In a funny way, it was supposed to be a recreation of th Bushnell's TURTLE, the submersible that was used in New York Harbor during the Revolutionary War. With Busnell's craft he had some degree of steering an a hand cranked screw for limited propulsion.
There is video at Yahoo about this "designer" from Red Hook. He got caught in the current and literally surrounded by NYPD's finest...looks like they have a couple of old 41' UTBs too...
Although Sgt. Ezra Lee was unable to place the mine on the hull of the British Ship EAGLE (in NY Harbor) he did release it near Governor's Island, and 1 hour later it blew up. Although he didn't sink a ship with it, the British did relocate their fleet which helped to end the blockade of NYC. The TURTLE did work; the latest one didn't...the fool is lucky he didn't sink - or get blown up!!!
