American inventor, born at Saybrook, CT, in 1742; died in Warrenton, GA, in 1824. He was a graduate of Yale in 1775. His mind was of an inventive turn, and during his college course he was at work constructing a torpedo for the destruction of ships. He built the American Truth, an iron-plate diving-boat to carry one man, who should guide himself to the enemy’s vessel and thereto fasten the Bushnell torpedo, which was regulated by clockwork to explode at a given time. In 1777 he successfully tested his invention, and with it blew up a British schooner in New York harbor. The following year he sent a fleet of barrels down the Delaware to destroy the British ships. The scheme was not entirely successful, but the next day they exploded and blew up one boat. The Battle of the Kegs, a humorous poem by Francis Hopkinson, describes the incident. Mr. Bushnell invented several destructive machines, not all of which were successful. He served during the war of the Revolution, and was made captain of the corps of sappers and miners.
