Hunley was the first submarine to successfully torpedo an enemy ship. This happened five years before the release of the novel 20 Leagues Under the Sea, in 1864. The American Civil War was coming to an end: the army of the Northern states won victory after victory, the Southerners could only hope for a miracle. From a technical point of view, the Hanley submarine was exactly that.
The submarine, built according to the design of James McClintock, was an engineering breakthrough of that time: 12 meters long, 1.75 meters high, autonomous navigation time 2 hours, speed 4 kilometers per hour. True, the speed directly depended on the physical training of the crew - the fact is that there was a crankshaft running through the entire submarine, which eight submariners had to rotate, sitting in a rather uncomfortable position. The torpedo was located at the end of a long harpoon attached to the bow of the boat. Thus, “torpedoing” was more like a ram.
The boat was delivered to Charleston by rail in the summer of 1863, but during one of the exercises it sank, taking five crew members with it. Two weeks later it was raised, repaired, a new crew was recruited, a successful training attack was carried out, but four days later the submarine sank to the bottom again. Among the soldiers, the name “Floating Coffin” stuck to it, which caused certain difficulties in recruiting a third crew. However, the money did its job - $2.5 million was guaranteed to the team if an enemy ship was sunk - eight people expressed a desire to become submariners.
On February 17, 1864, the Hunley attacked the corvette Housatonic. The crew of the ship noticed the approaching boat and even opened fire on it, but this did not stop the submarine from thrusting a torpedo into the side and, backing up, pulled the rope, which led to the detonation of gunpowder. Having sunk the Housatonic, the Hunley signaled that the operation was completed and she was returning to port. The submarine never returned home. The submarine was found only in 1995. When it was opened, it turned out that all the crew members were sitting in their places, as if no one had tried to escape. There are many versions of the death of the Hanley, from sabotage to damage in an explosion. According to one of them: the boat lay on the bottom to hide, and the tired crew simply fell asleep, not noticing how the candle, signaling a lack of oxygen, went out.
One of the first to go down inside the boat raised ashore was the military commandant of Charleston, General P. Barigard.
He later recalled:
"The sight was indescribably terrible. People twisted in agony huddled in a heap at the bottom. Everyone had an expression of despair and mortal torment on their faces. Some were holding burnt candles in their hands. Hunley was at his post. With his right hand he rested on the hatch cover, as if he was trying to open his left hand held a candle."
