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Hired Armed Lugger Spider
His Majesty's hired armed lugger ''Spider'' served the Royal Navy from 15 August 1795 to 4 April 1796.Winfield (2008), p.388. She was armed with eighteen 4-pounder guns and had a burthen of 172 tons ( bm). She took part in one notable action before she was lost in a collision with the 74-gun . ''Spider''s commander was Acting-Lieutenant James Oswald, and she served in the squadron under Admiral Adam Duncan off the Texel where she performed reconnaissance duties. On 13 August 1795 ''Spider'' captured the "Neutral Vessel" ''Maria'' , suggesting that she was already on active duty in advance of the formal contract. Two days later Oswald discovered the Dutch fleet some 9–10 miles NW of Camperdown, and reported that fact and the number and types of vessels to Duncan on 17 August. When Admirals Duncan and Pringle set out after the Dutch, together with a Russian squadron, they found that the Dutch had returned to port. ''Spider''s greatest moment occurred on 25 August. ''Spi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hired Armed Vessels
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the Royal Navy made use of a considerable number of hired armed vessels. These were generally smaller vessels, often cutters and luggers, that the Navy used for duties ranging from carrying and passengers to convoy escort, particularly in British coastal waters, and reconnaissance.Winfield (2008), p.387. Doctrine The Navy Board usually hired the vessel complete with master and crew rather than bareboat. Contracts were for a specified time or on an open-ended monthly hire basis. During periods of peace, such as the period between the Treaty of Amiens and the commencement of the Napoleonic Wars, the Admiralty returned the vessels to their owners, only to rehire many on the outbreak of war. The Admiralty provided a regular naval officer, usually a lieutenant for the small vessels, to be the commander. The civilian master then served as the sailing master. For purposes of prize money or salvage, hired armed vessels received the same ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hired Armed Vessels
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the Royal Navy made use of a considerable number of hired armed vessels. These were generally smaller vessels, often cutters and luggers, that the Navy used for duties ranging from carrying and passengers to convoy escort, particularly in British coastal waters, and reconnaissance.Winfield (2008), p.387. Doctrine The Navy Board usually hired the vessel complete with master and crew rather than bareboat. Contracts were for a specified time or on an open-ended monthly hire basis. During periods of peace, such as the period between the Treaty of Amiens and the commencement of the Napoleonic Wars, the Admiralty returned the vessels to their owners, only to rehire many on the outbreak of war. The Admiralty provided a regular naval officer, usually a lieutenant for the small vessels, to be the commander. The civilian master then served as the sailing master. For purposes of prize money or salvage, hired armed vessels received the same ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1790s Ships
Year 179 ( CLXXIX) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Aurelius and Veru (or, less frequently, year 932 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 179 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place Roman empire * The Roman fort Castra Regina ("fortress by the Regen river") is built at Regensburg, on the right bank of the Danube in Germany. * Roman legionaries of Legio II ''Adiutrix'' engrave on the rock of the Trenčín Castle (Slovakia) the name of the town ''Laugaritio'', marking the northernmost point of Roman presence in that part of Europe. * Marcus Aurelius drives the Marcomanni over the Danube and reinforces the border. To repopulate and rebuild a devastated Pannonia, Rome allows the first German colonists to enter territory cont ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Post Captain
Post-captain is an obsolete alternative form of the rank of Captain (Royal Navy), captain in the Royal Navy. The term served to distinguish those who were captains by rank from: * Officers in command of a naval vessel, who were (and still are) addressed as captain regardless of rank; * Commander (Royal Navy), Commanders, who received the title of captain as a courtesy, whether they currently had a command or not (e.g. the fictional Captain Jack Aubrey in ''Aubrey-Maturin series#Master and Commander, Master and Commander'' or the fictional Captain Horatio Hornblower in ''Hornblower and the Hotspur''); this custom is now defunct. In the Royal Navy of the 18th and 19th centuries, an officer might be promoted from commander to captain, but not have a command. Until the officer obtained a command, he was "on the beach" and on half-pay. An officer "took post" or was "made post" when he was first commissioned to command a vessel. Usually this was a rating system of the Royal Navy, ra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville
Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville, PC, FRSE (28 April 1742 – 28 May 1811), styled as Lord Melville from 1802, was the trusted lieutenant of British Prime Minister William Pitt and the most powerful politician in Scotland in the late 18th century. Dundas was instrumental in the encouragement of the Scottish Enlightenment, in the prosecution of the war against France, and in the expansion of British influence in India. Prime Minister Pitt appointed him Lord of Trade (1784–1786), Home Secretary (1791–1794), President of the Board of Control for Indian Affairs (1793–1801), Secretary at War (1794–1801) and First Lord of the Admiralty (1804–1805). His deft and almost total control of Scottish politics during a long period in which no monarch visited the country led to him being nicknamed "King Harry the Ninth", the "Grand Manager of Scotland" (a play on the masonic office of Grand Master of Scotland), the "Great Tyrant" and "The Uncrowned King of Scotland". He w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Pitt The Younger
William Pitt the Younger (28 May 175923 January 1806) was a British statesman, the youngest and last prime minister of Great Britain (before the Acts of Union 1800) and then first prime minister of the United Kingdom (of Great Britain and Ireland) as of January 1801. He left office in March 1801, but served as prime minister again from 1804 until his death in 1806. He was also Chancellor of the Exchequer for all of his time as prime minister. He is known as "Pitt the Younger" to distinguish him from his father, William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham, who had previously served as prime minister and is referred to as "William Pitt the Elder" (or "Chatham" by historians). Pitt's prime ministerial tenure, which came during the reign of King George III, was dominated by major political events in Europe, including the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. Pitt, although often referred to as a Tory, or "new Tory", called himself an "independent Whig" and was generally opposed to the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Downs (ship Anchorage)
The Downs is a roadstead (area of sheltered, favourable sea) in the southern North Sea near the English Channel off the east Kent coast, between the North and the South Foreland in southern England. In 1639 the Battle of the Downs took place here, when the Dutch navy destroyed a Spanish fleet which had sought refuge in neutral English waters. From the Elizabethan era onwards, the presence of the Downs helped to make Deal one of the premier ports in England, and in the 19th century, it was equipped with its own telegraph and timeball tower to enable ships to set their marine chronometers. The anchorage has depths down to 12 fathoms (22 m). Even during southerly gales some shelter was afforded, though under this condition wrecks were not infrequent. Storms from any direction could also drive ships onto the shore or onto the sands, which—in spite of providing the sheltered water—were constantly shifting, and not always adequately marked. The Downs served in the age of sail as a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Naval General Service Medal (1847)
__NOTOC__ The Naval General Service Medal (NGSM) was a campaign medal approved in 1847, and issued to officers and men of the Royal Navy in 1849. The final date for submitting claims was 1 May 1851.British Battles and Medals, page 34. Admiral Thomas Bladen Capel was one of the members of the board that authorised the medal. The NGSM was awarded retrospectively for various naval actions during the period 1793–1840, a period that included the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars and the Anglo-American War of 1812. Each battle or campaign covered by the medal was represented by a clasp on the ribbon. The medal was never issued without a clasp, 231 of which were sanctioned.British Battles and Medals, page 33. The clasps covered a variety of actions, from boat service, ship to ship skirmishes, to major fleet actions such as the Battle of Trafalgar. This medal and its army counterpart, the Military General Service Medal, were amongst the first real British campaign medals, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Admiralty
The Admiralty was a department of the Government of the United Kingdom responsible for the command of the Royal Navy until 1964, historically under its titular head, the Lord High Admiral – one of the Great Officers of State. For much of its history, from the early 18th century until its abolition, the role of the Lord High Admiral was almost invariably put "in commission" and exercised by the Lords Commissioner of the Admiralty, who sat on the governing Board of Admiralty, rather than by a single person. The Admiralty was replaced by the Admiralty Board in 1964, as part of the reforms that created the Ministry of Defence and its Navy Department (later Navy Command). Before the Acts of Union 1707, the Office of the Admiralty and Marine Affairs administered the Royal Navy of the Kingdom of England, which merged with the Royal Scots Navy and the absorbed the responsibilities of the Lord High Admiral of the Kingdom of Scotland with the unification of the Kingdom of Great ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Third-rate
In the rating system of the Royal Navy, a third rate was a ship of the line which from the 1720s mounted between 64 and 80 guns, typically built with two gun decks (thus the related term two-decker). Years of experience proved that the third rate ships embodied the best compromise between sailing ability (speed, handling), firepower, and cost. So, while first-rates and second-rates were both larger and more powerful, third-rate ships were the optimal configuration. Rating When the rating system was first established in the 1620s, the third rate was defined as those ships having at least 200 but not more than 300 men; previous to this, the type had been classified as "middling ships". By the 1660s, the means of classification had shifted from the number of men to the number of carriage-mounted guns, and third rates at that time mounted between 48 and 60 guns. By the turn of the century, the criterion boundaries had increased and third rate carried more than 60 guns, with seco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lugger
A lugger is a sailing vessel defined by its rig, using the lug sail on all of its one or several masts. They were widely used as working craft, particularly off the coasts of France, England, Ireland and Scotland. Luggers varied extensively in size and design. Many were undecked, open boats, some of which operated from beach landings (such as Hastings or Deal). Others were fully decked craft (typified by the Zulu and many other sailing drifters). Some larger examples might carry lug topsails. Luggers were used extensively for smuggling from the middle of the 18th century onwards; their fast hulls and powerful rigs regularly allowed them to outpace any Revenue vessel in service. The French three-masted luggers also served as privateers and in general trade. As smuggling declined about 1840, the mainmast of British three-masted luggers tended to be discarded, with larger sails being set on the fore and mizzen. This gave more clear space in which to work fishing nets. Local ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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