Armide was a 40-gun frigate of the French Navy, lead ship of her class, and launched in 1804 at Rochefort. She served briefly in the French Navy before the Royal Navy captured her in 1806. She went on to serve in the Royal Navy until 1815 when she was broken up.
Armide took part in Allemand's expedition of 1805. On 18 July, she captured and burnt a Prussian cutter to maintain the secrecy of the movements of the fleet, in spite of the neutrality of Prussia at the time. The next day, she captured HMSRanger and burnt her. She then took part in the assault on the Calcutta convoy, helping Magnanime engage and capture HMSCalcutta.
Sir Samuel Hood's engagement with the French Squadron off Rochefort, 25 September 1806, the Monarch Capt. Richard Lee, engaging La Minerve, L'Armide, & La Glore
During the action of 25 September 1806, HMSCentaur, under the command of CommodoreSir Samuel Hood, captured Armide, which was under the command of Captain Jean-Jacques-Jude Langlois, and assisted in the capture of Infatigable, Gloire and Minerve. Centaur lost three men killed and three wounded. In addition, a musket ball shattered Hood's arm, which had to be amputated. The wound forced Hood to quit the deck and leave the ship in the charge of Lieutenant William Case. Centaur also lost most of her lower rigging. In all, the British lost nine men killed and 32 wounded. Hood estimated that the French had 650 men aboard each vessel, inclusive of soldiers, but put off till later any estimate of their losses.[1]
Armide arrived at Plymouth on 2 October 1806, where she was laid up.[2] In 1807 and 1808 she was in ordinary in Plymouth. She then underwent repairs between February and October 1809.[2]
British service
Armide entered British service as the 38-gun fifth rate HMS Armide. In August 1809 Captain Lucius Ferdinand Hardyman commissioned her and assumed command.[2]
Napoleonic Wars
In January 1810 Armide, under Captain Hardyman, and the 80-gun second rate, HMSChristian VII, Captain Sir Joseph Sydney Yorke, were stationed off the Basque Roads. On 10 January, they sighted a small convoy sailing from the Île d'Aix to La Rochelle. The boats of the two ships went in under small arms and grapeshot fire from a shore battery and captured a chasse-maree of about 30 tons. The tide was ebbing too fast to bring off the other vessels so the British burnt a brig, a schooner and a chasse-maree. This was regrettable as the all were fully laden with cargoes consisting of best quality wines and brandies, soap, rosin, candles, pitch, oil, pine varnish, and the like. The cutting out expedition suffered no casualties.[3] The captured chasse maree was probably the Felicite.[4]
On 19 January Armide recaptured the brig Hope.[5] The next evening, boats from Armide and Christian VII pursued about 30 vessels that were coming out from the Maumusson Pass, between the Île d'Oléron and the mainland, making for La Rochelle. The French convoy then ran aground close under shore batteries. Still, the British were able to take one chasse-maree and burn four, despite heavy fire from the shore batteries. The rest escaped and headed back from where they had come. Two French sailors died in the affair and Armide had one man wounded.[3] The captured chasse maree was probably Glorieuse.[4]
On the night of 12 February, another convoy of ten vessels sailed from the river Charente and three chasse-marées went aground on the reef off the Point de Chatelaillon between La Rochelle and Île d'Aix. Yorke then sent in three boats each from Armide and Christian VII, plus two from HMS Seine, to attack them. Nine French gunboats, each carrying a 12-pounder carronade and six swivel guns, and manned with suffient men for 20 to 30 oars, fled from the British boats. The British, led by Lt. Gardiner Henry Guion, captured one gunboat, killing two of her crew and wounding three, including her commander; two gunboats grounded and could not be retrieved. The British then burnt the three chasse-marees that they had captured.[6][7]
On 29 April Armide was in company with Daring when they captured the Aimable Betsie.[8]Monkey and the hired armedcutterAdrian also shared in the proceeds of the capture of Aimable Betzie.[9]
On 4 May, boats from Armide, with the assistance of boats from the 8-gun Cherokee-classbrig-sloopCadmus, and the gun-brigsMonkey and Daring, attacked a French convoy of armed and coasting vessels off the Île de Ré. Despite strong fire from shore batteries and the convoy's escorts, the British capture and burnt 13 vessels and forced four ashore. Armide lost three men killed and three wounded.[10]
In August Captain Richard Dalling Dun assumed command. On 27 September, the boats of the 120-gun first rateHMSCaledonia, Captain Sir Harry Neale, the 74-gun Repulse-classthird rateHMSValiant, Captain Robert Dudley Oliver, and Armide, captured two laden brigs and burned a third that had taken shelter under the guns of a battery on the Point du Ché, near Angoulins. A force of 130 Royal Marines from the two ships of the line also took and destroyed the battery after engaging reinforcements on the way. The British suffered two men wounded, but killed at least 14 French soldiers in the battery alone.[11] The next day Armide, Caledonia, Valiant, Snapper, Arrow and the hired armed cutter Nimrod captured the San Nicolas and Aventura.[12]
On 9 January 1811, Armide and Pheasant recaptured the Nancy.[13]
Captain Francis Temple assumed command in September 1812.[2] On 10 December, Armide was in company with Piercer and so shared in the prize money from the capture of the chasse maree Civilité.[14]Armide was in sight on 23 December when the hired armed cutter Nimrod recaptured Sparkler, and so shared in the salvage money.[14]
On 16 January 1813, Armide grounded near two batteries on Point St. Jaques, Quiberon Bay. When the French hailed them, the pilot on Armide replied that she was the frigate USSPresident and that they required no assistance. Her crew managed to re-float Armide before the French discovered they had been tricked. Still, a court-martial reprimanded Temple, "dis-rated the master from his ship", and fined the pilot of all his pay, while also sentencing him to imprisonment in the Marshalsea for two months.[15]
From 5 February 1813 to May 1815 Armide was under the command of Captain Edward Thomas Troubridge.[2] On 14 May, he brought her into Nova Scotia, together with a convoy of three store ships from Cork.
On 7 August 1813 Armide captured an American schooner laden with munitions of war on the Rappahannock River at Windmill Point and with two ladies as passengers. Armide forwarded the ladies to their place of destination but kept their two male escorts and three sailors as prisoners.[16]
On 15 August, Armide was in company with Endymion and Pique when she captured the American privateer Herald of 230 tons burthen (bm), 17 guns and 100 men. She had thrown two guns overboard while pursued.[17] The next day Armide captured the French letter of marqueInvincible, formerly Invincible Napoleon. She was armed with 16 guns but had thrown ten overboard. She was of 331 tons burthen (bm) and had a crew of 60 men.[17]
Little Belt was an American sloop of 18 tons (bm) and 3 men, sailing from New York to Charleston, that HMSArmide destroyed on 26 September off "the Capes" after taking off Little Belt's cargo.[18]
To prepare for the attack on New Orleans, in early December 1814 Vice Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane hoisted his flag in Armide and took her together with the 38-gun frigate HMSSeahorse and the 18-gun Cruizer-classbrig-sloopHMSSophie off Pensacola to an anchorage at the Isle of Vaisseau at the beginning of December 1814. On her way down two American gunboats fired on Armide, which led to the Battle of Lake Borgne. Boats from the British fleet, under Captain Nicholas Lockyer of Sophie, and including Armide, captured the American gunboat flotilla. In this boat action British casualties were 17 men killed, including one from Armide, and 77 wounded.[19] In 1847 the Admiralty issued a clasp (or bar) marked "14 Dec. Boat Service 1814" to survivors of the boat service who claimed the clasp to the Naval General Service Medal.[lower-alpha 1]
After the British had succeeded in silencing American naval opposition, the British transported their troops 60 miles to Bayou Catalan (or des Pecheurs) at the head of Lake Borgne. The troops landed on 23 December and took up a position across the main road to New Orleans. While Captain Troubridge took command of the naval brigade ashore, Armide remained at anchor off Cat Island (Mississippi).
After their defeat in the Battle of New Orleans in January 1815 the British withdrew. Cochrane left the British headquarters on 14 January, returning to Armide on the 16th.[lower-alpha 2]
Fate
In February Armide was at Bermuda ready for passage home. She was broken up in November 1815.[2]
Notes
↑ The 'Names of Ships for which Claims have been proved' are as follows: warships Tonnant, Norge, Royal Oak, Ramillies, Bedford, Armide, Cydnus, Trave, Seahorse, Sophie, and Meteor; troopships Gorgon, Diomede, Alceste, and Belle Poule.[20]
↑ Cochrane spent a month on shore, as explained in his despatch to the Admiralty, written aboard the Armide dated 18 January 1815. 'Upon the 16th therefore the advance, commanded by Colonel Thornton... took post upon the Isle aux Poix, a small swampy spot at the mouth of the Pearl river, about thirty miles from the anchorage... where Major-General Keane, Rear-Admiral Codrington, and myself joined them on the following day [17 Dec 1814].... This arrangement [for withdrawal] being in a forward state of execution, I quitted head quarters on the 14th instant, leaving Rear-Admiral Malcolm to conduct the naval part of the operations in that quarter, and I arrived at this anchorage on the 16th [January], where I am arranging for the reception of the army, and preparing the fleet for further operations.' Reproduced in the London Gazette. "No. 16991". The London Gazette. 9 March 1815. pp.449–451.
↑ James, William (1824). "Vol. 5". The Naval History of Great Britain: From the Declaration of War by France in February 1793, to the accession of George IV in January 1820; with an account of the origin and progressive increase of the British Navy. London: Baldwin, Cradock and Joy. pp.333–335.
HMS Tonnant was an 80-gun ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She had previously been Tonnant of the French Navy and the lead ship of the Tonnant class. The British captured her in August 1793 during the Siege of Toulon but the French recaptured her when the siege was broken in December. Rear-Admiral Horatio Nelson captured her at Aboukir Bay off the coast of Egypt at the Battle of the Nile on 1 August 1798. She was taken into British service as HMS Tonnant. She went on to fight at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, during the Napoleonic Wars.
The Gunboat War was a naval conflict between Denmark–Norway and the British during the Napoleonic Wars. The war's name is derived from the Danish tactic of employing small gunboats against the materially superior Royal Navy. In Scandinavia it is seen as the later stage of the English Wars, whose commencement is accounted as the First Battle of Copenhagen in 1801.
HMS Starr was a 16-gun Merlin-class ship sloop of the Royal Navy. She was built by Tanner, of Dartmouth, to plans by Sir William Rule, and launched in July 1805. As a sloop she served on convoy duty, though she also participated in the invasion of Martinique in early 1809. She was rebuilt as a bomb vessel in May 1812 and renamed Meteor. As Meteor she served in the Baltic and then off the United States, participating in attacks on up the Potomac and on Baltimore and New Orleans. She was sold in October 1816.
Pomone was a 40-gun frigate of the French Navy, launched in 1785. The British captured her off the Île de Batz in April 1794 and incorporated her into the Royal Navy. Pomone subsequently had a relatively brief but active career in the British Navy off the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts of France before suffering sufficient damage from hitting a rock to warrant being taken out of service and then broken up in 1803.
HMS Cerberus was a 32-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She served in the French Revolutionary and the Napoleonic Wars in the Channel, the Mediterranean, the Adriatic, and even briefly in the Baltic against the Russians. She participated in one boat action that won for her crew a clasp to the Naval General Service Medal (NGSM). She also captured many privateers and merchant vessels. Her biggest battle was the Battle of Lissa, which won for her crew another clasp to the NGSM. She was sold in 1814.
HMS Belle Poule was a Royal Navy fifth-rate frigate, formerly Belle Poule, a Virginie-class frigate of the French Navy that had been built by the Crucy family's shipyard at Basse-Indre to a design by Jacques-Noël Sané. She was launched on 17 April 1802, and saw active service in the East. In 1806 a British squadron under Sir John Borlase Warren captured her off La Palma in the Canary Islands. The Admiralty commissioned her into the Royal Navy as HMS Belle Poule. She was sold in 1816.
HMS Niemen was a Royal Navy 38-gun fifth-rate frigate. She began her career as the Niémen, a 44-gun French Navy Armide-class frigate, designed by Pierre Rolland. She was only in French service for a few months when in 1809 she encountered some British frigates. The British captured her and she continued in British service as Niemen. In British service she cruised in the Atlantic and North American waters, taking numerous small American prizes, some privateers but mostly merchantmen. She was broken up in 1815, at the end of the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812.
HMS Weazel was a Royal Navy 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop, launched in 1805 at Topsham, Devon. She saw active service in and around the Mediterranean during the Napoleonic Wars resulting in her crews earning three clasps to the Naval General Service Medal, was decommissioned in 1815, and was sold for breaking in 1825.
HMS Hazard was a 16-gun Royal Navy Cormorant-class ship-sloop built by Josiah & Thomas Brindley at Frindsbury, Kent, and launched in 1794. She served in the French Revolutionary Wars and throughout the Napoleonic Wars. She captured numerous prizes, and participated in a notable ship action against the French frigate Topaze, as well as in several other actions and campaigns, three of which earned her crew clasps to the Naval General Service Medal. Hazard was sold in 1817.
HMS Unicorn was a 32-gun fifth-rate Pallas-class frigate of the Royal Navy, launched in 1794 at Chatham. This frigate served in both the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars, including a medal action early in her career. She was broken up in 1815.
HMS Piercer was a Royal Navy Archer-class gun-brig launched in 1804. She served against the French, Danes and Dutch in the Napoleonic Wars and was assigned to the Downs station. She participated in a number of operations in the Bay of Biscay, the English Channel, and the North Sea. In 1814 the British government transferred Piercer to the Kingdom of Hanover for use as a guard ship. Hanover decommissioned her in 1850.
Sir Henry Hope KCB was an English officer of the Royal Navy whose distinguished service in the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812 earned him acclaim. As captain of HMS Endymion, he was involved in the action on 14 January 1815 which ended in the capture of the American warship USS President.
HMS Clyde was a Royal Navy Artois-class frigate built at Chatham Dockyard of fir, and launched in 1796. In 1797, she was one of only two ships whose captains were able to maintain some control over their vessels during the Nore mutiny. In 1805, HMS Clyde was dismantled and rebuilt at Woolwich Dockyard; she was relaunched on 23 February 1806. She was ultimately sold in August 1814.
HMS Undaunted was a Lively-class fifth-rate 38-gun sailing frigate of the British Royal Navy, built during the Napoleonic Wars, which conveyed Napoleon to his first exile on the island of Elba in early 1814.
HMS Podargus was a Crocus-class brig-sloop of the Royal Navy. She participated in one major battle during the Gunboat War between Britain and Denmark. After the war she served at Saint Helena for five or six years. On her return to Britain in 1820 she was laid up; she was finally sold in 1833.
Royal George was launched in 1803 as a brig for the Revenue Service. The Royal Navy purchased her in 1806 and renamed her HMS Bustard. She served on active duty between 1808 and 1815, distinguishing herself in operations in the Mediterranean. She then sailed to the West Indies. The Royal Navy sold her in 1815 and she became the whaler Royal George. She made three whaling voyages and was lost in 1825 on her fourth.
HMS Monkey was launched in 1801 at Rochester. She served in the Channel, North Sea, and the Baltic, and was wrecked in December 1810.
HMS Growler was a Archer-class gun-brig built for the British Royal Navy and launched in 1804. She captured several French privateers and one Danish privateer, and took part in two actions that earned her crew the Naval General Service Medal (NGSM). She was sold in 1815.
HMS Minerva was a 32-gun fifth-rate Thames-class frigate of the Royal Navy, launched in 1805 at Deptford. Her namesake was the Roman goddess Minerva.
HMS Conflict was launched in 1805. She captured a number of vessels, including privateers, and participated in several major actions. She disappeared in November 1810 with the loss of all her crew.
References
Flournoy, Henry W. (1892) Calendar of Virginia State papers and other manuscripts:... preserved in the Capitol at Richmond. (R.F. Walker).
Roche, Jean-Michel (2005). "ARMIDE - Frégate de 40 canons type Armide (1804 - 1806)". Dictionnaire des bâtiments de la flotte de guerre française de Colbert à nos jours 1 1671 - 1870. Toulon: Roche. ISBN978-2-9525917-0-6. OCLC165892922.
Roosevelt, Theodore (1900). The Naval War of 1812. Vol.II. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press.
Winfield, Rif (2008), British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793–1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates, Seaforth, ISBN978-1-86176-246-7
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