Submarine Boats - The Beginnings of Underwater Warfare
by Richard Compton-Hall
Arco Publishing | 1984 | ISBN-10: 0668059249 | 192 pages | scanned PDF | 48.2 mb
https://www.amazon.com/Submarine-boats-beginnings-underwater-warfare/dp/0668059249
This is a history of early submarines. The book starts off with an excellent chapter on the introduction of the early Holland boats into Royal Navy service, then jumps back in time with a few chapters about the earliest submarines like the Revolutionary War era Turtle, the Confederate Hunley and a few other odd ones, before ending up discussing Holland and his submarines. He then continues with more about the early service of submarines in the Royal Navy before the first world war.
The book is primarily focused on the Royal Navy, although he does discuss submarines in navies of other nations. There are many photographs and quite a number of anecdotes and stories included from actual crews who served on the boats which not only give an excellent insight on what it was like to man these boats, but also give a more human picture of the crews. Many are quite entertaining and remind the reader that no matter how deadly serious the purpose for which these boats were built, they were crewed by humans who could laugh, play pranks and otherwise behave like real people.
