| History | |
|---|---|
 France | |
| Name | Argus |
| Builder | Jean Fouache and Enterprise Thibaudier, Le Havre [1] |
| Laid down | July 1799 |
| Launched | 20 July 1800 |
| Commissioned | May 1802 |
| Stricken | 31 March 1807 |
| Fate | Broken up April 1807 |
| General characteristics | |
| Displacement | 160 tons (French) |
| Length | 29.2 m (96 ft) |
| Beam | 8.4 m (28 ft) |
| Draught | 3.5 m (11 ft) |
| Complement | 84 |
| Armament | 14 × 8-pounder (bronze) guns [1] |
| Armour | Timber |
Argus was a 16-gun brig of the French Navy, launched in 1800 and broken up at Cayenne in 1807.
Argus was a Vigilant-class brig, designated No. 3 in 1799, of a six-vessel class. She was launched 1800, but not commissioned until 1802. [1]
She was at the battle of Trafalgar, but did not engage in combat.
On 23 October 1805, French Captain Julien Cosmao made a sortie from Cadiz with some of the more seaworthy ships that had escaped the battle, in an attempt to retake some of the captured prizes. Argus was among the sortieing vessels. A storm came up that wrecked many vessels and forced the remains of the French fleet back to Cadiz. There, the Spanish seized a number of them after Spain entered the war against France in 1808. However, Argus was not among the seized vessels.
Argus left Cayenne on 15 March 1806, provisioned for a cruise of four months and in company with the French brig Observateur. Argus was eager to escape and abandoned Observateur, which, however, was able to hold off her attacker. [2] Still, the British captured Observateur on 9 June. [3]
In late 1806, Argus, of sixteen 9-pounder guns and 120 men, and a schooner of two 18-pounder guns and 30 men, encountered HMS Express. The encounter was inconclusive as the French broke off the action and sailed away. Express had three men wounded. She had exhausted all her 18-pounder shot. The governor of Martinique, Admiral Villaret Joyeuse, reportedly cashiered Argus's captain for his failure to capture Express. [4]
Argus fought off Cayenne on 27 January 1807 at the side of Favourite. The British report from the engagement states that Argus was armed with fourteen brass 8-pounder guns, which were the equivalent of English 9-pounders, and had a crew of 120 men. [5]
Argus was condemned and ordered broken up at Cayenne on 31 March 1807. She was decommissioned on 21 April and then broken up. [1]
HMS Galatea was a fifth-rate 32-gun sailing frigate of the British Royal Navy that George Parsons built at Bursledon and launched in 1794. Before she was broken up in 1809 she captured numerous prizes and participated in a number of actions, first in the Channel and off Ireland (1794–1803), and then in the Caribbean (1802–1809), including one that earned her crew the Naval General Service Medal.
HMS Indefatigable was one of the Ardent-class 64-gun third-rate ships-of-the-line designed by Sir Thomas Slade in 1761 for the Royal Navy. She was built as a ship-of-the-line, but most of her active service took place after her conversion to a 44-gun razee frigate. She had a long career under several distinguished commanders, serving throughout the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. She took some 27 prizes, alone or in company, and the Admiralty authorised the issue of four clasps to the Naval General Service Medal in 1847 to any surviving members of her crews from the respective actions. She was broken up in 1816.
HMS Sirius was a 36-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. Between 1797 and 1805, the Sirius was engaged in maintaining the blockade of Napoleonic Europe. She was lost in 1810 when her crew scuttled her after she grounded during the Battle of Grand Port.
Heureux was a 22-gun French privateer brig that the British captured in 1800. She served with the Royal Navy as the 22-gun post ship HMS Heureux. She captured numerous French and Spanish privateers and merchant vessels in the Caribbean Sea before she was lost at sea in 1806. Her fate remains a mystery to this day.
HMS Hydra launched in 1797 was a fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. From 1813 to 1817 she served as a troopship. She was sold in 1820.
HMS Goliath was a 74-gun third-rate ship of the line in the Royal Navy. She was built by Adam Hayes at Deptford Dockyard and launched on 19 October 1781. She was present at the Battle of Cape St Vincent, Battle of the Nile, and Battle of Copenhagen. She was broken up in 1815.
HMS Favourite was a 16-gun Cormorant-class sloop of the Royal Navy, launched in 1794 at Rotherhithe. The French captured her in 1806 and renamed her Favorite. However, the British recaptured her in 1807 and renamed her HMS Goree. She became a prison ship in 1810 and was broken up in Bermuda in 1817.
HMS Wasp was an 18-gun sloop of the British Royal Navy. She was formerly the French naval brig Guêpe, which the Navy captured in 1800. She served during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, and was sold out of naval service in 1811.
Furet, launched in 1801, was an Abeille-class brig of the French Navy. HMS Hydra captured her on 27 February 1806, off Cadiz.
HMS Belette was an 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop, built by King at Dover and launched on 21 March 1806. During the Napoleonic Wars she served with some success in the Baltic and the Caribbean. Belette was lost in the Kattegat in 1812 when she hit a rock off Læsø.
HMS Admiral Rainier was a Dutch 16-gun brig that the British captured on 23 August 1800 at Kuyper's Island, Java. They took her into service and named her after Admiral Peter Rainier, the leader of the British expedition. After the British sold her in 1803 apparently the French captured her in 1804 and sold her to the Dutch colonial government in Batavia for anti-piracy patrol. Her Javanese crew mutinied in 1806 and eventually sailed to Penang where vessels of the British East India Company (EIC) seized the vessel. She returned to British service, only to be captured and recaptured by vessels of the EIC. Her ultimate fate is unknown.
HMS Moucheron was a French privateer, built in 1799, that the British captured in 1801. The British government purchased her in 1802 for the Royal Navy. She foundered in 1807 in the Mediterranean without leaving a trace.
The French brig Voltigeur was a Palinure-class brig launched in 1804. The British captured her in 1806 and renamed her HMS Pelican. She was sold in 1812.
HMS Bacchus was a schooner of the Adonis class of the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic War. She was built at Bermuda using Bermudan cedar and completed in mid-1806.
Etna was a French naval Etna-class ship-sloop launched in 1795 that the Royal Navy captured in November 1796. She was taken into service as HMS Aetna and renamed to HMS Cormorant the next year. She captured several merchant vessels and privateers before she was wrecked in 1800 off the coast of Egypt.
HMS Express was the name-ship of a class of two schooner-rigged advice-boats of the Royal Navy. Express was launched in 1800 and served until she was sold in 1813. During her career she served in one action and one campaign that in 1847 qualified her surviving crew members for clasps to the Naval General Service Medal.
The French brig Observateur, which was launched in 1800 for the French Navy, was a Vigilant-class 16-gun brig, one of six built to a design by Pierre-Alexandre-Laurent Forfait. The Royal Navy captured her in 1806 and took her into service as HMS Observateur. She participated in two actions, one for the French Navy and one for the Royal Navy, and one campaign before she was laid up in 1810. The Navy did not succeed in selling her until 1814.
Confiance, launched in 1797, was a privateer corvette from Bordeaux, famous for being Robert Surcouf's ship during the capture of the British East India Company's East Indiaman Kent. The British Royal Navy captured Confiance in 1805, took her into service under her existing name, and sold her in 1810. Before she was sold, Confiance took part in two notable actions.
HMS Constant was an Archer–class gun-brig of the Royal Navy, launched in 1801 for service against the French during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. She was variously stationed in English home waters, the Baltic, the Caribbean, and off the coast of Spain, and was responsible for the capture of at least seven enemy vessels during her fifteen years at sea. The Royal Navy sold Constant at Chatham Dockyard in 1816.
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