NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. — The first submarine in history to sink an enemy warship is upright for the first time in almost 150 years, revealing a side of its hull not seen since it sank off the South Carolina coast during the Civil War.
Workers at a conservation lab finished the painstaking, two-day job of rotating the hand-cranked H.L. Hunley upright late Thursday.
The Hunley was resting on its side at a 45-degree angle on the bottom of the Atlantic when it was raised in August 2000, and scientists had kept it in slings in that position in the lab for the past 11 years. But they needed to turn it upright to continue with the job of conservation.
Scientists hope the hidden side of the sub will provide clues as to why the Hunley sank with its eight-member crew in February 1864 after sending the Union blockade ship Housatonic to the bottom.
While there was no immediate clue from a first look at the hidden hull, “we are seeing some tantalizing clues on that side,” Hunley archaeologist Maria Jacobsen said Friday.
Scientists knew there were large hull breaches on the starboard side that remained out of view all these years.
