The Battle of Cape St. Vincent was a naval battle that took place off the southern coast of Portugal on 16 January 1780 during the American Revolutionary War. A British fleet under Admiral Sir George Rodney defeated a Spanish squadron under Don Juan de Lángara. The battle is sometimes referred to as the Moonlight Battle because it was unusual for naval battles in the Age of Sail to take place at night. It was also the first major naval victory for the British over their European enemies in the war and proved the value of copper-sheathing the hulls of warships.
HMS Polyphemus, a 64-gun third-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 27 April 1782 at Sheerness. She participated in the 1801 Battle of Copenhagen, the Battle of Trafalgar, and the Siege of Santo Domingo. In 1813 she became a powder hulk and was broken up in 1827.
HMS Speedy was a 14-gun Speedy-class brig of the British Royal Navy. Built during the last years of the American War of Independence, she served with distinction during the French Revolutionary Wars.
HMS Arethusa was a 38-gun Minerva-class fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy built at Bristol in 1781. She served in three wars and made a number of notable captures before she was broken up in 1815.
HMS Anson was a ship of the Royal Navy, launched at Plymouth on 4 September 1781. Originally a 64-gun third rate ship of the line, she fought at the Battle of the Saintes.
HMS Coventry was a 28-gun sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy, launched in 1757 and in active service as a privateer hunter during the Seven Years' War, and as part of the British fleet in India during the Anglo-French War. After seventeen years' in British service she was captured by the French in 1783, off Ganjam in the Bay of Bengal. Thereafter she spent two years as part of the French Navy until January 1785 when she was removed from service at the port of Brest. She was broken up in 1786.
Fénix was an 80-gun ship of the line (navio) of the Spanish Navy, built by Pedro de Torres at Havana in accordance with the system laid down by Antonio Gaztaneta launched in 1749. In 1759, she was sent to bring the new king, Carlos III, from Naples to Barcelona. When Spain entered the American Revolutionary War in June 1779, Fénix set sail for the English Channel where she was to join a Franco-Spanish fleet of more than 60 ships of the line under Lieutenant General Luis de Córdova y Córdova. The Armada of 1779 was an invasion force of 40,000 troops with orders to capture the British naval base at Portsmouth.
HMS Argo was a 44-gun fifth-rate Roebuck-class ship of the Royal Navy. She was launched in 1781 from Howdon Dock. The French captured her in 1783, but 36 hours later the British recaptured her. She then distinguished herself in the French Revolutionary Wars by capturing several prizes, though she did not participate in any major actions. She also served in the Napoleonic Wars. She was sold in 1816.
The Third Battle of Ushant or the action of 20–21 April 1782 was a naval battle fought during the American Revolutionary War, between a French naval fleet of three ships of the line protecting a convoy and two British Royal naval ships of the line off Ushant, a French island at the mouth of the English Channel off the northwesternmost point of France. This was the third battle that occurred in this region during the course of the war.
The action of 14 September 1779 was a minor naval engagement that occurred on 14 September 1779, off the Azores between the Royal Navy frigate HMS Pearl under the command of George Montagu and the Spanish Navy frigate Santa Mónica under the command of Miguel de Nunes, with the Pearl capturing the Santa Mónica after a brief engagement. The battle was an episode during the American Revolutionary War, where American rebels under the overall command of George Washington launched a revolution against the British government based on perceived grievances. Spain, having been handed a humiliating defeat during the Seven Years' War by the British, was eager to enter the war on the side of the Americans to regain the territories they had lost, such as Florida, Menorca and Gibraltar. British and Spanish naval forces engaged each other several times during the war, as the conflict spilled over into Europe with the Spanish laying siege to Gibraltar.
The action of 12 December 1782 was a naval engagement fought off the coast of Spain near Ferrol, in which the British 40-gun fifth rate HMS Mediator successfully attacked a convoy of five armed ships. Mediator succeeded in capturing one American privateer, the Alexander, and then captured the French ex-ship of the line La Ménagère. The convoy was part of Pierre Beaumarchais's supply chain to the American colonists.
HMS Monsieur was the former 40-gun French privateer Monsieur, built at Le Havre between July 1778 and 1779, then armed at Granville. The Royal Navy captured her in 1780 and subsequently put her into service as a 36-gun Fifth Rate. This frigate was sold in 1783.
HMS Prince William was a 64-gun third-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She had previously been Guipuzcoano, an armed 64-gun ship of the Spanish (Basque) mercantile Guipuzcoan Company of Caracas. She was also known by the religious name of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción.
HMS Crescent was a 28-gun Enterprise-class sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. Crescent was launched in 1779. The French captured her in 1781. She was wrecked in 1786.
HMS Brilliant was a 28-gun Enterprise-class sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. Brilliant was first commissioned in July 1779 under the command of Captain John Ford.
HMS Success was a 32-gun Amazon-class fifth-rate frigate of the British Royal Navy launched in 1781, which served during the American Revolutionary, French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. The French captured her in the Mediterranean on 13 February 1801, but she was recaptured by the British on 2 September. She continued to serve in the Mediterranean until 1811, and in North America until hulked in 1814, then serving as a prison ship and powder hulk, before being broken up in 1820.
The action of 17 February 1783 was a minor naval engagement fought in between Jamaica and Cuba in the Caribbean sea between a Royal Navy frigate HMS Fox and a Spanish Navy frigate Santa Catalina.
The French brig Duc de Chartres was built between 1779 and 1780 at Le Havre as a 24-gun privateer. As a privateer she captured one British warship before in 1781 the Royal Navy captured her. The Royal Navy took her into service as HMS Duc de Chartres. She then captured several American privateers and armed merchant vessels, and one French naval corvette in a noteworthy single-ship action. The Navy sold Duc de Chartres in 1784.
The action of 29 July 1782 was a minor naval engagement that took place towards the end of the American War of Independence. The British Royal Navy frigate HMS Santa Margarita captured the 36-gun French frigate Amazone off Cape Henry, but the next day the squadron under Louis-Philippe de Vaudreuil intervened and recaptured the frigate.
Vernon was launched at Bordeaux in 1775, almost certainly under another name. She first appeared in British records in 1779. Between 1781 and 1782, she was an armed transport and in 1781 took part in an action that cost her 13 crew members killed and wounded. After the war she traded widely. In 1787 she carried emigrants to Sierra Leone for the Committee for the Relief of the Black Poor. She was wrecked in December 1792.
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