 HDMS Diana under command of Captain N. C. Meyer being chased by a British 44-gun frigate near Cartagena | |
| History | |
|---|---|
 Denmark | |
| Name | HDMS Diana |
| Builder | Andreas Bodenhoff, Copenhagen |
| Fate | Captured by Spain on 26 September 1809 |
 Spain | |
| Name | Diana |
| Acquired | 26 September 1809 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type | Frigate |
HDMS Diana was a frigate of the Royal Danish Navy. She was seized by Spain on 26 September 1809.
She was launched from Andreas Bodenhoff's dockyards in Copenhagen in 1804. In early summer 1807, it was decided that HDMS Diana was to replace the frigate HDMS Fylla in the Danish West Indies. Captain lieutenant Christian Nicolai Meyer was selected as commander of the ship which was to call at Algiers on the way to deliver an offer to the Dey.
Diana set sail from Copenhagen on 7 July, called at Málaga on 1 September and arrived at Algiers on 7 September. After setting sail from Algiers, a British frigate informed the Danish ship about the war and fall of the Danish capital in the Battle of Copenhagen. Diana later called at Cartagena. In May 1808, Spain rose against Napoleon, Denmark's ally. In July 1809, Spain formed an alliance with Great Britain. Spain then declared war on Denmark, Diana was seized on 26 September 1809 and the crew was taken as prisoners of war.
In November 1810, Diana set sail for South America under the Spanish flag. 40 members of the crew ended up in an English prison. Meyer and a few other crew members were not allowed to leave Gibraltar until 1811. When he arrived at the Thames, he was surprised to learn that the 34 surviving crew members were still imprisoned. He managed to arrange for their release and the remaining members of Diana finally reached Copenhagen around 1 September 1812. [1]
The Anglo-Russian War was a war between the United Kingdom and the Russian Empire which lasted from 2 September 1807 to 18 July 1812 during the Napoleonic Wars. It began after Russia signed the Treaty of Tilsit with the First French Empire, which ended hostilities between the two nations. During the war, actual military engagements were limited primarily to minor naval actions in the Baltic Sea and Barents Sea.
The Gunboat War was a naval conflict between Denmark–Norway and Great Britain supported by Sweden 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.
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Holsteen was a 60-gun ship of the line in the Royal Dano-Norwegian Navy. She was commissioned in 1775 and the British Royal Navy captured her in the Battle at Copenhagen Roads on 2 April 1801. The British renamed the ship HMS Holstein, and later HMS Nassau. She participated in one major battle during the Gunboat War and was sold in 1814.
HDMS Najaden was a frigate of the Royal Dano-Norwegian Navy, which she served from 1796 until the British captured her in 1807. While in Dano-Norwegian service she participated in an action at Tripoli, North Africa. She served the Royal Navy as the fifth rate HMS Nyaden from 1808 until 1812 when she was broken up. During her brief British service she participated in some small attacks in the Barents Sea during the Anglo-Russian War.
HMS Mutine was a Royal Navy 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop, built by Henry Tucker at Bideford and launched in 1806. During her career she was in combat in Danish waters, in the Bay of Biscay, and at Algiers. She also visited North America, South America, and the West Coast of Africa. She was sold in 1819.
Captain Henry Inman was a British Royal Navy officer during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, serving in the American Revolutionary War, the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. Inman's service in the American war was punctuated by three shipwrecks: the burning of HMS Lark off Rhode Island in the face of a superior French squadron, the grounding of HMS Santa Monica on Tortola and the foundering of Hector following an engagement with two French ships in the Mid-Atlantic. After the war he was placed in reserve until the Spanish Armament of 1790, when he was given command of the 14-gun cutter HMS Pygmy stationed off the Isle of Man.
HMS Terpsichore was a 32-gun Amazon-class fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She was built during the last years of the American War of Independence, but did not see action until the French Revolutionary Wars. She served during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, in a career that spanned forty-five years.
HMS Magnet was a Cruizer-class brig-sloop built at Robert Guillaume’s yard at Northam and launched in 1807. She served in the Baltic, where she took two prizes, one an armed privateer, before wrecking in 1809.
HDMS Sarpen was a brig of the Royal Dano-Norwegian Navy, in which she served from 1791 until the British seized her in 1807. While in Dano-Norwegian service she participated in an indecisive action at Tripoli, North Africa. She served the Royal Navy as HMS Sarpen from 1808 until 1811 when she was broken up. During her brief British service she participated in the Walcheren Expedition. Her name is that of a waterfall on the Norwegian river Glomma.
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Hans Peter Holm was a Danish naval officer who commanded vessels of the Dano-Norwegian Navy in several actions. He commanded several naval vessels during the Gunboat War. His most important action occurred in 1812 at the Battle of Lyngør when a British squadron, led by the British ship-of-the-line HMS Dictator, destroyed his vessel, HDMS Najaden. Holm sustained wounds in the battle but survived, only to drown in an accident shortly afterwards.
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HDMS Friderichsværn was a Danish frigate built at Nyeholm, Copenhagen, in 1783. The British Royal Navy captured her in 1807 and took her into service as HMS Frederickscoarn. It sold her in 1814.
Frantz Christopher Henrik Hohlenberg was a Danish naval officer who specialised in ship design and had little seagoing experience. He succeeded Ernst Wilhelm Stibolt as Master Shipbuilder (fabriksmester) at the Royal Danish Dockyards in 1796. His ships included five ships of the line and 18 frigates. Three of the ships of the line and nine of the frigates were captured at the 1807 Battle of Copenhagen and subsequently added to the Royal Navy. He resigned after a controversy in 1803.
HDMS Nidelven was a brig launched at Copenhagen on 1 December 1792. She was present at both British attacks on Copenhagen, and the British Royal Navy seized her at Copenhagen on 7 September 1807 at the surrender of Copenhagen. The British took her into service as HMS Nid Elven. She served between 1808 and 1809, during which time she captured a small French privateer. She was laid up in 1809. The Navy sold her in 1814.
HDMS Justitia was a Royal Dano-Norwegian Navy ship-of-the-line, built to a design by Henrik Gerner. Although launched in 1777, she was not fully commissioned until 1780. The British Royal Navy seized her in 1807, together with the rest of the Danish fleet after the second battle of Copenhagen. The British never commissioned Justitia. A renaming to Orford in 1809 was cancelled. She was broken up in 1817.