The Submarine That Slipped Under the Emperor's Boat

Picture a lake in the middle of a town, right under the walls of a palace. The water is so clear you can see the bottom. This is Silver Lake, in Gatchina, the palace town where the emperors had a residence. It once hid a submarine there, in plain sight.

The man behind it was an engineer named Dzhevetsky, and he was in love with the idea of travelling under water. His first machine was a cramped steel cigar for one man, driven by pedals. It was built in Odessa. The second was three times roomier. It was tested near Petersburg, and then brought to Gatchina. The lake is fed by springs, and that's why the water is so clear. Anyone on the shore could watch the boat move beneath the surface.

On the appointed day, the emperor and the empress rowed out to the middle of the lake in an ordinary boat. Then the water beside them shivered, just slightly. And right under their keel, without a sound, a steel shadow slid past.

A few moments later the submarine surfaced alongside. The hatch opened. Dzhevetsky, soaked and delighted, held out a bouquet of orchids to the empress. Neptune's tribute, he said, to Her Majesty.

You might think the boat had some kind of magic invisibility. But why pick the clearest water around if you wanted to hide? Because it was the other way round. He wanted everyone to see, except the people sitting in the boat above. His crew knew the route of that boat in advance. And the submarine rode low enough to pass under the keel unnoticed.

The emperor, Alexander, ordered about fifty boats of this kind for coastal defence. The Gatchina boat was the first submarine in the world to go into series production.

But these boats had a short life. By eighteen ninety-one, all of them had been written off. Pedal power gave a speed barely above a man's walking pace. And the torpedo had long since outrun any crew that had to pedal.

What remains in Gatchina is a steel copy of the boat, full size. It stands as a memorial on the way from the railway station to the palace. You can walk up and touch it.

But when you stand there, look past the hull, at the water. It's just as clear as it was then. And maybe that's the whole secret. Sometimes even the boldest invention doesn't need a hiding place. It needs an honest look at itself.

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