Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 29.djvu/310

 294 Southern Historical Society Papers.

her to the bottom, with her crew, Lieutenant Payne, who was in the conning tower, crawled out and swam until a boat from the steamer which had caused the disaster rescued him. Again she was raised and again Lieutenant Payne took command. With his crew of ten men he made ready one evening to set out from Fort Sumpter upon an offensive expedition against the Union fleet, when, for some un- known reason, the David "turned turtle," taking to the bottom this time eight of her ten men, two of the seamen escaping with the commander. That was enough for Lieutenant Payne; he gave up submarine naval manoeuvres.

In spite of the disastrous succession of accidents, one man main- tained his faith in the David. That man was one of the designers, Mr. Aunley. He had the vessel raised, collected a crew, not without difficulty, and taking his craft up the Stone river, made several trials which seemed to justify his confidence. Then there came a day when the David went out and did not come back. Divers found her with her nose stuck in the mud. Mr. Aunley and his ten men were suffocated. For some time she lay at the bottom of the river, but another daring experimenter was found who undertook to navigate her successfully if she were raised. Raised she was, and the new commander might have made good his promises had he not attempted to show that he could take her under a schooner and up on the other side, in which experiment she fouled the cable and suffocated another crew.

A "WATER COFFIN."

It speaks volumes for the daring of the southern naval men that any could be found to venture upon the forlorn hope after this. Captain J. F. Carlson and Lieutenant George E. Dixon persuaded the authorities to raise the "water coffin," as the David had been gloomily nicknamed, and to let them take it out with the purpose of torpedoing the Housatonic of the union fleet. Only five men could be found who were willing to take so desperate a chance. At dusk of a still evening, February 17, 1864, the man-propelled craft made her way out of the harbor. She successfully passed the lines of picket craft around the inner squadron and made for the Housa- tonic, the Goliath of the outer line of the blockade. She was sighted at 8:45 by the officer of the deck on the Housatonic and hailed. She was running on the top of the water and burning no lights, and when discovered was but 200 yards away. She did not reply, but came on. A call to quarters was sounded. It was too late; the