The mystery of what killed the crew of the H.L. Hunley may finally be solved

The mystery of what caused the crew of the H.L. Hunley to suddenly die may finally be solved.

The Hunley was a confederate submarine that, in 1864, became the first sub to sink an enemy battleship. However, after its victory, it also sank to the bottom of the ocean.

It was pulled from its resting place in the year 2000 and, although a number of theories have surfaced, one recently published in the journal Plos One may have cracked the case.

The Hunley shot a torpedo that sunk the union ship the USS Housatonic. Biochemist Rachel Lance believes it was the shockwave the torpedo created that took the lives of the crew.

RELATED: Photos of the H.L. Hunley

The wave would have traveled through the cabin and caused pulmonary hemorrhaging.

After testing several blasts herself and using prior knowledge of air blast experiments on larger animals, Lance says "any explosive we've seen in the field ... would definitely create a lethal wave."

And while some doubt Lance’s theory, a gold pocket watch that belonged to the Hunley’s captain stopped at 8:23, which historians say is right around the time the sub made history.

The Hunley Project said in 2007 that something traumatic caused the watch to stop at that exact moment.

Researchers are still studying the sub and it seems like it’s only a matter of time until we find out the truth about what really happened to the Hunley.