Designs for underwater boats or submarines date back to the 1500s and ideas for underwater travel date back even further. However it was not until the 19th century that the first useful submarines began to appear. During the Civil War, the Confederates built the H.L. Hunley,the submarine that sank a Union ship. The U.S.S. Housatonic was built in 1864. But it wasn'tThe submariner's problem has always been how to improve his underwater endurance and performance, and both capabilities are defined by the ship. Early in submarine history the submariner's problem often was how to make his ship work at all. until after World War I began that the first truly practical and modern submarines were invented

Not until 1578 did any record appear of a craft designed for underwater navigation. William Bourne, a former Royal Navy gunner, designed a completely enclosed boat that could be submerged and rowed beneath the surface. His creation was a wooden framework bound in waterproofed leather. It was to be submerged by using hand vises to contract the sides and decrease the volume.
Although Bourne's idea never got beyond the drawing board, a similar apparatus was launched in 1605. But it didn't get much farther, because the designers had neglected to consider the tenacity of underwater mud. The craft became stuck in the river bottom during its first underwater trial.