Polish engineer and inventor Stefan Drzewiecki was born July 26, 1844.

Known as the Submarine Tsar, Drzewiecki developed working submarines as early as 1877. He first designed and built  a 2 man then 4 man sub and operated them during the Russo-Turkish War. 

Stefan Drzewiecki and his Submarine
From Poland’s 1973 Polish Scientists series
Designer: Tadeusz Michaluk

… his underwater vessel interested the Russian military enough that they requested an improved model—the Type II—which Drzewiecki exhibited in 1879 on Lake Gatchina to an audience that included the future Tsar Alexander III. So impressed was His Imperial Highness that he ordered a fleet of 50, and the slightly revised Type III—shown in this Polish stamp issued in 1973—became the first mass-produced submarine in the world. It was pedal-powered and sat four, with space for two mines.

Drzewiecki’s fleet patrolled the Black Sea until it was decommissioned in 1886. Many of his submarines were turned into buoys. 
Stefan Drzewiecki, Submarine Tsar | Hakai Magazine