 months before, USS New Ironsides had been partially damaged in an attack by the semi-submersible CSS David, and this windless, moonlit winter night offered perfect conditions for operating the approaching submarine, H.L. Hunley.
As all hands raced to their stations on Housatonic, seven Confederate sailors inside the primitive submarine turned a handcrank that powered the propeller as another man steered toward the 1,240-ton sloop-of-war. Even if they hadn’t been bearing down on a mighty warship, the eight men were already undertaking a dangerous mission simply by being inside the submarine that had already claimed the lives of 13 men, including its inventor, during training exercises.
The undersea vessel had been privately constructed in Mobile, Alabama, based on the plans of marine engineer Horace Lawson Hunley. Although Crosby initially thought he spotted a porpoise, the submarine more closely resembled a whale. It was constructed out of a 40-foot-long cylindrical iron steam boiler with a tapered bow and stern. After successful tests on the Mobile River, the submarine was transported to Charleston in August 1863 amid hopes by the Confederate navy that it could be a secret weapon in breaking the Union blockade.
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Shortly after testing began in Charleston Harbor, five of Hunley’s nine crewmembers drowned when a ship officer accidentally caused the vessel to dive while the hatches were still open. The submarine was salvaged, but less than two months later, a second training accident killed the eight-member crew, including H.L. Hunley himself.
Once again, the submarine was pulled to the surface, and even though he knew its tragic history, Lieutenant George Dixon agreed to take command of the vessel in November 1863 and raised a crew of courageous volunteers. As Dixon led his men on the daring attack on Housatonic, he carried with him his good luck charm, a bent gold coin that had saved his life by slowing a bullet that wounded him two years before at the Battle of Shiloh.
Although Confederate P.G