Typically constructed from plywood, this shallow-draft, barge-like boat could ferry a roughly platoon-sized complement of 36 men to shore at 12 knots (14 mph; 22 km/h).

Powered by a 225-horsepower Gray Marine 6-71 diesel engine at a maximum speed of 12 knots, it would sway in choppy seas, causing seasickness.

[1] The United States Marine Corps was always interested in finding better ways to get men across a beach in an amphibious landing.

They were frustrated that the Navy's Bureau of Construction and Repair could not meet its requirements and began to express interest in Higgins' boat.

However, that was the best available boat design, and it was put into production and service as the landing craft, personnel (large), abbreviated as LCP(L).

The LCP(L), also commonly called 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.

[10] On May 26, 1941, Commander Ross Daggett, from the Navy Bureau of Ships, and Major Ernest Linsert, of the Marine Corps Equipment Board, witnessed the testing of the three craft.

LCVPs fitted with a roof and an Oerlikon 20 mm cannon were used by the French Navy's Dinassauts during the First Indochina War to patrol the Mekong, along with other US-origin landing craft.

It had been used as a fishing boat in very shallow areas but, except for an easily removed addition to the cockpit, had not been altered; all of the armor plate was complete, as were gauges and equipment.

[22] Overlord purchased the vessel from its French owners and then transported the Higgins boat to Hughes Marine Service in Chidham, England, for initial evaluation and restoration.

During this evaluation, the First Division Museum acquired the Higgins boat from Overlord Research, LLC, and moved the vessel to Beaufort, North Carolina, for extensive restoration.

[24] An original LCVP is on display at the National Museum of the United States Army in Fort Belvoir, Virginia.

[31] The stern of the boat displays AG 39 and was presumably attached to the USS Menemsha (AG-39), a weather patrol ship in the North Atlantic, during WWII.

[35] In July 2018, a 1942 LCVP designed in a similar fashion to the Eureka model was discovered in the Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta of California.

Having been left unattended in brackish waters for at least 40 years, restoration was not required and post survey, the hull was confirmed as perfectly sound.

[citation needed] An intact surviving example is known to lie beached at King Edward Point on South Georgia although this craft is in poor condition due to the Antarctic environment.

[citation needed] An LCVP in relatively good condition was discovered in Shasta Lake in Northern California, during a drought in 2021.

The boat had been carried by the USS Monrovia during World War II, and had been in combat in Sicily and later in the Battle of Tarawa, where it had sunk and had later been salvaged.

[41] The use of these boats during the D-day invasions at Normandy is shown in the feature films The Longest Day and Saving Private Ryan.