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James Clephan
Captain James Clephan (1768–1851) was a Royal Navy officer who served as a lieutenant at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. He rose from the ranks to become a post-captain. A flag presented to him after the battle by the crew of the ship on which he served at Trafalgar was sold at auction for £384,000 on Trafalgar Day 2009. Biography Born in Scoonie in Fife, Scotland in 1768, Clephan was originally a weaver but joined the Merchant navy when the weaving industry went into decline. He was press ganged into the Royal Navy on 23 July 1794 aged 26. Beginning as an Able Bodied 2nd Class Mate aboard HMS ''Sibyl'', he then made 2nd Class Gunner's Mate on HMS ''Doris'' and master's mate on 10 October 1796. He was promoted to Midshipman on 7 January 1801 and was promoted to lieutenant on 31 July 1801 for distinguished conduct during the successful capture of the French corvette ''Chevrette'' at Brest.
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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 ...
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HMS Doris (1795)
HMS ''Doris'' was a 36-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy, launched on 31 August 1795. which saw service in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. ''Doris'' was built by Cleveley, of Gravesend. Service She entered service in November 1795, operating as part of the Channel Fleet during the Napoleonic Wars. Her first captain was the Hon. Charles Jones, who in 1797 became Lord Ranelagh. In June 1796, ''Doris'' and captured the French corvette ''Légère'', of twenty-two 9-pounder guns and 168 men. ''Légère'' had left Brest on 4 June in company with three frigates. During her cruise she had captured six prizes. However, on 23 June she encountered the two British frigates at . After a 10-hour chase the British frigates finally caught up with her; a few shots were exchanged and then ''Légère'' struck. The Navy took into her service as HMS ''Legere''. In January 1797 ''Doris'' shared with and in the capture of the French privateer ''Eclair''. ''Unicorn'' was th ...
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Union Jack
The Union Jack, or Union Flag, is the ''de facto'' national flag of the United Kingdom. Although no law has been passed making the Union Flag the official national flag of the United Kingdom, it has effectively become such through precedent. It is sometimes asserted that the term ''Union Jack'' properly refers only to naval usage, but this assertion was dismissed by the Flag Institute in 2013 following historical investigations. The flag has official status in Canada, by parliamentary resolution, where it is known as the Royal Union Flag. It is the national flag of all British overseas territories, being localities within the British state, or realm, although local flags have also been authorised for most, usually comprising the blue or red ensign with the Union Flag in the canton and defaced with the distinguishing arms of the territory. These may be flown in place of, or along with (but taking precedence after) the national flag. Governors of British Overseas Territories ha ...
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Battle Of The Nile
The Battle of the Nile (also known as the Battle of Aboukir Bay; french: Bataille d'Aboukir) was a major naval battle fought between the British Royal Navy and the Navy of the French Republic at Aboukir Bay on the Mediterranean coast off the Nile Delta of Egypt from the 1st to the 3rd of August 1798. The battle was the climax of a naval campaign that had raged across the Mediterranean during the previous three months, as a large French convoy sailed from Toulon to Alexandria carrying an expeditionary force under General Napoleon Bonaparte. The British fleet was led in the battle by Rear-Admiral Sir Horatio Nelson; they decisively defeated the French under Vice-Admiral François-Paul Brueys d'Aigalliers. Bonaparte sought to invade Egypt as the first step in a campaign against British India, as part of a greater effort to drive Britain out of the French Revolutionary Wars. As Bonaparte's fleet crossed the Mediterranean, it was pursued by a British force under Nelson who had ...
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HMS Spartiate (1798)
The ''Spartiate'' was originally a French 74-gun ship of the line, launched in 1797. In 1798, she took part in the Battle of the Nile, where she became one of the nine ships captured by the Royal Navy. In 1805, HMS ''Spartiate'' fought at the Battle of Trafalgar under Francis Laforey. With , she forced the surrender of the Spanish ship , of 80 guns. Casualties were three killed (two seamen & one boy), and twenty wounded (the boatswain larke two Midshipmen ellairs & Knapman one Marine illiam Parsonsand sixteen sailors), according to the three logs (Captain's log, Ship's log, Master's log). ''Spartiate'' returned to her home port of Plymouth for repairs from December 1805 to February 1806. Thereafter she joined the Channel Fleet and, for the next two years, was involved in the blockade of Rochefort.The Captain's log does show that she returned to the United Kingdom for replenishment purposes at the following time periods: 25 July to 3 August 1806, 14 January to 26 Febru ...
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Peace Of Amiens
The Treaty of Amiens (french: la paix d'Amiens, ) temporarily ended hostilities between France and the United Kingdom at the end of the War of the Second Coalition. It marked the end of the French Revolutionary Wars; after a short peace it set the stage for the Napoleonic Wars. Britain gave up most of its recent conquests; France was to evacuate Naples and Egypt. Britain retained Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Trinidad. It was signed in the city of Amiens on 25 March 1802 (4 Germinal X in the French Revolutionary calendar) by Joseph Bonaparte and Marquess Cornwallis as a "Definitive Treaty of Peace". The consequent peace lasted only one year (18 May 1803) and was the only period of general peace in Europe between 1793 and 1814. Under the treaty, Britain recognised the French Republic. Together with the Treaty of Lunéville (1801), the Treaty of Amiens marked the end of the Second Coalition, which had waged war against Revolutionary France since 1798. National goals Great Britain ...
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HMS Namur (1756)
HMS ''Namur'' was a 90-gun second-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built at Chatham Dockyard to the draught specified by the 1745 Establishment as amended in 1750, and launched on 3 March 1756. HMS ''Namur''’s battle honours surpass even those of the more famous HMS ''Victory''. History ''Namur'' was the flagship of Vice-Admiral Edward Boscawen in the capture of Louisburg in 1758. General James Wolfe had sailed across the Atlantic in ''Namur'' on this occasion before his capture of Quebec. Also on this journey was 6th Lieutenant Michael Henry Pascal, with his slave and servant Olaudah Equiano (called Gustavus Vasser at the time - this was the slave name given him by Pascal). In his book, Equiano wrote that the ceremony of surrender was "the most beautiful procession on the water I ever saw", and gives more detail of the occasion. In 1758, fifteen ''Namur'' sailors were tried and condemned to death by hanging for mutiny; they had protested to be replaced aboar ...
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William Cornwallis
Admiral of the Red Sir William Cornwallis, (10 February 17445 July 1819) was a Royal Navy officer. He was the brother of Charles Cornwallis, the 1st Marquess Cornwallis, British commander at the siege of Yorktown. Cornwallis took part in a number of decisive battles including the siege of Louisbourg in 1758, when he was 14, and the Battle of the Saintes but is best known as a friend of Lord Nelson and as the commander-in-chief of the Channel Fleet during the Napoleonic Wars. He is depicted in the Horatio Hornblower novel, ''Hornblower and the Hotspur''. His affectionate contemporary nickname from "the ranks" was Billy Blue, and a sea shanty was written during his period of service, reflecting the admiration his men had for him. Early life William Cornwallis was born 10 February 1744. His father was Charles, the fifth baron and first earl Cornwallis, and his mother was Elizabeth, daughter of Viscount Charles Townshend. William was the younger brother of General Charles Cor ...
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The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (founded in 1821) are published by Times Newspapers, since 1981 a subsidiary of News UK, in turn wholly owned by News Corp. ''The Times'' and ''The Sunday Times'', which do not share editorial staff, were founded independently and have only had common ownership since 1966. In general, the political position of ''The Times'' is considered to be centre-right. ''The Times'' is the first newspaper to have borne that name, lending it to numerous other papers around the world, such as ''The Times of India'', ''The New York Times'', and more recently, digital-first publications such as TheTimesBlog.com (Since 2017). In countries where these other titles are popular, the newspaper is often referred to as , or as , although the newspaper is of nationa ...
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Brest, France
Brest (; ) is a port city in the Finistère department, Brittany. Located in a sheltered bay not far from the western tip of the peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon. The city is located on the western edge of continental France. With 142,722 inhabitants in a 2007 census, Brest forms Western Brittany's largest metropolitan area (with a population of 300,300 in total), ranking third behind only Nantes and Rennes in the whole of historic Brittany, and the 19th most populous city in France; moreover, Brest provides services to the one million inhabitants of Western Brittany. Although Brest is by far the largest city in Finistère, the ''préfecture'' (regional capital) of the department is the much smaller Quimper. During the Middle Ages, the history of Brest was the history of its castle. Then Richelieu made it a military harbour in 1631. Brest grew around its arsenal unti ...
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Corvette
A corvette is a small warship. It is traditionally the smallest class of vessel considered to be a proper (or " rated") warship. The warship class above the corvette is that of the frigate, while the class below was historically that of the sloop-of-war. The modern roles that a corvette fulfills include coastal patrol craft, missile boat and fast attack craft. These corvettes are typically between 500 tons and 2,000 .although recent designs may approach 3,000 tons, having size and capabilities that overlap with smaller frigates. However unlike contemporary frigates, a modern corvette does not have sufficient endurance and seaworthiness for long voyages. The word "corvette" is first found in Middle French, a diminutive of the Dutch word ''corf'', meaning a "basket", from the Latin ''corbis''. The rank "corvette captain", equivalent in many navies to "lieutenant commander", derives from the name of this type of ship. The rank is the most junior of three "captain" ranks in sev ...
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French Navy
The French Navy (french: Marine nationale, lit=National Navy), informally , is the maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the five military service branches of France. It is among the largest and most powerful naval forces in the world, ranking seventh in combined fleet tonnage and fifth in number of naval vessels. The French Navy is one of eight naval forces currently operating fixed-wing aircraft carriers,Along with the U.S., U.K., China, Russia, Italy, India and Spain with its flagship being the only nuclear-powered aircraft carrier outside the United States Navy, and one of two non-American vessels to use catapults to launch aircraft. Founded in the 17th century, the French Navy is one of the oldest navies still in continual service, with precursors dating back to the Middle Ages. It has taken part in key events in French history, including the Napoleonic Wars and both world wars, and played a critical role in establishing and securing the French colonial ...
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