The ''Charmante'' class was a group of five 32-gun/12-pounder
frigate
A frigate () is a type of warship. In different eras, the roles and capabilities of ships classified as frigates have varied somewhat.
The name frigate in the 17th to early 18th centuries was given to any full-rigged ship built for speed and ...
s of the
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 t ...
, built during the late 1770s at
Brest
Brest may refer to:
Places
*Brest, Belarus
**Brest Region
**Brest Airport
**Brest Fortress
*Brest, Kyustendil Province, Bulgaria
*Břest, Czech Republic
*Brest, France
**Arrondissement of Brest
**Brest Bretagne Airport
** Château de Brest
*Brest, ...
(lead ship)
Nantes
Nantes (, , ; Gallo: or ; ) is a city in Loire-Atlantique on the Loire, from the Atlantic coast. The city is the sixth largest in France, with a population of 314,138 in Nantes proper and a metropolitan area of nearly 1 million inhabita ...
(2 ships) and
Saint Malo
Saint-Malo (, , ; Gallo: ; ) is a historic French port in Ille-et-Vilaine, Brittany, on the English Channel coast.
The walled city had a long history of piracy, earning much wealth from local extortion and overseas adventures. In 1944, the Alli ...
(2 ships). They were designed by
Jean-Denis Chevillard. Of the five ships, two were wrecked, two were captured by the British, and one by the Spanish.
*
''Charmante''
:Builder: Brest
:Ordered:
:Laid down: April 1777
:Launched: 30 August 1777
:Completed: January 1778
:Fate: Wrecked on the
Chaussée de Sein on 24 March 1780
*
''Junon''
:Builder: Rochefort
:Ordered:
:Laid down: September 1777
:Launched: March 1778
:Completed: May 1778
:Fate: Wrecked by the
Great Hurricane of 1780
The Great Hurricane of 1780 was the deadliest Atlantic hurricane on record. An estimated 22,000 people died throughout the Lesser Antilles when the storm passed through the islands from October 10 to October 16. Specifics on the hurricane's tr ...
off
Saint Vincent on 11 October 1780
*
''Gracieuse''
:Builder: Rochefort
:Ordered:
:Laid down: November 1785
:Launched: 18 May 1787
:Completed: May 1788
:Fate: Renamed ''Unité'' on 28 September 1793. Capturd by the British on 11 April 1796, recomissionned as HMS ''Unite'', sold in 1802
*
''Inconstante''
:Builder: Rochefort
:Ordered:
:Laid down: January 1789
:Launched: 9 September 1790
:Completed: February 1791
:Fate: Captured by HMS ''Penelope'' and ''Iphigenia'' on 25 November 1793 off
Saint Domingue
Saint-Domingue () was a French colonization of the Americas, French colony in the western portion of the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, in the area of modern-day Haiti, from 1659 to 1804. The name derives from the Spanish main city in the islan ...
and recommissioned in the Royal Navy as HMS ''Convert''
*
''Hélène''[Roche, p.239]
:Builder: Rochefort
:Ordered:
:Laid down: 1789
:Launched: 18 May 1791
:Completed: June 1792
:Fate: Captured by the Spanish on 19 February 1793 during the
French expedition to Sardinia and recommissioned in the Spanish Navy as ''Sirena''
Citations
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Charmante class frigate
Frigate classes
Ship classes of the French Navy