Designs for underwater boats or submarines date back to the s and ideas for underwater travel date back even further. However, it was not until the 19th century that the first useful submarines began to appear. During the Civil War , the Confederates built the H. Hunley, the submarine that sank a Union ship. The U. Housatonic was built in But it wasn't until after World War I began that the first truly practical and modern submarines were invented.
The submariner's problem has always been how to improve his underwater endurance and performance, and both capabilities are defined by the ship. Early in submarine history the submariner's problem often was how to make his ship work at all. Historical accounts point out that man has always sought to explore the ocean depths. An early record from the Nile Valley in Egypt gives us the first illustration.
It is a wall painting that shows duck hunters, bird spears in hand, creeping up to their prey beneath the surface as they breathe through hollow papyrus reeds. The Athenians are said to have used divers to clear the harbor entrance during the siege of Syracuse. And Alexander the Great , in his operations against Tyre, ordered divers to destroy any submersible vehicle submarine defenses the city might undertake to build.
While in none of these records does it actually say that Alexander had any kind of submersible vehicle, legend has it that he descended in a device that kept its occupants dry and admitted light. Not until did any record appear of a craft designed for underwater navigation.
William Bourne, a former Royal Navy gunner, designed a completely enclosed boat that could be submerged and rowed beneath the surface. His creation was a wooden framework bound in waterproofed leather. It was to be submerged by using hand vises to contract the sides and decrease the volume. Although Bourne's idea never got beyond the drawing board, a similar apparatus was launched in But it didn't get much farther because the designers had neglected to consider the tenacity of underwater mud.
The craft became stuck in the river bottom during its first underwater trial. What might be called the first "practical" submarine was a rowboat covered with greased leather.
Van Drebbel's submarine was powered by rowers pulling on oars that protruded through flexible leather seals in the hull. Snorkel air tubes were held above the surface by floats, thus permitting a submergence time of several hours. Van Drebbel's submarine successfully maneuvered at depths of 12 to 15 feet below the surface of the Thames River. Van Drebbel followed his first boat with two others. The later models were larger but they relied upon the same principles.
Legend has it that after repeated tests, King James I of England rode in one of his later models to demonstrate its safety. Despite its successful demonstrations, Van Drebbel's invention failed to arouse the interest of the British Navy. It was an age when the possibility of submarine warfare was still far in the future. In the British periodical "Gentlemen's Magazine" printed a short article describing a most unusual device for submerging and surfacing.
Reproducing an Italian scheme developed by Giovanni Borelli in , the article depicted a craft with a number of goatskins built into the hull. Each goatskin was to be connected to an aperture at the bottom. After traveling to St. The ship boasted several technological breakthroughs including multiple ballast tanks for added buoyancy, a crude airlock and a propeller that was powered by crewmen operating an internal treadmill.
Its most unusual feat came during the coronation of Czar Alexander II, when it submerged with a four-member brass band aboard. Witnesses later reported that they could hear a rendition of the Russian national anthem coming from beneath the waves. Drawing of Hunley on a pier.
The primitive attack sub H. Hunley was designed to help the Confederacy escape the stranglehold of Union naval blockades during the Civil War. Built privately in Mobile, Alabama, in , it was fashioned from a recycled iron steam boiler and included space for eight crewmen—one to steer, and seven to turn the hand cranks that powered its propeller. Its bow bristled with a foot spar mounted with a torpedo, which would detonate when rammed against an enemy ship.
It sank on two occasions during its trial runs, killing a total of 13 crewmen including its namesake, marine engineer Horace Lawson Hunley. The sub was repeatedly salvaged, however, and on February 17, , Lieutenant George Dixon and a crew of volunteers sailed it into Charleston Harbor and successfully drove its torpedo into the side of the sloop-of-war USS Housatonic.
The Union vessel went down in minutes, but the Hunley also sank, possibly because of damage sustained during its attack. Despite becoming the first submariners in history to destroy an enemy ship, Dixon and his Confederates all perished.
Rather than relying on hand cranks, foot pedals or treadmills to move its propeller, this foot behemoth used a piston engine powered by compressed air stored in tanks. The air also helped provide the crew with oxygen and served as a means for automatically emptying its ballast tanks. Le Plongeur made several successful dives, but its limited air supply and dangerously unstable structural design led to it being removed from active duty in Drawing of Monturiol and his submarine.
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