The Hunley
(1999) ~
VHS
Produced for Turner
Network Television and originally broadcast in the summer of 1999, The
Hunley is a straightforward, engrossing historical drama focusing on
a little-known chapter of the Civil War: the introduction of the submarine
into American naval warfare off the shore of war-torn Charleston, South Carolina,
in 1864. Writer-director John Gray had previously helmed the 1998 TV movie
The Day Lincoln Was Shot, and he has a knack for capturing the Civil
War era with a heightened sense of authenticity, allowing for the dramatic
license of mainstream television. Armand Assante plays Lieutenant Dixon,
a traumatized soldier and grieving widower with just the right mixture of
bravado and nihilism to skipper the C.S.S. Hunley--essentially an
iron boiler cobbled into a hand-powered submersible weapon--with a volunteer
crew of nine men who propel the crude sub in an effort to break the Union's
coastal blockade. Donald Sutherland is superbly cast as Dixon's Confederate
commander, General Beauregard, and the film's best scenes are those between
Assante and Sutherland, playing two weary warriors with one final chance
for victory. Otherwise, this is a very conventional film made with integrity
but no particular flair, faithfully adhering to historical fact while
establishing a solid supporting cast. Assante is guilty of moderate overacting,
but he compensates with enough charisma to make his ill-fated command
dramatically involving. Most effective is the sense of sheer bravery in the
pioneering effort to prove the Hunley as a viable tool of war; the
final scene within the sub is both haunting and dramatically intense. (Historical
note: The C.S.S. Hunley--named after the drowned captain of a previous
test vessel--was discovered intact off the coast of Charleston in 1995; efforts
were later made to raise and restore this relic of naval history.) --Jeff
Shannon
The CSS Hunley: The Greatest Undersea Adventure of the Civil
War
by Richard Bak. Hardcover (June 1999)
Reviewer: Jeff from Colorado,
USA
The story of the CSS Hunley's successful attack on the Union Sloop-of-War,
the Husatonic is both riveting military and political history. There is enough
detail for you die hard sub fans, the way the comparatively primitive technology
wrestled with the problems of manned undersea operations of a warship. Students
of history will love the gripping and tragic descriptions of the struggle
of the besieged,blockaded, and bombarded southern cities endured, making
the confedaracy desparate to enough to go ahead with a daring technological
leap even though the first two crews died in the testing phase of this remarkable
vessel. Highly recomended.
Union
and Confederate Submarine Warfare in the Civil War
by Mark K. Ragan
Most Civil War enthusiasts have heard about the Hunley, the Confederate submarine that sank the USS Housatonic on February 17, 1864. Less well known, however, is that the Hunley was not alone in the water. Both the Union and the Confederacy built submarines; many were operational and patrolled for enemy ships. In Union and Confederate Submarine Warfare in the Civil War, Mark K. Ragan brings this little-known history to the surface. Ragan, who served as consultant on the 1999 TNT movie Hunley, uses contemporary letters, newspaper accounts, factory records, and log books to recount the early history of submarine warfare--from Bushnell's Turtle to the Hunley, from the Alligator to the Intelligent Whale. Many observers were enthusiastic about the new technology, describing it as "as formidable as it is economical." Others were violently opposed, labeling submarines "unchivalrous" and "infernal machines." For better or worse, the submarine was here to stay.
The CSS H.L. Hunley : Confederate Submarine
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