The Turtle was the first ever combat submarine built during the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783). The unit was built and put into service in 1776. Its displacement was about 2 tons with a width of about 1.3 meters. "Turtle" was armed with a powder charge weighing up to 68 kilograms with a fuse. "Turtle" is the work of the self-taught American inventor David Bushnell, who created a new device for installing powder charges, that is, incendiary mines, on board British sailing ships. The turtle was made mainly of wood with numerous iron elements. It housed one crew member, who, in turn, moved two propellers responsible for the draft and horizontal movement of the ship. The first attempt to use this avant-garde weapon at that time took place on the night of September 6-7, 1776, but was unsuccessful. Like the next two. In the same month, during the fourth successful attack, "Turtle" was sunk. Its creators managed to raise the wreck to the surface, but stopped trying to improve the structure.
