Turtle Submarine Attack

Background. David Bushnell conceived a submersible vessel to lift the British naval blockade during the American War of Independence, building the Turtle in 1775 as a means of attaching explosive charges to ships in a harbor. After the Battles of Lexington and Concord, he worked near Old Saybrook on a small, individually manned craft designed to fix a charge to an enemy hull. Governor Jonathan Trumbull recommended the invention to George Washington, who provided funds and support for development and testing. The associated mine was delayed several times from its expected completion between 1771 and 1776, and during trials in November 1775 Bushnell found that the craft's illumination failed when temperatures dropped too low.

The Attack on HMS Eagle. In August 1776, with his brother Ezra ill, Bushnell asked General Samuel Holden Parsons for volunteers, and Ezra Lee prepared to attack HMS Eagle, flagship of the blockade squadron. Destroying this symbol of British naval power was expected to damage British morale and threaten the blockade and control of New York Harbor. Lee reported that the charge drifted into the East River and exploded with tremendous violence, throwing water and wood high into the air. It was the first use of a submarine to attack a ship, though only American records document it; British records contain no accounts of a submarine attack or explosions on the night of the attack on Eagle. The attempt reflected American ingenuity after the fall of New York and a willingness to embrace radical new technologies; Benjamin Gale had written to Silas Deane that the astonishment and advantages if it succeeded were easier to conceive than describe.

Aftermath and Loss of the Turtle. Despite the failure, Washington praised Bushnell as a man of great mechanical powers, fertile of invention and a master in execution, noting he had furnished him money and other aids in 1776. Turtle was lost on October 9, 1776, when Royal Navy frigates HMS Phoenix, HMS Roebuck, and HMS Tartar sank her tender sloop by gunfire in the Hudson River near Fort Washington and Fort Lee. Bushnell continued work on underwater explosives, devising mines in 1777 for attacks near New London and on the Delaware River.