It was a 149-ton steam-powered submarine which had its design approved in October 1893 [3] and built under a U.S. Navy contract issued in March 1895.

Her features included three propellers, a steam engine plant, a retractable smokestack, thrusters to facilitate maneuvering, a camera lucida (an optical device serving as a periscope), and two torpedo tubes.

Plunger was constructed at the Columbia Iron Works in Baltimore, Maryland and launched on August 7, 1897, and the Navy conducted dock trials in 1898.

Her complex steam power plant proved impractical for a submarine and the boat was not accepted for service by the Navy.

[5] The contract was canceled between Holland and the Navy in 1900, and the money already outlaid was applied to the cost of purchasing a new submarine which became USS Plunger (SS-2).