Higgins boat
LCVP side elevation and plan
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| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Builders: | Higgins Industries and others |
| Operators: | |
| Built: | 1941–45 |
| Completed: | 20,000 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Landing craft |
| Displacement: | 18,000 lb (8,200 kg) light |
| Length: | 36 ft 3 in (11.05 m) |
| Beam: | 10 ft 10 in (3.30 m) |
| Draft: |
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| Propulsion: | Gray Marine 6-71 Diesel Engine, 225 hp (168 kW) or Hall-Scott gasoline engine, 250 hp (186 kW) |
| Speed: | 12 knots (14 mph; 22 km/h) |
| Capacity: | 6,000 lb (2,700 kg) vehicle or 8,100 lb (3,700 kg) general cargo |
| Troops: | 36 troops |
| Crew: | 4: Coxswain, engineer, bowman, sternman |
| Armament: | 2 × .30 cal. (7.62 mm) Browning machine guns |
The landing craft, vehicle, personnel (LCVP) or Higgins boat was a landing craft used extensively in amphibious landings in World War II. The craft was designed by Andrew Higgins based on boats made for operating in swamps and marshes. More than 20,000 were built, by Higgins Industries and licensees.
Typically constructed from plywood, this shallow-draft, barge-like boat could ferry a platoon-sized complement of 36 men to shore at 9 knots (17 km/h). Men generally entered the boat by climbing down a cargo net hung from the side of their troop transport; they exited by charging down the boat's bow ramp.
Andrew Higgins started out in the lumber business, but gradually moved into boat building, which became his sole operation after the lumber transport company he was running entered bankruptcy in 1930. Most sources say his boats were intended for use by trappers and oil-drillers; occasionally, some sources imply or even say that Higgins intended to sell the boats to individuals intending to smuggle illegal liquor into the United States, and that the trappers and oil-drillers story was mainly a cover. Higgins' financial difficulties, and his association with the U.S. military, occurred around the time Prohibition was repealed, which would have ruined his market in the rum-running sector; the U.S. Navy's interest in the boats was in any case providential, though Higgins proved unable to manage his company's good fortune.
Fortunately for Higgins, the United States Marine Corps, always interested in finding better ways to get men across a beach in an amphibious landing, and frustrated that the Navy's Bureau of Construction and Repair could not meet its requirements, began to express interest in Higgins' boat. When tested in 1938 by the Navy and Marine Corps, Higgins' Eureka boat surpassed the performance of a Navy-designed boat, and was tested by the services during fleet landing exercises in February 1939. Satisfactory in most respects, the boat's major drawback appeared to be that equipment had to be unloaded, and men disembarked, over the sides, thus exposing them to enemy fire in combat situations. However, it was put into production and service as the landing craft, personnel (large), abbreviated as LCP(L). The LCP(L) had two machine gun positions at the bow. The LCP(L), commonly called the "U-boat" or the "Higgins" boat, was supplied to the British (from October 1940), to whom it was initially known as the "R-boat" and used for commando raids.
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