Naval/Maritime History 27th of August - Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1653 - Death of Simon de Vlieger (c. 1601, Rotterdam – buried 13 March 1653, Weesp)


Simon de Vlieger (c. 1601, Rotterdam – buried 13 March 1653, Weesp) was a Dutch designer, draughtsman, and painter, most famous for his marine paintings.

Life
Born in Rotterdam, de Vlieger moved in 1634 to Delft, where he joined the Guild of Saint Luke, and then to Amsterdam in 1638, though he maintained a house in Rotterdam until 1650 when he moved to Weesp, a small town on the outskirts of Amsterdam. In the 1630s and 1640s he was one of the best-known Dutch maritime painters. He moved away from the monochrome style of Jan Porcellis and Willem van de Velde, the elder towards a more realistic use of colour, with highly detailed and accurate representations of rigging and ship construction. He painted ships in harbour and at sea as well as storms and shipwrecks.

In addition to painting, he designed tapestries, etchings, stained glass windows for the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam, and the organ screen for the St. Laurenskerk in Rotterdam.

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His pupils included Willem van de Velde, the younger, Adriaen van de Velde, and Jan van de Cappelle. Jan van der Cappelle in fact owned 9 original De Vlieger paintings, and more than 1300 prints. When de Vleiger died in 1653, there were a number of unfinished, but still beautiful works. One of these, of a fisherman dragging nets to shore was sold by Jan van der Capelle to Joanna Six, wife of Simon van der Stel, and later shipped to the Cape of Good Hope where it was displayed at Groot Constantia, the home of van der Stel. His work was highly influential on the younger generation of maritime painters.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_de_Vlieger
 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1665 – Launch of french Thérèse, a 58-gun ship of the line of the French Navy.


The Thérèse was a 58-gun ship of the line of the French Navy. She was designed and built by François Pomet in Toulon Dockyard between 1662 and 1665, and was classed as a vaisseau de troisième rang (ship of the third rank). She was part of a French relief effort to Candia during a siege by the Ottomans and was sunk on 24 June 1669 after an explosion in her powder magazine. At the time she was a flagship of the expedition.

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a ship of Thérèse's type in the mid-1600s

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History
The Thérèse arrived at Candia on 19 June 1669 in company with 17 transport ships and 6,000 French soldiers. The French force was there to support the Venetian forces during the Siege of Candia. Another 24 French warships arrived on 3 July. Six days after their arrival the leader of the French corps, François de Vendôme, Duc de Beaufort, was killed in battle and Philippe de Montaut-Bénac de Navailles took over. On 10 July a council of all the leaders of the allied armies took place and the decision was made to use the fleet to attack the Turks northwest of the city, as this part of the city was totally impoverished. After the bombardment the allied forces aimed to strike and repel the Turks. 24 July was selected as the day of the operation. As planned that day, the whole Navy sailed west of the city to the mouth of the river Giofyros. The fleet comprised 58 warships mounting 1100 cannon. For three hours the fleet continuously bombarded the Turks, when suddenly La Thérèse's powder magazine caught fire, resulting in the destruction of the ship. Only seven of her crew survived out of 350. Immediately after this incident there was great confusion in the French naval force and the fleet's commander, Vincenzo Rospigliosi, ordered the bombardment to be abandoned, and sailed the fleet to the island of Dia.

The accident seriously damaged the citizens' and sailors' morale and caused divisions in the military leadership. The leader of the French force, Philippe de Montaut, decided to withdraw from the city, having sustained casualties of over 2,000 dead and injured, and suffering a shortage of food and supplies.

Captain General Francesco Morosini, tried in vain to change de Montaut's mind. Eventually, between 16 and 21 August, the whole French fleet sailed away leaving the allied forces, a total of 3,600 men, consisting of Venetians, Italians, English, Scottish, Germans and Greeks, to fight alone against over 60,000 Turks. A few days later Morosini was informed that Turkish reinforcements had arrived in Crete, and decided to surrender the city. He signed the capitulation on 6 September and the city was handed over to the Turks.

The shipwreck
Manolis Voutsalas, a Greek diver, discovered the wreck of La Thérèse, but initially was unsure of her identity. In 1976 Jacques Cousteau visited Crete and Voutsalas showed him the site of the shipwreck, west of the port of Heraklion. Cousteau, after several dives, identified it as the shipwreck of La Thérèse. The scientific underwater excavation of the shipwreck started in 1987 by the Ministry of Culture Greece. The archaeologist M. Anagnostopoulou and Nicolas Lianos, started the excavation of the shipwreck, succeed to map the wreck (sc. 1:100) and raise several objects. Among them, a bronze cannon with the inscription "Le Duc de Vendôme 1966" (admiral), and "HONARATUS SUCHET F(ecit) TOLONI" (cnf. M. Anagnostopoulou- N. Lianos, ΑΑΑ v.ΧΙΧ(1986). It is considered the first systematic underwater excavation in Greece.



 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1697 – Launch of HMS Kingston, a 60-gun fourth rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built by Frame in Hull


HMS Kingston
was a 60-gun fourth rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built by Frame in Hull and launched on 13 March 1697. She had an eventful career, taking part in numerous engagements.

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Career
During the War of Spanish Succession, Kingston took part in the engagements of Gibraltar (1704) under the command of Edward Acton, Vélez Málaga (1709) and Gaspé (1711).

She was rebuilt for the first time according to the 1706 Establishment at Portsmouth Dockyard, and relaunched on 9 May 1719. She was rebuilt for a second time at Plymouth according to the 1733 proposals of the 1719 Establishment, and relaunched on 8 October 1740. Kingston was present at the Battle of Toulon in 1744.

During the Seven Years' War, the ship was part of Admiral John Byng's squadron sent to relieve Fort St. Philip (Port Mahon) in 1756, besieged by a French amphibious force who had invaded the island of Menorca (historically called "Minorca" by the British). The squadron set sail from England on 10 April. On 2 May, it arrived at Gibraltar, departing on 8 May. On 19 May, it came into sight of Fort St. Philip. The French fleet then advanced to meet Byng. On 20 May, the squadron fought the Battle of Menorca where several British ships were seriously damaged but none was lost on either side. On 24 May, after a council of war, Byng gave orders to return to Gibraltar, abandoning Menorca to its fate. The squadron arrived at Gibraltar on 19 June.

In 1757, the ship was part of Admiral Holbourne's squadron which left Ireland on 5 May for the planned expedition against Louisbourg. By 10 July, the entire squadron was finally at anchor before Halifax where it made its junction with Hardy's squadron. However, in August, when the combined fleet was ready to set sail, Louisbourg had already been reinforced by three French squadrons and Governor Loudon cancelled the whole enterprise. Holbourne's squadron stayed off Louisbourg until 25 September when it was dispersed by a storm, forcing it to return to Great Britain in a very bad condition. On 20 November 1759, Kingston took part in the Battle of Quiberon Bay where the French navy suffered a great defeat.

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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan, stern board outline with some detail, sheer lines with inboard detail, and a basic longitudinal half-breadth for Kingston (1719), a 60-gun Fourth Rate, two-decker. Signed by John Naish [Master Shipwright, Portsmouth Dockyard, 1715-1726 (died December)].

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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan, stern board outline with some decoration detail, sheer lines, and longitudinal half-breadth proposed (and approved) for Kingston (1740), a 60-gun Fourth Rate, two-decker. This ship was built to replace the previous Kingston (1719), also a 60-gun ship. Signed by Peirson Lock [Master Shipwright, Plymouth Dockyard, 1726-1742].


As the Lord Clive
The ship was sold to privateers linked to the East India Company on 14 January 1762 and renamed Lord Clive.

The same year during the Spanish-Portuguese War, 1761-1763, these privateers, fighting on the side of Portugal, had plans to conquer Spanish territory in South America and organised a raid on Buenos Aires and Montevideo.
Their squadron, under the command of Robert McNamara from the East India Company, consisted of Lord Clive (60), Ambuscade(40), two Portuguese ships (among which were the frigate Gloria (38)) transporting 500 foot soldiers, and five storeships. On 2 November, the squadron sailed from Rio de Janeiro towards the mouth of the Río de la Plata but soon abandoned the project because Spanish defenders in both cities were fully alerted and well prepared.

On 6 January 1763, McNamara decided to attack and retake Colonia do Sacramento also in Spanish hands. 60-gun Lord Clive and the 40-gun HMS Ambuscade, along with 38-gun Portuguese Gloria, anchored near the city and started bombardment, but they received unexpected strong resistance from the city's gun battery. After three hours of an exchange of fire, a fire developed on Lord Clive that quickly progressed until it reached her magazine, which exploded, sinking her. There were 272 fatalities on board, including McNamara. HMS Ambuscade and Gloria were badly damaged too, and retired from combat.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Kingston_(1697)
 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1703 – Launch of HMS Antelope, a 50-gun fourth rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched at Rotherhithe


HMS
Antelope
was a 50-gun fourth rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched at Rotherhithe on 13 March 1703. She was rebuilt once during her career, and served in the Seven Years' War and the American Revolutionary War.

Orders were issued on 9 January 1738 for Antelope to be taken to pieces and rebuilt according to the 1733 proposals of the 1719 Establishment at Woolwich, from where she was relaunched on 27 January 1741.

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Career
On 16 June 1756, she sailed from England for Gibraltar with Vice Admiral Sir Edward Hawke, 1st Baron Hawke and Rear Admiral Charles Saunders. She arrived there on 3 July with an order to supersede Admiral John Byng. Antelope returned to England with Byng, sailing on 9 July and arriving at Spithead on 26 July, where Byng was arrested before being landed on 19 August. His trial started on board St George on 27 December.

On 30 April 1757, Captain Samuel Hood took command of Antelope. On 15 May, after a short action off Brest, France, the French Aquilon, 50, was driven on to the rocks in Audierne Bay where she was wrecked. Then, on 31 October 1758, in the Kingroad off Portishead, Antelope took Belliqueux, 64, one of a French squadron returning from Quebec, that had anchored off Ilfracombe, Antelope opened fire but the French ship surrendered without having fired a shot in return.

Not every action was a success. In 1759, under the command of Captain James Webb, Antelope was attached to Commodore William Boys' squadron, which had been blockading François Thurot in Dunkirk throughout the summer and early autumn. On 15 October, when the squadron had been driven off station during a gale, Thurot made his escape with six frigates and corvettes carrying 1300 troops and sailed to Gothenburg.

In 1762, Antelope was stationed in Placentia Bay, Newfoundland, under the command of Commodore Thomas Graves, who was the Colony's Naval Governor. A French fleet from Brest, under M. de Ternay, with 1500 troops commanded by the Comte d'Haussonville, sailed into St. John's and captured the town on 24 June. Captain Graves immediately sent word to Commodore Lord Colville at Halifax who joined him in blockading the French, and brought troops over from Louisbourg on Cape Breton Islandon 11 September. During a gale on 16 September de Ternay evaded the blockade and, abandoning the troops, sailed back to France.

On her way home to England Antelope encountered Marlborough, under Captain Thomas Burnett, which had sailed from Havanaas part of the escort of a convoy of prizes and transports, but had become separated in very heavy weather. She was leaking so badly that her guns had to be thrown overboard and the pumps kept working. Antelope took all her people off on 29 November when she started to founder and she was allowed to sink.

Later, in 1780, Antelope was again patrolling the Labrador coast and intercepted the American ship Mercury. As the vessels came to close quarters, a package was thrown overboard from the latter. One of the sailors on Antelope dived from the deck and rescued the package, which contained details of secret negotiations then being conducted between the United States and the United Provinces. Antelope Harbour, Labrador, is named for this incident.

Antelope was sold out of the service on 30 October 1783.

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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan from midships to bow, body plan from midships to stern with stern board decoration, sheer lines with some inboard detail and figurehead, and longitudinal half-breadth with some lower deck detail for Antelope (1703), a 50-gun Fourth Rate two-decker. This may be the ship as she was when in Plymouth Dockyard in 1713. An attached letter (not scanned) lays out the dimensions of the ship, as taken at Plymouth on 7 March 1713.

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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan, sheer lines with some inboard detail, and longitudinal half-breadth proposed (and approved) for Antelope (1742), a 1733 Establishment 50-gun Fourth Rate, two-decker.



 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1761 - HMS Vengeance (28), Cptn. Gamaliel Nightingale, took Entreprenant (26).


HMS
Vengeance
was a 28-gun sixth rate of the Royal Navy. She had previously been a French privateer under the same name until her capture in 1758 during the Seven Years' War.

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French career and capture
Vengeance was built in 1757 at Saint-Malo. HMS Hussar, under the command of Captain John Elliot, captured her off The Lizardon 8 January 1758 and brought her into Plymouth. An Admiralty order was issued, authorising her purchase into the navy on 11 March 1758, and she was duly acquired on 21 June that year for the sum of £2,151.3.0d. She was officially named the following day, and was fitted at Plymouth between August and September 1758 for the sum of £1,619.18.6d.

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The Desperate action between the Terrible and Vengeance Dec 1757 (Print) (PAD8334)

British career
Vengeance was first commissioned on 27 October 1758 under the command of Captain Gamaliel Nightingale, for service in the Irish Sea and, later, to assist with the impressment of sailors on the River Mersey in northwest England. In July 1759 she was anchored at the mouth of the Mersey when she encountered a whaler, Golden Lyon, returning from Greenland. On Nightingale's orders a press gang from Vengeance boarded the whaler to search for seamen eligible for impressment. The whaler's crew were exempt by virtue of their current merchant service, but not so her passengers, who were crew from another whaler that had sunk. To avoid impressment these passengers attacked the gang, capturing Vengeance's first lieutenant and throwing the rest of the gang overboard.

Golden Lyon then headed for the Mersey docks. Vengeance gave chase but the whaler reached the dock first and her crew and passengers fled ashore. Having recovered the press gang members from the river, Captain Nightingale waited for nightfall and then led the crew of Vengeance ashore to the customs house, where the whalers had taken refuge. The customs house was stormed by armed assault and the whaler crew seized and carried back to Vengeance. An angry crowd that gathered on the docks was dispersed by pistol fire and Vengeance then returned to the Mersey. Nightingale subsequently had the whaler crew flogged; those that were eligible for impressment were also kept on board and added to the Royal Navy ranks.

Vengeance joined Commodore Robert Duff's squadron in October 1759, and was part of Admiral Sir Edward Hawke's fleet at the Battle of Quiberon Bay on 20 November 1759. The following year she scored a success against privateers, capturing the letter-of-marque Comte de Nancy on 6 April 1760.

Vengeance departed for Quebec on 22 June 1760, but was back in Britain by September. Her success against privateers continued into 1761; she captured the Minerve on 27 January.

On 13 March Vengeance captured the letter-of-marque Entreprenant, pierced for 44 guns, but armed en flûte with twenty-six 6 and 12-pounder guns. Entreprenant had a crew of 203 men and was carrying a cargo from Bordeaux to San Domingo. The engagement involved three exchanges of fire lasting in total some three hours. Vengeance had six men killed and 27 wounded, most dangerously; two died later. The French suffered 15 men killed and 24 wounded before they struck. On 23 March Vengeance captured the privateer Tigre. This was a small vessel out of Saint Malo, armed with four carriage guns and four swivel guns. She had a crew of 45 men under the command of Joseph Merven. She had left Abbrevak on the 21st and had not captured anything before falling prey to Vengeance off The Lizard.

Vengeance captured the 12-gun privateer Auguste, of La Rochelle, on 5 April, and was paid off in June 1761. She was surveyed on 8 August 1763, and again on 26 August 1766. This time an admiralty order was issued on 4 September for her to be fitted as a breakwater, and she was scuttled at Plymouth in October.



 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1780 - HMS Alexander (74) and HMS Courageux (74), Cptn. Charles Feilding, took french Monsieur.


HMS Alexander was a 74-gun third-rate of the Royal Navy. She was launched at Deptford Dockyard on 8 October 1778. During her career she was captured by the French, and later recaptured by the British. She fought at the Nile in 1798, and was broken up in 1819. She was named after Alexander the Great.

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Launch of HMS Alexander at Deptford in 1778 (BHC1875), by John Cleveley the Younger (NMM) - HMS Alexander is the ship still on the slipway, centre background

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British service and capture
On 13 March 1780, Alexander and HMS Courageaux captured the 40-gun French privateer Monsieur after a long chase and some exchange of fire. The Royal Navy took the privateer into service as HMS Monsieur.

In 1794, whilst returning to England in the company of HMS Canada after escorting a convoy to Spain, Alexander, under the command of Rear-Admiral Richard Rodney Bligh, fell in with a French squadron of five 74-gun ships, and three frigates, led by Joseph-Marie Nielly. In the Action of 6 November 1794 Alexander was overrun by the Droits de l'Homme, but escaped when she damaged the Droits de l'Homme's rigging. Alexander was then caught by Marat, which came behind her stern and raked her. Then, the 74 gun third-rate Jean Bart closed in and fired broadsides at close range, forcing Bligh to surrender Alexander. In the meantime, Canada escaped. The subsequent court martial honourably acquitted Bligh of any blame for the loss of his ship.

The French took her to Brest and then into their French Navy under the name Alexandre. On 22 June 1795, she was with a French fleet off Belle Île when the Channel Fleet under Lord Bridport discovered them. The British ships chased the French fleet, and brought them to action in the Battle of Groix. During the battle HMS Sans Pareil and HMS Colossus recaptured Alexander. After the battle, HMS Révolutionnaire towed her back to Plymouth.

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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan with stern board outline, sheer lines with inboard detail, and longitudinal half-breadth for Alexander (1778), a 74-gun Third Rate, two-decker, as built at Deptford Dockyard.

Return to British service
The Alexander took part in the Battle of the Nile in 1798, under the command of Captain Alexander Ball. She was the second ship to fire upon the French fleet, engaging the flagship, L'Orient. The Alexander sank three French ships before she had to withdraw due to a small fire on board. The Alexander was one of the few ships not carrying a detachment of soldiers.

Northumberland, Alexander, Penelope, Bonne Citoyenne, and the brig Vincejo shared in the proceeds of the French polaccaVengeance, captured entering Valletta, Malta on 6 April.

Alexander served in the navy's Egyptian campaign between 8 March 1801 and 2 September, which qualified her officers and crew for the clasp "Egypt" to the Naval General Service Medal that the Admiralty issued in 1847 to all surviving claimants.

Fate
From 1803 she was out of commission in Plymouth, and was finally broken up in 1819.



HMS Monsieur was the former 40-gun French privateer Monsieur, built at Le Havre between July 1778 and 1779, then armed at Granville. The Royal Navy captured her in 1780 and subsequently put her into service as a 36-gun Fifth Rate. This frigate was sold in 1783.

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Privateer
From August 1779 to March 1780, Nicholas Guidelou was her captain. On her first cruise, in the space of four months, he captured 28 prizes off the English and Irish coasts. Only three of his prizes were retaken, and he brought into port 543 prisoners and 120 cannon. King Louis XVI honoured Guidelou with a sword and a letter of thanks.

On 28 March 1779, Monsieur captured the Scots letter of marque Leveller, off the harbour of Cork. Two days later, five leaguesoff Cape Clear, Monsieur captured the Polly, sailing for Liverpool. After Polly was ransomed for 1250 guineas, the privateer let her continue her journey. The next day, 1 April, another French privateer fired at Polly, but she was able to take refuge in the port of Skibbereen.

On 14 August 1779 John Paul Jones led a small squadron consisting of Bon Homme Richard, Alliance, Pallas, Vengeance, Cerf, and two privateers, Monsieur and Granville, out of Groa. On 18 August they recaptured the Dutch vessel Verwagting, which an English privateer had captured eight days earlier. She had been carrying brandy and wine from Barcelona to Dunkirk. During the night Monsieur's captain took what he wanted from the prize, and then sent her off to Ostend under his name and with his prize crew. Jones overhauled the prize, put his own prize crew aboard, and sent her off to Lorient under his orders. The next evening Monsieur left Jones's squadron. Granville left either at the same time or soon thereafter.

On 22 January 1780, the Lively was sailing from London to Liverpool when she fell victim to the Irish pirate vessel Black Prince. Lively escaped only to fall victim to Monsieur two days later. Monsieur took all the crew out of Lively, except for three boys, and put a 13-man prize crew aboard. On 4 February, the boys recaptured the ship while almost the entire prize crew was asleep. The next day they sailed to Kinsale where the letter of marque Hercules took possession.

Capture
On 12 March 1780 the Third Rate Alexander, under the command of Captain Lord Longford, was west of Scilly when she spotted a frigate. Alexander gave chase and after 18 hours got within range, at which time the quarry raised French colours. The two vessels exchanged fire for some two hours, the quarry using stern chasers to answer Alexander's bow chasers. As Alexander pulled alongside the quarry, Alexander's fore-top-mast simply fell over due to rot. Fortunately, Courageux, Captain Charles Fielding, had joined the engagement and she took up the chase. Some time and some firing later, the quarry struck. She turned out to be the Monsieur, of Granville, under the command of Jean de Bochet. She was armed with 40 guns, 12-pounders on the gundeck and 6-pounders on the quarterdeck and forecastle, and had a crew of 362 men. She was eight days out of Lorient but had taken no prizes. Longford described her as "a very fine frigate, almost new".

British service
The prize was brought into Portsmouth harbour on 19 March, a week after her capture, and the Admiralty decided to take her into service. She was refitted for Royal Naval service at a cost of £8,364 between May and October 1780, and re-armed as a 36-gun frigate.

The Royal Navy commissioned her as HMS Monsieur under the command of Captain the Honourable Charles Phipps in July 1780. On 10 December, Monsieur, in company with Vestal, St Albans, Portland, and Solebay captured Comtess de Buzancois. A few days later, on 15 December, Monsieur captured the French cutter Chevreuil. Chevreuil, of Saint-Malo, was armed with twenty 6-pounder guns, had a crew of 116 men, and had been launched on 1 March 1779.

In 1781, Monsieur, now commanded by Captain the Honourable Seymour Finch, was serving with Vice-Admiral Darby's Channel Fleet. She therefore participated in the relief of Gibraltar, with the fleet sailing from Spithead on 13 March and arriving at Gibraltar on 12 April. At some point, vessels of the Fleet engaged Spanish gunboats off Cadiz, during which Monsieur and Minerva had some men badly wounded. Monsieur was among the many ships of Darby's fleet that shared in the prize money for the capture of Duc de Chartres, the Spanish frigate Santa Leocadia, and the French brig Trois Amis.

On 9 October 1781, Monsieur, Minerva, Captain Charles Fielding, Flora and Crocodile captured the American privateer Hercules, of 20 guns and 120 men. The next day Minervaand Monsieur captured the American privateer Jason, of 22 guns. Minerva captured the privateer Wexford, which was six weeks out of Boston and had captured nothing. All three privateers were taken off Cape Clear Island, Ireland, and taken into Cork.

On 12 December at the Second Battle of Ushant, Admiral Richard Kempenfelt captured 15 French transports. Monsieur was among the many vessels that shared in the prize money for the Emille Sophie de Brest and the Margueritte, and presumably other prizes.

In the middle of July 1782, Monsieur was in a squadron of four third rates and three frigates under the command of Captain Reeve, in the recently launched Crown, as commodore. In the Bay of Biscay the squadron captured three prizes: the Pigmy cutter, the Hermione, a victualler with 90 bullocks for the combined fleet, and a brig carrying salt.

Fate
Following the conclusion of the war, Monsieur was paid off at Deptford in March 1783. She was sold for £820 on 25 September of that year.


Courageux was a heavy 74-gun ship-of-the-line of the French Navy, launched in 1753. She was captured by the Royal Navy in 1761 and taken into service as HMS Courageux. In 1778, she joined the Channel Fleet and later, was part of the squadron commanded by Commodore Charles Fielding, that controversially captured a Dutch convoy on 31 December 1779, in what became known as the Affair of Fielding and Bylandt. On 4 January 1781, Courageux was west of Ushant, when she recaptured Minerva in a close range action that lasted more than an hour. The following Spring, Courageux joined the convoy, under George Darby, which successfully relieved the besieged Gibraltar.

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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan with stern board decoration and name in a cartouche on the counter, the sheer lines with inboard detail and figurehead, and the longitudinal half-breadth for 'Courageux' (1761), a captured French Third Rate, as taken off prior to fitting as a 74-gun Third Rate, two-decker at Portsmouth Dockyard.

At the start of French Revolutionary War, Courageux took part in the blockade and subsequent occupation of Toulon. In September 1793, she was sent with a squadron under Robert Linzee, to support an insurrection in Corsica and took part in the unsuccessful attack on San Fiorenzo. When Toulon was evacuated, Courageux was in a state of disrepair and was forced to warp out of her mooring without a rudder. She was however able to complete repairs while she rescued allied troops from the waterfront. At the Battle of Genoa in March 1795, she was instrumental in the capture of the French ships Ça Ira and Censeur but at the subsequent Battle of the Hyères Islands, she was so slow getting into the action that by the time she arrived, the order had been given to disengage.

In December 1796, Courageux was with the Mediterranean fleet, anchored in the bay of Gibraltar, when a great storm tore her from her mooring and drove her onto the rocks of the Barbary coast. Of the 593 officers and men that were on board, only 129 escaped; five by means of a launch, and the rest by clambering along the fallen mainmast to the shore.





 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1781 -Launch of HMS Latona, a 36-gun, fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy that served during the American Revolution, the French Revolutionary Wars, and the Napoleonic Wars.


HMS Latona
was a 36-gun, fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy that served during the American Revolution, the French Revolutionary Wars, and the Napoleonic Wars. Shortly after her launch in 1781, she participated in the Battle of Dogger Bank against a Dutch squadron in the North Sea. In September 1782, Latona took part in the relief of Gibraltar and was the first ship in the convoy to pass through the Straits, when Richard Howe sent her ahead, to spy on the condition of the Franco-Spanish fleet in Algeciras Bay.

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Late in 1792, when the British began re-arming in anticipation of another war with France, Latona underwent a refit and was recommissioned for the Channel Fleet. On 18 November 1793, she spotted, chased and engaged a squadron of six ships-of-the-line and some smaller vessels. She was unable to detain the enemy ships for long and they escaped before the rest of the British fleet could catch up. Still with Howe's fleet in May 1794, Latona and her compatriots were waiting for a large grain convoy bound for France from the United States. The British eventually found what they were looking for off Ushant on 28 May, and began a running battle which ended three days later on the Glorious First of June. Latona escaped serious damage despite being actively involved in the battle, coming to the assistance of the ship-of-the-line HMS Bellerophon and firing on two French 74s before towing her to safety.

Latona operated with a British squadron in the Anglo-Russian invasion of Holland during August 1799, and was present at the Vlieter Incident, when a Dutch squadron surrendered without resistance. She subsequently served in the Baltic before being decommissioned and laid up in ordinary, shortly after the Treaty of Amiens. Hostilities resumed in May 1803, but Latona was not brought back into service until the end of 1804. In April 1806, she was sent to the West Indies and was part of a small squadron of four frigates that captured Curaçao, on 1 January 1807. Sailing into the harbour second, behind HMS Arethusa, she helped the British frigate capture the 36-gun Kenau Hasselar before putting men ashore to storm the town and its defences.

When the 40-gun Junon escaped a blockade of the Îles des Saintes in February 1809, she was pursued by Latona, a second frigate and two brigs. As the French frigate engaged the 14-gun HMS Superieure, Latona caught up and forced her to strike. A French expedition to the Caribbean under Amable Troude in April also found itself trapped when it stopped at the Îles des Saintes. When the islands were captured by a force under Major-General Frederick Maitland, the French squadron was forced to flee. Latona, the ship-of-the-line HMS Pompee and the frigate HMS Castor went after the 74-gun Hautpoult which struck two days later, when more British ships appeared on the horizon. Latona was converted to a troopship in May 1810 then hulked in 1813. In October that year, she began service as a receiving ship at Leith, then in December, she was recommissioned as a warship and used as the flagship of Admiral Sir William Johnstone Hope. She was sold in 1816.

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LATONA 1781 lines

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Plan showing the body plan, sheer lines, and longitudinal half-breadth for Latona (1781). CHECK DATE OF PLAN From Tyne & Wear Archives Service, Blandford House, Blandford Square, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 4JA.

Design
Latona was a 36-gun frigate designed by the senior surveyor John Williams and ordered on 22 March 1779. Her keel, of 116 feet 10 inches (35.6 m) was laid down at Limehouse in November 1782 by the shipwright company, Greaves and Purnell. When finished, she was 141 feet 3 inches (43.1 m) along the gun deck, had a beam of 38 feet 11 3⁄4 inches (11.9 m) and a depth in the hold of 13 feet 6 inches (4.1 m). She was 94420⁄94 tons burthen and drew between 10 ft 1 1⁄2 in (3.086 m) and 13 ft 11 1⁄2 in (4.255 m).

The frigate was initially designed to carry a main battery of twenty-eight 18-pounder (8.2 kg) guns, with a secondary armament of ten 6-pounder (2.7 kg) guns on the upperworks. On 30 September the armament was increased by the addition of ten 18-pounder carronades, although only eight were fitted, and fourteen 1⁄2-pounder (0.23 kg) swivel guns. Then on 25 April 1780, it was decided to upgrade the six-pound long guns with 9 pounders (4.1 kg).

In this era it was common for each surveyor to produce independent designs for new ship types, and this design was a counterpoint to Edward Hunt's HMS Minerva; together the two draughts represent the prototype of the thirty-eight gun, 18-pounder armed frigate.

Latona was launched on 13 March 1781 and taken down the Thames to Deptford where she was fitted-out and coppered between 15 March and 21 April. Latona's build and first fitting cost the Admiralty £22,470.3.5d.



 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1782 – Launch of French Puissant, built in 1781-82 to a design by Antoine Groignard as a Pégase class 74-gun ship of the line


Puissant was built in 1781-82 to a design by Antoine Groignard as a Pégase class 74-gun ship of the line. Her captain handed her over to the British at Toulon on 29 August 1793. She arrived at Portsmouth on 3 May 1794. She then remained there as an unarmed receiving ship, sheer hulk, and flagship until her sale in 1816.

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British career
On 28 August 1793, Admiral Lord Hood of the Royal Navy and Admiral Juan de Lángara of the Spanish Navy, committed a force of 13,000 British, Spanish, Neapolitan and Piedmontese troops to the French royalists' cause at Toulon. The next day, the royalists handed over a number of their vessels to the British.

Puissant was under the command of Mon. Ferrand. After her hand-over to British control she spent several weeks laying opposite and firing on a shore battery of 24-pounders at the head of La Seine in Toulon harbor. She then sailed to Portsmouth, arriving there on 3 May 1794. The British government awarded Ferrand a pension of £200 per annum for his services.

In February and March 1796 Puissant was fitted as a receiving ship (at a cost of £10,044) and was commissioned in April under Commander David Hotchkiss. From March 1798 she was under the command of Lieutenant R. Allen, in March 1799 under Lieutenant J. Baker, and then between October 1799 and 1801 under Commander William Syme.

In 1803 Lieutenant James Bowen recommissioned her as a receiving ship. Later that year she became a sheer hulk under Commander James Irwin who remained her captain through 1810. Captain Charles William Paterson succeeded Irwin in 1811 and remained in command until 12 August 1812. In September 1812 Captain Benjamin Page became her captain and she served as the flagship for Admiral Sir Richard Bickerton. She was paid off (decommissioned) in October 1815, and sold on 11 July 1816 (for £2,250) to be taken to pieces.

Prize-money
Although Puissant was unarmed and confined to port, her crew did earn prize money on three occasions. On 26 October 1807, Tsar Alexander I of Russia declared war on Great Britain. The official news did not arrive there until 2 December, at which time the British declared an embargo on all Russian vessels in British ports. Puissant was one of some 70 vessels that shared in the seizure of the 44-gun Russian frigate Speshnoy (Speshnyy), then in Portsmouth harbour. The British seized the Russian storeship Wilhelmina (Vilghemina) at the same time.[4] The Russian vessels were carrying the payroll for Vice-Admiral Dmitry Senyavin’s squadron in the Mediterranean.

Then on 27 August 1808, Puissant and the "armed cutter" Linnet shared in the detention of the Danish ship Deodaris. At the time, Linnet may have been acting as a tender to Puissant.

Lastly, when news of the outbreak of the War of 1812 reached Britain, the Royal Navy seized all American vessels then in British ports. Puissant was among the Royal Navy vessels then lying at Spithead or Portsmouth and so entitled to share in the grant for the American ships Belleville, Janus, Aeos, Ganges and Leonidas seized there on 31 July 1812.

Fate
Puissant was paid off in October 1815. She was then sold on 11 July 1816 for £2,250.


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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan, stern board outline, sheer lines with inboard detail, and longitudinal half-breadth for Puissant (1793), a captured French Third Rate, as taken off at Portsmouth Dockyard possibly after having been refitted as a prison ship. Signed by Nicholas Diddams [Master Shipwright, Portsmouth Dockyard, 1803-1823].


The Pégase class was a class of 74-gun ships of the French Navy, built to a common design by naval constructor Antoine Groignard. It comprised six ships, all ordered during 1781 and all named on 13 July 1781.

The name-ship of the class - Pégase - was captured by the British Navy just two months after her completion; the other five ships were all at Toulon in August 1793 when that port was handed over by French Royalists to the occupying Anglo-Spanish forces, and they were seized by the British Navy. When French Republican forces forced the evacuation of the Allies in December, the Puissantwas sailed to England (and - like the Pégase - was used as a harbour hulk there until the end of the Napoleonic Wars), and the Liberté (ex-Dictateur) and Suffisant were destroyed during the evacuation of the port; the remaining pair were recovered by the French Navy - see their respective individual histories below.

Pégase class (1781 onwards) – Designed by Antoine Groignard.
  • Pégase 74 (launched 15 October 1781 at Brest) – Captured by the British in the Bay of Biscay in April 1782 and added to the RN under the same name, BU 1815
  • Dictateur 74 (launched 16 February 1782 at Toulon) – Renamed Liberté in September 1792, captured by the British at Toulon in August 1793 and burnt by them there in December 1793, repaired by the French but BU 1807
  • Suffisant 74 (launched 6 March 1782 at Toulon) – Captured by the British at Toulon in August 1793 and burnt by them there in December 1793
  • Puissant 74 (launched 13 March 1782 at Lorient) – Captured by the British at Toulon in August 1793 and added to the RN under the same name, sold in 1816
  • Alcide 74 (launched 27 May 1782 at Rochefort) – Captured by the British at Toulon in August 1793, retaken there by the French in December 1793, blown up by the British in the Battle of Hyeres in July 1795
  • Censeur 74 (launched 24 August 1782 at Rochefort) – Captured by the British at Toulon in August 1793, retaken there by the French in December 1793, captured by the British in the Battle of Cape Noli in March 1795, retaken by the French in October 1795, and transferred to Spain in June 1799, BU 1799


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_ship_Puissant_(1782)
 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1795 - HMS Lively (32), Cptn. George Burlton, captured Tourterelle (28), Cptn. Guillaume S. A. Montalan, off Ushant


HMS Lively was a 32-gun fifth-rate Alcmene-class frigate of the British Royal Navy launched on 23 October 1794 at Northam, Devon. She took part in three actions that would in 1847 qualify for the issuance of the Naval General Service Medal, one a single-ship action, one a major battle, and one a cutting-out boat expedition. Lively was wrecked in 1798.

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Service
Lively was commissioned in October 1794 under Captain Viscount Lord Garlies. On 4 March 1795 she captured the French corvette Espion about 13 leagues off Ushant. Espion was armed with eighteen 6-pounder guns and had a crew of 140 men. She was five days out of Brest on a cruise. Captain George Burlton, acting in the absence of Lord Garlies, who was sick on shore, commanded Lively. Four days later Lively recaptured the ship Favonius.

On 13 March 1795 she captured the French corvette Tourtourelle. Lively sighted three vessels and headed for the larger one, which tacked to meet her. After three hours of exchanging fire the French vessel was so disabled that she struck. She turned out to be the 28-gun corvette Tourtourelle, under the command of Captain Guillaume S. A. Montalan. She had lost 16 men killed and 25 wounded; Lively had only two men wounded. The British took Tourtourelle into service as HMS Tourterelle. The Admiralty would recognize the action in 1847 with the award of the Naval General Service Medal with clasp "Lively 13 March 1795". Lively also captured the other two vessels that Tourterelle had been escorting. They had been prizes to Espion.

Lively captured the Danish ship, Concordia on 27 February 1796 but had to share the prize money with 13 allied ships that were in sight at the time.

Lively was present at the Battle of Cape St. Vincent under the command of Captain Lord Garlies. She and three other British frigates jointly fired on a Spanish ship-of-the-line that had gotten separated from the rest, but other than that Lively took no significant part in the combat and suffered no losses. Her main function was to repeat signals. She did take possession of the San Ysidro (or San Isidro), one of the Spanish vessels that surrendered. In 1847 the Admiralty authorized the issuance of the NGSM with clasp "St. Vincent" to the 348 surviving claimants from the battle.

In 1797 Captain Benjamin Hallowell assumed command. On 29 May, during the battle for Santa Cruz, Lieutenant Thomas Hardyled a cutting out party using boats from Minerve and Lively to capture the French 16-gun corvette Mutine. The cutting out party boarded and captured the vessel; they then sailed her out of the port to the British fleet under heavy fire from shore and naval guns. Hardy was wounded during the action, as were 14 of the other British officers and men in the cutting out party. The British subsequently commissioned Mutine under her existing name with Hardy as commander. In 1847 the Admiralty authorized the issuance of the NGSM with clasp "29 May Boat Service 1797" to the three surviving claimants from Lively and Minerve.

In October 1797 Minerva and Lively captured the Marselloise as she was sailing from Guadeloupe to France. They then took the richly-laden former Sugar Cane into Martinique.

On 5 January 1798, Mercury captured the 16-gun privateer Benjamin. Alcmene, Thalia and Lively joined the chase and shared in the capture.

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Lines (ZAZ2926)

Fate
On 12 April 1798, she was under the command of Captain James Nicoll Morris when she was wrecked on Rota Point off Cadiz. She and Seahorse were patrolling to intercept any ships trying to enter or leave the port. During the night she grounded and despite all efforts by Seahorse, she could not be pulled off. In the morning of 14 April it became apparent that Spanish gunboats were marshaling, while shore batteries started to fire on the British vessels and the boats transferring the crew to Seahorse; In the process, only one man was lost. Morris then set fire to Lively as he left. The subsequent court martial acquitted Morris and his officers of all blame.


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Scale 1:48. Plan showing the inboard profile for Pallas (1793), Stag (1793), Unicorn (1734),all 32-gun, Fifth Rate Frigates. The plan was later used in 1793 for Cerberus (1794) and in 1795 for Galatea (1794), Lively (1794), Alcemene (1794), Maidstone (1795), and Shannon (1796). The alterations in red relate to Maidstone and Shannon only.

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Frame (ZAZ2927)


Cerberus (or Alcmene) class 32-gun fifth rates 1794, designed by John Henslow.



 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1795 - Battle of Genoa - Part I


The Battle of Genoa (also known as the Battle of Cape Noli and in French as Bataille de Gênes) was a naval battle fought between French and allied Anglo-Neapolitan forces on 14 March 1795 in the Gulf of Genoa, a large bay in the Ligurian Sea off the coast of the Republic of Genoa, during the French Revolutionary Wars. The French fleet was led by Contre-amiral Pierre Martin and comprised 14 (later 13) ships of the line while the British Royal Navy and Neapolitan fleet, under Vice-Admiral William Hotham mustered 13 ships of the line. The battle ended with a minor British-Neapolitan victory and the capture of two French ships.

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The battle was part of a naval campaign in the spring of 1795, during which Martin sought to assert French control over the waters off Southern France. These had been effectively ceded to the British 18 months earlier when the British captured the French Mediterranean naval base of Toulon. Although it was recaptured at an ensuing siege, the main French Mediterranean fleet had been burned in the harbour. Only half the fleet was salvageable and as repairs continued in Toulon, the British used their dominance to invade and capture the island of Corsica during 1794. By the start of 1795 enough French ships were in fighting condition that Martin felt able to make limited cruises in the Ligurian Sea. At the start of March 1795 he sailed for Genoa, encountering and capturing a British ship of the line en route. Off Genoa Martin found himself pursued by Hotham's fleet and, after two days of manoeuvres in calm weather, the French admiral turned back towards the French coast.

Hotham pursued, and on 13 March his leading ships caught the French rearguard. For two days Martin's rearmost ships fought a series of running engagements with the British fleet in which several ships from both sides were badly damaged. Martin's flagship the 120-gun Sans Culotte lost contact with the battle overnight, and after a brief resumption of the battle the following morning he gave orders to withdraw. Two French ships, Ça Ira and Censeur, were left behind, overwhelmed, and forced to surrender by the British. Hotham was urged by his subordinate, Captain Horatio Nelson, to continue pursuit, but refused and withdrew his fleet for repairs. One British ship, HMS Illustrious, was later wrecked on the Italian coast. Martin sent his damaged ships into Toulon for repairs and anchored the rest of the fleet in the Îles d'Hyères in preparations for further operations; four months later the fleets fought a second engagement, the Battle of the Hyères Islands, which also ended in a minor British victory.


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"The 'Agamemnon' engaging the Ça Ira', 13 March 1795". Nicholas Pocock, 1810. NMM

Background
The French Revolutionary Wars expanded significantly in February 1793 when the National Convention of the newly-formed French Republic declared war on the Kingdom of Great Britain. To defend British commercial interests in the Mediterranean Sea, a Royal Navy fleet was assembled and sent to blockade the French Mediterranean Fleet in their main port of Toulon on the Southern coast of France. On arrival in August 1793, the British fleet found that Toulon was in a state of upheaval due to the Reign of Terror, and the British commander Lord Hood persuaded the citizens to declare for the French Royalist cause and allow British forces to seize the town and the French fleet. Republican forces laid siege to the city and four months of heavy fighting followed until the Royalists and their allies were expelled on 18 December. During the chaotic evacuation of the city most of the French Mediterranean fleet was set on fire by British and Spanish boarding parties.

In the aftermath, the British launched an invasion of Corsica while the French set about rebuilding their fleet. Due to failures by Spanish landing parties, many of the naval stores in Toulon had survived the fire as had more than half of the fleet, although many ships were badly damaged. For most of 1794 the surviving French ships remained in harbour, the new commander Contre-amiral Pierre Martin leading a brief sally in June with seven ships of the line which was forced to shelter at Gourjean Bay to escape an attack by Lord Hood's fleet. Problems stemming from the French Revolution several years earlier meant that the French fleet was suffering severe reductions in experience and morale in comparison with the British fleet.

By 1795 the full surviving strength of the French Mediterranean Fleet had been restored, Martin mustering 15 ships of the line and six frigates for an operation in the Ligurian Sea. The purpose of this operation is uncertain; the report of the Committee of Public Safety to the National Convention stated that the fleet was at sea to secure shipping lines in the Mediterranean, while other sources indicate that an amphibious landing in Corsica was the intention. Such an operation is mentioned in the correspondence of Représentant en mission from the National Convention, Étienne-François Letourneur, sent to provide political oversight for the fleet. This plan was also indicated by the numbers of troopships assembling in Toulon, although these vessels did not leave harbour during the operation. Historian Adolphe Thiers has suggested that the objective may have been a demonstration of force against Rome, following the lynching of French ambassador Nicolas Bassville there two years earlier.

Martin's cruise
See also: Order of battle at the Battle of Genoa
Martin was reluctant to leave Toulon until he could be certain that the lax British blockade of the port had been temporarily retired. Hood had been replaced in late 1794 by his deputy Vice-Admiral William Hotham, who based his ships in San Fiorenzo Bay on the northern coast of Corsica during the winter. There they had attempted partial refits and one ship, HMS Berwick, had been badly damaged due to poor handling during a gale. In late February Hotham sailed for more extensive repairs at Leghorn in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, leaving Berwick behind. Martin received news of Hotham's departure at the start of March, and sailed from Toulon on 3 March.

The French fleet faced a series of gales, and it took four days to reach the Corsican coast; two ships were partly dismasted during the passage. There Martin's scouts discovered the damaged Berwick limping around Cap Corse with jury masts. Recognising his superiority, Martin detached a squadron of frigates and ships of the line to chase Berwick and a short battle developed in which the fleeing Berwick fought the frigate Alceste. Both ships took damage in the encounter, but as Alceste dropped back, a bar shot tore the head off Captain Adam Littlejohn on Berwick. With other ships coming into range, Berwick unable to escape and their captain dead, the surviving officers decided to surrender. Martin ordered the captured Berwick and the damaged Alceste to detach for the protected anchorage at Gourjean Bay, while his fleet continued eastwards into the Gulf of Genoa.

On same day as the capture of Berwick, news of the French departure from Toulon reached Hotham at Leghorn from Genoa, with reports that the French had passed Île Sainte-Marguerite on 6 March, heading east. This was corroborated by the scouting sloop HMS Moselle, which reported the French to the north-west, heading south. Within a day Hotham's fleet was ready to sail, leaving the harbour in the early morning of 9 March. Hotham believed that the French target was Corsica, and sent the brig HMS Tarleton under Commander Charles Brisbane to warn Littlejohn and arrange a rendezvous with Berwick off Cap Corse. On the evening of 9 March Tarleton returned with the news of the capture of Berwick, causing Hotham to veer north-west in his course. The following day the frigates scouting ahead of the British fleet discovered Martin's fleet off Cape Noli in the Gulf of Genoa, steering westwards, back towards Toulon.

Chase
The weather was calm, and it was not until 11 March that ships from the main body of the British fleet sighted the French, now south and to windward of the British. The lead ship in Hotham's fleet at this time was HMS Princess Royal, leading a vanguard some 5 or 6 nautical miles (11 km) ahead of the main body of the fleet. Contact was lost for a time, but re-established on 12 March when Martin brought his fleet about. Martin advanced to within 3 nautical miles (5.6 km) of Princess Royal before tacking away to larboard. The weather remained calm with choppy seas which made manoeuvring very difficult and prevented either fleet from closing for battle; when presented with the opportunity to attack, Martin declined.

A breeze from the south in the evening gave Hotham the opportunity to form up his fleet into a line of battle with the van to the west, the French to the southwest. The night was characterised by heavy squalls, and the French ship Mercure lost a topmast; the damaged ship detached to join Berwick at Gourjean Bay, accompanied by a frigate, while continuing to steer his fleet to the west away from the British. At 08:00 the following morning another of Martin's ships, the large 80-gun Ça Ira from the rearguard of the French fleet, collided with the neighbouring Victoire and its fore and main topmasts collapsed overboard.

By the morning of 13 March it had become clear to Hotham that Martin had no intention of engaging the British fleet, and the British admiral decided to authorise a general chase, permitting his captains to break from the line and pursue the French to the best of their ships' ability. The leading ship of the chase was a frigate, the 36-gun HMS Inconstant under Captain Thomas Fremantle, which reached the damaged Ça Ira within an hour of the collision and opened fire at close range on the larboard quarter.

Seeing that Ça Ira was under threat, the French frigate Vestale attacked Inconstant from a distance, pulled past the British ship and attached a tow line to the limping ship of the line. Fremantle brought his ship around and fired into Ça Ira again, but on this occasion was exposed to the main broadside of the French ship and was subject to cannon-fire which caused casualties of three killed and 14 wounded, as well as significant damage. Unable to continue the action, Fremantle pulled back for repairs. The attack by Inconstant had allowed other British ships to join the action, so that at 10:45 the 64-gun HMS Agamemnon under Captain Horatio Nelson was able to open fire on the French ship.

Agamemnon, supported briefly by HMS Captain under Captain Samuel Reeve, retained contact with Ça Ira, firing on the French ship at long range for three and a half hours. Nelson had been able to position his ship off the stern of Ça Ira and weave back and forth behind the French ship, unleashing a devastating raking fire. The attack killed or wounded 110 crew on the French ship, and shattered the masts and rigging. Nelson had just seven men wounded in the encounter. Efforts by Sans Culotte and Barra to intervene were driven off and Ça Ira was severely damaged by Agamemnon's fire. Eventually parts of the French centre dropped back in support and Hotham ordered Nelson to fall back rather than risk being overwhelmed. While this combat continued other British ships had come up, HMS Bedford and HMS Egmont engaging three French ships, including Timoléon and Martin's flagship the 120-gun Sans Culotte. Egmont was hampered during the engagement by an explosion of a bursting cannon on the lower deck, which caused nearly 30 casualties among the gun crews. Hotham's fleet was unable to fully engage with the retreating French throughout the day however, and when night fell both fleets continued westwards, the French withdrawing with the British line in pursuit.

Battle rejoined
During the night Martin and Letourneur transferred from Sans Culotte to the frigate Friponne, which allowed them to move through the fleet more easily and direct operations more effectively, and was part of French standing orders when in a fleet battle. Orders were given for the French fleet, now in full retreat towards Toulon, to sail close to the wind on the larboard tack away from the British. For unexplained reasons Sans Culotte did not follow these orders and dropped out of the fleet during the night, while Ça Ira dropped further and further behind the main body of the French force. To better protect the damaged ship, Vestale was withdrawn and replaced with the ship of the line Censeur, towing Ça Ira back towards Toulon.

In the morning the fleets were manoeuvring 21 nautical miles (39 km) southwest of Genoa, the British closing on the French line to the west. Ça Ira and Censeur had fallen a long way back from the French fleet, and Hotham sent his fastest ships in pursuit, propelled by a northwesterly breeze. By 06:30 Bedford and Captain had caught up with the French stragglers, Captain in the lead fighting both for 15 minutes before Bedford reached the engagement. Captain suffered severe damage to its rigging, sails and masts and by 07:50 was unmanageable and drifting out of the action, and was towed to safety. Shortly afterwards Bedford too was forced to withdraw with extensive damage to the sailing rig. Both French ships had also been badly damaged, and were left drifting out of control, unable to unite with Martin's main fleet.

Martin sought to defend his beleaguered rearmost ships, and gave orders for his line to wear in succession so as to cut between the British fleet and the badly damaged Ça Ira and Censeur, which were now threatened by the recently arrived HMS Illustrious and HMS Courageux. Both fleets were by this point beset by a period of calm weather which made manoeuvres difficult, and the French turn caught HMS Lowestoft by surprise, the frigate suddenly under the guns of the leading French ship Duquesne under Captain Zacharie Allemand. Allemand fired on the frigate, and Captain Benjamin Hallowell, aware that he could not effectively respond, sent his entire crew below decks to protect them from the French gunfire. Lowestoft was badly damaged in sails and rigging, but was saved from further loss by the arrival of the Neapolitan frigate Minerva which interceded with Duquesne.

In turning, Allemand failed to follow orders effectively, meaning that instead of passing to leeward of the British ships, between the enemy and Ça Ira and Censeur, he passed to windward, sailing down the other side of the British vanguard. Hotham had succeed in interposing his ships between the shattered French ships and Martin's main fleet, and it seemed that a close general action was inevitable. At 08:00 Allemand engaged Illustrious and then Courageux, Duquesne joined in the attack by Victoire and Tonnant, and the British ships supported more distantly by Agamemnon and Princess Royal. For an hour the French and British vanguards exchanged heavy fire, with Illustrious taking the worst of the exchange, drifting out of the battle heavily damaged; the mainmast had collapsed onto the mizzen mast and both had fallen over the side, while the ship's crew had suffered 90 casualties. Courageux was the next to suffer, similarly losing two masts and with the hull shattered by French shot. Captain Augustus Montgomery's crew had lost nearly 50 sailors killed and wounded. The French ships in this exchange were reported as firing heated shot, although it had little effect on the battle. Allemand's van squadron then pulled away from the drifting British ships, which were unsupported by the becalmed British fleet.

The rest of the French fleet had not followed Allemand, and turned away, the van following. This left the battered Ça Ira and Censeur trapped on the far side of the British fleet, Martin abandoning them to their fate. Isolated, these ships surrendered at 10:05. Without British pursuit, concerted long range firing finally ceased at 14:00; Hotham had decided that addressing the severe damage to his van ships and securing the prizes was more important than continuing the action and tacked his fleet away from Martin's rapidly disappearing ships. Nelson believed that by abandoning the prizes and disabled ships and closely following the French, Hotham could force an action which might destroy the entire French fleet. So convinced was the British captain that he took a boat to Hotham's flagship HMS Britannia to try and persuade the admiral. Hotham refused, replying that "We must be contented, we have done very well". No amount of appeals by Nelson or Rear-Admiral Samuel Goodall on Princess Royal could move Hotham to continue the action, and soon the French were out of sight.

..............


 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1795 - Battle of Genoa - Part II


Aftermath
Hotham gathered his prizes and dismasted ships and turned eastwards for the anchorage in the Gulf of La Spezia. All of his battle line had been in action and taken casualties, with the heaviest losses aboard the badly damaged and partially dismasted Illustrious and Courageux. Captain, Bedford, Egmont and HMS Windsor Castle were also damaged, all suffering more than 20 casualties. British and Neapolitan total losses amounted to 74 killed in action and 284 wounded. French losses were not fully accounted in the aftermath of the battle, although the cumulative total on the shattered Ça Ira and Censeur was listed in British accounts as approximately 400 casualties. Among the surviving French ships casualties are not known with precision, but Duquesne, Victoire, Tonnant and Timoléon were all recorded as being badly damaged.

Hotham's ships anchored in the Gulf of La Spezia after the action, and on 17 March were struck by a heavy gale, in which the damaged Illustrious broke its tow rope to the frigate HMS Meleager and began to drift towards the coast. The ship's jury masts were lost overboard and the many holes in the hull allowed water to pour into the ship. At 13:30 the ship's situation was worsened when a loaded cannon fired accidentally, blowing off the gunport and blasting a large hole in the ship from the inside. This rendered Illustrious unmanageable, and by 14:00 the Italian coast was clearly visible to the east. His ship drifting dangerously inshore, at 14:30 Captain Thomas Frederick gave control to a sailor on board who claimed to have navigated the region and knew a safe anchorage. For five hours Illustrious struggled to avoid disaster, but at 19:30 the ship grounded near Avenza. Frederick attempted to anchor in an effort to save the ship, but this failed due to battle damage and strong winds and waves tore the rudder off at 22:30.

The following morning Tarleton came alongside the irreparably damaged Illustrious, although it was not until 20 March that the weather had abated sufficiently to permit the evacuation to begin. Tarleton, Lowestoft, HMS Romulus, and teams of ship's boats, successfully removed all of the crew and most of the ship's stores without casualties. Once the wreck had been cleared, it was set on fire and abandoned. The surviving fleet remained at La Spezia for a week effecting basic repairs, before sailing for San Fiorenzo on 25 March. Refits lasted until 18 April, at which point Hotham returned to Leghorn. Both prizes were commissioned into the Royal Navy at San Fiorenzo under their original names, although neither had long careers; Censeur was sent to escort a convoy to Britain in the late summer of 1795, still in a damaged state, and was attacked, isolated and recaptured by a French squadron off Cape St. Vincent at the Action of 7 October 1795. Ça Ira survived only a little longer, catching fire accidentally while at anchor off San Fiorenzo on 11 April 1796 and being completely destroyed, although only four of the 600 crew were killed.

Martin retreated to Hyères after the battle, joined shortly afterwards by the damaged ships from Gourjean Bay and the flagship from Genoa. After separating during the night of 13 March, Sans Culotte had sought to rejoin the French fleet but been sighted and chased by a Spanish squadron, sheltering in the neutral port until the route back to France was clear. Martin sent the most damaged ships back to Toulon for refit, remaining at anchor off Hyères with 11 ships of the line until April, when he too returned to port, joined by reinforcements from the French Atlantic Fleet. The captains of Sans Culottes, Mercure and Duquesne were reprimanded by Martin for failing to follow his orders, but subsequently cleared of misconduct by a jury, which also highly commended the captains of Ça Ira and Censeur. He did not sail again until June, and was caught by Hotham once more in early July. Retreating towards Hyères, the French fleet was pursued by the British, and the rearmost ship Alcide was overrun and destroyed at the Battle of the Hyères Islands.

Although the battle was a British victory, Nelson was privately scathing of Hotham's refusal to renew the action, writing that "I could never have called it well done". Sir William Hamilton, British ambassador to the Kingdom of Naples, shared Nelson's opinion, writing that "I can, entre nous, perceive that my old friend Hotham is not quite awake enough for such a command as that of the King's fleet in the Mediterranean." Hotham believed his actions vindicated by the prevention of possible French landings on Corsica and was preoccupied by events on land, where a peace treaty between France and Tuscany placed access to the harbour at Leghorn in jeopardy. Historians have criticised Hotham's timidity, William Laird Clowes writing in 1900 stated that "it was an unsatisfactory victory. Hotham took two ships of the line but gained little credit, seeing that he might have, and should have, done much more." More than five decades after the battle the Admiralty recognised the action with a clasp attached to the Naval General Service Medal, awarded upon application to all British participants still living in 1847.




The Order of battle at the Battle of Genoa recounts the British-Neapolitan and French fleets which participated in a short campaign in the Gulf of Genoa during the French Revolutionary Wars. The campaign featured the principal Battle of Genoa on 13–14 March 1795, and an earlier smaller battle off Cap Corse on 8 March. Losses were even: although the British succeeded in capturing two French ships in the main action, two British ships were also lost elsewhere during the campaign. The French foray into the Ligurian Sea was driven back to a safe harbour, resulting in a restoration of the British blockade of Toulon, and leading to a second battle later in the year.

The campaign began on 3 March when the French Mediterranean Fleet sailed from the naval base at Toulon for an operation in the Ligurian Sea. During the winter they had been under constant blockade from a British fleet based at San Fiorenzo on Corsica, which had been captured in a British invasion the previous year. In February the British fleet, under the command of Vice-Admiral William Hotham, had sailed from San Fiorenzo to Leghorn for repairs, leaving behind HMS Berwick, damaged in a January storm. When news of Hotham's withdrawal reached Toulon, Contre-amiral Pierre Martin sailed the French fleet out and caught Berwick off the northern coast of Corsica. The damaged ship was unable to outrun pursuit and surrendered at the Action of 8 March 1795 after the captain was decapitated by French shot.

Hotham discovered Martin's movements and sailed to meet him, encountering the French near Cape Noli on 10 March. For several days both fleets lay becalmed, unable to come to action. On 13 March the wind increased and Hotham attacked, Martin falling back under pursuit. One of Martin's rearguard, Ça Ira, collided with another ship and fell back. Ça Ira was engaged by first the frigate HMS Inconstant and then HMS Agamemnon under Captain Horatio Nelson. Elsewhere there was scattered fighting between other British and French ships. Over night the French flagship accidentally detached from the fleet, and in the morning Hotham renewed the attack, overwhelming Ça Ira and the Censeur, sent to support it. A French counterattack was beaten off, although HMS Illustrious and HMS Courageux were badly damaged.

Hotham declined to renew the action due to concern for his damaged ships, to the frustration of his subordinates, particularly Nelson. The French withdrew to Gourjean Bay and then Toulon, and the British to the Gulf of La Spezia. There a storm drove the damaged Illustrious ashore, and the ship was destroyed. In the aftermath both fleets refitted and prepared for another engagement; in early July the French fleet was again attacked by the British, at the Battle of the Hyères Islands, and the rearmost ship Alcide was overrun and destroyed


Hotham's fleet
Note that as carronades were not traditionally taken into consideration when calculating a ship's rate,[14] these ships may have been carrying more guns than indicated below. Officers killed in action are marked with a symbol.

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Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1795 - Battle of Genoa - Part III - some important vessels


The Couronne was an 80-gun ship of the line of the French Navy.

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Career
Couronne was built at Brest, having been started in May 1781 and launched in August that year. She probably was built from the salvaged remains of her predecessor, Couronne, which had been accidentally burnt at the dockyard in April 1781. She had a refit at Toulon in 1784.

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Model of Couronne, on display at the Château de Brest.

French Revolution
In 1792 she was renamed Ça Ira, in reference to the revolutionary anthem Ah! ça ira.

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Ça Ira fighting at the Battle of Genoa on 14 March 1795

On 14 March 1795, she took part in the Battle of Genoa under Captain Coudé, in which a French squadron, under Admiral Pierre Martin, was pursued off Alassio by a superior British fleet consisting of 15 ships of the line under Lord Hotham. During the chase, around 9:00, Ça Ira ran afoul of Victoire, losing her fore and main topmasts and falling back of the French squadron. The frigate HMS Inconstant under Captain Thomas Fremantle caught up and engaged Ça Ira; Vestale came to help, fired distant broadsides at Inconstant and took Ça Ira in tow. Ça Ira began a heavy fire on Inconstant which forced her to retreat. At 10:45, HMS Agamemnon under Captain Horatio Nelson caught up and opened fire, shortly aided by HMS Captain; the artillery duel continued for four hours until French ships came to support Ça Ira, compelling Agamemnon to retreat.

During the night, Vestale was relieved by the 74-gun Censeur in towing the now dismasted Ça Ira. In the morning, the British fleet had come in windward; HMS Captain caught up and engaged the two French ships, which battered her for 1 hour and 15 minutes, leaving her severely damaged, in distress, and eventually to be towed away from the action. HMS Bedford came to reinforce Captain, and had her rigging also severely damaged. The British fire had also reduced Ça Ira and Censeur to an almost helpless state. The main of the French fleet attempted to come to the rescue of her rear again and seize the opportunity of the battered state of the British vanguard, but the lack of wind, incompetent French gunnery, and opposition by HMS Illustrious and HMS Courageux prevented any effective action. Only the Duquesne intervened, and had to retreat after she sustained damage and casualties. Ça Ira and Censeur tried to fight but due to a false manoeuvre Ça Ira collided with Censeur; her rigging fell on Censeur, stranding both ships. As a favourable wind built up, the French squadron retreated, leaving Censeur and Ça Ira without hope of rescue. Men from Agamemnon boarded Ça Ira and captured her. Reduced to hulks, the French ships eventually struck. They were taken into Spezia Bay.

Late career
Ça Ira was commissioned in the Royal Navy, but in too battered a state to serve, she was used as a hospital hulk in Saint-Florent.

Ça Ira was destroyed on 11 April 1796 in an accidental fire; boats from other ships attempted to aid, but as the fire became out of control, Ça Ira was evacuated and brought away from the anchorage. She drifted and ran aground half a mile to the northward of the citadel and burnt to the water line. An inquiry subsequently concluded that the fire had been accidentally put on by a "bottle of combustible matter improperly kept in the carpenters cabin", and acquitted the officers from blame.

Archaeological discovery
In 1988, a 19th-century map was discovered, allowing the discovery of the wreck the following year, and its subsequent excavation. From 1990 to 1995, underwater archaeological survey was undertaken by Tech Sub, a non-profit organisation.


Censeur was a 74-gun Pégase-class ship of the line of the French Navy, launched in 1782. She served during the last months of the American War of Independence, and survived to see action in the French Revolutionary Wars. She was briefly captured by the British, but was retaken after a few months and taken back into French service as Révolution. She served until 1799, when she was transferred to the Spanish Navy, but was found to be rotten and was broken up.

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Construction and early service
Censeur was laid down at Rochefort in August 1781 to a design by Antoine Groignard. Launched on 24 August 1782, she had entered service by October that year. She was one of the ships captured during the occupation of Toulon in 1793, though she was left to fall into Republican hands intact in the withdrawal.

sistership Pegase
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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan, stern board outline with decoration detail and name in a cartouche on the counter, sheer lines with inboard detail and figurehead, and longitudinal half-breadth for Pegase (1782), a captured French Third Rate, as taken off at Portsmouth Dockyard. The plan shows the ship with the French layout of fittings, and the proposed alterations for fitting her as a British 74-gun Third Rate, two-decker. Signed by George White [Master Shipwright, Portsmouth Dockyard, 1779-1793].


Capture
Main article: Naval Battle of Genoa (1795)
On 3 March 1795 Censeur, under her captain Louis-Marie Coudé, formed part of a fleet of 15 ships of the line under the command of Rear-Admiral Pierre Martin, which sailed from Toulon bound for Corsica with 5,000 troops. The fleet was intercepted in the Gulf of Genoa on 13 March by a British force under the command of Vice-Admiral William Hotham, which promptly gave chase to the French. Martin attempted to flee, but in the confusion two of his 80-gun ships, Ça Ira and Victoire, collided, causing the Ça Ira to lose her fore and main topmasts. Several British ships, including the 64-gun HMS Agamemnon under Captain Horatio Nelson, came up to the straggling Ça Ira and opened fire, causing Martin to double back to protect her. A cautious Hotham called his ships back and reformed the line, and as night fell Martin disengaged and resumed his flight, with the Censeur towing the Ça Ira. At daybreak on 14 March the British resumed their attack on the still lagging Ça Ira and Censeur. Martin again attempted to come to their aid, but after some heavy fighting, withdrew with his transports, leaving both ships to be captured by the British. The two ships fought on until Censeur had lost her fore and main masts, and sustained combined casualties of 400 men.

British service and recapture
Main article: Action of 7 October 1795
She was placed under the temporary command of Commander Thomas Boys immediately after her capture, after which Captain Sir John Gore was placed in command. Censeur, jury-rigged and armed en flûte was then sent back to England with a convoy under Commodore Thomas Taylor. It consisted of 63 merchants of the Levant convoy, the 74-gun ships HMS Fortitude under Taylor, and HMS Bedford under Captain Augustus Montgomery, the 44-gun HMS Argo under Captain Richard Randall Burgess, the 32-gun frigates HMS Juno, Captain Lord Amelius Beauclerk, HMS Lutine, Captain William Haggit, and the fireship HMS Tisiphone, Captain Joseph Turner. The convoy called at Gibraltar on 25 September, at which point thirty-two of the merchants left that night in company with Argo and Juno. The rest of the fleet sailed together, reaching Cape St Vincent by the early morning of 7 October. At this point a sizeable French squadron was sighted bearing up, consisting of six ships of the line and three frigates under Rear-Admiral Joseph de Richery. The British ships of the line formed a defensive line, but as they were doing so Censeur's jury-rigged foretopmast carried away, and only having been fitted with a frigate's mainmast, she was obliged to fall behind. Fortitude and Bedford hung back to support her, and resisted the French attack for an hour, during which Censeur's remaining top masts were shot away and she exhausted her supply of powder. Gore surrendered his ship, and the remaining British warships and one surviving merchant of the convoy made their escape.

Last years
She was re-added to French Navy as Révolution and served with them until 1799, when she was transferred by France to Spain in consequence of the Second Treaty of San Ildefonso. In exchange for Censeur the French received the Spanish 74-gun San Sebastian, which they renamed Alliance. Censeur was however found to be rotten, and was broken up.

Notes
a. ^ The six ships of the Pégase-class proved unlucky in their encounters with the Royal Navy. Pégase, the nameship of the class, was captured by the British in 1782, less than a year after being launched, and served in the Royal Navy until 1815. Liberté, Suffisant, Puissant, Alcide and Censeur were all taken by Royalist forces during the occupation of Toulon in 1793, with Liberté and Suffisant being burnt in the withdrawal, Puissant taken away and added to the Royal Navy, and Alcide and Censeur left to fall back into Republican hands. Alcide blew up while fighting a British and Neopolitan fleet at the Naval Battle of Hyères Islands in July 1795.



Orient was an Océan-class 118-gun ship of the line of the French Navy, famous for her role as flagship of the French fleet at the Battle of the Nile in August 1798, and for her spectacular destruction that day when her magazines exploded. The event was commemorated by numerous paintings and poems.

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Career
The ship was laid down in Toulon, and launched on 20 July 1791 under the name Dauphin Royal. In September 1792, after the advent of the French First Republic, and not yet commissioned, she was renamed Sans-Culotte, in honour of the Sans-culottes.

On 14 March 1795, she took part in the Battle of Genoa as flagship of Rear Admiral Martin. She covered the rear of the French line, exchanging fire with HMS Bedford and HMS Egmont, but lost contact with her fleet during the night and was thus prevented from taking further part in the action. In May 1795, Sans-Culotte was again renamed as a consequence of the Thermidorian Reaction, and took her best-known name of Orient.

In 1798, Orient was appointed flagship of the squadron tasked with the invasion of Egypt, under Admiral Brueys, with Captain Casabianca as his flag officer. Orient also ferried the chiefs of the Armée d'Égypte, notably General Bonaparte. The fleet avoided the British blockade and captured Malta before landing troops in Egypt. Afterwards, the squadron anchored in a bay east of Alexandria, in a purportedly strong defensive position. The British 's squadron under the command of Nelson discovered the fleet on 1 August, and Nelson attacked the next day, starting the Battle of the Nile. Nelson had his units sail between the shore and the French ships at anchor, picking them one by one in a cross-fire. Orient eventually came under fire from five ships, caught fire and exploded spectacularly at 22:30.

The number of casualties is disputed: the British reported 70 survivors, reflecting the numbers they rescued aboard their ships, and inferring considerable losses over the 1,130-man complement; however, the crew was far from complete at the time of the battle and a number of survivors might have been picked up by French ships. Contre-amiral Decrès reported as many as 760 survivors.

The explosion is also often presented as a turning point of the battle; as a matter of fact, the battle was won by the British when their reinforcements arrived at nightfall, and the interruption of the fighting was brief after the explosion.

sistership
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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan with sternboard decoration, sheer lines with inboard detail and figurehead, and longitudinal half-breadth for Commerce de Marseilles (captured 1793), a captured French First Rate.

Legacy
The explosion of Orient struck the public of the time, both because of its historical signification and of its spectacular aesthetics. Its romantic load was compounded by the presence aboard of Captain Casabianca's young son, who died in the wreck; this particular detail inspired Felicia Hemans's poem Casabianca:

The boy stood on the burning deck
Whence all but he had fled;
The flame that lit the battle's wreck
Shone round him o'er the dead
Shortly after the battle, Nelson was presented with a coffin carved from a piece of the main mast of Orient, which had been taken back to England for this purpose; he was put inside this coffin after his death at the Battle of Trafalgar.

Archaeology
Between 1998 and 1999, French archaeologist Franck Goddio led an expedition that carried out an underwater archaeological study of Orient's wreck-site. Recovered artifacts included such items as small-arms, coins, personal possessions of crew-members and printing type from a printing press carried on board the vessel. The distribution of artifacts and wreckage on the sea-floor lead Goddio to suggest that Orient was not destroyed by a single explosion, but by two almost-simultaneous explosions.




 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1797 – Launch of HMS Hydra, a fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy, armed with a main battery of twenty-eight 18-pounder guns.


HMS Hydra
launched in 1797 was a fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy, armed with a main battery of twenty-eight 18-pounder guns.

She was built to the design of the captured French frigate Melpomene (taken in 1794).

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Lines (ZAZ2441)

The french Melpomone was the basis for the Hydra
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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan with stern board decoration and name in a cartouche on the counter, the sheer lines with inboard detail and figurehead, and longitudinal half-breadth for Melpomene (captured 1794), a captured French Frigate, as taken off at Chatham Dockyard having been fitted as a 38-gun Fifth Rate Frigate. Note that the plan shows her with a fairly typical French layout of wheel abaft the mizzen and a single set of anchor bitts on the upper deck.

French Revolutionary Wars
Hydra was commissioned in April 1797 under Captain Sir Francis Laforey.

At the Action of 30 May 1798, Hydra, in company with the bomb vessel HMS Vesuvius and the cutter HMS Trial, ran aground the French corvette Confiante, which was destroyed. The corvette Vésuve and an unnamed cutter also ran ashore, but the British were not able to destroy them.

Hydra was anchored at the Nore on Sunday 17 May 1801 (as recorded in the journal of Captain Matthew Flinders of HMS Investigator).

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Capture of the Fort & Vessels in the Spanish Harbour of Begu,(Catalonia) by H.M.Ship Hydra, Capt G Munday Aught 7th 1807
The lithograph shows a bow port-quarter view of the 38-gun HMS Hydra very close to the Catalan coast. Although her sails are unfurled, they are hanging loose and the sea is calm, as her starboard guns fire on the port of Bagur on 7th August 1807. A 13th century fort dominates the hill over-looking the port and defensive watchtowers can be seen on the cliff headland and at the narrow entrance of the harbour. The masts of small local, lateen-rig vessels and possibly a naval vessel can be seen in the harbour. On Hydra’s sheltered port side, two naval cutters are being rowed away, crammed with armed military men. The commander of the Hydra from 1803 was George Mundy, one of Collingwood’s active frigate commanders in harrying the post-Trafalgar French fleet along the Spanish coast. In August 1807, Mundy encountered a flotilla of Spanish supply ships, protected by two French naval sloops, in the gulf of Rosas. They ran for the narrow little harbour of Bagur (the modern spelling appears to be Begur). Mundy, with great daring, went in so close to the coast that the barrels of the guns in the fort and watchtowers could not be lowered enough to hit the Hydra. Mundy ordered Lt Edward O’Brien Drury to take two boats of marines and scale the cliffs. This they successfully did, capturing the fort and then entering the harbour to take French sloops and the local vessels.


Napoleonic Wars
Under the command of Captain George Mundy, for eight years from October 1802 to September 1810, she had an active career in the Napoleonic Wars, including the Blockade of Cadiz (1805-1806).

On 24 June 1803 Hydra and His Majesty's hired armed cutter Rose captured the French privateer Phoebe. Phoebe, of four guns, two swivel guns, and 33 men, had left Cherbourg some seven days earlier. The gun-brig HMS Starling recaptured the brigs William, of Sunderland, and Diana, of London, and their cargoes. She also recaptured Egyptian, of Waterford, which had been sailing in ballast. Phoebe had captured them before she herself was captured. Hydra and Starling arrived at Portsmouth on 29 June.

On 30 January 1804, Hydra and Tribune, operating independently, encountered a French flotilla of 20 vessels off Cape La Hogue, and captured three gun brigs and a lugger. The gun brigs were of 100 tons burthen and new, having been launched only ten days earlier and having been rigged while still in the stocks. They had troops aboard that had embarked the day after the launch. The vessels were from Saint-Malo, sailing to Cherbourg.

Hydra captured brig No. 51 and lugger no. 411. The brig was armed with three 24-pounder guns and was under the command of a lieutenant de vaisseau. She had 50 men aboard, a lieutenant and 26 of whom were from the 32nd Regiment of the Line. The lugger was armed with one 18-pounder, and had 36 men aboard. A lieutenant and 26 of whom were soldiers from the same regiment.

Fortune captured brigs No. 43 and No. 47. These brigs too had three guns each, one 18 and two 24-pounders. No. 43 had 50 men aboard and No. 47 had 60. The reports of the number of men captured are contradictory. Still, both brigs were carrying troops from the same 32nd Regiment (or Demi-Brigade). Before capturing the two brigs, Tribune had destroyed a large boat. Captain Bennet of Tribune further reported that he had seen a frigate, which he believed was Hydra, capture a lugger and continue in pursuit of a brig.

Hydra and Tribune shared the proceeds of the prize money and the head money for brigs Nos. 43, 47, and 51, and the lugger No. 411. However, because the two British vessels were there in different capacities, Hydra being part of a squadron under Admiral Sir James Saumarez, commander of Royal Navy forces in the Channel Islands, and Tribune reporting directly to Admiral George Montagu, Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth, the division of the captains' shares of the prize money was complex.

Hydra shared with Phoebe in the proceeds from the capture between 9 and 15 November 1804 of the vessels Paulina and Sesostris.

After Admiral Lord Nelson defeated the Franco-Spanish fleet at the battle of Trafalgar on 21 October 1805, four French frigates and the brig Furet took refuge at Cadiz, where they remained into February 1806. To try to lure them out, Vice-Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood pulled his ships-of-the-line ten leagues out to sea, leaving only Hydra, under Captain George Mundy, and the brig-sloop Moselle in close blockade. On 23 February a strong easterly wind drove the British off their station, which led the French commander, Captain Louis-Charles-Auguste Delamarre de Lamellerie, to seize the opportunity to escape. On the evening of 26 February Hydra and Moselle were three leagues west of the Cadiz lighthouse when they sighted the French vessels. Mundy began firing rockets and alarm guns to alert Collingwood, while sailing parallel to the escaping French squadron. Mundy then sent Carden in Moselleto try to locate the British fleet. On the morning of 27 February Moselle reached Collingwood, who despatched three frigates to try to catch the French.

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Action Between HMS Hydra and the Furet, 27 February 1806; National Maritime Museum, Greenwich

In the meantime, Hydra had managed to isolate the French brig from her companions, and after a two-hour chase, captured Furet. The French frigates did not come to their brig's aid, and after firing a pro forma broadside, Furet surrendered. Furet was armed with eighteen long 9-pounder guns, and had a crew of 130 men under the command of lieutenant de vaisseau Demay. She was provisioned for a cruise of five months. Under the rules of prize-money, Moselle shared in the proceeds of the capture of Furet. During the next six months, Lamellerie's frigate squadron cruised the Atlantic, visiting Senegal, Cayenne and the West Indies, but failed significantly to disrupt British trade.

Hydra took part in the Peninsular War in 1807, including the bombardment of the defences of the Catalan port of Begur on 7 August 1807. She was then out of commission for nearly three years.

During a refit at Portsmouth in 1813, Hydra was fitted as a troopship and recommissioned in July 1813 under Captain Joseph Digby. From then until finally paying off in 1817 she was employed as a troopship and, in that capacity, for example, Captain Robert Lawson's Company, 8th Battalion Royal Artillery, left Spain on 22 July 1814, on board HMS Hydra, bound for Plymouth.

Fate
Hydra was sold in 1820.

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Frame (ZAZ2443)

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Inboard profile plan (ZAZ2444)


 

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Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1804 - HMS Emerald (36), Cptn James O'Bryen, and armed sloop Fort Diamond, Thomas Forrest, cut out privateer schooner Mozambique (10), Citizen Vallentes, from under the battery at Seron, Martinique


Fort Diamond

Emerald's first lieutenant, Thomas Forest, commanded the 6-gun cutter Fort Diamond on 13 March 1804 when, with 30 of Emerald's crew aboard, she captured a French privateer off Saint-Pierre, Martinique. Contrary winds prevented the privateer, Mosambique, from entering St Pierre and she had sought shelter beneath the batteries at Seron. Because Emerald was too far downwind, Captain O'Bryen used boats and crew from Emerald to create a diversion and draw fire from the battery while Fort Diamond approached from the opposite direction, rounded Pearl Rock (some two miles off the coast), and bore down on Mosambique. Forest put the cutter alongside with such force that a chain securing the privateer to the shore snapped. The 60-man French crew abandoned their vessel and swam ashore. The Royal Navy took Mosambique into service.




HMS Emerald was a 36-gun Amazon-class frigate that Sir William Rule designed in 1794 for the Royal Navy. The Admiralty ordered her construction towards the end of May 1794 and work began the following month at Northfleet dockyard. She was completed on 12 October 1795 and joined Admiral John Jervis's fleet in the Mediterranean.

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In 1797, Emerald was one of several vessels sent to hunt down and capture the crippled Santisima Trinidad, which had escaped from the British at the Battle of Cape St Vincent. Emerald was supposed to have been present at the Battle of the Nile but in May 1798 a storm separated her from Horatio Nelson's squadron and she arrived in Aboukir Bay nine days too late. She was part of Rear-Admiral John Thomas Duckworth's squadron during the Action of 7 April 1800 off Cadiz.

Emerald served in the Caribbean throughout 1803 in Samuel Hood's fleet, then took part in the invasion of St Lucia in July, and of Surinam the following spring. Returning to home waters for repairs in 1806, she served in the western approaches before joining a fleet under Admiral James Gambier in 1809, and taking part in the Battle of the Basque Roads. In November 1811 she sailed to Portsmouth where she was laid up in ordinary. Fitted out as a receiving ship in 1822, she was eventually broken up in January 1836.

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Emerald's sister ship Amazon (right) engaging the French frigate, Droits de l'Homme (centre), with HMS Indefatigable (left)


please read about her intensive career in wikipedia.......





 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1804 - the French privateer schooner Mosambique, built in 1798, captured by Royal Navy in 1804 and took her into service.


HMS
Mosambique
was the French privateer schooner Mosambique, built in 1798, and commissioned as a privateer in 1804. The British Royal Navy captured her in 1804 and took her into service. She served in the West Indies, engaging in several indecisive single-ship actions before she captured one French privateer. She was sold there in 1810.

Origins
Mosambique was built in 1798 and commissioned as a privateer in early 1804. She was cruising under the command of Captain Vallentes and provisioned for three months when captured.

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Capture
On the morning of 13 March 1804, Fort Diamond, the tender to Diamond Rock, was under the command of Emerald's first lieutenant, Thomas Forest. Fort Diamond weathered the Pearl Rock to bear down on a French privateer schooner, Mosambique, which had anchored close to the shore under a battery at Ceron, outside the port of Saint-Pierre, Martinique. In cooperation with Emerald and Pandour, which sent two boats each to create a diversion, Fort Diamond ran alongside the schooner, running into her at a rate of about nine knots an hour. At her approach, the schooner's crew fired a broadside and discharged some small arms before all 50 or 60 crewmen jumped overboard and swam ashore. The impact of Fort Diamond's strike broke the chain that anchored the Mosambique to shore, and the boarding party cut two cables to free her. Fort Diamond's casualties amounted to two men wounded. Mosambique turned out to be armed with ten 18-pounder carronades, though she was pierced for 14 guns. She was from Guadeloupe and under the command of Citizen Vallentes. In April 1827 head-money was distributed for the capture.

The Royal Navy took her into service as HMS Mosambique.

British service
The Admiralty registered Mosambique on 13 March 1804.

In January 1805, Mosambique recaptured the English sloop Experiment, which was carrying a cargo of wood. Mosambique was commissioned in 1806 under the command of Lieutenant John Campbell. That year she was returning from having escorted several vessels to Tortola to join a convoy when she encountered the French privateer Grande Decidé, of 30 guns and 250 men. The privateer tried twice to capture Mosambique, but was driven off both times. Grande Decidé eventually left after Mosambique attacked with a view to boarding, a plan that Grande Decidé's anti-boarding nets frustrated.

In 1807 Mosambique was under the command of Lieutenant John Jackson. Around April she recaptured the Harriet, which she sent into Grenada.

Next Mosambique fought an indecisive action with the French privateer Général Ernouf off Guadeloupe. Général Ernouf had a crew of 110 men, more than twice as many as Mosambique's 45, and 14 cannon to Mosambique's ten. Still, in the engagement General Ernouf lost some 40 men killed and wounded and was forced to break off the action, taking refuge in port, while Mosambique lost only two men.

On 29 March 1808, Cerberus, in company with Lilly, Pelican, Express, Swinger and Mosambique, sailed from Marie-Galante to attack the island of La Désirade. They arrived on 30 March and landed seamen and marines under the command of Captain Sherriff. As the squadron approached they exchanged fire with a battery of 9-pounders covering the entrance to the harbour. The ships' guns silenced the battery and the French surrendered.

On 21 April Mosambique captured the French letter of marque brig Jean Jacques. Jean Jacques was pierced for 18 guns but carried only six long 9-pounders. She was 36 days out of Bordeaux and sailing for Guadeloupe. Captain W.H. Sherriff, of Lily, the commander of the squadron to which Mosambique belonged, reported that he was particularly pleased at the capture as the Jean Jacques had been sent out for "the express Purpose of cruising in these Seas, and, from her superior Sailing, would have proved a great Annoyance to the Trade." While Mosambique was capturing the Jean Jacques, the squadron saw a brig on fire. The squadron's boats went to the brig's assistance, extinguished the flames, and discovered that she was the Brothers of Liverpool, a prize to Jean Jacques. In the entire affair, the British had no casualties and the French suffered only one man wounded.

On 13 October Lieutenant Stephen Briggs took command of Mosambique. However, on 8 December he transferred to Grenada to take command of her.

On 20 December Admiral Alexander Cochrane appointed James Atkins, who had been Acting Master of Grenada, to the rank of Lieutenant and command of Mosambique. Under Atkins she was at the capture of Martinique. In 1847 the Admiralty authorized the issuance of the Naval General Service Medal with clasp "Martinique" to all surviving claimants from the action. The Admiralty appointed Atkins to the command of Grouper. Lieutenant Burton replaced Atkins in command of Mosambique.

Fate
Mosambique was sold in 1810.



 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1806 - The Action of 13 March 1806 was a naval engagement of the Napoleonic Wars, fought when a British and a French squadron met unexpectedly in the mid-Atlantic.


The Action of 13 March 1806 was a naval engagement of the Napoleonic Wars, fought when a British and a French squadron met unexpectedly in the mid-Atlantic. Neither force was aware of the presence of the other prior to the encounter and were participating in separate campaigns. The British squadron consisted of seven ships of the line accompanied by associated frigates, led by Rear-Admiral Sir John Borlase Warren, were tasked with hunting down and destroying the French squadron of Contre-Admiral Jean-Baptiste Willaumez, which had departed Brest for raiding operations in the South Atlantic in December 1805, at the start of the Atlantic campaign of 1806. The French force consisted of one ship of the line and one frigate, all that remained of Contre-Admiral Charles-Alexandre Durand Linois' squadron that had sailed for the Indian Ocean in March 1803 during the Peace of Amiens. Linois raided British shipping lanes and harbours across the region, achieving limited success against undefended merchant ships but repeatedly withdrawing in the face of determined opposition, most notably at the Battle of Pulo Aura in February 1804. With his stores almost exhausted and the French ports east of the Cape of Good Hope that could have offered him replenishment eliminated, Linois decided to return to France in January 1806, and by March was inadvertently sailing across the cruising ground of Warren's squadron.

Linois had twice failed to capture, or even seriously engage, large and valuable British merchant convoys on his cruise. When he saw scattered sails in the distance at 03:00 on 13 March 1806, he decided to investigate in his ship of the line Marengo, in the hope that the ships would again prove to be a merchant convoy. By the time he realised that the approaching ships were actually a powerful naval squadron, he was too close to outrun the lead ship, Warren's flagship HMS London. As London engaged Marengo, the French frigate Belle Poule attempted to escape from the approaching squadron independently, but was also run down and brought to battle by the British frigate HMS Amazon. Both engagements lasted over three hours and were bloody, the French ships surrendering after three and a half hours and losing nearly 70 men between them.

The battle marked the end of Linois's three-year campaign against British trade and was the second British victory of the Atlantic campaign, following the Battle of San Domingo the previous month. Willaumez eventually returned to France, although without many of his squadron who were destroyed by British operations or Atlantic gales. Linois, despite the criticism levelled at him for his failures in the Indian Ocean, was considered to have fought hard and been unlucky to have encountered such an overwhelming force. Made a prisoner of war, Linois was not exchanged by Napoleon, who criticised his behaviour during the campaign and refused to employ him at sea again.

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Background
Further information: Linois's expedition to the Indian Ocean
By March 1806, the French squadron under Contre-Admiral Charles-Alexandre Durand Linois had been operating against British trade in the Indian Ocean and elsewhere since the start of the Napoleonic Wars in 1803. Despatched to India before war was declared, Linois left Brest in March 1803, sailing to the South China Sea in an effort to intercept the China Fleet, a huge merchant convoy from Canton to Britain via Madras that carried goods worth in excess of £8 million. On 15 February 1804, Linois encountered the China Fleet, which due to delays with the squadron in India had sailed without its Royal Navy escort. The loss of this undefended convoy could have devastated the British economy and been the highlight of Linois's career, but instead the French admiral was fooled by a ruse of the convoy commander, Commodore Nathaniel Dance. Dance pretended that some of his East Indiaman merchant ships were disguised ships of the line and engaged Linois at long range, dissuading the French commander from pressing the attack. Dance's merchant ships even pursued the fleeing French squadron for some distance, before resuming their original course. This affair, known as the Battle of Pulo Aura, was a humiliation for Linois and provoked Napoleon's fury when the Emperor was informed of it by the governor of Île de France, Charles Decaen.

Six months later, Linois was operating off the Indian port of Vizagapatam when his squadron encountered the British warship HMS Centurion and two merchant ships under her protection. In the ensuing Battle of Vizagapatam, Centurion was badly damaged; one of the merchant ships was captured and the other driven ashore. Rather than ensure the capture or destruction of Centurion, Linois refused further combat for fear of damaging his ships in shallow coastal waters and withdrew, again provoking censure from Napoleon. In August 1805, Linois was engaged with another convoy of East Indiamen in the central Indian Ocean, but on this occasion was confronted by the ship of the line HMS Blenheim under Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Troubridge. After some ineffectual skirmishing, Linois withdrew again, unwilling to risk taking fatal damage to his ships so far from a safe port. Although he had seized five Indiamen and a number of small ships that had been sailing individually during his three-year cruise, he failed to make a significant impact on British trade in the region and ruined his reputation as a successful naval commander. Deciding to switch his operations to the Atlantic after discovering that a squadron under Rear-Admiral Sir Edward Pellew was searching for him, Linois visited the Cape of Good Hope, where one of his frigates was wrecked. He subsequently cruised the coast of West Africa, capturing two small ships but again failing to make a significant impact on British trade in the region. Learning from an American ship that a British expeditionary force had captured Cape Town, Linois decided to return to France with his remaining ships, the 74-gun ship of the line flagship Marengo and the frigate Belle Poule, sailing northwards and crossing the equator on 17 February.

Unknown to Linois, he was sailing directly into the middle of a complex series of manoeuvres by British and French squadrons known as the Atlantic campaign of 1806. On 13 December, two large French squadrons sailed from Brest under orders to operate against British Atlantic trade. The first, under Vice-Admiral Corentin-Urbain Leissegues, consisting of the 120-gun Impérial, four other ships of the line and three smaller vessels, sailed for the Caribbean. The second under Contre-Admiral Jean-Baptiste Willaumez, who commanded six ships of the line and four smaller vessels, sailed for the South Atlantic. These squadrons were able to escape due to the reduction in the size and diligence of the British continental blockade that had been relaxed in the aftermath of the Trafalgar campaign of 1805, in which 13 French and 12 Spanish ships of the line had been captured or destroyed. These losses significantly reduced the ability of the French and their allies to operate in the Atlantic. However, all of these ships came from the Mediterranean fleets: the Brest fleet had failed to even leave port in support of the campaign and thus survived unscathed. When the blockade was relaxed, the squadrons were able to break out into the Atlantic without resistance, following their orders to avoid combat with significant British forces and to cruise British trade routes in search of lightly protected merchant convoys. In response, the British rapidly mustered three squadrons of their own in pursuit. The first, under Rear-Admiral Sir Richard Strachan, was ordered to the South Atlantic, to operate in the region of Saint Helena. The second under Rear-Admiral Sir John Borlase Warren was sent to the mid-Atlantic, based around Madeira, while the third under Sir John Thomas Duckworth was detached from the blockade of Cadiz. Duckworth pursued Lessigues to the Caribbean and on 6 February annihilated his force at the Battle of San Domingo, but Willaumez avoided encountering any of the squadrons sent to intercept him. Anticipating Willaumez's return to France, the remaining British squadrons took up station in the Mid-Atlantic.

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An engraving from the early nineteenth century depicting the capture of the French ship Marengo by HMS London on 13 March 1806.

Battle
On 13 March 1806, Warren's squadron was cruising in the Eastern Atlantic. Most of the squadron were grouped to the northwest, but HMS London under Captain Sir Harry Burrard-Neale and the flagship HMS Foudroyant under Captain John Chambers White were sailing together some distance from the rest of the British force, in company with the frigate HMS Amazon under Captain William Parker. At 03:00, sails were spotted to the north-east by lookouts on London. Hastening in pursuit with the wind from the south-west, Captain Neale signalled the location of the strange ships to Warren with blue lights, the admiral following with Amazon and the rest of the squadron trailing behind. To the north-east, Linois had also sighted sails in the distance and turned Marengo south-west in pursuit, anticipating a third encounter with a valuable merchant convoy. Captain Alain-Adélaïde-Marie Bruilhac of Belle Poule insisted that the sails were from British warships, but Linois over-ruled him, arguing that any warships would be part of the convoy's escort and could be avoided in the night. It was not until 05:30, when London appeared from the gloom just ahead of Marengo that Linois realised his mistake. He attempted to escape, but his ships had been at sea for an extended period and were sluggish compared to the 98-gun London, which rapidly came alongside the French ship of the line and opened a heavy fire.

Linois returned London's fire as best he could, but by 06:00 he realised that he was outmatched and swung away, issuing orders for Captain Bruilhac in Belle Poule to escape as best he could. The frigate however, which had been firing at London during the battle, continued engaging the larger ship to give Linois support as he attempted to pull away. At 06:15, Bruilhac sighted Amazon bearing down and also withdrew, pulling ahead of Neale's ship which continued to fire into Marengo. Both Marengo and London had suffered severe damage to their rigging, and neither were able to effectively manoeuvre: as a result, Linois was unable to avoid either Neale's continued fire or shots from Amazon as Parker swept past in pursuit of Belle Poule. By 08:30, Parker's frigate was alongside Bruilhac's and the ships exchanged fire over the next two hours, Amazon succeeding in damaging Belle Poule's rigging to prevent her escape. Behind the battling frigates, Marengo had taken further battering from London and by 10:25 also came under fire from Foudroyant, and HMS Repulse under Captain Arthur Kaye Legge. HMS Ramillies under Captain Francis Pickmore was also rapidly coming into range. In the face of this overwhelming force, the French ship of the line had no option but to surrender, although by the time the tricolour was lowered at nearly 11:00, both Linois and Captain Joseph-Marie Vrignaud had been taken below with serious wounds.

Almost simultaneously with the surrender of Marengo, Captain Bruilhac surrendered Belle Poule, the damage inflicted by Amazon and the presence of Warren's squadron persuading him that further resistance was hopeless. French losses in the engagement were severe, Marengo suffering extensive damage to her hull and rigging and losing 63 men killed and 83 wounded from a crew of 740. The latter included both Linois and his son with serious wounds and Captain Vrignaud, who had to have his right arm amputated. Losses on Belle Poule included six killed and 24 wounded from her complement of 330. British losses were comparatively light, London suffering ten dead and 22 wounded and Amazon four killed and five wounded. London was the only British ship damaged, mainly in her rigging, which was hastily repaired in the aftermath of the battle.

Aftermath
On 23 April, a heavy storm swept the Eastern Atlantic, striking Warren's squadron and their prizes. Marengo was seriously damaged, losing all three masts and taking on a large quantity of water that had to be pumped overboard by the understrength crew working in shifts. Five men were drowned. Ramilles also suffered in the high winds, losing almost all her masts and rolling for some hours, completely out of control. It was only when the storm had abated that jury masts could be raised and the scattered ships could rejoin the squadron for its journey back to Britain, arriving at Spithead. Willaumez eventually returned to the North Atlantic in the early summer, passing through the Caribbean before being dispersed in a hurricane, his ships scattered across the Western Atlantic. Most eventually reached France, but the campaign had been another disaster for the French Navy, with less than half of the ships sent out returning to Brest. The loss of Marengo and Belle Poule formed a footnote to the campaign, but the defeat of Linois was widely celebrated in Britain, where both ships were commissioned into the Royal Navy under their French names. Linois was praised for his defence of his ship in the face of overwhelming British force, and historian William James, writing in 1827, considered that had Linois faced London alone he might have had the advantage. Four decades later the battle was among the actions recognised by a clasp attached to the Naval General Service Medal, awarded upon application to all British participants from London and Amazon still living in 1847.

The engagement was not quite the end for Linois' squadron: the last survivor, the frigate Sémillante had originally been ordered to sail for Mexico in March 1805. This plan was foiled by an encounter with the British frigate HMS Phaeton in the Philippines, and Captain Léonard-Bernard Motard returned to the Indian Ocean, operating for the next three years against British shipping from Île de France. Eventually the old frigate was assessed as worn out and sold from service in 1808, operating as a privateer for a year before she was captured in 1809. Napoleon refused to exchange Linois for a British prisoner, and the Emperor's fury at the admiral's failures in the Indian Ocean prevented any subsequent appointments. In 1814, after Napoleon's abdication, the new French regime made Linois governor of Martinique, but when the Hundred Days began, Linois declared for Napoleon and the British invaded and captured his island. His career over, Linois retired. He died some 34 years later, in 1848.




 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1806 - The Action of 13 March 1806
HMS London (90) and HMS Amazon (38) captured Marengo (80), Rear Ad. Linois, and Belle Poule (40) supported by Rear Admiral Sir John Borlase Warren's squadron in the Atlantic.




Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Téméraire class 74-gun ship of the line of the French Navy, active during the French Directory, French Consulate and First French Empire. Renamed Marengo in 1802, she took part in Linois' operations in the Indian Ocean before her capture by the Royal Navy.

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The London Man of War capturing the Marengo Admiral Linois, 13 March 1806 (Print) (PAD5761)

Career
Construction of Jean-Jacques Rousseau began in September 1794 at Toulon, and she was launched on 21 July 1795. In October 1796, under Captain Racord, she was part of the Villeneuve's squadron that sailed from Toulon to Brest.

On 2 December 1802, she was renamed to Marengo, reflecting the political change away from the Revolutionary Republic inspired by Jean-Jacques Rousseau towards the advent of General Bonaparte. On 6 March 1803, she departed Brest as the flagship of a squadron under Admiral Linois, set to take possession of Pondicherry, which the Treaty of Amiens had attributed to France. The squadron also comprised the frigates Belle Poule, Atalante and Sémillante, along with two troopships carrying 1350 soldiers under General Decaen.

From May 1803, tensions rose between France and England. Linois' squadron arrived at Pondicherry on 11 July, where the 64-gun HMS Trident and the sloop HMS Rattlesnake lay at anchor. British authorities delayed the transfer until the French brig Bélierarrived with news that the War of the Third Coalition was about to break out in Europe. Finding his squadron vulnerable to a surprise attack, Linois made a dramatic night escape to Isle de France.


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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body stern board outline, sheer lines with some inboard detail, and longitudinal half-breadth for Marengo (1806), a captured French Third Rate, as taken off at Portsmouth Dockyard prior to being broken up in November 1816. Signed by Nicholas Diddams [Master Shipwright, Portsmouth Dockyard, 1803-1823].

War eventually broke out in September, and Linois reinforced French garrisons at La Réunion and Batavia, and then set out to prey upon British trade in the Indian Ocean. In October, after having sent Atalante to a mission to Muscat, he headed for the Dutch East Indies with Belle Poule and Sémillante, where he expected to find supplies. On his way, he raided the British settlement at Bengkulu, capturing two merchantmen; 5 others were scuttled by fire by their own crews to avoid capture. At Batavia, Linois found little support from the Dutch authorities.

In early 1804, Linois attempted to intercept a large convoy of Honourable East India Company (HEIC) East Indiamen, leading to the Battle of Pulo Aura. The British commander, Commodore Dance, led a vigorous defence and Linois, feeling isolated away from supplies and repairs and unwilling to risk attrition, chose to withdraw. The news of Linois' failure further discredited him at Batavia, and the growing reluctance of the Dutch to provide support to his squadron forced him to return to Isle de France.

In August Linois was cruising in the Indian Ocean in Marengo, together with Atalante and Sémillante. On the 18th, near Desnoeufs Island they encountered and captured two British merchant men, Charlotte and Upton Castle. They had been on their way to Bombay when Linois's squadron captured them.[2]

Linois described Charlotte as being copper-sheathed, of 650 tons and 16 guns. She was carrying a cargo of rice. Upton Castle he described as being copper-sheathed, of 627 tons, and 14 guns. She was carrying a cargo of wheat and other products from Bengal. He sent both his prizes into Isle de France (Mauritius).[2]

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HMS Centurion repelling Marengo at the Battle of Vizagapatam (the battle occurred at a far greater range than depicted).

In September, Linois attempted another raid against a merchant convoy, leading to the Battle of Vizagapatam. British Rear-Admiral Peter Rainier had replaced the small frigate HMS Wilhelmina with the 50-gun HMS Centurion. Although Centurion was not a match for Marengo, she skillfully used her lower draught to keep Marengo at bay in the shallow waters. There again Linois hesitated to commit his forces and withdrew after a four-hour exchange that left Marengo in need to six month worth of repairs.

On 11 July 1805 the East Indiaman Brunswick and the country ship Sarah were off the Point de Galle when they encountered Marengo and Belle Poule. Marengo captured Brunswick and Belle Poule drove Sarah ashore. Marengo and Belle Poule arrived at the Cape of Good Hope on 13 September. By that time their prize, Brunswick had stranded at the Cape and been lost.

In March 1806, Linois set out to return to France with Marengo and Belle Poule, and prey upon British shipping between St. Helena and the Canary Islands on his way home. On 13 March, he detected a group of ship, and sailed in pursuit of what he believed to be a convoy; it was in fact the division of Vice-Admiral Sir John Warren, with seven ships of the line (including the 90-gun London, the 74-gun Ramillies and Repulse, and the 80-gun Foudroyant), two frigates (including the 36-gun Amazon) and one corvette. In the ensuing Action of 13 March 1806, Londonengaged Marengo, which eventually struck her colours; Belle Poule battled against Amazon and later against Ramilles, and had to surrender as well.

Fate
The British took Marengo into service as HMS Marengo. She was used as a prison hulk from 1809 until she was broken up in 1816.


HMS Belle Poule was a Royal Navy fifth rate frigate, formerly Belle Poule, a Virginie-class frigate of the French Navy, which was built by the Crucy family's shipyard at Basse-Indre to a design by Jacques-Noël Sané. She was launched on 17 April 1802, and saw active service in the East, but in 1806 a British squadron under Sir John Borlase Warren captured her off La Palma in the Canary Islands. The Admiralty commissioned her into the Royal Navy as HMS Belle Poule. She was sold in 1816.

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Capture of the 'Gypsy', 30 April 1812: left to right: HMS Belle Poule, Gypsy, and HMS Hermes, by Thomas Buttersworth

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No scale. Plan showing the starboard profile of the figurehead for Belle Poule (1806), a captured French Frigate, now a 32-gun, Fifth Rate Frigate Signed by Nicholas Diddams [Master Shipwright, Portsmouth Dockyard, 1802-1823].

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_London_(1766)
 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1808 - HMS Emerald (36), Frederick Lewis Maitland, took French corvette Apropos (12) in Vivero harbour but had to blow her up after she went aground under fire.


Apropos, sometimes Apropus
Emerald's boats participated in a cutting-out expedition in Viveiro harbour on 13 March 1808. While cruising inshore at around 17:00, Emerald spotted a large French schooner, Apropos,[Note 9] of 250 tons (bm), anchored in the bay. Apropos was armed with twelve 8-pounder guns, though pierced for 16, and had a crew of more than 70 men under the command of lieutenant de vaisseau Lagary.

The crews of the schooner and of the two batteries guarding the harbour had seen Emerald but Maitland still made plans to attack Apropos. He soon discovered it was not possible to place Emerald so as to engage both enemy batteries simultaneously, and instead sent landing parties to silence the guns, which had been firing on his ship since 17:30. The first landing party, led by Lieutenant Bertram and accompanied by two marine lieutenants and two master mates, stormed the outer fort. Maitland then positioned Emerald close to the second battery while a boat under the command of his third lieutenant, Smith, landed about a mile along the shore. This second landing party encountered Spanish soldiers, but drove them off and pursued them inland. By the time Smith's party returned to the beach, Emerald had already silenced the battery. In the darkness, Smith subsequently failed to locate the fort.

The crew of Apropos had run her ashore soon after Emerald had entered the harbour. The harbour batteries having been destroyed, Captain Maitland sent a further force under Midshipman Baird to secure and refloat the French ship. The original landing party under Lieutenant Bertram, which had already encountered and dispersed 60 members of the schooner's crew, met Baird's party on the beach. The British made several unsuccessful attempts to re-float the schooner before being forced to set her afire and depart. British casualties were heavy. Emerald had nine men killed, and 16 wounded, including Lieutenant Bertram. Maitland estimated that French casualties too had been heavy.

In 1847 the Admiralty issued the clasp "Emerald 13 March 1808" to the Naval General Service Medal to the ten surviving claimants from the action.


HMS Emerald was a 36-gun Amazon-class frigate that Sir William Rule designed in 1794 for the Royal Navy. The Admiraltyordered her construction towards the end of May 1794 and work began the following month at Northfleet dockyard. She was completed on 12 October 1795 and joined Admiral John Jervis's fleet in the Mediterranean.

In 1797, Emerald was one of several vessels sent to hunt down and capture the crippled Santisima Trinidad, which had escaped from the British at the Battle of Cape St Vincent. Emerald was supposed to have been present at the Battle of the Nile but in May 1798 a storm separated her from Horatio Nelson's squadron and she arrived in Aboukir Bay nine days too late. She was part of Rear-Admiral John Thomas Duckworth's squadron during the Action of 7 April 1800 off Cadiz.

Emerald served in the Caribbean throughout 1803 in Samuel Hood's fleet, then took part in the invasion of St Lucia in July, and of Surinam the following spring. Returning to home waters for repairs in 1806, she served in the western approaches before joining a fleet under Admiral James Gambier in 1809, and taking part in the Battle of the Basque Roads. In November 1811 she sailed to Portsmouth where she was laid up in ordinary. Fitted out as a receiving ship in 1822, she was eventually broken up in January 1836.



 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1811 - Battle of Lissa (1811) - Part I
Cptn. William Hoste with 3 frigates and one 22 gun ship defeated a Franco-Venetian squadron of 6 frigates and 6 smaller vessels under Bernard Dubourdieu



The Battle of Lissa (sometimes called the Battle of Vis; French: Bataille de Lissa; Italian: Battaglia di Lissa; Croatian: Viška bitka) was a naval action fought between a British frigate squadron and a larger squadron of French and Italian frigates and smaller ships on 13 March 1811 during the Adriatic campaign of the Napoleonic Wars. The engagement was fought in the Adriatic Sea for possession of the strategically important island of Lissa (also known as Vis), from which the British squadron had been disrupting French shipping in the Adriatic. The French needed to control the Adriatic to supply a growing army in the Illyrian Provinces, and consequently dispatched an invasion force in March 1811 consisting of six frigates, numerous smaller craft and a battalion of Italian soldiers.

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The French invasion force under Bernard Dubourdieu was met by Captain William Hoste and his four ships based on the island. In the subsequent battle, Hoste sank the French flagship, captured two others, and scattered the remainder of the Franco-Venetian squadron. The battle has been hailed as an important British victory, due to both the disparity between the forces and the signal raised by Hoste, a former subordinate of Horatio Nelson. Hoste had raised the message "Remember Nelson" as the French bore down, and had then manoeuvred to drive Dubourdieu's flagship ashore and scatter his squadron in what has been described as "one of the most brilliant naval achievements of the war".

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Battle of Lissa, 13 March 1811 painting by Nicholas Pocock

Background
Further information: Adriatic campaign of 1807–1814
The Napoleonic Wars, the name for a succession of connected conflicts between the armies of the French Emperor Napoleon and his European opponents, were nine years old when the War of the Fifth Coalition ended in 1809. The Treaty of Schönbrunn that followed the war gave Napoleon possession of the final part of Adriatic coastline not under his control: the Illyrian Provinces. This formalised the control the French had exercised in Illyria since 1805 and over the whole Adriatic Sea since the Treaty of Tilsit in 1807. In the Treaty of Tilsit, Russia had granted France control over the Septinsular Republic and withdrawn their own forces from the region, allowing Napoleon freedom of action in the Adriatic. At Schönbrunn, Napoleon made the Illyrian Provinces part of metropolitan France and therefore under direct French rule, unlike the neighbouring Kingdom of Italy which was nominally independent but in reality came under his personal rule. Thus, the Treaty of Schönbrunn formalised Napoleon's control of almost the entire coastline of the Adriatic and, if unopposed, would allow him to transport troops and supplies to the Balkans. The French army forming in the Illyrian Provinces was possibly intended for an invasion of the Ottoman Empire in conjunction with the Russians; the two countries had signed an agreement to support one another against the Ottomans at Tilsit.

To disrupt the preparations of this army, the British Royal Navy, which had controlled most of the Mediterranean since the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, seized the Dalmatian Island of Lissa in 1807 and used it as a base for raiding the coastal shipping of Italy and Illyria. These operations captured dozens of ships and caused panic and disruption to French strategy in the region. To counter this, the French government started a major shipbuilding programme in the Italian seaports, particularly Venice, and despatched frigates of their own to protect their shipping. Commodore Bernard Dubourdieu's Franco-Venetian forces were unable to bring the smaller British force under William Hoste to a concerted action, where Dubourdieu's superior numbers might prove decisive. Instead, the British and French frigate squadrons engaged in a campaign of raids and counter-raids during 1810.


Captain Bernard Dubourdieu


Captain William Hoste

In October 1810, Dubourdieu landed 700 Italian soldiers on Lissa while Hoste searched in vain for the French squadron in the Southern Adriatic. The island had been left in the command of two midshipmen, James Lew and Robert Kingston, who withdrew the entire population of the island into the central mountains along with their supplies. The Italian troops were left in possession of the deserted main town, Port St. George. The French and Italians burnt several vessels in the harbour and captured others, but remained on the island for no more than seven hours, retreating before Hoste returned. The remainder of the year was quiet, the British squadron gaining superiority after being reinforced by the third-rate ship of the lineHMS Montagu.

Early in 1811 the raiding campaigns began again, and British attacks along the Italian coast prompted Dubourdieu to mount a second invasion of Lissa. Taking advantage of the temporary absence of Montagu, Dubourdieu assembled six frigates and numerous smaller craft and embarked over 500 Italian soldiers under Colonel Alexander Gifflenga. The squadron amassed by Dubourdieu not only outnumbered the British in terms of men and ships, it was also twice as heavy in weight of shot. Dubourdieu planned to overwhelm Hoste's frigate squadron and then invade and capture the island, which would eradicate the British threat in the Adriatic for months to come.

Battle
Dubourdieu (as commodore) led a squadron consisting of six frigates (four of 40 guns and two of 32 guns), a 16-gun brig, two schooners, one xebec, and two gunboats. Three of his ships were from the French Navy, and the others from the Navy of the Kingdom of Italy. In addition the squadron carried 500 Italian soldiers. In the absence of Montagu, Hoste's squadron consisted of three frigates (one of 38 guns and two of 32 guns) and one 22-gun post ship. The island of Lissa itself was defended by a small number of local troops under the command of two midshipmen.

Dubourdieu's squadron was spotted approaching the island of Lissa at 03:00 on 12 March 1811 by Captain Gordon in HMS Active, which had led the British squadron from Port St George on a cruise off Ancona. Turning west, the British squadron awaited the French approach in line ahead, sailing along the north coast of the island within half a mile of the shoreline. By 06:00, Dubourdieu was approaching the British line from the north-east in two divisions, leading in Favorite at the head of the windward or western division. Dubourdieu hoped to pass ahead of Active at the head of the British line and cross it further east with Danaé, which led the leeward division. Dubourdieu intended to break the British line in two places and destroy the British squadron in the crossfire.

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The opening stages of the battle

Over the next three hours the squadrons continued to close, light winds restricting them to a little over three knots. A protege of Nelson, Hoste recalled the inspirational effect of Nelson's signal before the Battle of Trafalgar and raised his own: "Remember Nelson", which was greeted with wild cheering from the squadron. As he closed with Hoste's force, Dubourdieu realised that he would be unable to successfully cross Active's bow due to the British ship's speed, and would also be unable to break through their line due to the British ships' close proximity to one another. He instead sought to attack the second ship in the British line, Hoste's flagship HMS Amphion. Dubourdieu possessed not only a significant advantage in ships but also in men, the Italian soldiers aboard giving him the opportunity to overwhelm the British crews if he could board their frigates successfully. The first shots of the battle were fired at 09:00, as the British used their wider field of fire to attack the leading French ships, Favorite and Danaé, unopposed for several minutes. The French squadron held their fire, Dubourdieu gathering his troops and sailors into Favorite's bow in order to maximise the effect of his initial attack once his flagship came into contact with Amphion.

Hoste was aware of Dubourdieu's intentions and the French advantage in numbers, and consequently ordered a large 5.5-inch (140 mm) howitzer on Amphion's deck triple-shotted until the cannon contained over 750 musket balls Once Favorite was within a few yards of Amphion's stern, Hoste gave permission for the gun to be fired and the cannon's discharge instantly swept the bow of Favorite clear of the French and Italian boarding party. Among the dozens killed and wounded were Dubourdieu and all the frigate's officers, leaving Colonel Gifflenga in command of Favorite. As Favorite and Amphion closed with one another, firing continued between the British rear and the French leeward division, led by Danaé. Several of the French ships came at an angle at which they could bring their guns to bear on HMS Cerberus, the rearmost British ship, and both sides were firing regular broadsides at one another.

Hoste's manoeuvre
Following the death of Dubourdieu, Captain Péridier on Flore ordered the French and Venetian ships to attack the British line directly. The battered Favorite led with an attempt to round Amphion and rake her before catching her in crossfire, as had been Dubourdieu's original intention. The remainder of the Franco-Venetian squadron followed this lead and attempted to bring their superior numbers to bear on the British squadron. Hoste was prepared for this eventuality and immediately ordered his ships to wear, turning south and then east to reverse direction. This movement threw the Franco-Venetian squadron into confusion and as a result the squadron's formation became disorganised. Favorite, which had lost almost its entire complement of officers, was unable to respond quickly enough to the manoeuvre and drove onto the rocky coastline in confusion, becoming a total wreck.

Thrown into further confusion by the loss of Favorite, the French and Venetian formation began to break up and the British squadron was able to pull ahead of their opponents; the leading French ships Flore and Bellona succeeded in only reaching Amphion, which was now at the rear of the British line. Amphion found herself caught between the two frigates and this slowed the British line enough that the French eastern division, led by Danaé, was able to strike at HMS Volage, now the leading British ship after overtaking Cerberus during the turn. Volage was much smaller than her opponent but was armed with 32-pounder carronades, short range guns that caused such damage to Danaé that the French ship was forced to haul off and reengage from a longer range. The strain of combat at this greater distance ruptured Volage's short-ranged carronades and left the ship much weakened, with only a single gun with which to engage the enemy.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Lissa_(1811)
 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History
13 March 1811 - Battle of Lissa (1811) - Part II


Chase
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Battle of Lissa, 13 March 1811 Engraved by Henri Merke after a painting by George Webster, 1812

Behind Volage and Danaé, the Venetian Corona had engaged Cerberus in a close range duel, during which Cerberus took heavy damage but inflicted similar injuries on the Italian ship. This exchange continued until the arrival of Active caused the Danaé, Corona and Carolina to sheer off and retreat to the east. To the rear, Amphion succeeded in closing with and raking Flore, and caused such damage that within five minutes the French ship's officers threw the French colours overboard in surrender. Captain Péridier had been seriously wounded in the action, and took no part in Flore's later movements. Amphion then attacked Bellonaand in an engagement that lasted until 12:00, forced the Italian ship's surrender. During this combat, the small ship Principessa Augusta fired on Amphion from a distance, until the frigate was able to turn a gun on them and drive them off. Hoste sent a punt to take possession of Bellona but due to the damage suffered was unable to launch a boat to seize Flore. Realising Amphion's difficulty, the officers of Flore, who had made hasty repairs during the conflict between Amphion and Bellona, immediately set sail for the French harbour on Lesina (Hvar), despite having already surrendered.

Active, the only British ship still in fighting condition, took up pursuit of the retreating enemy and at 12:30 caught the Corona in the channel between Lissa and the small island of Spalmadon. The frigates manoeuvred around one another for the next hour; captains Gordon and Pasqualigo each seeking the best position from which to engage. The frigates engaged in combat at 13.45, Active forcing Corona's surrender 45 minutes later after a fire broke out aboard the Italian ship. Active too had suffered severely and as the British squadron was not strong enough to continue the action by attacking the remaining squadron in its protected harbour on Lesina, the battle came to an end. The survivors of the Franco-Venetian squadron had all reached safety; Carolina and Danaé had used the conflict between Active and Corona to cover their escape while Flore had indicated to each British ship she passed that she had surrendered and was in British possession despite the absence of a British officer on board. Once Flore was clear of the British squadron she headed for safety, reaching the batteries of Lesina shortly after her Carolina and Danaé and ahead of the limping British pursuit. The smaller craft of the Franco-Venetian squadron scattered during the battle's final stages and reached Lesina independently.

Conclusion
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The latter stages of the battle. The burning Favorite can be seen in the background. Engraving by Henri Merke after a painting by George Webster, 1812

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The Battle of Lissa, 13 March 1811; the end of the action (Print) (PAI6443)

Although Favorite was wrecked, over 200 of her crew and soldier-passengers had reached the land and, having set fire to their ship, prepared to march on Port St. George under the leadership of Colonel Gifflenga. Two British midshipmen left in command of the town organised the British and indigenous population into a defensive force and marched to meet Gifflenga. The junior British officers informed Gifflenga that the return of the British squadron would bring overwhelming numbers of sailors, marines and naval artillery to bear on his small force and that if he surrendered immediately he could expect better terms. Gifflenga recognised that his position was untenable and capitulated. At Port St. George, the Venetian gunboat Lodola sneaked unnoticed into the harbour and almost captured a Sicilian privateer, Vincitore. The raider was driven off by the remaining garrison of the town without the prize, while attempting to manoeuvre her out of the bay.

In the seas off Lissa, British prize crews were making strenuous efforts to protect their captures; Corona was heavily on fire in consequence of her engagement with Active and the British prize crew fought the blaze alongside their Italian prisoners. The fire was eventually brought under control, but not without the death of five men and several more seriously burnt when the blazing mainmast collapsed. Problems were also experienced aboard Bellona, where Captain Duodo planned to ignite the powder magazine and destroy the ship following its surrender. Duodo had been mortally wounded in the action, and so ordered his second in command to light the fuse. The officer promised to do so, but instead handed control of the magazine to the British prize crew when they arrived. Duodo died still believing that the fuse had been lit.

Hoste also remained at sea, cruising in the battered Amphion beyond the range of the shore batteries on Lesina. Hoste was furious at the behaviour of Flore's officers and sent a note into Lesina demanding that they give up the ship as indicated by its earlier surrender. In surrendering and then escaping, the officers of Flore had breached an informal rule of naval conflict under which a ship that voluntarily struck its flag submitted to an opponent in order to prevent continued loss of life among its crew. Flore had been able to pass unmolested through the British squadron only because she was recognised to have surrendered, and to abuse this custom in this way was considered, in the Royal Navy especially, to be a dishonourable act. The French at Lesina did not respond to Hoste's note, and the British squadron was eventually forced to return to Lissa to effect repairs.

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The Battle of Lissa, 13 March 1811; the 'Bellona' captured (Print) (PAI5772)

Aftermath
Casualties of the action were heavy on both sides. The British ships suffered 190 killed or wounded in the battle and a number lost afterwards in the fire aboard Corona. Captains Hoste and Hornby were both badly wounded and the entire British squadron was in need of urgent repair before resuming the campaign. In the French and Italian squadron the situation was even worse, although precise losses are not known. At least 150 had been killed aboard Favorite either in the action or the wreck, and the 200 survivors of her crew and passengers were all made prisoner. Bellona had suffered at least 70 casualties and Corona's losses were also severe. Among the ships that escaped less is known of their casualties, but all required repair and reinforcement before the campaign could resume. Total French and Italian losses are estimated at no less than 700. Losses among the officers of the combined squadron were especially high, with Commodore Dubourdieu and captains Meillerie and Duodo killed and Péridier seriously wounded.

The immediate aftermath saw renewed efforts by Hoste to induce the French to hand over Flore, efforts that were rebuffed by the captain of the Danaé, who had assumed command of the French squadron. The surviving French and Venetian ships were initially laid up in Ragusa (Dubrovnik) awaiting supplies to continue the campaign, but a separate British squadron discovered and sank the supply ship at Parenzo (Poreč), necessitating a full French withdrawal from the area. In Britain, Hoste's action was widely praised; the squadron's first lieutenants were all promoted to commander and the captains all presented with a commemorative medal. Nearly four decades later the battle was also recognized in the issue of the clasp Lissa to the Naval General Service Medal, awarded to all British participants still living in 1847. On their arrival in Britain, Corona and Bellone were repaired and later purchased for service in the Royal Navy, the newly built Corona being named HMS Daedalus and Bellone becoming the troopship HMS Dover. Daedalus was commissioned in 1812 under Captain Murray Maxwell, but served less than a year; wrecked off Ceylon in July 1813.

British numerical superiority in the region was assured; when French reinforcements for the Adriatic departed Toulon on 25 March they were hunted down and driven back to France by Captain Robert Otway in HMS Ajax before they had even passed Corsica. Throughout the remainder of 1811 however, British and French frigate squadrons continued to spar across the Adriatic, the most significant engagement being the action of 29 November 1811, in which a second French squadron was destroyed. The action had significant long-term effects; the destruction of one of the best-trained and best-led squadrons in the French Navy and the death of the aggressive Dubourdieu ended the French ability to strike into the Balkans against the Ottoman Empire.

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