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Action Of 31 May 1809
The action of 31 May 1809 was a naval skirmish in the Bay of Bengal during the Napoleonic Wars. During the action, an Honourable East India Company convoy carrying goods worth over £500,000 was attacked and partially captured by the French frigate ''Caroline''. The three East Indiamen that made up the convoy fought against their opponent with their own batteries of cannon but ultimately were less powerful, less manoeuvrable and less trained than their opponent and were defeated one by one; only the smallest of the three escaped. The action was the first in a string of attacks on important convoys in the Indian Ocean by French cruisers operating from Île de France and Île Bonaparte during a concerted campaign against British shipping in the region. Background In November 1808, a squadron of powerful French frigates sailed for Île de France under Commodore Jacques Hamelin. This squadron was under orders to attack and capture or destroy British shipping in the Indian Ocean, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 French domination over most of continental Europe. The wars stemmed from the unresolved disputes associated with the French Revolution and the French Revolutionary Wars consisting of the War of the First Coalition (1792–1797) and the War of the Second Coalition (1798–1802). The Napoleonic Wars are often described as five conflicts, each termed after the coalition that fought Napoleon: the Third Coalition (1803–1806), the Fourth (1806–1807), the Fifth (1809), the Sixth (1813–1814), and the Seventh (1815) plus the Peninsular War (1807–1814) and the French invasion of Russia (1812). Napoleon, upon ascending to First Consul of France in 1799, had inherited a republic in chaos; he subsequently created a state with stable financ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British India
The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another, they existed between 1612 and 1947, conventionally divided into three historical periods: *Between 1612 and 1757 the East India Company set up Factory (trading post), factories (trading posts) in several locations, mostly in coastal India, with the consent of the Mughal emperors, Maratha Empire or local rulers. Its rivals were the merchant trading companies of Portugal, Denmark, the Netherlands, and France. By the mid-18th century, three ''presidency towns'': Madras, Bombay and Calcutta, had grown in size. *During the period of Company rule in India (1757–1858), the company gradually acquired sovereignty over large parts of India, now called "presidencies". However, it also increasingly came under British government over ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nicobar Islands
The Nicobar Islands are an archipelagic island chain in the eastern Indian Ocean. They are located in Southeast Asia, northwest of Aceh on Sumatra, and separated from Thailand to the east by the Andaman Sea. Located southeast of the Indian subcontinent, across the Bay of Bengal, they are part of India, as the Nicobar district within the union territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. UNESCO has declared the Great Nicobar Island as one of the World Network of Biosphere Reserves. The International Coordinating Council of UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere Programme (MAB), added the following new sites to the World Network of Biosphere Reserves (WNBR) http://www.unesco.org/new/en/media-services/multimedia/photos/mab-2013/india/. Geography The Nicobar Islands cover a land area of and had a popula ...[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lascar
A lascar was a sailor or militiaman from the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, the Arab world, British Somaliland, or other land east of the Cape of Good Hope, who was employed on European ships from the 16th century until the middle of the 20th century. Etymology The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' states that the word has two possible derivations: :Either an erroneous European use of Urdu ''lashkar'' army, camp .. or a shortened form of its derivative ''lashkarī'' ..In Portuguese ''c''1600 ''laschar'' occurs in the same sense as ''lasquarim'' , i.e. Indian soldier; this use, from which the current applications are derived, is not recorded in English. The Portuguese adapted this term to "lascarins", meaning Asian militiamen or seamen, from any area east of the Cape of Good Hope, including Indian, Malay, Chinese and Japanese crewmen. The English word "lascarins", now obsolete, referred to Sri Lankans who fought in the colonial army of the Portuguese until the 1930s. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Line
The line of battle is a tactic in naval warfare in which a fleet of ships forms a line end to end. The first example of its use as a tactic is disputed—it has been variously claimed for dates ranging from 1502 to 1652. Line-of-battle tactics were in widespread use by 1675. Compared with prior naval tactics, in which two opposing ships closed on one another for individual combat, the line of battle has the advantage that each ship in the line can fire its broadside without fear of hitting a friendly ship. This means that in a given period, the fleet can fire more shots. Another advantage is that a relative movement of the line in relation to some part of the enemy fleet allows for a systematic concentration of fire on that part. The other fleet can avoid this by manoeuvring in a line itself, with a result typical for sea battles since 1675: two fleets sail alongside one another (or on the opposite tack). Early development The first recorded mention of the use of a line o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles-Alexandre Léon Durand Linois
Charles-Alexandre Léon Durand, Comte de Linois (27 January 1761 – 2 December 1848) was a French admiral who served in the French Navy during the reign of Napoleon Bonaparte. He commanded the combined Franco-Spanish fleet during the Algeciras Campaign in 1801, winning the First Battle of Algeciras before losing the Second Battle of Algeciras.Piat pp. 195–196 He then led an unsuccessful campaign against British trade in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea in 1803, being defeated by a harmless fleet of the East India Company during the Battle of Pulo Aura and ending his cruise and sea-going career being bested in battle by John Warren in the action of 13 March 1806. Following the Bourbon restoration, Linois was appointed Governor of Guadeloupe. He supported Napoleon during the Hundred Days and so, on his return to France, he was forced to resign and was court martialled. Although acquitted, he was placed in retirement and never served again. Biography Born in Brest, L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ship Of The Line
A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which depended on the two columns of opposing warships maneuvering to volley fire with the cannons along their broadsides. In conflicts where opposing ships were both able to fire from their broadsides, the opponent with more cannons firingand therefore more firepowertypically had an advantage. Since these engagements were almost invariably won by the heaviest ships carrying more of the most powerful guns, the natural progression was to build sailing vessels that were the largest and most powerful of their time. From the end of the 1840s, the introduction of steam power brought less dependence on the wind in battle and led to the construction of screw-driven wooden-hulled ships of the line; a number of purely sail-powered ships were converted to this propulsion mech ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Of Pulo Aura
The Battle of Pulo Aura was a minor naval engagement of the Napoleonic Wars, fought on 14 February 1804, in which a large convoy of Honourable East India Company (HEIC) East Indiamen, well-armed merchant ships, intimidated, drove off and chased away a powerful French naval squadron. Although the French force was much stronger than the British convoy, Commodore Nathaniel Dance's aggressive tactics persuaded Contre-Admiral Charles-Alexandre Durand Linois to retire after only a brief exchange of shot. Dance then chased the French warships until his convoy was out of danger, whereupon he resumed his passage toward British India. Linois later claimed that the unescorted British merchant fleet was defended by eight ships of the line, a claim criticised by contemporary officers and later historians. The battle occurred during an extended commerce raiding operation by a French squadron led by Linois in the ship of the line '' Marengo''. Linois had sailed to the Indian Ocean in 1803 b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Corvette Revenant
''Revenant'' was a 20-gun privateer corvette, launched in 1807, and designed by Robert Surcouf for commerce raiding. The French Navy later requisitioned her and renamed her ''Iéna'', after Napoleon's then-recent victory at the Battle of Jena–Auerstedt. The British captured her in 1808 and she served in the Royal Navy as HMS ''Victor''. The French Navy recaptured her in 1809, taking her back into service under the new name. The British again captured her when they took Isle de France (now Mauritius) in December 1810. They did not restore her to service and she was subsequently broken up. Career Her coppered hull allowed her to sail at up to 12 knots. Her cost was 277,761 francs-or. One of her owners was the banker Jacques Récamier. Indian ocean cruises (1807 - 1808) In February 1807, Surcouf enlisted Potier as first officer on his new privateer ''Revenant''.Cunat, p.412 ''Revenant'' then departed from Saint-Malo on 2 March, and sailed for Isle de France. ''Revenant'' arriv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sloop-of-war
In the 18th century and most of the 19th, a sloop-of-war in the Royal Navy was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. The rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above; thus, the term ''sloop-of-war'' encompassed all the unrated combat vessels, including the very small gun-brigs and cutters. In technical terms, even the more specialised bomb vessels and fireships were classed as sloops-of-war, and in practice these were employed in the sloop role when not carrying out their specialised functions. In World War I and World War II, the Royal Navy reused the term "sloop" for specialised convoy-defence vessels, including the of World War I and the highly successful of World War II, with anti-aircraft and anti-submarine capability. They performed similar duties to the American destroyer escort class ships, and also performed similar duties to the smaller corvettes of the Royal Navy. Rigging A sloop-of-war was quite different from a civilian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Silk
Silk is a natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be woven into textiles. The protein fiber of silk is composed mainly of fibroin and is produced by certain insect larvae to form cocoons. The best-known silk is obtained from the cocoons of the larvae of the mulberry silkworm ''Bombyx mori'' reared in captivity (sericulture). The shimmering appearance of silk is due to the triangular prism-like structure of the silk fibre, which allows silk cloth to refract incoming light at different angles, thus producing different colors. Silk is produced by several insects; but, generally, only the silk of moth caterpillars has been used for textile manufacturing. There has been some research into other types of silk, which differ at the molecular level. Silk is mainly produced by the larvae of insects undergoing complete metamorphosis, but some insects, such as webspinners and raspy crickets, produce silk throughout their lives. Silk production also occurs in hymenoptera ( bee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hooghly River
The Bhagirathi Hooghly River (Anglicized alternatively spelled ''Hoogli'' or ''Hugli'') or the 'Bhāgirathi-Hooghly', called the Ganga or the Kati-Ganga in mythological texts, is the eastern distributary of the Ganges River in West Bengal, India, rising close to Giria in Murshidabad. The main distributary of the Ganges then flows into Bangladesh as the Padma. Today there is a man-made canal called the Farakka Feeder Canal connecting the Ganges to the Bhagirathi. The river flows through the Rarh region, the lower deltaic districts of West Bengal, and eventually into the Bay of Bengal. The upper riparian zone of the river is called Bhagirathi while the lower riparian zone is called Hooghly. Major rivers that drain into the Bhagirathi-Hooghly include Mayurakshi, Jalangi , Ajay, Damodar, Rupnarayan and Haldi rivers other than the Ganges. Hugli-Chinsura, Bandel, Chandannagar, Srirampur, Barrackpur, Rishra, Uttarpara, Titagarh, Kamarhati, Agarpara, Baranagar and Kolkata are loc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
