Customer Reviews

Raising the Hunley: The Remarkable History and Recovery of the Lost Confederate Submarine

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I first heard about the Confederate submersible H.L. Hunley 46 years ago when I was a scared five year old in St. Mary's Hospital in Duluth, MN. I had an unheard crippling disease (everyone thought it was polio) and wasn't doing very well. There was no TV in our area of the hospital and I couldn't read more than a few words, but my Dad brought me a book about submarines. He and I used to stay up past my bedtime to watch "The Silent Service" WW II docu-dramas about the submarine service and he knew I was nuts about subs. On page three, was a painting of the "Huntley" (sic) getting ready to ram her torpedo into the hull of the USS Housatonic. I made my Dad and the nurses and the bigger kids in the childrens' ward read those pages over and over to me. Even then I wondered what could have happened to the sub and the brave sailors on board. Later I was able to talk to my great grandma who remembered a little of the civil war and told me what she knew about the Hunley. I've been hooked ever since. (By the way, the disease turned out to be septic arthritis and thanks to antibiotics I made a full recovery.)

I have been an email correspondent with Brian Hicks and Schuyler Kropf, award-winning journalists of the Charleston (SC) Post and Courier newspaper for several years now. They have been on the Hunley "beat" ever since it's discovery in 1995 and I'm sure they have become really tired of my pestering them for measurements and modeling details for the RC model I am building of the Confederate sub. But ever since Mr. Hicks told me about their project I have been bursting at the seams to get my hands on a copy of their brand new book about the famous rebel "fishboat". I received my copy on a Friday and pretty much spent the whole weekend reading and relishing every word.

First off, if you are expecting lots of new technical details and a myriad of new photos of the submarine, you might be a little disappointed. Mark K. Ragan's two books* still have more of the technical particulars about the H.L. Hunley and it's forbears. But if you are interested in new insights into the design, construction and recovery of the sub and a glimpse into the mind of wealthy New Orleans lawyer, former legislator, plantation owner and deputy chief customs collector Horace Lawson Hunley, this book is for you.

An important and often overlooked aspect in the study of history is not just what happened but why it happened. The authors do a splendid job of delving into possible motives for what made Hunley the man he was and why he may have taken his boat on that fateful practice run that took his and his crews' lives. A driven man, Hunley kept copious notes to himself: points to drive home in letters, legal briefs, and motivational quotes worthy of a Dale Carnegie or Tony Robbins. He was also very curious as to what made great men great and made a note to himself to get a book on the subject of the deaths of "Great Men".

Part two of the book begins with self-described adventurer Dr. Lee Spence's claim to have originally found the sub and his long quest to be recognized as the discoverer of the long lost rebel "murdering machine". Hicks and Kropf describe novelist Clive Cussler's involvement with the search and his team's eventual finding and the recovery of the lost vessel. The writers do a fine job of not taking sides in the controversy of just who discovered the Hunley, letting the reader make up his or her own mind.

From there we almost are immersed in politics as agency battles agency for final control of the destiny of the Hunley. It makes for fascinating reading. Hicks' and Kropf's style of writing is much easier to read than any of the other books I have read about the Hunley (just about all of them). These guys are professional writers and it shows.

I can't recommend this book highly enough.

On 17 February 1864, the Confederate privateer submarine HUNLEY, then called a "fish-boat" or "torpedo boat," crewed by eight volunteers successfully attacked and sank a Union blockade ship off Charleston... and disappeared. This marvelous book recounts not only the history of the first successful attack submarine, but the mystery surrounding it. The story of the search for the ship, its discovery and its astounding recovery is documented, along with introducing the reader to a fascinating cast of characters involved in this real-life drama.

Even if you have little interest in history, this is still a book well worth your time. It is frequently, and often not accurately, said of non-fiction that "it reads like a novel." This book really does. The story is not only well told, but the pacing of the story and character development is strong. That journalists, who are known for dry prose, could produce a book like this is refreshing. One thing I particularly liked were the brief biographies of the main characters that appear at the end, a sort of "what happened to them after this story."

I won't belabor the facts revealed about the submarine (many), the attack (requiring incredible courage), or the people (combatants, searchers, and archaeologists) or the possible solutions to the mysteries surrounding this fabled ship. It is so rare to find a book today that is well-written, informative, compulsively readable. This book is all that, plus just down right entertaining. This book is a treasure. Read it!

Brian Hicks and Schuyler Kropf have lived and breathed the Hunley since 1995 and it shows with this book.If you are unfamillar with the story of the Hunley,this is the book that will bring you up to speed.From the concept,to the attack,to the raising,to the excavation,Hicks and Kropf makes you feel like your right there.This book is a must read.

I first ran across the story of the Hunley in a popular journal on archaeology and was fascinated by the tale of courage, desperation, and originality. Subsequently I saw parts of a film on the subject, and I was hooked. I found the book by Brian Hicks, Schuyler Kropf in Amazon.com's menu and decided to pursue more information on the subject.

The authors are journalists rather than professional historians or archaeologists, but they do have a talent for writing and a sense of the character of the South and Civil War history that gives the book a more readable quality. They also seem to have researched their topic well. The final pages of the book recount their efforts to follow the "fish boat's" story from first inception to final successful strike against the USS Housatonic, a Union ship participating in the blockade of the Charleston harbor. Considering that the Hunley was a secret weapon and a stealth weapon at that, its paper trail would be expected to be a difficult one to follow. The authors made a remarkable success of it, giving life to their subject.

Interesting too was the narrative of the Hunley's resurrection and restoration. The serendipitous survival of the boat in a nearly intact condition is itself an amazing story. The great care with which it was removed from the water and painstakingly preserved is a credit to underwater archaeology. Certainly it could easily have been a disaster. What the preserved remains had to say about the vessel itself: its construction, its advanced styling, the likelihood of it's having continued to be water free for long enough to allow small stalactites to form, etc. made it an even more entertaining study. It's definitely on par with the Titanic for human interest.

To a Civil War buff, the story of the Hunley is irresistable. The book begins with the conception and execution of the "fish boat" in Mobile and continues with its introduction into service in Charleston. The book then interweaves the distant past with the very recent past, telling the tale of the boat's crews (3 crews, none who answered to 'Lucky') and the tale of the multiple personalities involved in raising her some 135 years later. The writing is only adequate; the story of the boat and her design is more interesting reading than that of her crew and her salvagers. Nonetheless, this is an enjoyable book that can easily be read in one (pleasant) day.

This is the book for you regardless of whether you want a single volume on this facinating story or crave ever more detail after reading everything else available. Confederate submarine development is covered from its infancy in New Orleans right through the latest archeological discoveries in the laboratory. Written by two men who have covered this story since 1995 for the Charleston Post & Courier the reader glides through this excellent narrative as easily as the Hunley sliced through the water.I cannot recommend this highly enough. This is an extraordinary piece of history!

If your interests run to one of the most ingenious achievements in naval history, the gritty determination of desperate men, or simply a good, old-fashioned mystery, this book should captivate you as much as it did me. The authors have sifted through rarified documents and firsthand accounts to present a very intriguing story as only investigative writers in Charleston might. The real merit of this book is its careful, reader friendly presentation of what could otherwise have been an abstruse topic. Here are basic charts, drawings, photos, expert insights, interviews, and personal backgrounds all introduced in historical context. Throughout the book appropriate facts are cleverly recalled and embroidered in the story of the evolving discoveries. When you finally put this book down, you will wish it could have been twice as long and had provided answers to the Hunley's remaining mysteries.

What an exciting and informative book! Part history, part research, part archealogy, but all joined and very readable. The incredible dedication and bravery of the crews who parished aboard the "fish-boat" deserve the highest honor. These men of the past never gave up, just as the modern day team who had to move natural and govermental mountains to raise her from her watery grave. Since the research is on going and the mysteries haven't been all solved this book does not have the definative answers, I try to log unto the hunley.org site periodically to check for new developments. It's well worth reading by anyone interested in Civil War history, early submarine warfare or archealogy.

When you read this review please consider it in light of the fact that I am the discoverer of the Hunley. I found it in 1970 and have considerable evidence to prove it.

Although I agree that this book contains some interesting information on the Hunley, I would never recommend it to anyone.

I lost any respect that I might otherwise have had for Hicks and Kropf after they ignored the precision of my mapped location of the Hunley and credited Clive Cussler and NUMA with the discovery of the Hunley.

Their book credits Cussler even though Cussler is not an archaeologist, never dove on the wreck a single time and was not even the director of the 1994/1995 expedition that dug up and filmed the wreck. That expedition was officially an expedition under the auspices of the South Carolina Institute of Archaeology & Anthropology (SCIAA) and not a NUMA expedition. That expedition was directed by SCIAA underwater archaeologist Mark Newell, who Hicks and Kropf clearly libeled in their book. More importantly, Dr. Newell is an honest man. Although he could take the position that since he was the director, he was the discover, he has publicly acknowledged that he used my maps to plan the expedition and has credited me with the actual discovery.

Could it possibly be that Hicks and Kropf thought they could later coauthor a book with Cussler as a reward for the glowing praise they bestowed on Cussler, who they even called "his authorship" in his book? I believe that's a distinct possibility. I do know that Hicks subsequently wrote a book on another of Cussler's alleged shipwreck discoveries.

I say alleged discoveries, because there is no way that I would take any of Cussler's claims on face value after he has made so many unsupported or demonstrably false claims. Those claims include Cussler's later disproved claim that NUMA had found the wreck of the HMS Actaeon, which had been sunk at the entrance to Charleston harbor in 1776. Another time Cussler claimed NUMA had found the wreck of a famous Civil War ironclad in the Mississippi River, but the find was later identified by archaeologist Alan Saltus as only a pile of discarded steel pipe. In 1981 Cussler claimed to have discovered the wrecks of the blockade runners Norseman and Stonewall Jackson, even though my company, Shipwrecks Inc., had been credited with their discovery over 12 years earlier in not only the Charleston papers, but in the New York Times. Cussler once claimed that NUMA had discovered the wreck of the USS Keokuk & that his diver had strode its decks and that it was intact and could be raised. That was pure malarkey. No part of that claim was true. He had not even found the wreck (although NUMA did come back and presumably located it the following year) some distance from where he first claimed. Moreover, the Keokuk had been blasted apart and heavily scrapped in the years following the Civil War and was in no way intact.

Cussler uses his alleged shipwreck discoveries as a way to garner free publicity for himself and his novels. Cussler's first unsuccessful search for the Hunley was tied directly to his efforts to promote the release of the movie "Raise the Titanic," which was based on one of his novels. Although I feel Cussler has robbed me of credit I rightfully deserve, I agree that he is a good writer and I am still a fan of his novels. On the other hand, I consider Brian Hicks to be just a hack. As for Kropf, my opinion of him is extremely low because he was the main reporter following the Hunley for many years and he has never seemed to get the story right.

Dr. E. Lee Spence
u/w archaeologist
843 532-8222

I had heard of the Hunley while stationed in Charleston, SC. I didn't delve too deep into it's history, as I was only there for 9 months, and there's only so much history that one can take in in that amount of time. This book raised my interest in the Hunley, and I have undertaken more research on the subject. The writers did an excellent job presenting the story. My hat's off to them.