Today is the anniversary of the first successful submarine attack in military history, the sinking of the USS Housatonic by the Confederate submarine CSS Hunley just outside Charleston harbor in 1864. The hand-propelled submarine was thought to have been lost for more than a century until it was found buried beneath the ocean floor in 1995, and recovered 5 years later. Today, it is preserved in the Hunley Museum, where sadly, political correctness has become so prevailing that the term “CSS” and “Confederate submarine” have been erased in describing the vessel. The simple historical fact is that it was a Confederate submarine and should be referred to as CSS Hunley.
