Nine ships 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 ...

have borne the name HMS ''Racehorse'': * was an 18-gun

privateer A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...

captured from the French in 1757. She was on

Arctic The Arctic ( or ) is a polar regions of Earth, polar region located at the northernmost part of Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean, adjacent seas, and parts of Canada (Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut), Danish Realm (Greenla ...

discovery in 1773. She was renamed ''Thunder'' (and re-classed as a bomb vessel) on 24 October 1775. The French captured ''Thunder'' off

Sandy Hook Sandy Hook is a barrier spit in Middletown Township, Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States. The barrier spit, approximately in length and varying from wide, is located at the north end of the Jersey Shore. It encloses the southern en ...

on 14 August 1778. * HMS ''Race Horse'' was the mercantile ''Hercules'' that the Royal Navy purchased at Jamaica in 1776, and that the American ''Andrea Doria'' captured on 24 December 1776. ''Surprise''s crew destroyed her in 1777 at

Delaware Bay Delaware Bay is the estuary outlet of the Delaware River on the northeast seaboard of the United States. It is approximately in area, the bay's freshwater mixes for many miles with the saltwater of the Atlantic Ocean. The bay is bordered inlan ...

to prevent the Royal Navy from recapturing her. * was a 16-gun

sloop A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular sa ...

purchased in 1777 and shortly thereafter renamed ''Senegal''. The French 74-gun captured her on 14 August 1778. The French renamed her ''Sénégal''. recaptured her on 2 November 1780 after an engagement that lasted five hours and in which the French lost 12 killed and 28 wounded, while the British lost two killed and four wounded. The Royal Navy took her back into service as HMS ''Senegal''. ''Senegal'' was at

Gorée (; "Gorée Island"; Wolof: Beer Dun) is one of the 19 (i.e. districts) of the city of Dakar, Senegal. It is an island located at sea from the main harbour of Dakar (), famous as a destination for people interested in the Atlantic slave trade ...

being repaired when she caught fire and exploded on 22 November, with the loss of captain and 22 men.Hepper (1994), p.60. * was a 10-gun

schooner A schooner () is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than the mainmast. A common variant, the topsail schoon ...

purchased in 1778. She was wrecked in 1779 at

Beachy Head Beachy Head is a chalk headland in East Sussex, England. It is situated close to Eastbourne, immediately east of the Seven Sisters. Beachy Head is located within the administrative area of Eastbourne Borough Council which owns the land, formin ...

. * was a 16-gun

launched in 1781. She was broken up in 1799. * was an 18-gun launched in February 1806. She was wrecked in 1822 off the

Isle of Man ) , anthem = "O Land of Our Birth" , image = Isle of Man by Sentinel-2.jpg , image_map = Europe-Isle_of_Man.svg , mapsize = , map_alt = Location of the Isle of Man in Europe , map_caption = Location of the Isle of Man (green) in Europe ...

. * was an 18-gun sloop launched in 1830. She became a coal hulk in 1860 and was sold in 1901. * was a wood screw gunvessel launched in 1860. She was wrecked in 1864 near

Yantai Yantai, Postal Map Romanization, formerly romanization of Chinese, known as Chefoo, is a coastal prefecture-level city on the Shandong Peninsula in northeastern Shandong province of People's Republic of China. Lying on the southern coast of ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. * was a launched in 1900. She was sold in 1920, resold, and broken up in 1921. * was an R-class destroyer launched in 1942. She was sold in 1949.

Citations

References

* *Demerliac, Alain (1996) ''La Marine De Louis XVI: Nomenclature Des Navires Français De 1774 À 1792''. (Nice: Éditions OMEGA). * {{DEFAULTSORT:Racehorse, Hms Royal Navy ship names