DISCOVERT OF A BURIED TORPEDO BOAT OFF CHARLESTON.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 158, 16 February 1871, Page 7

DISCOVERT OF A BURIED TORPEDO BOAT OFF CHARLESTON.

(From the "Houston Telegraph.")

In 1864 the fleet of Admiral Farragut was blockading Mobile while a heavy land and naval attack was directed against Charleston. During our long "defensive war a good deal o£ ingenuity had been expended by the Confederates upon torpedoes and torpedo boats. The most remarkable of these boats was constructed in Mobile by Messrs Huntly and M'Clintock, and launched in 1866 ; and nothing which has gone down into the sea was more wonderfully or more fearfully contrived to wreak destruction and vengeance upon friend and foe.

She was built of boiler iron, and impervious to water or air. Her extreme length was about thirty feet, with five or six feet beam, and about five or six feet depth of hold. In general contour she resembled a cigar, sharp at both ends. She was propelled by a screw, the shaft of which ran horizontally along her back from stem to stern, and was turned by the manual force of eight men, seated along it on either side.

The only hatchway was circular, about two feet in diameter, with a low coaming around it, which was placed well forward, and when desired could be closed by an iron cap working on hinges, and made air-tight.

In the former part of this cap was inserted a clear glass bull's eye. She was provided with water-tight compartments, by filling or emptying which she would sink or rise, and to enable her to rise instantly, her ballasting of railroad bars was placed on her bottom outside her hull, which, by means of keys accessible to her crew, could be detached in a moment, so that she could rise quickly to the surface.

Besides her rudder, which was of the usual form, this vessel was equipped with side paddles or fins, which like those of a fish, serve to guide it up or down with reference to the surface of the water.

To prepare for action, a floating torpedo was secured to her stern by a line more than one hundred feet long, aud the crew having embarked, the water tanks were filled until the boat was in equilibrio, and almost submerged. The hatchway was closed, the men revolved the shaft, the captain or pilot standing under the hatch, steered the boat, regulating at the same time, by the action of her lateral fins, the depth at which she would move.

Her greatest speed did not exceed four knots. She could remain submerged for half an hour or an hour, without any great inconvenience to her f~crew — and on one occasion sho has been known to remain under water two hours without actual injury to them, although no means were provided for procuring fresh air, and from the moment the hatchway was closed the men thus fastened in their living tomb inhaled and exhaled continuously the atmospere which was enclosed with them.

The plan of attack proposed by the inventors was to dive beneath the keel of an enemy's ship, hauling the torpedo after her. Its triggers or sensitive primers would thus press against the ship's bottom, explode the torpedo, and inevitably sink the ship.

Not anticipating an early opportunity of using this dangerous vessel against the fleet of Farragut, Greneral Meury sent her by rail to Greneral Beauregard, at Charleston, believing the waters of the harbour better suited to her peculiar construction, while in the Ironsides, or some other gigantic war ship theu attacking Charleston, might be found an object worth the great risk to which her own crew were exposed in any enterprise they might undertake in her. Greneral Beauregard changed the

arrangement of the torpedo by fastening it to her bow. Its front was terminated by a sharp and barbed lancehead, so that when the boat was driven end on against a ship's sides, the lancehead would be forced deep into the timbers, below the water-live, and would fasten the torpedo firmly against the ship. Then the torpedo boat would back off and explode it by a lanyard.

Gf-eneral Beauregard's call upon the Confederate fleet for volunteers to man this dangerous craft was promptly answered by Lievtenant Payne, a Virginian, and eight sailors. They were soon ready for action; and on the evening set for their expedition, the last preparation had been made.

The torpedo boat was lying alongside the steamer from which the crew had embarked ; she was submerged till the coamings of her hatch alone was visible above the water. Her commander, Payne, was standing in the hatch-way in the act of ordering her to be cast oft", when the swell of a passing steamer rolled over and sank her instantly, with her eight men, in several fathoms of water. Lieutenant Payne sprang out of the hatchway as the boat sank from under him, and be alone was left alive.

In a few days she was raised and again made ready for service. Again Payne volunteered and eight men with him. ♦

The embarkation for thsir secoud attempt was made from Fort Sumpter, and as before, all having been made ready, Payne standing at his post in the hatchway, ordered the hawser to be cast off — when the boat careened and sank instanily. Payne sprang out ; two of the men followed him ;

the other six went down in the boat and perished. Again the boat was raised and made ready for action, and her owner, Capt. Huntly, took her for an experimental trip into the Stoney River, where after going through her usual evolutions, she dived in deep water, and for hours, and for days, the return of poor Huntly and his crew was watched for and looked for in vain.

After near a week's search she was found inclining at an angle of forty degrees ; her nozzle was driven deep into the soft mud of the bottom. Her crew of nine dead men were standing, sitting, lying about in her hold asphyxiated. Huntly was standing dead at his post, a candle in one hand, while the other had grown stiff with death in his vain efforts to unclamp the hatch. Others had been working at the keys of the ballast, but the inclination at which the boat had gone down had jammed the keys so that the men could not cast off the heavy weight which held them down. Their deaths had been hard and lingering.

Again this faithful vessel was made ready for action, and volunteers being called for, Lieutenant Dixon 21st Alabama volunteers, a native of Mobile. and eight men agreed to take her against the enemy. The new and powerful war ship Housatonic was selected for attack, and on a quiet night, the bravest crew set out from Charleston in that terrible, nameless torpedo boat, that ever manned craft before.

We all know the fate of the Housatonic. Brave Dixon guided the torpedo fairly against her, the explosion tore up the great war ship's sides so that she went down with nearly all her crow within two minutes.

The torpedo vessel also disappeared for ever from mortal view. Whether she went down with the enemy, or whether she drifted out to sea to bury her gallant dead, was never known, and their late was left till the great day when the pea shall give up its dead.

But within a few weeks past clivers in submarine armour have vifeited the wreck of the Housatonic, and they found the little torpedo vessel lying beside her huge victim, and within her ai*e the bones of the most devoted and daring men that ever went to war.