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Sign up todayThe H. L. Hunley
This audiobook uses AI narration.
We’re taking steps to make sure AI narration is transparent.
Learn moreOn the evening of February 17, 1864, the Confederacy’s H. L. Hunley sank the Union’s formidable sloop-of-war, the USS Housatonic—to her own demise. For generations, searchers prowled Charleston’s harbor for the sunken boat, while legends surrounding the Hunley and its fate continued to grow. Even after the submarine was located in 1995 and recovered five years later, those legends have continued to grow.
Now, in a tour de force of document sleuthing and insights gleaned from the excavation of this remarkable vessel, distinguished Civil War–era historian Tom Chaffin presents the most thorough telling possible of the H. L. Hunley’s story. Of panoramic breadth, this Civil War saga begins long before the submarine was even assembled and follows the tale into the boat’s final hours and through its recovery in 2000.
The H. L. Hunley is an alternate selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club, History Book Club, and Military Book Club.
Tom Chaffin is the author of Sea of Gray and Pathfinder. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, Time, and other publications. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia.
Barrett Whitener has won half a dozen coveted AudioFile Earphones Awards for his audiobook narration. His audiography includes A Reporter's Life by Walter Cronkite, Undaunted Courage by Stephen E. Ambrose, and Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman.
Reviews
“Fueled by obsessive scholarship and a boyish sense of wonder, Tom Chaffin takes us deep down into uncharted fathoms of the Civil War—and then surfaces with a finny, fascinating tale that’s equal parts Shelby Foote and Jules Verne.”
“There is no more compelling human or high-tech story in the annals of the Civil War than the saga of the remarkable H. L. Hunley and its brave, ill-fated crew. Drawing on a vast archive of original sources and an abundance of interpretive skill, Tom Chaffin has crafted an informed, dramatic page-turner. This is authoritative military history that reads like a novel.”
“Chronicling this multifaceted story of the Confederacy’s secret hope, Tom Chaffin has answered many of the mysteries surrounding the H.L. Hunley. With an extensive examination of primary documents, he has taken on the mythologizers, offering instead an extraordinary contribution to historical understanding.”
“This lively account of the first submarine to sink an opposing ship is an excellent niche history…Sampling from letters, articles and memoirs, the author succeeds in separating facts from legend in this engrossing examination of a pioneering weapon of war.”
“Avoiding uninformed speculation, Chaffin crafts an exciting narrative of an important innovation in military technology and the political considerations that shaped its development. Insightful and intriguing, meriting a place toward the front of the squadron of Civil War, naval and aquatic archeology titles.”
“Barrett Whitener keeps himself in the background, letting the obscure story be the main character. He builds the archiving of the ship’s contents to a swell of sentiment as he describes the finding of a lucky twenty-dollar gold piece on the corpse of one of the Rebel sailors. As enlightening as the performance may be, listeners—although well stocked with the author’s description—will find themselves yearning to see the Civil War contraption.”
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