Wooden submarine. The first Russian submarines

The very first

Observing sea inhabitants, man tried to imitate them. Relatively quickly, he learned to build structures capable of floating on water and moving along its surface, but under water... Beliefs and legends mention individual attempts made by people in this direction, but it took centuries to more or less correctly imagine and express it in the design drawings of the underwater vessel. One of the first to do this was the great Italian Renaissance creator scientist Leonardo da Vinci. They say that Leonardo destroyed the drawings of his submarine, justifying it as follows: “People are so evil that they would be ready to kill each other even at the bottom of the sea.”

The surviving sketch shows an oval-shaped vessel with a ram in the bow and a low deckhouse, in the middle part of which there is a hatch. It is impossible to make out other design details.

The first to realize the idea of an underwater vessel were the Englishmen William Brun (1580) and Magnus Petilius (1605). However, their structures cannot be considered ships, since they could not move under water, but only sank and surfaced like a diving bell.

In the 20s of the 17th century. The English court nobility had the opportunity to tickle their nerves by taking an underwater trip along the Thames. The unusual ship was built in 1620 by a scientist - physicist and mechanic, court physician of the English King James I, the Dutchman Cornelius van Drebbel. The vessel was made of wood, covered with oiled leather for water resistance, could dive to a depth of about 4 m and remain under water for several hours. Immersion and ascent were accomplished by filling and emptying leather bellows. The inventor used a pole as a propulsion device, which was supposed to push off from the river bottom while inside the vessel. Convinced of the insufficient effectiveness of such a device, Drebbel equipped the next underwater vessel (its speed was about 1 knot) with 12 ordinary roller oars, each of which was controlled by one oarsman. To prevent water from getting inside the vessel, the holes in the hull for the passage of oars were sealed with leather cuffs.

In 1634, the French monk P. Mersen, a student of R. Descartes, first proposed a project for a submarine intended for military purposes. At the same time, he expressed the idea of making its body from metal. The shape of the body with pointed ends resembled a fish. The weapons on the boat included drills to destroy the hull of enemy ships below the waterline and two underwater guns located on each side with non-return valves that prevented water from entering the boat through the barrels when fired. The project remained a project.

In 1718, a peasant from the village of Pokrovskoye near Moscow, Efim Prokopievich Nikonov, who worked as a carpenter at a state-owned shipyard, wrote in a petition to Peter I that he was undertaking to make a ship that could sail “hiddenly” in the water and approach enemy ships “to the very bottom,” and also “to use a shell to destroy ships.” Peter I appreciated the proposal and ordered, “hidden from prying eyes,” to begin work, and the Admiralty Collegiums to promote Nikonov to “master of hidden ships.” First, a model was built that successfully stayed afloat, sank and moved underwater. In August 1720, the world's first submarine was laid down secretly, without unnecessary publicity, in St. Petersburg at the Galerny Dvor.

What was Nikonov's submarine like? Unfortunately, it has not yet been possible to discover her drawings, but some indirect information from archival documents suggest that it had a wooden body about 6 m long and about 2 m wide, sheathed on the outside with sheets of tin. The original immersion system consisted of several tin plates with many capillary holes, which were mounted in the bottom of the boat. During the ascent, water taken into a special tank through holes in the plates was removed overboard using a piston pump. At first, Nikonov intended to arm the boat with guns, but then he decided to install an airlock chamber through which, when the ship was underwater, a diver dressed in a spacesuit (designed by the inventor himself) could emerge and, using tools, destroy the bottom of the enemy ship. Later, Nikonov retrofitted the boat with “fiery copper pipes,” information about the principle of operation of which has not reached us.

Nikonov spent several years building and rebuilding his submarine. Finally, in the fall of 1724, in the presence of Peter I and the royal retinue, she was launched into the water, but in doing so she hit the ground and damaged the bottom. With great difficulty, the ship was pulled out of the water and Nikonov himself was saved. The tsar ordered the hull of the boat to be strengthened with iron hoops, encouraged the inventor and warned the officials so that “no one would blame him for the embarrassment.” After the death of Peter I in 1725, people stopped being interested in the “hidden” ship. Nikonov's demands for labor and materials were not satisfied or were deliberately delayed. It is not surprising that the next test of the submarine ended unsuccessfully. In the end, the Admiralty Board decided to curtail the work, and the inventor was accused of “invalid buildings,” demoted to “simple Admiralty workers,” and in 1728 exiled to the distant Astrakhan Admiralty.

In 1773 (almost 50 years after Nikonov’s “hidden ship”) the first submarine was built in the United States, the inventor of which, David Bushnell, was dubbed by the Americans “the father of scuba diving.” The hull of the boat was a shell made of oak planks, fastened with iron hoops and caulked with tarred hemp. At the top of the hull there was a small copper turret with a sealed hatch and portholes, through which the commander, who combined the entire crew in one person, could observe the situation. Appearance the boat resembled a turtle shell, which is reflected in its name. At the bottom of the Turtle there was a ballast tank, when filled, it sank. During the ascent, water was pumped out of the tank using a pump. In addition, emergency ballast was provided - a lead weight, which, if necessary, can be easily detached from the hull. The boat was moved and controlled along the course using oars. The weapon was a powder mine with a clock mechanism (attached to the hull of an enemy ship using a drill).

D. Bushnell's submarine: a - front view; b - side view

In 1776, during the Revolutionary War, the Turtle was used in action. The target of the attack was the English 64-gun frigate Eagle. But the attack failed. To protect against fouling, the bottom of the frigate turned out to be covered with copper sheets, against which the drill was powerless.

Nautilus and others

At the end of the 18th century. The ranks of submarine inventors were joined by Robert Fulton, who later became famous for creating the world's first steamship, a native of America, the son of a poor Irish emigrant. The young man, who was interested in painting, went to England, where he soon took up shipbuilding, to which he dedicated later life. To succeed in such a complex undertaking, serious engineering knowledge was needed, to acquire which Fulton went to France.

The young shipbuilder made several interesting proposals in the field of underwater weapons. With the maximalism characteristic of his youth, he wrote: “Warships, in my opinion, are the remnants of outdated military habits, a political disease for which no remedy has yet been found; my firm conviction is that these habits must be eradicated and the most effective means for this is underwater mine-armed boats."

Fulton's mind was not only inquisitive, but also practical. In 1797, he turned to the government of the French Republic with a proposal: “Keeping in mind the enormous importance of reducing the power of the British fleet, I was thinking about building a mechanical Nautilus - a machine that gives me a lot of hope for the possibility of destroying their fleet...”

The proposal was rejected, but the persistent inventor obtained an audience with the first consul Napoleon Bonaparte and interested him in the idea of a submarine ship.

In 1800, Fulton built a submarine and, with two assistants, dived to a depth of 7.5 m. A year later, he launched the improved Nautilus, whose hull, 6.5 m long and 2.2 m wide, was shaped like a cigar blunted at the bow. For its time, the boat had a decent diving depth - about 30 m. In the bow there was a small pilothouse with portholes. Nautilus became the first submarine in history to have separate propulsion systems for surface and underwater travel. A manually rotated four-bladed propeller was used as an underwater propulsion device, which made it possible to reach a speed of about 1.5 knots. On the surface, the boat moved under sail at a speed of 3-4 knots. The mast for the sail was hinged. Before diving, it was quickly removed and placed in a special chute on the hull. After the mast was raised, the sail unfurled and the ship became like a nautilus shell. This is where the name Fulton gave his submarine came from, and 70 years later borrowed by Jules Verne for the fantastic ship of Captain Nemo.

An innovation was a horizontal rudder, with the help of which the boat had to be kept at a given depth when moving underwater. Immersion and ascent were carried out by filling and draining the ballast tank. The Nautilus was armed with a mine, which consisted of two copper barrels of gunpowder connected by an elastic bridge. The mine was towed on a cable, brought under the bottom of the enemy ship and exploded using an electric current.

The ship's combat capability was tested at the Brest roadstead, where the old sloop was taken out and anchored. Nautilus came to the raid under sail. Having removed the mast, the boat sank 200 m from the sloop, and a few minutes later an explosion occurred and a column of water and debris shot up in the place of the sloop.

True, shortcomings also emerged, the most significant of which was the low efficiency of the horizontal rudder due to the very low speed in the submerged position, and therefore the boat was poorly maintained at a given depth. To eliminate this drawback, Fulton used a screw on the vertical axis.

The inventor abandoned the combat use of the Nautilus due to the fact that the French Minister of the Navy did not satisfy his demand to assign military ranks to the crew members of the boat, without which the British, if captured, would hang them as pirates. The minister formulated the reason for the refusal in a style characteristic of the professional conservatism of sailing admirals: “We cannot be considered to be on military service people who use such a barbaric means to destroy the enemy." In such a formulation, it is difficult to draw the line between chivalry and a lack of understanding of the merits of the new weapon.

Fulton headed to England, where he was warmly received by Prime Minister W. Pitt. Successful experiments with ship explosions did not so much inspire as they confused the British Admiralty. After all, the “mistress of the seas” at that time had the most powerful fleet in the world, since in her maritime policy she was guided by the principle of the double superiority of her fleet over the fleet of the next most powerful naval power. Fulton said that after another demonstration of the combat capabilities of a submarine, when the brig Dorothea was blown up, one of the most authoritative sailors of the English fleet, Lord Jervis, said: “Pitt is the greatest fool in the world, encouraging a method of warfare that gives nothing to a people who already have supremacy at sea and which, if successful, can deprive him of this supremacy."

But Pitt was by no means a simpleton. On his initiative, the Admiralty offered Fulton a lifelong pension with the condition... to forget about his invention. Fulton indignantly rejected the offer and returned to his homeland in America, where he built the first paddle steamer suitable for practical use, the Claremont, which immortalized his name.

In the first half of the 19th century. there was no shortage of attempts to create a submarine. The submarines, which turned out to be unsuccessful, were built by the French Maugery, Caster, Jean Petit and the Spaniard Severi, the latter two died during testing.

The original design of the submarine was developed in 1829 in Russia by Kazimir Chernovsky, who was imprisoned in Shlisselburgskaya. fortresses As a propulsion device, he proposed blade rods - pushers, when pulled into the ship, the blades folded, and when extended, they opened like umbrellas with emphasis on the water. But despite a number of bold technical solutions, the War Ministry was not interested in the project, since the inventor was a political criminal.

A noticeable mark in underwater shipbuilding was left by an active participant in the Patriotic War of 1812, the famous Russian engineer Adjutant General Karl Andreevich Schilder. He was the author of a number of projects and improvements. In the 30s of the 19th century. Schilder developed an electrical method for controlling underwater mines, successful experiments with which gave him the idea of a submarine.

In 1834, in St. Petersburg, at the Aleksandrovsky Foundry (now the Proletarsky Plant association), a submarine with a displacement of about 16 tons was built according to Schilder’s design, which is considered to be the first-born of the Russian submarine fleet and the world’s first metal submarine. Its body, 6 m long, 2.3 m wide and about 2 m high, was made of five-millimeter boiler iron. The propulsion system used were paddles made like the paws of waterfowl and located in pairs on each side. When moving forward, the strokes folded, and when moving backward, they opened, providing support. Each stroke was driven by swinging the drive handle from inside the ship. The design of the drive made it possible, by changing the angle of swing of the strokes, not only to provide rectilinear movement boat, but also its ascent or dive. The innovation was the “optical tube” - the prototype of the modern periscope, which Schilder designed using the idea of \u200b\u200bthe “horizontoscope” by M.V. Lomonosov.

The boat was armed with an electric mine designed to operate at a close distance from enemy ships, as well as missiles, which were launched from two three-pipe missile launchers located on the side. The rockets were ignited by electric fuses, the current to which was supplied from galvanic cells. The boat could fire salvo missiles from surface and submerged positions. This was the first missile weapon in the history of shipbuilding, which in our time has become the main one in the strategy and tactics of war at sea.

Schilder's submarine with a crew of eight led by midshipman Shmelev set out for testing on August 29, 1834. The first underwater voyage in Russian history began. The boat maneuvered under. water and stopped submerged using an anchor of an original design. The missile launchers were successfully tested. Schilder stand out additional funds and he is developing a design for a new submarine. Its hull was also made of iron and had a regular cylindrical shape with a pointed bow ending in a long bowsprit and a metal harpoon with a suspended mine inserted into it. Having thrust a harpoon into the side of the enemy ship, the boat reversed to a safe distance. The mine exploded with an electric fuse, the current to which was supplied from a galvanic element through a wire. Tests of the submarine ended at the Kronstadt roadstead on July 24, 1838 with a demonstration of the explosion of the target vessel.

Schilder's submarines had a very significant drawback: their speed did not exceed 0.3 knots. The inventor understood the unacceptability of such a low speed for warship, but he was also aware that using a “muscular” engine would not be able to increase the speed of the submarines he created.

Unfulfilled hope

In 1836, Russian academician Boris Semenovich Jacobi created the world's first electric boat with paddle wheels, which were rotated by an electric motor powered by a battery of galvanic cells. The commission that conducted the tests, noting great value invention, but drew attention to the very low speed of the vessel - less than 1.5 knots. The idea of an electric ship was jeopardized. Members of the commission came to Jacobi’s aid - engineer Lieutenant General A.A. Sablukov and shipbuilder Staff Captain S.O. Burachek, who argued that the problem is not in electric propulsion, but in the low efficiency of the wheel propulsion. At a meeting of the commission, Burachek, supported by Sablukov, proposed replacing the paddle wheels on the electric ship with a water-jet propulsion device, which he called a “through water flow.” The commission members approved the proposal, but it was never implemented.

A water jet, like a paddle wheel and a propeller, is a jet propulsion device. The working body of the water cannon (pump, propeller) communicates to the water high speed, from which it is thrown out in the form of a jet stream into the stern through a nozzle and creates a thrust that moves the ship.

The first patent for a water-jet propulsion device was received in 1661 by the Englishmen Toogood and Hayes, but the invention remained on paper. In 1722, their compatriot Allen proposed “to use for the movement of ships the water that would be thrown from the stern from known power through a mechanism." But where could one get such a mechanism at that time? In the 1830s, while in exile, the Decembrist sailor M.A. Bestuzhev drew attention to the water-jet propulsion system and even developed an original design...

Having failed to convert the Jacobi electric ship to a water-jet propulsion system, A.A. Sablukov, who took an active part in testing Schilder’s submarines, proposed, in order to increase the speed, to equip his second boat with a water-jet propulsion device of his own design, which consisted of two receiving and draining channels inside the boat’s hull with a centrifugal pump in the form of a horizontally located impeller driven by a steam engine. Schilder accepted the offer, and by the autumn of 1840 the boat was re-equipped. But due to a lack of funds, the mechanical drive of the pump had to be abandoned, replacing it with a manual one.

Tests of the world's first water-jet submarine were carried out in Kronstadt and ended in failure. The speed of the boat did not increase, and it could not have been otherwise when the pump was rotated manually. However, the Chief of the Main Naval Staff, Admiral A.S., who was present at the tests. Menshikov did not even want to hear about further work on finishing the ship. The Maritime Department stopped subsidizing the work. Not finding support in the highest spheres of the fleet, knowing about the ridicule of the courtiers, who nicknamed him “eccentric general” for his numerous projects that were ahead of his time, K.A. Schilder stopped technical research in the field of naval weapons and devoted himself entirely to official activities in the engineering troops, which he headed towards the end of his life.

One of the diving enthusiasts, Bavarian Wilhelm Bauer, and two assistants, on February 1, 1851, tested the first Brandtaucher submarine in Kiel harbor with a displacement of 38.5 tons, driven by a manually rotated propeller. The tests almost ended in disaster. At a depth of 18 m, the boat was crushed, and the crew escaped through the side neck with great difficulty. Both companions were forever cured of even the thought of scuba diving, but not Bauer himself, who had not yet created a more or less suitable boat, predicted with pathos: “...Monitors, battleships, etc. are now only the funeral horns of an obsolete fleet.”

Everything turned out to be much more complicated, which the inventor apparently thought about more than once while getting out of the sunken Brandtaucher, but Bauer was persistent. After the Bavarian government refused to build a new submarine, he offered his services to Austria, England and the USA, but did not meet with support there either. And only the Russian government, concerned about what emerged during the Crimean War technical backwardness of the fleet, reacted favorably to the Bavarian's proposal, concluding a contract with him in 1885 for the construction of a submarine. Four months later the ship was built, but Bauer avoided demonstrating its combat qualities, although there was an almost unlimited opportunity to attack the Anglo-French fleet blockading Kronstadt. Moreover, he achieved the postponement of the tests to the spring of 1856, that is, to the time when hostilities ceased. The reason for the delay became clear when the tests began. The submarine covered about 25 meters in 17 minutes and... stopped due to “complete exhaustion of the people driving the propeller.” Later she sank, and Bauer’s next proposal to build an underwater corvette for the Russian fleet was decisively rejected. Returning to his homeland, Bauer continued his inventive activities, but, like his predecessors, he never created a suitable submarine.

Steam and air

The low-power “muscle” engine stood as an insurmountable barrier to the inventors of submarines. And although at the end of the 18th century. Glasgow mechanic James Watt invented the steam engine; its use on a submarine was delayed for many years due to a number of problems, the main one being the supply of air for combustion of fuel in the furnace of a steam boiler when the boat was submerged. The main one, but not the only one. Thus, when the machine was operating, fuel was consumed and, accordingly, the mass of the submarine changed, but it must always be ready to dive. The crew's stay in the boat was hampered by heat generation and toxic gases.

The design of a submarine with a steam engine was first developed by the French revolutionary Armand Mézières in 1795, but such a ship was built only 50 years later in 1846 by his compatriot Dr. Prosper Peyern. In the original power plant of the boat, called Hydrostat, steam was supplied to the machine from a boiler, in a hermetically sealed firebox in which specially prepared fuel was burned - compressed briquettes of a mixture of nitrate and coal, which released the necessary oxygen when burned. At the same time, water was supplied to the firebox. Water vapor and fuel combustion products were sent to the steam engine, from where, having completed the work, they were discharged overboard through a non-return valve. Everything seemed fine. But in the presence of moisture, nitric acid was formed from nitrate (nitric oxide) - a very aggressive compound that destroyed the metal parts of the boiler and machine. In addition, controlling the combustion process with the simultaneous supply of water to the firebox turned out to be very difficult, and the removal of the steam-gas mixture at depth overboard was an intractable problem. In addition, the bubbles of the mixture did not dissolve in the sea water and unmasked the submarine.

Peyern's failure did not deter his followers. Already in 1851, the American Philippe Laudner built a submarine with a steam engine power plant. But the inventor did not have time to finish the job. During one of the dives on Lake Erie, the boat exceeded the permissible depth and was crushed, burying the crew along with Philipps at the bottom of the lake.

Faced with the problem of using a steam engine in a submarine, some inventors took the path of creating structures that occupy an intermediate position between a submarine and a surface ship. Such semi-submarines with a hermetically sealed hull and a pipe rising above it could be located at a depth limited by the height of the pipe, in which two channels were located - for the supply of atmospheric air to the boiler firebox and for the removal of combustion products. A similar submarine was built in 1855 by the inventor of the steam hammer, the Englishman James Nesmith, but due to a number of major shortcomings it turned out to be unsuitable for use.

Many original submarine projects were received by the Russian Naval Ministry during the Crimean War of 1853-1856, when patriotic enthusiasm served as an impetus for the creative initiative of specialists in many fields military equipment. In 1855, fleet mechanical engineer N.N. Spiridonov presented to the Marine Scientific Committee a project for a submarine with a crew of 60 people, equipped with a water-jet propulsion unit, the piston pumps of which were driven by compressed air. Air to the two pneumatic motors was to be supplied through a hose from an air pump installed on the surface escort vessel. The project was considered difficult to implement and ineffective.

In an attempt to solve the problem of an underwater engine using compressed air, the talented Russian inventor Ivan Fedorovich Aleksandrovsky turned out to be more successful. In June 1863, in the boathouse of the St. Petersburg Carr and McPherson plant (now the Baltic shipyard named after Sergo Ordzhonikidze), the usual excitement was observed that accompanied the laying of the ship, but it was noteworthy that a guard was posted at the entrance to the boathouse, blocking access to it to outsiders. By autumn, an outlandish ship, unlike any of the many built by the plant, was already towering there. The spindle-like hull had neither deck nor masts. This was the second submarine designed by I. F. Aleksandrovsky. The first one was not built...

Ivan Fedorovich Alexandrovsky

In his youth, Aleksandrovsky was interested in painting and was not unsuccessful. In 1837, the Academy of Arts awarded him the title of “non-class artist” and Aleksandrovsky began his independent working life as a teacher of drawing and drawing at the gymnasium. Meanwhile, the young artist was irresistibly drawn to the technical sciences and, with his characteristic tenacity, independently acquired knowledge, especially in the field of colloid chemistry, optics and mechanics.

In the middle of the 19th century. In Europe, the newly emerging photography became fashionable, and Aleksandrovsky became interested in the new business. In the early 50s, he finally left teaching and opened a photo studio. From now on, his business card read: Ivan Fedorovich Aleksandrovsky, artist-photographer, own studio, St. Petersburg, Nevsky Prospect, 22, apt. 45. Deep knowledge not only in the field of photography, but also in related chemistry and optics allowed Aleksandrovsky to achieve great success in his new business and made his photo studio the best in the capital, which turned into a very profitable enterprise. But this man did not live by bread alone. Aleksandrovsky continues to study science and is interested in various fields of technology and especially shipbuilding. The turning point in his fate came in 1853, when in the summer, shortly before the start of the Crimean War, Aleksandrovsky visited London on business at his photographic studio, where he not only saw an armada of formidable steam ships, but also heard more than once that the squadron being prepared was intended to sail to the shores of the Crimea in order to " teach the Russians a lesson." Knowing the low technical level of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, which consisted mainly of sailing ships, Ivan Fedorovich could not remain indifferent and decided to create a submarine.

The project was almost completed when Aleksandrovsky learned that the construction of the previously mentioned Bauer submarine had begun under a contract with the Russian Navy Ministry. Despite the efforts and resources expended by this time, Aleksandrovsky is developing a new project for an original submarine with engines running on compressed air, for which he involves in the project a prominent specialist in the field of pneumatic engines S.I. Baranovsky.

In 1862, the Marine Scientific Committee approved the project, and in 1863 the ship was laid down.

The submarine with a displacement of 352/362 tons was equipped with a single two-shaft power plant for surface and underwater travel, consisting of two pneumatic engines with a power of 117 hp. With. each with a drive to its own propeller. The supply of air, compressed to a pressure of 60-100 kg/cm2, was stored in 200 cylinders with a capacity of about 6 m3, which were thick-walled steel pipes with a diameter of 60 mm, and according to the inventor’s calculations, it was supposed to ensure the boat floats underwater at a speed of 6 knots for 3 h. To replenish the supply of compressed air, a compressor was provided on the boat high pressure. The air exhausted in the pneumatic engines partially entered the boat for breathing by the crew members, and was partially removed overboard through a pipe with a non-return valve that prevented water from entering the engines if they were stopped when the boat was in a submerged position.

In addition to the original power plant, Aleksandrovsky implemented a number of other progressive technical solutions in the project. Particularly noteworthy is the first use of blowing water ballast with compressed air for ascent, which has been used to this day for more than a hundred years on submarines of all countries. In general, this happens as follows.

To fill the ballast tank with sea water, there are seacocks, or simply holes, in its lower part, and ventilation valves in the upper part. With the seacocks and ventilation valves open, the air from the tank freely escapes into the atmosphere, seawater fills the tank and the submarine submerges. When ascending, compressed air is supplied to the ballast tanks with the ventilation valves closed, which squeezes water out of the tank through the open seacocks.

The weapons on Aleksandrovsky's submarine were two buoyant mines connected to each other by an elastic bridge. The mines were placed outside the boat's hull. Being fired from inside the boat, the mines floated up and covered the bottom of the enemy ship on both sides. The explosion was carried out electric shock from a battery of galvanic cells after the boat moved to a safe distance from the target of attack.

In the summer of 1866, the submarine was transferred to Kronstadt for testing. Due to the shortcomings identified during their course, it was tested for several years, during which significant changes were made to the design. But some shortcomings could not be eliminated. The speed of the boat in a submerged position did not exceed 1.5 knots, and the cruising range was about 3 miles. At such a low speed, horizontal rudders turned out to be ineffective. All submarines of that time, equipped with horizontal rudders, starting with the Nautilus, had this drawback (horizontal rudders, the effectiveness of which is approximately proportional to the square of the speed, did not ensure that the boat was kept at a given depth).

Aleksandrovsky’s submarine was accepted into the treasury and enrolled in the mine detachment. However, a decision was made that it was unsuitable for military purposes and that it was inappropriate to carry out further work to eliminate the shortcomings. If we can agree with the first part of the decision, then the second was controversial, and one can understand the inventor who, recalling the indifference to his ship of the Navy Ministry, wrote with bitterness: “To my extreme regret, I must say that since then I have not only “I did not meet with the sympathy and support of the Navy Ministry, but even all work to fix the boat was completely stopped.”

David crushes Goliath

Meanwhile basic research S.I. Baranovsky in the field of practical use of compressed air for power plants did not go unnoticed abroad. In 1862, in France, according to the project of Captain 1st Rank Bourgeois and engineer Brun, the submarine "Plonger" with a displacement of 420 tons was built with a single pneumatic engine with a power of 68 hp for surface and underwater travel. s., in many ways reminiscent of Aleksandrovsky’s ship. The test results turned out to be even less favorable than those of Aleksandrovsky’s boat. Low speed, ineffective horizontal rudders, traces of air bubbles...

An engineer from Russia, Major General O.B., was present and took part in the Plonger tests. Gern, who, being interested in issues of underwater diving, designed three submarines for the order of the military engineering department. Two of them were driven by a manually rotated propeller, and the third by a gas engine. But none of the boats lived up to expectations, and Gern, using the experience of testing Plonger, developed a design for an original submarine with a displacement of about 25 tons. Power plant The ship consisted of a two-cylinder steam engine with a power of 6 liters. s., receiving steam at a pressure of 30 kgf/cm2 from a boiler adapted to work on solid and liquid fuel. When the boat was in the surface position, the machine worked on steam coming from a boiler heated with wood or charcoal, and underwater - on compressed air in the pneumatic engine mode or from the boiler, for which purpose, before diving, the firebox was sealed and slow-burning fuel briquettes were burned in it , releasing oxygen during combustion. In addition, as a backup option, in a submerged position the boiler could be heated with turpentine, which was sprayed into the firebox with compressed air or oxygen.

For its time, the submarine O.B. Gerna was a significant step forward. Its metal spindle-shaped body was divided into three compartments by two bulkheads. The boat was equipped with an air regeneration system, consisting of a lime tank located in the hold of the middle compartment; a fan pumping air through the tank; three cylinders with oxygen periodically added to the purified air.

The submarine was built in 1867 at the Alexander Foundry in St. Petersburg. However, the tests of the ship, carried out in the Italian pond of Kronstadt, dragged on for nine years. During this time, Gern made a number of improvements. But the boat could float underwater only with a pneumatic engine, since it was not possible to seal the boiler furnace. To eliminate this and some other shortcomings, funds were required, which the military engineering department cut in every possible way.

Meanwhile, a significant event occurred in the history of diving. Before civil war 1861-1865 In the United States, virtually no attention was paid to submarine shipbuilding. With the outbreak of war, the southerners declared open competition on best project submarine. Of the presented projects, preference was given to the submarine of engineer Aunley, under whose leadership a series of small cylindrical iron boats with pointed ends, about 10 m long and about 2 m wide, was built. The first boat was named David after the biblical young David, who defeated the giant Goliath . Goliaths, of course, meant the surface ships of the northerners. David was armed with a pole mine with an electric fuse that exploded from inside the boat. The crew consisted of nine people, eight of whom rotated the crankshaft with the propeller. The immersion depth was maintained by horizontal rudders. In essence, these were semi-submersible ships, which, when moving underwater, left a flat deck above the surface of the water.

Schematic representation of a David-class submarine

In October 1863, a boat of this series attacked a Northern battleship at anchor, but the explosion was carried out prematurely and she was lost. Four months later, the Hanley boat made a similar attempt, but from the waves of a steamer passing nearby, it tilted sharply, scooped up water and sank. The boat was raised and repaired. But evil rock pursued her. The David type boats had insufficient stability, as a result of which the Hanley, which was anchored at night, suddenly capsized. The boat was restored again. To determine the causes of accidents involving Aunley, extensive tests were carried out, during which Hunley sank again with the entire crew and the inventor. Another recovery and repair followed, after which on February 17, 1864, Hanley became the hero of the event, which is described in " Maritime history civil war" written:

"On January 14, the Secretary of the Navy wrote to Vice Admiral Dahlhorn, commander of the fleet at Charleston, that, according to information he had received, the Confederates had launched a new ship capable of destroying his entire fleet ... on the night of February 17, the newly built beautiful ship Housatonic with a displacement of 1200 tons, stood at anchor in front of Charleston, was destroyed under the following circumstances: at about 8:15 in the evening, some suspicious object was seen 50 yards from the ship. It looked like a board floating towards the ship. Two minutes later, the officers were already near the ship. were warned in advance and had a description of the new "hellish" machines with information about the best way get rid of them. The watch commander ordered the anchor ropes to be loosened, the vehicle to be set in motion and everyone to be called upstairs. But, unfortunately, it was already too late... One hundred pounds of gunpowder at the end of the pole was enough to destroy the most powerful battleship." However, the boat itself did not escape the fate of its victim. As it turned out later, Hanley did not have time to move to a safe distance and was pulled in inside the battleship along with water gushing through the hole. But David crushed Goliath. The death of Housatonic caused a stir in the naval departments. different countries and drew attention to weapons that until recently were not taken seriously by many.

Under the enemy ship, use a drill to attach a mine to its bottom, and then set the clock mechanism into action and retreat to a safe distance. In domestic and foreign books on the history of the development of scuba diving, images of a Buchnel boat with two types of propulsors are usually given. Let's look at these drawings in more detail. In the top drawing (probably from an original drawing) roughly...

Lieutenant Beklemishev. They were allowed to settle in the Experimental Shipbuilding Basin, where they developed the project of “destroyer No. 113” - this was the first name of the submarine “Dolphin” (a class of submarines in Russian fleet did not exist yet). On May 3, 1901, the commission in the above-mentioned composition presented the project they had developed to the chief inspector of shipbuilding. In July 1901...

The capabilities of a boat capable of diving and cruising under the surface of the water, avoiding ambushes from enemy ships and all sorts of detection systems, have dominated the minds of the world's military leaders since ancient times. According to one legend, Alexander the Great personally climbed into a primitive form of vessel capable of submersion in order to carry out underwater reconnaissance.

One of the first ideas for a submarine was conceived by an Englishman named William Bourne in 1578, but it wasn't until 1620 that Dutch inventor Cornelius Drebbel finally brought the plan to fruition. Drebbel's submarine, built of wood and propelled by oars, could remain underwater for several hours.

Air was supplied to the team underwater in the boat through tubes that were attached to the buoys. When he demonstrated the submarine's capabilities by sailing down the Thames, remaining underwater for what was rumored to be 3 hours, the thousands of Londoners who had gathered on both sides of the river to witness this heroic feat were convinced that men had died.

An exact replica of Yefim Nikonov's submarine - believed to be the first military submarine built - stands in Sestroretsk, near St. Petersburg, on the banks of the Neva.

The Dutch poet and composer Constantijn Huygens, who observed these tests, later wrote how this "daring invention" could be used in war time, attacking and sinking enemy ships while remaining in apparent safety at anchor. Like Huygens, many others also recognized the submarine's military potential, although it would be another hundred years before the first military submarine was built.

In 1718, a Russian carpenter named Efim Nikonov wrote a letter to Peter the Great claiming that he could build a “hidden ship” that could float underwater and destroy all enemy ships with cannons. Curious and interested, Peter I invited Nikonov to St. Petersburg and asked him to begin construction.

Nikonov completed construction of the model in 1721 and conducted tests in the presence of the Tsar, who was so pleased with the results that he ordered Nikonov to build a full-size secret warship.

Nikonov's submarine was built of wood and shaped like a barrel. She was armed with "fire trumpets", weapons similar to flamethrowers. The submarine was supposed to approach the enemy ship, pull the ends of the “pipes” out of the water and blow up the enemy ship with a flammable mixture. In addition, he developed an airlock so that aquanauts could escape from the submarine and destroy the ship's hold.

The first test of the submarine was carried out in the spring of 1724. It turned out to be a failure. The submarine sank, hit the bottom, and its hold broke. Nikonov himself, along with four crew members, was inside the ship. They managed to escape only thanks to a miracle.

Peter I encouraged Nikonov, admonishing him to improve the design of the boat. But failures continued to haunt Nikonov, especially after the death of his patron, Tsar Peter. In the spring of 1725, the second test of the “hidden ship” ended in failure, as did the third in 1727. In the end, the patience of the Admiralty Board of the Russian imperial fleet burst. Nikonov was demoted to an ordinary carpenter and sent to work at the Astrakhan shipyard on the Volga.

The first successful use of a military submarine in actual combat occurred during the American Revolutionary War in 1775. The submarine, called Turtle, was designed by American inventor David Bushnell. It was an egg-shaped, manually operated device that could carry one person, and was the first submarine capable of independent underwater control and movement.

The "turtle" sank, allowing water to fill a tank at the bottom of the ship, and surfaced thanks to a hand pump that pumped water out of it. Thanks to the propellers, which were driven by muscle power, the submarine moved vertically and horizontally with maximum speed 4.8 km/h. The air supply in the submarine was enough for about 30 minutes of operation.

During the American Revolutionary War, the Turtle, piloted by Sergeant Ezra Lee, attempted and failed to attach a charge to the hull of a British military H.M.S. Eagle. According to reports of the attack, Lee was discovered before he could complete the mission, forcing him to abandon the submarine. However, the only recordings documenting the attack were American. The British had no reports of the attack during the war, leading some historians to doubt the authenticity of the story. Some believe that the entire Turtle story was fabricated as disinformation and morale-boosting propaganda.

Replicas of the Turtle are now on display in several US museums, as well as the Royal Submarine Museum. navy(Royal Navy Submarine Museum) in Gosport, England.

A full-size model of Bushnell's "Turtle" at the U.S. Navy Submarine Force Museum and Library in Groton, Connecticut, USA.

A submarine is a vessel that is capable of submersion and remains under water for a long time, as well as performing certain military operations. Submarines are used in military practice, both for reconnaissance and combat purposes. For peaceful purposes, vessels are widely used in research expeditions.

First attempts

The history of submarines is very deep. He also mentioned similar buildings, but abandoned the idea for fear of using destructive force V underwater world. According to historical data, Alexander the Great tried to use something similar to an underwater bell for the purpose of reconnaissance. The Zaporozhye Cossacks used special “Chaika” boats, capable of operating upside down.

The first submarine in history appeared in the 17th century in London, being invented by the physicist and mechanic Cornel van Drebbel. To bring the unit into working condition 3 officers and 12 oarsmen were needed.

Submarine Cornelius van Drebbel

In 1634, the Jesuit Mersen described the construction of a submarine very similar to the modern version.

David Bushnell, an American inventor, built a model of a submarine in 1776, first intended to attack the enemy. The boat was named “Turtle” due to the external similarity of the two halves of the vessel, welded together and reminiscent of a turtle shell. In the upper half there was a dome with glass. However, at the first attempt to attack, the boat was destroyed by the English fleet.

Successes and failures of submarine designers

In 1800, Robert Fulton developed a good model of a submarine for 3 people and presented it to Bonaparte. However, numerous and expensive tests of the ship seemed useless to Napoleon, and he abandoned this idea.

Drawing by Robert Fulton

In 1810, a boat for 9 people was invented, but it died during one of the tests. The first missile launch from a submarine was carried out from Schilder's boat, tested in 1834 - Russian inventor. Its rowing devices vaguely resembled duck feet.

The Peyern hydrostat, developed in 1845, was the first to use pressure differences in a boat. Over the next 10 years, the boat was used to remove underwater rocks.

The first submarine to successfully participate in combat was the American Hunley. She had several ballast tanks that were filled with water for diving and manually purged for surfacing. To urgently raise the boat to the surface, iron weights attached to the bottom were provided. The boat's propeller rotated with the help of 7 sailors. In 1864, the submarine sank in an explosion, having previously sunk an enemy sloop.

The first Russian submarine was built at the Baltic Shipyard according to the drawings of Ivan Aleksandrovsky in 1866.

At the beginning of the 20th century, submarines began to actively appear in the armed forces of many countries around the world.

First submarine afloat

The first Russian submarine appeared under Peter I at the beginning of the 18th century. The designer of the submarine was peasant Efim Prokopievich Nikonov from the village of Pokrovskoye, who worked at the shipyard. In 1718, he wrote to Peter I that he could build a “hidden ship” that would go underwater and swim to the very bottom of enemy ships, and there he could smash the bottom of the ship with a shell.

A copy of Nikonov's submarine in Sestroretsk near the Cathedral of Peter and Paul

Peter liked the proposal and ordered that work begin immediately, and Nikonov himself be promoted to “master of secret ships.” And Nikonov began. Since neither the drawings nor the description have survived to this day, we have to collect information about the structure of the submarine bit by bit. Evidence has been preserved that coopers were hired to build the vessel, which means that the shape of the boat was most likely barrel-shaped. And there is evidence of the issuance of “fifteen iron strips, two inches and two quarters wide,” most likely for the manufacture of hoops to tighten the barrel-shaped boat. Wood, iron, and leather were used throughout the construction of the submarine. The dimensions of the boat were six meters long and two meters wide.

Approximate drawing of work on a submarine

The immersion system consisted of several tin plates with many capillary holes, which were mounted in the bottom of the ship. During the ascent, water taken into a special tank through holes in the plates was removed overboard using a piston pump. The submarine was row-powered and the entire crew consisted of four people; Nikonov himself was the commander of the test dives and supervised the entire process.

Nikonov submarine during a dive

Initially, it was planned to arm the boat with guns, but during the construction process, plans changed and Nikonov decided to build an airlock through which a diver could emerge from the submarine under water and cause damage to the enemy ship. For the diver, the designer invented a spacesuit with a sealed helmet and weights on the back. It has been written about the history of diving suits. But later Nikonov nevertheless armed the boat with “fiery copper pipes”; unfortunately, information about the principle of their operation has not reached us.

Drawing “Peter on the first test of the submarine”

Finally, the designer got around to testing his brainchild. In the autumn of 1724, not far from St. Petersburg, on Lake Razliv, in the presence of Peter I himself, the first tests of the “hidden ship” took place. The submarine under the command of Nikonov sank several meters under the water, but due to incorrect calculations of the depth, its bottom hit the rocks at the bottom and cracked. The ship was raised and Peter, encouraging the inventor, ordered the hull of the boat to be strengthened with iron hoops, and ordered the officials not to “blame anyone for embarrassment” in relation to Nikonov. In the spring of 1725, after repairing the ship, the designer again tried to test it in the water, but a leak was discovered and the dive was cancelled.

Vessel diagram

1 - permeable part of the body with twines

2 - work compartment

3 - airlock compartment

4 - durable superstructure

5 - entrance hatch

6 - entrance hatch to the airlock compartment

7 - exit hatch to the sea

8 - main ballast tank with a board to fill it evenly

9 - fittings for filling and ventilation of the Central City Hospital

10 - drainage pump of the Central City Hospital

11 - solid ballast

12-14 - valves for filling and draining the airlock compartment

15 - oars

16 - viewing windows

17 - steering wheel

18 - rockets

After the death of Peter I, they stopped being interested in Nikonov’s submarine; they did not respond to his demands for labor and materials or deliberately delayed a response. In the end, the Admiralty board curtailed work on the submarine, accused the inventor of “invalid buildings” and demoted him from a master to an employee. And in 1728 he was exiled to the distant Astrakhan Admiralty. This is where the story of the first submarine ends, but not everything is so sad. There is evidence that Nikonov himself, after the death of Peter, without financial support state, based on his enthusiasm alone, he made several successful dives on his “hidden ship”.

Outside view of the paddle

Submarine interior

Nowadays, not far from the place where Nikonov’s submarine first dived, in Sestroretsk near the Cathedral of Peter and Paul there is a copy of the “hidden ship”. It was created based on very scarce information that has reached our time.

The very first

Observing sea inhabitants, man tried to imitate them. Relatively quickly, he learned to build structures capable of floating on water and moving along its surface, but under water... Beliefs and legends mention individual attempts made by people in this direction, but it took centuries to more or less correctly imagine and express it in the design drawings of the underwater vessel. One of the first to do this was the great creator of the Renaissance, the Italian scientist Leonardo da Vinci. They say that Leonardo destroyed the drawings of his submarine, justifying it as follows: “People are so evil that they would be ready to kill each other even at the bottom of the sea.”

The surviving sketch shows an oval-shaped vessel with a ram in the bow and a low deckhouse, in the middle part of which there is a hatch. It is impossible to make out other design details.

What was Nikonov's submarine like? Unfortunately, it has not yet been possible to find its drawings, but some indirect information from archival documents suggests that it had a wooden body about 6 m long and about 2 m wide, sheathed on the outside with sheets of tin. The original immersion system consisted of several tin plates with many capillary holes, which were mounted in the bottom of the boat. During the ascent, water taken into a special tank through holes in the plates was removed overboard using a piston pump. At first, Nikonov intended to arm the boat with guns, but then he decided to install an airlock chamber through which, when the ship was underwater, a diver dressed in a spacesuit (designed by the inventor himself) could emerge and, using tools, destroy the bottom of the enemy ship. Later, Nikonov retrofitted the boat with “fiery copper pipes,” information about the principle of operation of which has not reached us.

Nikonov spent several years building and rebuilding his submarine. Finally, in the fall of 1724, in the presence of Peter I and the royal retinue, she was launched into the water, but in doing so she hit the ground and damaged the bottom. With great difficulty, the ship was pulled out of the water and Nikonov himself was saved. The tsar ordered the hull of the boat to be strengthened with iron hoops, encouraged the inventor and warned the officials so that “no one would blame him for the embarrassment.” After the death of Peter I in 1725, people stopped being interested in the “hidden” ship. Nikonov's demands for labor and materials were not met or were deliberately delayed. It is not surprising that the next test of the submarine ended unsuccessfully. In the end, the Admiralty Board decided to curtail the work, and the inventor was accused of “invalid buildings,” demoted to “simple Admiralty workers,” and in 1728 exiled to the distant Astrakhan Admiralty.

In 1773 (almost 50 years after Nikonov’s “hidden ship”) the first submarine was built in the United States, the inventor of which, David Bushnell, was dubbed by the Americans “the father of scuba diving.” The hull of the boat was a shell made of oak planks, fastened with iron hoops and caulked with tarred hemp. At the top of the hull there was a small copper turret with a sealed hatch and portholes, through which the commander, who combined the entire crew in one person, could observe the situation. In appearance, the boat resembled a turtle shell, which is reflected in its name. At the bottom of the Turtle there was a ballast tank, when filled, it sank. During the ascent, water was pumped out of the tank using a pump. In addition, emergency ballast was provided - a lead weight, which, if necessary, can be easily detached from the hull. The boat was moved and controlled along the course using oars. The weapon was a powder mine with a clock mechanism (attached to the hull of an enemy ship using a drill).

D. Bushnell's submarine: a - front view; b - side view

Nautilus and others

At the end of the 18th century. The ranks of submarine inventors were joined by Robert Fulton, who later became famous for creating the world's first steamship, a native of America, the son of a poor Irish emigrant. The young man, who was interested in painting, went to England, where he soon took up shipbuilding, to which he devoted his future life. To succeed in such a complex undertaking, serious engineering knowledge was needed, to acquire which Fulton went to France.

The proposal was rejected, but the persistent inventor obtained an audience with the first consul Napoleon Bonaparte and interested him in the idea of a submarine ship.

Nautilus by R. Fulton

The inventor abandoned the combat use of the Nautilus due to the fact that the French Minister of the Navy did not satisfy his demand to assign military ranks to the crew members of the boat, without which the British, if captured, would hang them as pirates. The minister formulated the reason for the refusal in a style characteristic of the professional conservatism of sailing admirals: “People who use such a barbaric means to destroy the enemy cannot be considered in military service.” In such a formulation, it is difficult to draw the line between chivalry and a lack of understanding of the merits of the new weapon.

In 1834, in St. Petersburg, at the Aleksandrovsky Foundry (now the Proletarsky Plant association), a submarine with a displacement of about 16 tons was built according to Schilder’s design, which is considered to be the first-born of the Russian submarine fleet and the world’s first metal submarine. Its body, 6 m long, 2.3 m wide and about 2 m high, was made of five-millimeter boiler iron. The propulsion system used were paddles made like the paws of waterfowl and located in pairs on each side. When moving forward, the strokes folded, and when moving backward, they opened, providing support. Each stroke was driven by swinging the drive handle from inside the ship. The design of the drive made it possible, by changing the angle of the swing of the strokes, not only to ensure the linear movement of the boat, but also to ascent or submerge it. The innovation was the “optical tube” - the prototype of the modern periscope, which Schilder designed using the idea of \u200b\u200bthe “horizontoscope” by M.V. Lomonosov.

Schilder's submarine with a crew of eight led by midshipman Shmelev set out for testing on August 29, 1834. The first underwater voyage in Russian history began. The boat maneuvered under. water and stopped submerged using an anchor of an original design. The missile launchers were successfully tested. Schilder is allocated additional funds and develops a project for a new submarine. Its hull was also made of iron and had a regular cylindrical shape with a pointed bow ending in a long bowsprit and a metal harpoon with a suspended mine inserted into it. Having thrust a harpoon into the side of the enemy ship, the boat reversed to a safe distance. The mine exploded with an electric fuse, the current to which was supplied from a galvanic element through a wire. Tests of the submarine ended at the Kronstadt roadstead on July 24, 1838 with a demonstration of the explosion of the target vessel.

Submarine K. Schilder

Schilder's submarines had a very significant drawback: their speed did not exceed 0.3 knots. The inventor understood that such a low speed was unacceptable for a warship, but he was also aware that using a “muscular” engine would not be able to increase the speed of the submarines he created.

Unfulfilled hope

In 1836, Russian academician Boris Semenovich Jacobi created the world's first electric boat with paddle wheels, which were rotated by an electric motor powered by a battery of galvanic cells. The commission that conducted the tests, noting the enormous importance of the invention, but drew attention to the very low speed of the vessel - less than 1.5 knots. The idea of an electric ship was jeopardized. Members of the commission came to Jacobi’s aid - engineer Lieutenant General A.A. Sablukov and shipbuilder Staff Captain S.O. Burachek, who argued that the problem is not in electric propulsion, but in the low efficiency of the wheel propulsion. At a meeting of the commission, Burachek, supported by Sablukov, proposed replacing the paddle wheels on the electric ship with a water-jet propulsion device, which he called a “through water flow.” The commission members approved the proposal, but it was never implemented.

A water jet, like a paddle wheel and a propeller, is a jet propulsion device. The working body of the water cannon (pump, propeller) imparts high speed to the water, with which it is thrown into the stern through the nozzle in the form of a jet stream and creates a thrust that moves the ship.

The first patent for a water-jet propulsion device was received in 1661 by the Englishmen Toogood and Hayes, but the invention remained on paper. In 1722, their compatriot Allen proposed “to use water for the movement of ships, which would be thrown from the stern with a certain force through a mechanism.” But where could one get such a mechanism at that time? In the 1830s, while in exile, the Decembrist sailor M.A. drew attention to the water-jet propulsion system. Bestuzhev and even developed an original design...

Tests of the world's first water-jet submarine were carried out in Kronstadt and ended in failure. The speed of the boat did not increase, and it could not have been otherwise when the pump was rotated manually. However, the Chief of the Main Naval Staff, Admiral A.S., who was present at the tests. Menshikov did not even want to hear about further work on finishing the ship. The Maritime Department stopped subsidizing the work. Not finding support in the highest spheres of the fleet, knowing about the ridicule of the courtiers, who nicknamed him “eccentric general” for his numerous projects that were ahead of his time, K.A. Schilder stopped technical research in the field of naval weapons and devoted himself entirely to his career in the engineering forces, which he headed towards the end of his life.

Everything turned out to be much more complicated, which the inventor apparently thought about more than once while getting out of the sunken Brandtaucher, but Bauer was persistent. After the Bavarian government refused to build a new submarine, he offered his services to Austria, England and the USA, but did not meet with support there either. And only the Russian government, concerned about the technical backwardness of the fleet that emerged during the Crimean War, reacted favorably to the Bavarian’s proposal, concluding a contract with him in 1885 for the construction of a submarine. Four months later the ship was built, but Bauer avoided demonstrating its combat qualities, although there was an almost unlimited opportunity to attack the Anglo-French fleet blockading Kronstadt. Moreover, he achieved the postponement of the tests to the spring of 1856, that is, to the time when hostilities ceased. The reason for the delay became clear when the tests began. The submarine covered about 25 meters in 17 minutes and... stopped due to “complete exhaustion of the people driving the propeller.” Later she sank, and Bauer’s next proposal to build an underwater corvette for the Russian fleet was decisively rejected. Returning to his homeland, Bauer continued his inventive activities, but, like his predecessors, he never created a suitable submarine.

Steam and air

Many original submarine projects were received by the Russian Naval Ministry during the Crimean War of 1853-1856, when patriotic enthusiasm served as an impetus for the creative initiative of specialists in many areas of military technology. In 1855, fleet mechanical engineer N.N. Spiridonov presented to the Marine Scientific Committee a project for a submarine with a crew of 60 people, equipped with a water-jet propulsion unit, the piston pumps of which were driven by compressed air. Air to the two pneumatic motors was to be supplied through a hose from an air pump installed on the surface escort vessel. The project was considered difficult to implement and ineffective.

Ivan Fedorovich Alexandrovsky

In 1862, the Marine Scientific Committee approved the project, and in 1863 the ship was laid down.

The submarine with a displacement of 352/362 tons was equipped with a single two-shaft power plant for surface and underwater travel, consisting of two pneumatic engines with a power of 117 hp. With. each with a drive to its own propeller. The supply of air, compressed to a pressure of 60-100 kg/cm2, was stored in 200 cylinders with a capacity of about 6 m3, which were thick-walled steel pipes with a diameter of 60 mm, and according to the inventor’s calculations, it was supposed to ensure the boat floats underwater at a speed of 6 knots for 3 h. To replenish the supply of compressed air, a high-pressure compressor was provided on the boat. The air exhausted in the pneumatic engines partially entered the boat for breathing by the crew members, and was partially removed overboard through a pipe with a non-return valve that prevented water from entering the engines if they were stopped when the boat was in a submerged position.

The weapons on Aleksandrovsky's submarine were two buoyant mines connected to each other by an elastic bridge. The mines were placed outside the boat's hull. Being fired from inside the boat, the mines floated up and covered the bottom of the enemy ship on both sides. The explosion was carried out by electric current from a battery of galvanic cells after the boat moved to a safe distance from the target of attack.

David crushes Goliath

Meanwhile, fundamental research by S.I. Baranovsky in the field of practical use of compressed air for power plants did not go unnoticed abroad. In 1862, in France, according to the project of Captain 1st Rank Bourgeois and engineer Brun, the submarine "Plonger" with a displacement of 420 tons was built with a single pneumatic engine with a power of 68 hp for surface and underwater travel. s., in many ways reminiscent of Aleksandrovsky’s ship. The test results turned out to be even less favorable than those of Aleksandrovsky’s boat. Low speed, ineffective horizontal rudders, traces of air bubbles...

An engineer from Russia, Major General O.B., was present and took part in the Plonger tests. Gern, who, being interested in issues of underwater diving, designed three submarines for the order of the military engineering department. Two of them were driven by a manually rotated propeller, and the third by a gas engine. But none of the boats lived up to expectations, and Gern, using Plonger’s testing experience, developed a design for an original submarine with a displacement of about 25 tons. The ship’s power plant consisted of a two-cylinder steam engine with a capacity of 6 liters. s., receiving steam at a pressure of 30 kgf/cm2 from a boiler adapted to operate on solid and liquid fuels. When the boat was in the surface position, the machine worked on steam coming from a boiler heated with wood or charcoal, and underwater - on compressed air in the pneumatic engine mode or from the boiler, for which purpose, before diving, the firebox was sealed and slow-burning fuel briquettes were burned in it , releasing oxygen during combustion. In addition, as a backup option, in a submerged position the boiler could be heated with turpentine, which was sprayed into the firebox with compressed air or oxygen.

Meanwhile, a significant event occurred in the history of diving. Before the Civil War 1861-1865. In the United States, virtually no attention was paid to submarine shipbuilding. With the start of the war, the southerners announced an open competition for the best submarine design. Of the presented projects, preference was given to the submarine of engineer Aunley, under whose leadership a series of small cylindrical iron boats with pointed ends, about 10 m long and about 2 m wide, was built. The first boat was named David after the biblical young David, who defeated the giant Goliath . Goliaths, of course, meant the surface ships of the northerners. David was armed with a pole mine with an electric fuse that exploded from inside the boat. The crew consisted of nine people, eight of whom rotated the crankshaft with the propeller. The immersion depth was maintained by horizontal rudders. In essence, these were semi-submersible ships, which, when moving underwater, left a flat deck above the surface of the water.

Schematic representation of a David-class submarine

In October 1863, a boat of this series attacked a Northern battleship at anchor, but the explosion was carried out prematurely and she was lost. Four months later, the Hanley boat made a similar attempt, but from the waves of a steamer passing nearby, it tilted sharply, scooped up water and sank. The boat was raised and repaired. But evil fate pursued her. The David type boats had insufficient stability, as a result of which the Hanley, which was anchored at night, suddenly capsized. The boat was restored again. To determine the causes of accidents involving Aunley, extensive tests were carried out, during which Hunley sank again with the entire crew and the inventor. Another recovery and repair followed, after which on February 17, 1864, Hanley became the hero of an event about which it is written in the “Naval History of the Civil War”:

"On January 14, the Secretary of the Navy wrote to Vice Admiral Dahlhorn, commander of the fleet at Charleston, that, according to information he had received, the Confederates had launched a new ship capable of destroying his entire fleet ... on the night of February 17, the newly built beautiful ship Housatonic with a displacement of 1200 tons, stood at anchor in front of Charleston, was destroyed under the following circumstances: at about 8:15 in the evening, some suspicious object was seen 50 yards from the ship. It looked like a board floating towards the ship. Two minutes later, the officers were already near the ship. were warned in advance and had a description of the new “hellish” machines with information about the best way to get rid of them. The watch commander ordered the anchor ropes to be loosened, the machine to be set in motion and everyone to be called up. But, unfortunately, it was too late... One hundred pounds of gunpowder at the end. the pole turned out to be sufficient to destroy the strongest armadillo." However, the boat itself did not escape the fate of its victim. As it turned out later, Hanley did not have time to move to a safe distance and was pulled inside the battleship along with the water gushing through the hole. But David crushed Goliath. The death of Housatonic caused a stir in the naval departments of different countries and drew attention to weapons, which until recently were not taken seriously by many.