Ted Turner lends name to Hunley recovery effort

Web posted July 23, 1997

Associated Press

CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) - Media magnate Ted Turner, interested in doing a film on the Confederate submarine Hunley, will lend his name to the recovery effort.

As much as $10 million will be needed to raise, restore and display the Hunley, the first sub to sink an enemy warship.

Turner, a Civil War buff, will allow his name to be used in the hunt for private donations, state Sen. Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston, said Monday.

The state Hunley Commission hopes to raise most of the money from corporate America, McConnell said.

Turner has already made Civil War films, including ``Gettysburg'' and a television movie about the rebel prison at Andersonville, Ga.

The announcement came at the Charleston Museum as officials unveiled an art and model exhibit that features Conrad Wise Chapman's historic 1863 painting of the Hunley as it sat on a harborside wharf.

The print is on loan from the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond, Va.

The exhibit will be on display here until Aug. 10, when it travels to the State Museum in Columbia, then on to other museums around South Carolina.

The Hunley, which is in good condition, was discovered in May 1995 off Charleston Harbor. It sank in February 1864 after attacking the Union blockade ship Housatonic.

Officials hope to raise the sub in the next few years.