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Sphinx-class Post Ship
The ''Sphinx''-class sailing sixth rates were a series of ten post ships built to a 1773 design by John Williams. Although smaller than true frigates, post ships were often referred to incorrectly as frigates by sea officers, but not by the Admiralty or Navy Board. The first vessel in the class was launched in 1775, six more in 1776, two in 1777 and the last in 1781. The vessels of the class served in the Royal Navy during the American Revolutionary War. Three of them - ''Sphinx'' and ''Ariel'' in September 1779, and ''Unicorn'' in September 1780 - were captured by the French Navy, but ''Sphinx'' was recovered in December 1779 and ''Unicorn'' in April 1781. Some survived to see service in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of major global conflicts pitting the French Empire and its allies, led by Napoleon I, against a fluctuating array of European states formed into various coalitions. It produced a period of Fren ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sixth-rate
In the rating system of the Royal Navy used to categorise sailing warships, a sixth-rate was the designation for small warships mounting between 20 and 28 carriage-mounted guns on a single deck, sometimes with smaller guns on the upper works and sometimes without. It thus encompassed ships with up to 30 guns in all. In the first half of the 18th century the main battery guns were 6-pounders, but by mid-century these were supplanted by 9-pounders. 28-gun sixth rates were classed as frigates, those smaller as 'post ships', indicating that they were still commanded by a full ('post') captain, as opposed to sloops of 18 guns and less under commanders. Rating Sixth-rate ships typically had a crew of about 150–240 men, and measured between 450 and 550 tons. A 28-gun ship would have about 19 officers; commissioned officers would include the captain, and two lieutenants; warrant officers would include the master, ship's surgeon, and purser. The other quarterdeck officers were the c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deptford Dockyard
Deptford Dockyard was an important naval dockyard and base at Deptford on the River Thames, operated by the Royal Navy from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. It built and maintained warships for 350 years, and many significant events and ships have been associated with it. Founded by Henry VIII in 1513, the dockyard was the most significant royal dockyard of the Tudor period and remained one of the principal naval yards for three hundred years. Important new technological and organisational developments were trialled here, and Deptford came to be associated with the great mariners of the time, including Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh. The yard expanded rapidly throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, encompassing a large area and serving for a time as the headquarters of naval administration, and the associated Victualling Yard became the Victualling Board's main depot. Tsar Peter the Great visited the yard officially incognito in 1698 to learn shipbuildi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bahamas
The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to 88% of the archipelago's population. The archipelagic state consists of more than 3,000 islands, cays, and islets in the Atlantic Ocean, and is located north of Cuba and northwest of the island of Hispaniola (split between the Dominican Republic and Haiti) and the Turks and Caicos Islands, southeast of the U.S. state of Florida, and east of the Florida Keys. The capital is Nassau, Bahamas, Nassau on the island of New Providence. The Royal Bahamas Defence Force describes The Bahamas' territory as encompassing of ocean space. The Bahama Islands were inhabited by the Lucayan people, Lucayans, a branch of the Arawakan-Taino language, speaking Taíno, for many centuries. Christopher Columbus was the first European to see the islands, making hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMS Narcissus (1781)
HMS ''Narcissus'' was a ''Sphinx''-class 20-gun sixth-rate post ship of the Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ... launched in 1781. Most notably in 1782, while she was under the command of Captain Edward Edwards, a mutiny occurred aboard the vessel that resulted in the hanging of six men, and the flogging of an additional 14. Captain Edwards went on to command HMS ''Pandora'', which was assigned to carry the ''Bounty'' mutineers back to England. Fate ''Narcissus'' was wrecked in 1796. References Sixth-rate frigates of the Royal Navy 1781 ships Ships built in Plymouth, Devon Maritime incidents in 1796 {{UK-mil-ship-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blackwall, London
Blackwall is an area of Poplar, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, East London. The neighbourhood includes Leamouth and the Coldharbour conservation area. The area takes its name from a historic stretch of riverside wall built along an outside curve of the Thames, to protect the area from flooding. While mostly residential, the Poplar Dock and Blackwall Basin provide moorings for vessels. Setting and administration The area's significance derived from its position on an outside curve of the Thames, where currents slowed down, making it a sheltered spot useful to a range of shipping activities. This sheltered position was enhanced by the presence of the Blackwall Rock reef, though this could also be a danger to shipping. A further advantage of the area was that it lay east of the Isle of Dogs, so loading and unloading here avoided that time and effort of sailing round that peninsula to London, while still being very close to the City of London. The area developed on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMS Ariel (1777)
HMS ''Ariel'' was a 20-gun ''Sphinx''-class sixth-rate post ship of the Royal Navy. The French captured her in 1779, and she served during the American Revolutionary War for them, and later for the Americans, before reverting to French control. Her French crew scuttled ''Ariel'' in 1793 to prevent the British from recapturing her. British career The Admiralty on 3 July 1776 ordered ''Ariel'' from John Perry & Co.'s Blackwall Yard. Perry & Co. laid down her keel that month and launched her on 7 July 1777. She was commissioned under Captain John Jackson, and cruised in the North Sea in August 1777. After a brief spell off the Norwegian and Danish coasts, she sailed for North America on 7 November. In 1778 she captured several American vessels. While ''Ariel'' was under the command of John Becher on 31 March, she shared in the capture of the frigate . (The Royal Navy took ''Virginia'' into service as HMS ''Virginia''.) On 25 May 1778, under command of Capt. Charles Phipps, she c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deptford
Deptford is an area on the south bank of the River Thames in southeast London, within the London Borough of Lewisham. It is named after a ford of the River Ravensbourne. From the mid 16th century to the late 19th it was home to Deptford Dockyard, the first of the Royal Dockyards. This was a major shipbuilding dock and attracted Peter the Great to come and study shipbuilding. Deptford and the docks are associated with the knighting of Sir Francis Drake by Queen Elizabeth I aboard the ''Golden Hind'', the legend of Sir Walter Raleigh laying down his cape for Elizabeth, Captain James Cook's third voyage aboard HMS ''Resolution'', and the mysterious apparent murder of Christopher Marlowe in a house along Deptford Strand. Though Deptford began as two small communities, one at the ford, and the other a fishing village on the Thames, Deptford's history and population has been mainly associated with the docks established by Henry VIII. The two communities grew together and flouri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMS Unicorn (1776)
Eleven ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS ''Unicorn'', after the mythological creature, the unicorn: * was a 36-gun ship captured from Scotland in 1544 and sold in 1555. * was a 56-gun ship launched in 1634 and sold in 1687. * (or ''Little Unicorn'') was an 18-gun fire ship A fire ship or fireship, used in the days of wooden rowed or sailing ships, was a ship filled with combustibles, or gunpowder deliberately set on fire and steered (or, when possible, allowed to drift) into an enemy fleet, in order to destroy sh ... originally in Dutch service as the ''Eenhoorn''. She was captured in 1665 and expended on 4 June 1666, on the fourth day of the Four Days' Battle. * was a 6-gun purchased in 1666 and sunk as a blockship at Chatham on 11 June 1667, together with five other vessels, in a futile attempt to block the Dutch from advancing up the River Medway. * was a 28-gun sixth rate launched in 1748 and broken up in 1771. * was a 20-gun post ship launched in 1776 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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