistic
feeling and the possibility of collecting prize money
for the destruction of enemy vessels of war. The initial
New Orleans group consisted of machinists (or "practical
engineers") Baxter Watson and James McClintock,
lawyer and Deputy Collector of Customs Horace L. Hunley,
customs house employee and diver John K. Scott, Hunley's
wealthy brother-in-law Robert Ruffin Barrow, and prominent
lawyer and newspaper editor Henry J. Leovy. These six
men were the driving force behind the Pioneer's
construction over the winter of 1861-1862 at the Leeds
Foundry, near the Government Yard at New Basin. While
the composition of this group would evolve somewhat
over the next several years, it would be McClintock
and (until his death) Hunley who would remain at its
core.
The First Attempt: Pioneer
The effort to construct Pioneer
was possibly alluded to as early as 17 August 1861 in
the New Orleans Daily Delta (Kloeppel
1992, 6). Leovy was likely the source of these rumors,
as he was on the Daily Delta's editorial
staff. Their submersible was floated in February 1862
at the government yard at New Basin, taken up the New
Canal, and reportedly underwent trials in Lake Ponchartrain.
McClintock later described the first of his three boats
as being built:
...in New Orleans in 1862, of iron 1/4 inch
thick, 30 feet long, 4 feet in diameter with cone ends
10 feet long, with a propeller in one end, turned with
a crank by two (2) persons inside of the boat. This boat
was faulty in shape. Yet it demonstrated the fact that
a boat could be built, that would move at the will of
the operator in any direction required, and at any distance
from the surface of the water. The evacuation of New Orleans
occurred before all our experiments were completed (McClintock
Narrative, PRO, Adm. Series 1/6236, File 39455).
According to a letter written in 1871 by McClintock
to fellow Confederate underwater warfare specialist
Matthew Fontaine Maury, during this shakedown the boat
sank a schooner and two target barges by means of a
towed torpedo (Perry 1965, 95; Kloeppel 1987, 6-9).
On 29 March 1862 application was made by John K. Scott
for a letter of marque and reprisal as a privateer,
which was issued to the Pioneer by
Hunley's supervisor, Collector F.H. Hatch on March 31
under the authorization of C.S. Secretary of State Judah
P. Benjamin (also a New Orleans lawyer and acquaintance
of Leovy's). The letter of marque records the vessel's
name as Pioneer, and the vessel type
as a "submarine propeller" armed with
a "magazine of powder." The Pioneer
is described as measuring 34 feet in overall length,
4 feet in beam, drawing 4 feet of water, and weighing
4 tons. It was painted black and had "round
conical ends." To obtain the letter of marque
a surety of $5,000.00 was posted by Hunley and Leovy
(ORN I, 9, 399-400). The number of
crew required is listed as three, with John K. Scott
as the vessel commander (the choice of Scott as vessel
commander may have been dictated by not only his presumed
piloting ability, but also his experience as a diver,
which is alluded to by correspondence appearing in ORN
II, 1, 556). The Pioneer never saw
action, for less than a month later New Orleans fell
the combined U.S. forces under Flag Officer David G.
Farragut, USN and General Benjamin F. Butler, USA as
part of the combined campaign to take the Mississippi
River Valley from Head of the Passes to Cairo and divide
the Confederacy in half. Most likely sometime between
24 and 28 April 1862, with Farragut and Butler at the
city gates, possibly while the levee front and shipyards
were ablaze in the destruction of any goods of material
value to the enemy, an attempt was made by Pioneer's
builders to conceal it somewhere in the vicinity of
the New Basin. At least three of the group, McClintock,
Watson, and Hunley, fled to Mobile, Alabama with the
intention of building an improved vessel there.
During the subsequent Federal occupation of New Orleans,
the Pioneer was discovered and a
study of its construction was made by U.S. Navy Lieutenants
Alfred Colin and George W. Baird of the USS Pensacola's
engineering department. Colin and Baird forwarded their
study to the fleet engineer (Baird 1902, 845-846). In
1868 the Pioneer was sold for scrap
at a public auction held before the New Orleans Customs
House (New Orleans Picayune, 15 February
1868, morning and afternoon editions). There has existed
a great deal of speculation regarding the dimensions
and configuration of this Hunley
predecessor, as well as whether or not a submersible
recovered from a canal connected to Lake Ponchartrain
in July 1878 (Scharf 1887, 761) and presently located
at the Louisiana State Museum may in fact constitute
the remains of Pioneer (Robinson
1928, Arthur 1947, Kloeppel 1989; Wills 1994, Luraghi
1996). Fortunately, within the last year the surviving
records of Colin and Baird's documentation have been
located and brought to light by historical researcher
Mark Ragan ("Letters received by the Secretary
of the Navy from Officers below the Rank of Commander,
1802-1884," NARA, RG 45, Entry M148). The documentation
uncovered by Ragan includes a drawing of the boat (Figure
3), conclusively revealing that the Louisiana State
Museum Vessel is not the Pioneer.
This lends further potential credence to a theory recently
proposed by researcher Francis Chandler Furman which
suggests that the Louisiana State Museum vessel may
in fact be one of the submersibles reportedly constructed
at the Tredegar Iron Works (Coski 1996, 292 ff). If
this is the case, its minuscule size may indicate a
purpose as a builder's scale working prototype (Pinkerton
1888, 400) which may have been sent to New Orleans through
Edward M. Ivens, Tredegar's New Orleans agent (ORN
II, 1, 533) as a model to assist in the construction
of larger such vessels to be built at Confederate Navy
Department facilities there and elsewhere (ORN
I, 9, 411-412; I, 22, 103-105).
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Figure 3. The "Rebel Submarine Ram "documented by Lieutenants
Colin and Baird. It is
undoubtedly the Confederate Privateer Pioneer. This
drawing and its accompanying
documentation, uncovered by researcher Mark Ragan,
provides definitive proof that the
Louisiana State Museum vessel is not McClintock
and Watson's privateer Pioneer, as
previously thought by some. |
The Second Attempt: American Diver
Upon arriving in Mobile, McClintock, Watson, and Hunley
were joined in their efforts by engineers Thomas Park
and Thomas Lyons of the Park & Lyons machine
shops, who provided their facilities for the fabrication
of a new boat. The group also now began to receive support
from the military in the form of Lieutenant William
Alexander, CSA, an engineer temporarily detached from
the Twenty-First Alabama Volunteer Regiment and detailed
to duty at Park & Lyons. According to information
from a Confederate deserter who had
worked in the Mobile shop around this time, upon completion
their resulting vessel was referred to as American
Diver (ORN I, 15, 229).
In a letter to Matthew Fontaine Maury written after
the war, McClintock recorded that the original intention
was to build a boat capable of mechanical self-propulsion:
To obtain room for the machinery
and persons, she was built 36 feet long, 3 feet wide,
and 4 feet high, 12 feet at each end was built tapering
or modeled to make her easy to pass through the water.
There was much time and money lost in efforts to build
an electromagnetic engine for propelling the boat...I
afterwards fitted cranks to turn the propeller by hand,
working four men at a time, but the air being so closed,
and the work so hard, that we were unable to get a speed
sufficient to make the boat of service against vessels,
blockading the port (Maury Papers, Library of Congress;
cited in Ragan 1995, 22, 24).
Not long thereafter, McClintock provided more detail
in the narrative he gave to officers of the Royal Navy
during his secret meeting at Halifax. He wrote that:
In 1863 I built the second boat,
also of iron 1/4 inch thick, and in order to obtain
more room as well as to correct the faults of the first
boat, she was built with square sides. Dimensions was
36 feet long, 4 feet high, and 3 feet across top &
bottom, with ends tapered like a wedge for a model,
with a 30 inch propeller in the end. I spent much time
and money in efforts to work an Electro Magnetic Engine,
but without success. I afterwards fitted her up with
cranks, to be turned by four men. But her speed was
not sufficient to make her of service against blockaders,
they being six miles at sea (McClintock Narrative, PRO,
Adm. Series 1/6236, File 39455).
The origin of the American Diver's
electromagnetic engine remains obscure, and as a result
it has been the subject of much conjecture. McClintock
may have initially been influenced by several descriptions
of electromagnetic engines which appeared in the British
technical publication The Engineer
(11 May 1860, 309; 29 March 1861, 201; 4 April 1861,
216; 5 September 1862, 148; 19 September 1862, 177).
This seems a logical possibility in light of the fact
that he later admitted that this same publication was
the source of more detailed information regarding an
ammoniacally-powered submarine proposed by him to the
Royal Navy. Records indicate that during the second
boat's construction, Admiral Franklin Buchanan, CSN
informed Secretary of the Navy Stephen Mallory that
"within the last week or ten days we succeeded
in getting a man from New Orleans who was to have made
the `magnetic engine' by which it was to have been propelled"
(Kloeppel 1995, 24). This "man from New Orleans"
may have been the "Frenchman" referred
to in other correspondence, and may have in fact been
the mysterious figure named Anstilt (or Alstitt) (Schell
1992, 168-171). At this same time in Mobile in 1863,
an electric-powered vessel attributed to Anstilt, sometimes
referred to as the American Ram,
was also purportedly under construction. A somewhat
fanciful sketch of this alleged boat appeared in Harper's
Illustrated Weekly of 10 June 1864. Sources
regarding this vessel are extremely sketchy, and it
seems likely that they may actually have been referring
to the American Diver, perhaps confusing
Anstilt's proposed designs and propulsion experiments
with his possible work with the McClintock group at
Park & Lyons (Schell, 1992, 169-171). Unfortunately,
when it became apparent that the electromagnetic engine
was incapable of providing the amount of power required,
it was removed and a small, custom-built steam plant
was installed in its place. However, this powerplant
was also determined to be unusable and likewise was
removed (Ragan 1995, 22).
Significantly, the records from the PRO documenting
McClintock's 1872 visit to Halifax include a three-view
sketch of a submersible, drawn by Captain Nicholson
in the presence of McClintock (see Figures 1 and 2,
above). While the dimensions and configuration of all
three of McClintock's boats are detailed in the accompanying
written report, the boat represented in the sketch appears
to possess features of both the second and third boats.
Some of these discrepancies are acknowledged and explained
in the accompanying text. Nicholson and Ellis recorded
that "the drawing we enclose is a representation
of the boat that effected this destruction [of Housatonic],
it is not drawn to scale, nor did the original boat
contain any engine, the only motive power then available
being manual labor...("Report of a submarine
boat built by Mr. McClintock of Mobile, U.S. of America,"
PRO Adm. Series 1/6236, File 39455). It seems significant
that the PRO drawings bear a close resemblance to the
vessel represented in a postwar drawing by Baird which
was made in the presence of, and based upon information
provided by, McClintock (Figure 4). Baird, apparently
assuming that McClintock built only one boat in Mobile,
subsequently identified the boat in this drawing as
"the vessel that destroyed the U.S.S. Housatonic"
(Baird 1902, 846). Because of this, it has been commonly
assumed that he was attempting to represent the Hunley,
when in fact what McClintock may have actually been
describing to him was the American Diver.
In a response to Baird's article written shortly after
it appeared, Alexander raised an objection to this identification,
noting of the drawing in question that "after
the capture of New Orleans McClintock went to Mobile
and built the submarine in Plate I. I don't know where
McClintock is living, but hope he will assist in correcting
this error" (Ragan 1995, 25). Unfortunately,
McClintock was never able to correct the record; he
was long since dead by this time, having been killed
in Boston Harbor in 1879 in an accidental explosion
while demonstrating the use of some of his underwater
contact mine designs for the government (Ragan 1995,
164). But while McClintock did not survive long enough
to answer Alexander's request, the PRO drawings seem
to reinforce the accuracy of his memory in regard to
the configuration of his second boat, left behind in
the form of his letter to Maury and his description
as relayed to Baird. One interpretation of the newly
uncovered PRO written descriptions and drawings may
be that they may suggest a much closer relationship
in design between McClintock's second and third boats
than has previously been suspected.
|
Figure 4. Diagram of a submarine
boat drawn by Rear Admiral Baird in McClintock's
presence.
Baird has labeled this as "The Vessel that destroyed
the U.S.S. Housatonic." Alexander
subsequently stated in a letter to the Navy that
this identification was in error, and that the
sketch represented not the Hunley but the first
boat built in Mobile. |
The American Diver was floated in
Mobile Bay in February of 1863. It was towed off Fort
Morgan with the intention of manning it there and attacking
the Federal fleet, but as the weather grew worse and
the sea became rough, the boat became difficult to manage
and foundered. No lives were lost in this mishap, but
the Confederate submariners had been deprived of another
vessel in which they had invested much effort, time,
and funding.
The Third Attempt: H.L. Hunley
McClintock and Hunley's group would not be discouraged.
Financially strapped, they sold shares in the third
venture to members of the Singer Submarine Corps, composed
of engineers E.C. Singer, B. Gus Whitney, R.W. Dunn,
and J.D. Breaman (Duncan 1965, 64).
Hunley held one third of the shares, Singer one third,
and the last third was split among Whitney, Dunn, and
Breaman (Ragan 1995, 26). It may have been at this early
stage of the boat's construction that Lieutenant Alexander
was joined by another Army assignee to this detail,
his friend Lieutenant George Dixon, CSA, also of the
21st Alabama (Dixon, it should be noted, was actually
a Kentuckian, while Alexander was British, having emigrated
to America only several years previously). Dixon and
Alexander were veterans of Shiloh, and Dixon is known
to have sustained a serious leg wound there (Ragan 1995,
28). The group obtained a long cylindrical steam boiler
which the engineers lengthened, deepened, and fitted
out to accommodate a maximum crew of nine. Whether the
steam boiler used originated from a steamship, railroad
engine, or other source remains unclear; further research
into boiler design, construction, and configuration
may provide an answer.
The boat was launched in July 1863 at Mobile's Theater
Street dock. At this early point before Hunley's asphyxiation
and the subsequent naming of the vessel for him, this
vessel may have been referred to by several different
names, including "the Fish Boat" (Fort
1914; Stanton 1914), "the fish torpedo
boat" (Beauregard 1878, 152), and "the
Porpoise" (Ragan 1995, 42).
Trials produced pleasing results. Admiral Franklin Buchanan,
CSN noted that the boat was capable of making four knots
(Ragan 1995, 30). The attention of General P.G.T Beauregard,
CSA was evidently captured by the method of illumination;
he recorded that "light was afforded through
the means of bull's-eyes placed in the manholes"
(Beauregard 1878, 153). McClintock described the boat
as follows:
In the Spring of 1864 I built the
3d boat, having abandoned the artificial motive power
as not attainable in our situations. I modeled her,
and built expressly for hand power. This boat was of
an elliptic shape, with modeled ends, and looked similar
to surf, or whale boats, placed one on top of the other.
She was built of iron 3/8 inch thick, 40 feet long top
& bottom, 42 inches wide in the middle, &
48 inches high, fitted with cranks geared to her propeller
& turned by 8 persons inside of her. And although
she was a beautiful model boat, and worked to perfection
just like her predecessors, the power was too uncertain
to admit of her venturing far from shore. This boat
was taken to Charleston, SC, and destroyed the sloop
of war Housatonic. Myself nor the
Sub Marine's gallant commander who lost his life in
demonstrating her [illegible, possibly "success"]
considered there was any danger in going out and destroying
any vessel, but the danger was in having sufficient
power to bring the boat back (McClintock Narrative,
PRO, Adm. Series 1/6236, File 39455).
Interestingly, McClintock's statement regarding "cranks
geared to her propeller" may indicate that
the drive train included a reduction gear. A similar
such feature is present in the construction of the U.S.
Navy's Intelligent Whale (personal
communication, Peter Hitchcock to Richard Wills, 1996).
|
Figure 5. Diagram of the H. L. Hunley, drawn by William A.
Alexander, showing the boat's
longitudinal elevation plan view, and a transverse
section. Alexander's numbers represent the
following features: (1) the bow and stern castings;
(2) water-ballast tanks; (3) tank bulkheads;
(4) compass; (5) sea cocks; (6) pumps; (7) mercury
gauge; (8) keel-ballast stuffing boxes;
(9) propeller shaft and cranks; (10) stern bearing
and gland; (11) shaft braces; (12) propeller;
(13) wrought ring around propeller; (14) rudder;
(15) steering control; (16) steering lever; (17)
steering
rods; (18) rod braces; (19) air box; (20) hatchways;
(21) hatch covers; (22) shaft of side fins;
(23) side fins; (24) shaft lever; (25) one of the
crew turning propeller shaft; (26) cast-iron keel
ballast;
(27) bolts; (28) butt end of torpedo boom. |
Years after the war, Alexander made a sketch of the
third vessel's construction (Figure 5) and described
the boat as follows:
We decided to build another boat, and for this
purpose took a cylinder boiler which we had on hand, 48
inches in diameter and twenty-five feet long (all dimensions
are from memory). We cut this boiler in two, longitudinally,
and inserted two 12-inch boiler-iron strips in her sides,
lengthened her by one tapering course fore and aft, to
which were attached bow and stern castings, making the
boat about 30 feet long, 4 feet wide and 5 feet deep.
A longitudinal strip 12 inches wide was riveted the full
length of the top. At each end a bulkhead was riveted
across to form water-ballast tanks (unfortunately these
were left open on top); they were used in raising and
sinking the boat. In addition to these water tanks the
boat was ballasted by flat castings, made to fit the outside
bottom of the shell and fastened thereto by "Tee"
headed bolts passing through stuffing boxes inside the
boat, the inside of the bolt squared to fit a wrench,
that the bolts might be turned and the ballast dropped,
should the necessity arise. In connection with each of
the water tanks there was a sea-cock open to the sea to
supply the tank for sinking; also a force pump to eject
water from the tanks into the sea for raising the boat
to the surface. There was also a bilge connection to the
pump. A mercury gauge, open to the sea, was attached to
the shell near the forward tank, to indicate the depth
of the boat below the surface. A one and a quarter shaft
passed through stuffing boxes on each side of the boat,
just forward of the end of the propeller shaft. On each
side of this shaft, outside of the boat, castings, or
lateral fins, five feet long and eight inched wide, were
secured. This shaft was operated by a lever amidships,
and by raising or lowering the needs of these fins, operated
as the fins of a fish, changing the depth of the boat
below the surface at will, without disturbing the water
level in the ballast tanks.
The rudder was operated by a wheel, and levers connected
to rods passing through stuffing-boxes in the stern
castings, and operated by the captain or pilot forward.
An adjusted compass was placed in front of the forward
tank. The boat was operated by manual power, with an
ordinary propeller. On the propelling shaft there were
formed eight cranks at different angles; the shaft was
supported by brackets on the starboard side, the men
sitting on the port side turning the cranks. The propeller
shaft and cranks took up so much room that it was very
difficult to pass fore and aft, and when the men were
in their places this was next to impossible. In operation,
one- half the crew had to pass through the fore hatch;
the other through the after hatchway. The propeller
revolved in a wrought iron ring or band, to guard against
a line being thrown in to foul it. There were two hatchways
- one fore and one aft -- 16 inches by 12, with a combing
8 inches high. These hatches had hinged covers with
rubber gasket, and were bolted from the inside. In the
sides and ends of these combings glasses were inserted
to sight from. There was an opening made in the top
of the boat for an air box, a casting with a close top
12 by 18 by 4 inches, made to carry a hollow shaft.
This shaft passed through stuffing boxes. On each end
was an elbow with a 4 foot length of 1 1-2 inch pipe,
and keyed to the hollow shaft; on the inside was a lever
with a stop-cock to admit air (Alexander 1902).
It was decided that the boat should be shipped by flatcar
to Charleston, South Carolina for anti-blockade duty
under the command of General P.G.T. Beauregard, CSA.
Whereas Mobile's defenses were well fortified, Charleston
was suffering under a siege of more serious proportions.
Charleston's coastal waters may also have presented
a more desirable operating environment, especially in
terms of providing greater depth. Furthermore, General
Beauregard in Charleston looked favorably upon unconventional
weapons, while General Dabney H. Maury and Admiral Franklin
Buchanan in Mobile may not have been so willing to embrace
such unproven forms of naval warfare. Finally, the move
was undoubtedly encouraged by the high bounties being
placed upon the naval vessels of the South Atlantic
Blockading Squadron. The result was that the submersible
was shipped to Charleston by flatcar in August 1863.
In a letter "inflicted" upon his fiancé,
Lieutenant George Gift, CSN of the CSS Gaines
described how he had "been employed during
the past day or two in hoisting out of the water and
sending away toward Charleston a very curious machine
for destroying vessels" which he describes
as follows:
In the first place imagine a high pressure steam
boiler, not quite round, say 4 feet in diameter in one
way and 3-½ feet the other -- draw each end of
the boiler down to a sharp wedge shaped point. The 4 feet
is the depth of the hold and the 3-½ feet the breadth
of beam. On the bottom of the boat is riveted an iron
keel weighing 4000 lbs which throws the center of gravity
on one side and makes her swim steadily that side down.
On top and opposite the keel is placed two man hole plates
or hatches with heavy glass tops. These plates are water
tight when covered over. They are just large enough for
a man to go in and out. At one end is fitted a very neat
little propeller 3-½ feet in diameter worked by
men sitting in the boat and turning the shaft by hand
cranks being fitted on it for that purpose. She also has
a rudder and steering apparatus.
Embarked and under ordinary circumstances with men
ballast &tc she floats about half way out of
the water & resembles a whale. But when it is
necessary to go under the water there are apartments
into which the water is allowed to flow, which causes
the boat to sink to any required depth, the same being
accurately indicated by a column of mercury. Air is
supplied by means of pipes that turn up until they get
below a depth of 10 feet, when they must depend upon
the supply carried down which is sufficient for 3 hours!
During which time she could have been propelled 15 miles!
Behind the boat at a distance of 100 to 150 feet is
towed a plank and under that plank is attached a torpedo
with say 100 lb of powder. The steersman has a string
by which he can explode the torpedo by giving it a jerk.
I saw them explode a vessel as an experiment. They approached
within about fifty yards of her keeping the man holes
just above water. At that distance she the submarine
sank down and in a few minutes made her appearance on
the other side of the vessel. He pulled the string and
smashed her side to atoms...(Turner 1995, 5-8).
Alexander later indicated that this towed torpedo arrangement
proved unworkable, recording that:
The torpedo was a copper cylinder
holding a charge of ninety pounds of explosive, with
percussion and friction primer mechanism, set off by
flaring triggers. It was originally intended to float
the torpedo on the surface of the water, the boat to
dive under the vessel to be attacked, towing the torpedo
with a line 200 feet long after her, one of the triggers
to touch the vessel and explode the torpedo, and in
the experiments made in the smooth water of Mobile River
on some old flatboats these plans operated successfully,
but in rough water the torpedo was continually coming
too near the wrong boat. We then rigged a yellow pine
boom, 22 feet long and tapering; this was attached to
the bow, banded and guyed in each side. A socket on
the torpedo secured it to the boom (Alexander 1902).
As can be seen from some of the previous accounts,
the dimensions of Hunley vary somewhat
depending on which historical source is consulted. When
put into a table form alongside the dimensions recorded
for McClintock's other boats, and compared to reliable
documented measurements, it may be possible to draw
some conclusions regarding the relative accuracy of
these dimensions (Figure 6). McClintock's descriptions
of circa 1871 and 1872 descriptions emerge as being
consistently near the mark, if not perhaps slightly
conservative as in the case of Pioneer.
Gift is not far off, while Alexander (who in all fairness
cautioned 40 years after the fact that "all
dimensions are from memory") seems to be somewhat
further off the mark.
Figure 6. A
table comparing the dimensions of the three McClintock-built
Confederate submersible boats, using historical and
archaeological sources. |
Vessel |
Length |
Beam |
Depth |
|
Pioneer |
"34 feet"
(Letter of Marque, 1862) "35 feet" (USN
drawing, 1862) "30 feet" (McClintock to
Maury, ca. 1871 "30 feet" (McClintock's
Royal Navy Narrative, 1872) "30 feet" (Baird,
1902) |
"4 feet"(Letter
of Marque, 1862) "4 feet diameter" (USN
drawing, 1862) "4 feet" (McClintock to Maury,
ca. 1871 |
"4 feet"(Letter
of Marque, 1862) "4 feet diameter" (USN
drawing, 1862) |
|
American Diver |
"36 feet" (McClintock
to Maury, ca. 1871) "36 feet" (McClintock's
Royal Navy Narrative, 1872) "about 25
feet" (Alexander, 1902) |
"3
feet" (McClintock to Maury, ca. 1871) "3
feet across top and bottom" (McClintock's Royal
Navy Narrative, 1872) "[about] 5 feet" (Alexander,
1902) |
"4
feet" (McClintock to Maury, ca. 1871) "4
feet high" (McClintock's Royal Navy Narrative,
1872) "[about] 6 feet" (Alexander, 1902)
|
|
H. L. Hunley |
"40 feet" (McClintock
to Maury, ca. 1871) "40 feet long, top and bottom"
(McClintock's Royal Navy Narrative, 1872) "about
30 feet" (Alexander, 1902) approx. 39 feet 5
inches (1996 survey) |
"3 1/2 feet...breadth of the
beam" (Gift, 1863) "31/2 feet" (McClintock
to Maury, ca. 1871) "42 inches wide in the middle"
(McClintock's Royal Navy Narrative, 1872) "about
4 feet" (Alexander, 1902) approx. 3 feet 10 inches
(1996 survey) |
"4 feet depth of
hold" (Gift, 1863) "4 feet" (McClintock
to Maury, ca. 1871) "48 inches high" (McClintock's
Royal Navy Narrative, 1872) "about 5 feet"
(Alexander, 1902) between 4 and 5 feet (1996 survey)
|
Sometime during its operations in Charleston, the boat
became the object of an artistic study by the famed
artist Conrad Wise Chapman. Chapman has left us two
informative depictions of the boat: his pencil study
and his finished oil portrait (Figure 7).
|
Figure 7. Conrad Wise Chapman's famous oil
painting of the Hunley. |
Following its arrival in South Carolina, the boat experienced
a number of operational difficulties. The Army became
increasingly unhappy with McClintock's management of
the boat, and as a result seized it, replacing the civilian
crew with C.S. Navy personnel. It was following this
transition that the boat was twice accidentally lost
in Charleston Harbor with fatalities, being both times
subsequently salvaged. The first incident killed five
members of the crew of nine, most of whom were volunteers
from the CSS Chicora and CSS Palmetto State.
Lieutenant C.L. Stanton, CSN provides the background
of this misfortune.
One day when Lieutenant Payne, my friend
and shipmate, was aboard the Chicora I arranged
to go down under the water with him; but as the
boat was obliged to leave before my watch on deck
was over, Lieutenant Charles H. Hooker [sic,
he means Hasker] took my place. She dived about
the harbor successfully for an hour or two and finally
went over to Fort Johnson, where the little steamer
Etiwan was lying alongside the wharf. She
fastened to her side with a light line with the
fins in position for diving... (Stanton 1914).
Lieutenant Charles H. Hasker, CSN (a former U.S. Navy
hand who had been the boatswain on the CSS Virginia
during the Battle of Hampton Roads) was sitting immediately
behind Payne in the lead cranksman's position at the
time of the accident, and related the following experience:
We were lying astern of the steamer Etowah
[one of several names by which the CSS Etiwan
was known], near Fort Johnson, in Charleston Harbor.
Lieutenant Payne, who had charge, got fouled in
the manhole by the hawser and in trying to clear
himself got his foot on the lever which controlled
the fins. He had just previously given the order
to go ahead. The boat made a dive with the manholes
open and filled rapidly. Payne got out of the forward
hole and two others out of the aft hole. Six of
us went down with the boat. I had to get over the
bar which connected the fins and through the column
of water which was rapidly filling the boat. The
manhole plate came down on my back; but I worked
my way out until my left leg was caught by the plate,
pressing the calf of my leg in two. Held in this
manner, I was carried to the bottom in forty-two
feet of water. When the boat touched bottom I felt
the pressure relax. Stooping down, I took hold of
the manhole plate, drew out my wounded limb, and
swam to the surface. Five men were drowned on this
occasion (Fort 1914).
Payne and Hasker escaped the forward hatch, while the
team's explosives expert, Charles L. Sprague, and another
unidentified crewmember managed to fight their way out
through the aft coaming. Carried to the bottom and drowned
were sailors Frederick (Frank) Doyle, John Kelly, Nicholas
(Nick) Davis, and Michael Kane (or Cane) of the Chicora,
and Absolum Williams of the Palmetto State
(Ragan 1995, 54). Following this tragedy, the military
sent a request to Mobile asking for people more familiar
with the boat to come to Charleston to take over its
operation upon its recovery. Horace Hunley, Thomas Park's
son Thomas W. Park (often misidentified as his father),
and approximately six or so other volunteers, probably
mechanics from the Park & Lyons shop, answered
the call, journeyed to Charleston, and spent some time
putting the boat through "diving and raising"
tests, possibly for the purpose of testing a new adjusted
compass (Ragan 1995, 66). When it finally appeared to
observers that all the vessel required was experienced
hands, the boat suffered another terrible disaster.
While running submerged, Hunley, acting as vessel commander,
made a simple error in regulating the water contained
within the forward ballast tank, and the boat buried
its bow in the harbor mud, stuck fast, and partially
flooded, killing the entire crew of eight. In addition
to Hunley, Park, and the stout-hearted Sprague, this
crew contained Mobilians Robert Brockbank, Charles McHugh,
John Marshall, Henry Beard, and Joseph Patterson (who
may be the individual identified as "White"
in Alexander's narrative). Even after the passage of
nearly fifteen years, General Beauregard's recollection
of the events surrounding the recovery of the boat and
crew three weeks after the sinking was still vivid when
he set it to paper:
Lieutenant Dixon made repeated descents
in the harbor of Charleston, diving under the naval
receiving ship which lay at anchor there. But one
day when he was absent from the city Mr. Hunley,
unfortunately, wishing to handle the boat himself,
made the attempt. It was readily submerged, but
did not rise again to the surface, and all on board
perished from asphyxiation. When the boat was discovered,
raised and opened, the spectacle was indescribable
and ghastly; the unfortunate men were contorted
into all kinds of horrible attitudes; some clutching
candles, evidently endeavoring to force open the
man-holes; others lying on the bottom tightly grappled
together, and the blackened faces of all presented
the expression of their despair and agony. After
this tragedy I refused to permit the boat to be
used again; but Lieutenant Dixon, a brave and determined
man, having returned to Charleston, applied to me
for authority to use it against the Federal steam
sloop-of-war Housatonic, a powerful new vessel,
carrying eleven guns of the largest caliber, which
lay at the time in the north channel opposite Beach
Inlet, materially obstructing the passage of our
blockade-runners in and out (Beauregard 1878, 153-154).
The divers hired to locate and rig the boat for salvage
found it buried bow-first in the mud. Alexander's insightful
attempt to reconstruct the accident provides some detail
of the crew's standard operating procedures:
The position in which the boat was found
on the bottom of the river, the condition of the
apparatus discovered after it was raised and pumped
out, and the position of the bodies in the boat,
furnished a full explanation for her loss. The boat,
when found, was lying on the bottom at an angle
of about 35 degrees, the bow deep in the mud. The
bolting-down bolts of each hatch cover had been
removed. When the hatch covers were lifted considerable
air and gas escaped. Captain Hunley's body was forward,
with his head in the forward hatchway, his right
hand on top of his head (he had been trying, it
would seem, to raise the hatch cover). In his left
hand was a candle that had never been lighted, the
sea-cock on the forward end, or `Hunley's' ballast
tank, was wide open, the cockwrench not on the plug,
but lying on the bottom of the boat. Mr. Park's
body was found with his head in the after hatchway,
his right hand above his head. He also had been
trying to raise the hatch cover, but the pressure
was to great. The sea-cock to his tank was properly
closed, and the tank was nearly empty. The other
bodies were floating in the water. Hunley and Parks
were undoubtedly asphyxiated, the others drowned.
The bolts that held the iron keel ballast had been
partly turned, but not sufficient to release it.
In the light of these conditions, we can easily depict before our minds, and
almost readily explain, what took place in the
boat during the moments immediately following
its submergence. Captain Hunley's practice with
the boat had made him quite familiar and expert
in handling her, and this familiarity produced
at this time forgetfulness. It was found in practice
to be easier on the crew to come to the surface
by giving the pumps a few strokes and ejecting
some of the water ballast, than by the momentum
of the boat operating on the elevate fins. At
this time the boat was under way, lighted through
the deadlights in the hatchways. He partly turned
the fins to go down, but thought, no doubt, that
he needed more ballast and opened his sea-cock.
Immediately the boat was in total darkness. He
then undertook to light the candle. While trying
to do this the tank quietly flooded, and under
great pressure the boat sank very fast and soon
overflowed, and the first intimation they would
have of anything being wrong was the water rising
fast, but noiselessly, about their feet in the
bottom of the boat. They tried to release the
iron keel ballast, but did not turn the keys quite
far enough, and therefore failed. The water soon
forced the air to the top of the boat and into
the hatchways, where captains Hunley and Parks
were found. Parks had pumped his ballast tank
dry, and no doubt Captain Hunley had exhausted
himself on his pump, but he had forgotten he had
not closed his sea cock (Alexander 1902).
McClintock's caution with the boat may have been excessive,
but in hindsight it seems to have been justifiable in
light of the two tragedies which subsequently befell
the boat. Both accidents seem to have been in some way
attributable to personal errors on the part of the vessel
commanders; in Payne's case the result was that five
of the crew drowned, whereas Hunley's actions may have
resulted in not only his own death but also his entire
crew. In addition to these operational casualties, one
of the boat's investors, Gus Whitney, also died during
this period, possibly from exposure related to the operations
of the boat (Duncan 1965, 66).
Upon the salvage of the boat, Dixon and Alexander saw
their fellow submariners buried in Charleston's Magnolia
Cemetery. The surviving members of the group memorialized
Hunley's efforts by naming the boat H.L. Hunley
after him. Saddened but undaunted, Dixon and Alexander
enlisted another volunteer crew, which ultimately came
to include naval personnel James A. Wicks, Arnold Becker,
C. Simkins, F. Collins, (first name unknown) Ridgeway,
and (first name unknown) Miller, as well as Corporal
C.F. Carlson, CSA, of Company A, South Carolina Light
Artillery (Ragan 1995, 90, 126). The group moved their
operations to Battery Marshall, on Sullivan's Island,
where between November 1863 and February 1864 they frequently
fought foul weather to cast off on night cruises on
the seas off Charleston. On 5 February, fate touched
Alexander in the form of orders received to report to
another project, and he reluctantly bid Dixon and the
crew a farewell. He never saw his friends again. On
17 February, Corporal Donald W. McClaurin of Battery
Marshall was summoned to the boat in order to make adjustments
to the on-board machinery, during which time he made
note of the Hunley's third and final
torpedo configuration:
As I recall, the torpedo was fastened
to the end of an iron pipe, about two inches in
diameter and twenty to twenty-five feet in length,
which could be extended in front and withdrawn at
ease by guides in the center of the boat to hold
it in place. Lieutenant Dixon landed and requested
that two of my regiment, the 23rd South Carolina
Volunteers, go aboard and help them to adjust the
machinery, as it was not working satisfactorily.
Another man and I went aboard and helped propel
the boat for some time while the Lieutenant and
others adjusted the machinery and the rods that
held the torpedo and got them to working satisfactorily
(Ragan 1995, 130).
The manner in which the spar was rigged has been the
matter of some debate. Lieutenant Stanton recorded his
views on this subject as follows:
Lieutenant Payne, although a willing volunteer
for this dangerous service, never at any time had
faith in the success of the enterprise. I heard
him say time and again that if he struck a vessel
with the torpedo staff projecting horizontally he
feared the boat would enter the hole made by the
explosion in the ship's side, and the machinery
would not be powerful enough to back the boat out
before it was carried down by the wreck. His idea
was that if the torpedo staff was lowered to an
angle of forty-five degrees when the ship was struck
the torpedo would explode near the keel, and the
Fishboat's bow, striking the solid planking of the
ship, would recoil sufficiently to make the machinery
effective in backing out of danger of being drawn
down by the wreck. I have always felt very certain
that the torpedo staff was in this position when
the Housatonic was struck...Besides, when
the boat lay alongside the Chicora on the
night of 14th of February, I examined it closely...(Stanton
1914).
On that same day as Corporal McClaurin was helping
to fine-tune the boat's machinery, a recognition signal
using a blue lamp was arranged between Dixon and the
men of Battery Marshall for the purpose of guiding the
boat back to port after dark:
The day of the night the perilous undertaking
was accomplished, the little war vessel was taken
to Breach Inlet. The officer in command [Dixon]
told Lieutenant-Colonel Dantzler [in command of
Battery Marshall] when they bid each other good-by,
that if he came off safe he would show two blue
lights (Cardozo 1866, 124, cited in Ragan 1995,
132).
On the evening of 17 February 1864, with Dixon at the
helm, Hunley set out on patrol. Approximately
two and a half miles off Charleston Bar, the Hunley
observed and shaped a course for the screw
sloop-of-war USS Housatonic, which
lay at anchor on blockade duty. The Housatonic's
lookout spotted the Hunley and voiced
a warning, but the ship's attempt to get underway was
not timely enough to prevent contact and detonation.
The Housatonic sank in approximately
three minutes. The subsequently convened board of inquiry
into the Housatonic's loss provides
a good amount of detail regarding the Hunley's
audacious attack. Acting Master John Crosby, who was
the Officer of the Deck on that moonlit eight to twelve
watch, related the following:
I took the deck at 8 P.M. on the night
of February 17th. About 8:45 P.M. I saw something
in the water, which at first looked to me like a
porpoise, coming to the surface to blow. It was
about 75 to 100 yards from us on our starboard beam.
The ship heading northwest by west ½ west
at the time, the wind two or three points on the
starboard bow. At that moment I called the Quartermaster's
attention to it asking him if he saw anything; he
looked at it through his glass, and said he saw
nothing but a tide ripple in the water. Looking
again within an instant I saw it was coming toward
the ship very fast. I gave orders to beat to quarters
slip the chain and back the engine, the orders being
executed immediately (Ragan 1995, 136).
Lieutenant F.J. Higginson, the ship's executive officer,
recorded that upon hearing the alarm for general quarters:
I went on deck immediately, found the
Officer of the Deck on the bridge, and asked him
the cause of the alarm; he pointed about the starboard
beam on the water and said "there it is."
I then saw something resembling a plank moving towards
the ship at a rate of 3 or 4 knots; it came close
alongside, a little forward of the mizzen mast on
the starboard side. It then stopped, and appeared
to move off slowly. I then went down from the bridge
and took the rifle from the lookout on the horse
block on the starboard quarter, and fired at this
object. It had the appearance of a plank sharp at
both ends; it was entirely on awash with the water,
and there was a glimmer of light through the top
of it, as though through a dead light (Ragan 1995,
136- 138).
The Housatonic's commanding officer,
Captain Charles W. Pickering, stated that:
On reaching the deck I gave the order
to slip, and heard for the first time it was a torpedo,
I think from the Officer of the Deck. I repeated the
order to slip, and gave the order to go astern, and
to open fire. I turned instantly, took my double barreled
gun loaded with buck shot, from Mr. Muzzey, my aide
and clerk, and jumped up on the horse block on the starboard
quarter which the first Lieutenant had just left having
fired a musket at the torpedo. I hastily examined the
torpedo; it was shaped like a large whale boat, about
two feet, more or less, under water; its position was
at right angles to the ship, bow on, and the bow within
two or three feet of the ship's side, about abreast
of the mizzenmanst, and I supposed it was then fixing
the torpedo on. I saw two projections or knobs about
one third of the way from the bows. I fired at these,
jumped down from the horse block, and ran to the port
side of the Quarter Deck as far as the mizzen mast,
singing out "Go astern Faster" (Ragan
1995, 136).
The ship's Assistant Engineer, Mr. Mayer, related his
experiences as follows:
The engine was immediately backed,
and had made three or four revolutions when I heard
the explosion, accompanied by a sound of rushing water
and crashing timbers and metal. Immediately the engine
went with great velocity as if the propeller had broken
off. I then throttled her down, but with little effect.
I then jumped up the hatch, saw the ship was sinking
and gave the order for all hands to go on deck (Ragan
1995, 138).
Ensign Charles Craven also managed to lay down fire
at the attacking vessel, recording that:
I heard the Officer of the Deck give
the order "Call all hands to Quarters."
I went on deck and saw something in the water on the
starboard side of the ship, about thirty feet off, and
the Captain and the Executive Officer were firing at
it. I fired two shots at her with my revolver as she
was standing toward the ship as soon as I saw her, and
a third shot when she was almost under the counter,
having to lean over the port to fire it (Ragan 1995,
138).
The Housatonic took five of its
crew to the bottom, including Ensign E.C. Hazeltine,
Quartermaster John Williams, Fireman
Second Class John Walsh, Landsman Theodore Parker, and
Pickering's erstwhile yeoman Charles O. Muzzey (Ragan
1995, 142). But a final toll was exacted in exchange
for the submersible's tactical victory. The Hunley
and its crew never returned to Sullivan's Island, even
though the prearranged lamp signals were believed to
have been received from Dixon's crew and interpreted
as a request for a light to guide them safely back into
port (ORN I, 15, 335). The vanishing
of the Hunley with all hands subsequently
became one of the sea's greatest mysteries, remaining
unsolved until the wreck was definitively relocated
in 1995 by archaeologists Ralph Wilbanks, Wes Hall,
and Harry Pecorelli III of best-selling author Clive
Cussler's National Underwater & Marine Agency
(NUMA). A number of theories have been put forward regarding
when, where, and how the boat was lost. Alexander for
a long time believed that Hunley
had been caught in or beneath Housatonic
as the Navy warship rapidly sank (Alexander 1902), this
belief being based partially upon the incorrect observations
of government divers. But upon hearing from authoritative
Navy sources that these reports were not authentic,
Alexander still continued to believe that the wreck
must have nevertheless come to rest not far away, having
like Housatonic rapidly settled five
feet beneath the seabed. Alexander noted that an agreement
existed between the crewmembers that if the boat should
for any reason be unable to surface, "the sea
cocks were to be opened and the boat flooded"
in order to prevent the suffering of slow asphyxiation
known to have been experienced by Hunley's crew (Alexander
1903). It has been theorized that the agreement Alexander
spoke of may have represented the romanticized interpretation
of a practical last-ditch escape strategy, in which
an attempt would be made to equalize the pressures on
the hatch surfaces in order to allow the crew to open
them and ascend from the wreck (Ragan 1995, 168).
It has also been conjectured that the boat succumbed
to structural damage or crew injuries sustained as a
result of the contact and explosion, or from the Housatonic's
defending gunfire. While the potential effects of the
detonation on the submersible's hull integrity remain
a question, it seems very likely that the Hunley
did absorb some degree of projectile damage from small
arms fire, in light of the degree of fire and the close
range of the two vessels at the time the defending fire
was laid down. The boat drew fire from a variety of
light weapons, including Higginson's rifle, Craven's
revolver, Pickering's double-barreled shotgun (presumably
fired at the conning towers, based upon his testimony),
and possibly the musketry fire of several other lookouts.
It seems feasible that Pickering's spread of buckshot
at the "two projections" may have
provided a good chance for damage to occur to some of
the deadlights, and perhaps even caused crew injury.
Another theory put forward to account for the boat's
disappearance is that swift seas and worsening weather
prevented the exhausted crew from successfully regaining
port, and ultimately caused their delicately balanced
boat to founder. McClintock's opinion, recorded in 1872,
is as follows:
I would here state that I do not
believe that the Sub Marine Boat was lost in the operation
of destroying the Housatonic, but
was lost in a storm which occurred a few hours after.
I am aware that the Federals has made diligent search
for her, and have made three different reports of having
found her, yet no descriptions that I have ever heard
are correct (McClintock Narrative, PRO, Adm. Series
1/6236, file 39455).
During the late 1950s researcher Louis Genella conducted
research into the climatological conditions of the night
of 17 February, 1864, and concluded that on the 17th
tidal conditions in the vicinity of Fort Sumter were
probably as follows (all times are local): high water
occurring at 3:40 PM, low water occurring at 9:45 PM;
beginning of ebb current occurring at 4:30 PM, maximum
ebb occurring at 7:45 PM; and the beginning of flood
current occurring at 10:50 PM (Letter, Chief, Tides
& Currents Division, U.S. Coast Geodetic Survey,
Department of Commerce to Louis J. Genella, 13 March
1958; in the Louis J. Genella Collection, Tulane University
Library). The attack took place between approximately
8:45 and 9:00 PM. The time that the blue signal light
was witnessed and answered by Battery Marshall may have
been sometime around 9:30 PM, which is when a blue light
was observed on the water near the assisting USS Canandaigua
by Seaman Robert Flemming, who had climbed up into the
rigging of the settling Housatonic (Ragan 1995,
139-140, 170).
It may be likely that the cause of the Hunley's
loss was attributable to more than one of these factors.
In addition to the question of combat-related damage,
a number of other questions also remain unanswered.
Were eight or nine crewmen aboard for the final mission?
Is the crew still aboard, or did they manage to escape
the boat only to be lost at sea? If they are still aboard,
did any suffer injuries in the explosion and gunfire?
Are the hatches still bolted from the inside, or are
they merely resting in a closed position? Are all of
the keel ballast elements present, or was there any
attempt to jettison the keel ballast? Are the seacocks
still shut, or was there any attempt to purposefully
open them? Exactly how was the spar torpedo assembly
rigged, and does any evidence of it remain? What is
the identity of the third magnetic anomaly located during
the 1996 National Park Service remote-sensing survey
between the wrecks of the Hunley and Housatonic?
Could it be an element of the Hunley's keel ballast,
or perhaps the Housatonic's slipped anchor? Based
upon Assistant Engineer Mayer's testimony, the force
of the detonation may have either disengaged or completely
blown off the Housatonic's propeller. Could it
be a portion of the Housatonic's drive train?
These are only a few mysteries which await an answer.
In retrospect, the Confederate submersible operations,
and specifically H.L. Hunley's successful
engagement of Housatonic, had several
significant effects on U.S. Navy operations. They acted
as a powerful psychological warfare tool, causing fear
among the squadrons, particularly within the South Atlantic
Blockading Squadron following the Hunley's
action. They caused expensive and logistically intensive
modifications to Federal blockading strategies through
causing heightened security in the vessels on station,
requiring them to be ready to get underway at all times,
and forcing them to be redeployed further offshore at
night, which in the case of Charleston perhaps allowed
a greater possibility for blockade runners to get through
to that besieged port. Finally, they may have provided
the impetus for accelerated Federal attempts to gather
intelligence on such craft, conduct their own research,
and develop similar weapons. But while such attempts
had been underway as early as 1861, it was the H.L.
Hunley's attack on the Housatonic
that defined to the U.S. Navy the danger of the submersible
torpedo craft in Southern waters, and demonstrated to
the world the vast potential of the submersible vessel
in future naval strategy.
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