Any arguments against the procurement of submersibles ended on February 17, 1864, when lieutenant Dixon and his eight men in the submersible H.L. Hunley crashed their spar torpedo into the USS Housatonic outside Charleston, South-Carolina.
Interestingly, though, the H.L. Hunley was by far not the only submersible that made waves at that time. In Europe, and in fact in the rebel lands of the Confederacy, inventors had engaged in a flurry of activity and innovation, profoundly speeding up the development stages of the modern submersible.
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In this episode, cut into several parts for your convenience, we dive into what is the decisive period for submarine invention. During this period, from 1800 until 1914, inventors were able to learn from each other owing to the much easier proliferation of knowledge.
From Robert Fulton's famous 'Nautilus' and his time working for Napoleon Bonaparte to Wilhelm Bauer and the German Confederation to Spain, this first part covers 1800 to approximately 1850.
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Part two, up in two weeks, will also focus on submersibles in the American Civil War. Part three, up after that (after a little vacation break), will focus mostly on that major invention that gave submersibles the punch it needed: the torpedo. The end of part three will also see submersibles on the brink of World War One...
The history of submarines is one of men wanting to discover new frontiers through perseverance and grit, greed, luck - and tragedy. This first episode takes us all the way back to antiquity, to the days of Aristotle and Herodotus and the first groundbreakers, Cornelis Drebbel and David Bushnell. So get to that listening station, don those headphones and dive in.
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The trailer episode for the A History Of Submarines podcast about, you guessed it - the history of submarines! Almost 400 years of history crammed into one podcast series, covering the first designs and incarnations, the first successes and the failures, the wars in which they proved pivotal, the Cold War, and the present day.
With added bonus episodes and premium features. After listening to A History Of Submarines podcast, you'll know everything there is to know about how the metal beasts of the deep revolutionised warfare.