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Article published Apr 12, 2004
Crewmen to make their last journey

DEBRA G. LESTER
Staff Writer

More than 140 years after their deaths, the eight crewmen of the Confederate submarine H.L. Hunley will be laid to rest this week in Magnolia Cemetery in Charleston.Their final resting place will be alongside previous crewmen, including H.L. Hunley himself, who lost their lives in two training exercises aboard the doomed vessel.It has been a long journey home.On Feb. 17, 1864, the Hunley cast off from Breach Inlet on Sullivans Island into history. The black-powder charge the submarine rammed into the USS Housatonic, the Union Navy's largest ship, set her afire and sent the sloop of war to the bottom of the ocean. The feat ensured the Hunley a place in world naval history as the first submarine to sink an enemy warship in battle.Someone aboard the Hunley signaled to shore with a blue magnesium light, indicating they were returning from a successful mission. Then the greatest mystery of the Confederacy's super-secret weapon occurred: She disappeared into the cold moonlit night without a trace.For more than a century, explorers and treasure hunters sought the Hunley without success. That is until May 4, 1995, when a crew from the National Underwater Marine Agency (NUMA), established by adventure author Clive Cussler in the 1970s and often featured in his novels, discovered the submarine under three feet of sediment four miles off the coast of Sullivan's Island. As well as being stuck in the silt and sludge, the Hunley was stuck in time.Each time the Hunley sank, she was recovered so that her crew could have a proper burial and be refitted for service. NUMA and the Hunley Commission, established by the S.C. Legislature to oversee this unprecedented find, wanted to do the same for this crew and pre-serve the submarine for future generations."It has been a goal of The Hunley Commission for nine years to bring together all of the Hunley crews.This goal will finally be met when the last crew of the H.L. Hunley is committed to the earth and their spirits, along with those of their compatriots, will soar like eagles -- their souls free to bask in the sunlight while those of us left behind bestow upon them the honor that they so richly deserve," Sen. Glenn McConnell, chairman of the Hunley Commission, said Friday.A week-long tribute to the crew will begin at 5 p.m. today when the remains of the crew arrive in eight separate hearses at Patriot's Point Naval Museum in Mount Pleasant where they will be met by 48 Confederate re-enactors acting as pallbearers and are they will be met by 48 Confederate pallbearers and a Confederate Color Guard.The history-making crew will receive a ceremonial artillery salute by the Santee Light Artillery and a rendering of echoing Tattoo and Taps on an original bugle from the Battle of Gettysburg played by Prof. Tom Kindel of the Citadel and echoed by retired submarine veteran and bugler Ryan O'Neal.The public may view the processional of the coffins down the pier and onto the vessel where they will be placed on 8 funeral biers and met by a ceremonial honor guard. The public may board the Yorktown at 6 p.m. today to pay final respects to the crew.Today's ceremonial arrival and lying in state will begin an entire week of activities to honor the last crew of the Hunley and to provide access to the thousands of people who wish to pay their respects.After the submarine was found and the best way to recover her was determined, the voyage home began in 2000 as archeologists, divers, conservators, engineers, photographers and crane opera-tors decided the safest way to raise her.On Aug. 8, 2000, the Hunley was brought to the surface and traveled from the ocean past cheering crowds, including costumed re-enactors from all over the world gathered at the battery, then up the Cooper River to the Warren Lasch Conservation Center on the former Naval Base in North Charleston.The most knowledgeable archeologists, conservators and scientists in their fields slowly and carefully opened the heavily encrusted submarine and excavated the sediment they found inside, painstakingly sifting the silt for minute clues, each one only turning up more mysteries.The submarine was found to be much more technically advanced than historians had believed, offering more evi-dence that she was the precursor to the German U-2 boats.And the remains of the crew, eight men rather than the previously believed seven, were found in remarkable condition and sus-pended in time at their battle stations.Maria Jacobsen, senior archaeologist on the project, has painstakingly sifted through tons of silt in the Warren Lasch Conservation Lab, searching for details about the men and how they died.Forensic sculptor Sharon Long has molded faces on the crewmen's skulls, showing their faces for the first time since they disappeared.And Harry Pecorelli, diver and archeologist, was on the team that found the subma-rine in 1995 and has been in-volved in the research ever since.Though the journey of the Hunley's crew has ended, the research done by conservators and scientists will continue in an effort to learn why the submarine sank.The Hunley will be restored as closely as possible to what it looked like in 1864. It will be displayed at a future museum in North Charleston.Debra G. Lester can be reached at debra.lester@shj.com or 562-7264.