HMS Express (1815)

Last updated

History
US flag 15 stars.svgUnited States
NameAchilles
Launched1809
RenamedAnna Maria (1813)
FateCaptured c.1813-14
Naval Ensign of the United Kingdom.svg United Kingdom
NameHMS Anna Maria
Acquiredc.1814 by capture
Honours and
awards		 Naval General Service Medal (NGSM) with clasp "The Potomac 17 Augt. 1814" [1]
FateSold 1815 to the Admiralty
Naval Ensign of the United Kingdom.svg United Kingdom
NameHMS Express
AcquiredMay 1815 by purchase of a prize
FateSold 1827
General characteristics [2]
Tons burthen9227⁄94 (bm)
Length
  • 64 ft 6+1⁄2 in (19.7 m) (overall)
  • 53 ft 6+3⁄8 in (16.3 m) (keel)
Beam18 ft 0 in (5.5 m)
Depth of hold7 ft 1 in (2.2 m)
Sail plan Schooner
Complement26
Armament4 x 12-pounder carronades

HMS Express was the American merchant vessel Achilles, launched in 1809 in America. Her owners in 1813 renamed her Anna Maria. [2] In 1814 she served the British Royal Navy in North American waters as an advice boat. In 1815 the Royal Navy commissioned her as HMS Express, a ship's tender serving in the Mediterranean. In 1816 she was at the bombardment of Algiers. The Navy sold her at Malta in 1827.

Contents

HMS Anna Maria

It is not clear when the Royal Navy captured Anna Maria. On 27 November 1813 HMS Plantagenet captured the "Sloop Anna Maria, of 7 men and 60 tons, from Philadelphia, bound to New York". [3] This is the most likely candidate from among the several Anna Marias whose capture was announced in the London Gazette .

Anna Maria participated in the expedition up the Potomac (August–September 1814). On 17 August Euryalus, bomb vessels Devastation, Aetna, and Meteor, the rocket ship Erebus, and the dispatch boat Anna-Maria were detached under Captain Gordon of Seahorse to sail up the Potomac River and bombard Fort Washington, about ten or twelve miles below the capital.

Later Euryalus contributed a boat armed with a howitzer to assist Meteor, Fairy, Anna Maria, and a gunboat taken in prize in their unsuccessful attempt to stop the Americans from adding guns to a battery that would impede the British withdrawal. [4] [lower-alpha 1] In 1847 the Admiralty awarded the Naval General Service Medal (NGSM) with clasp "The Potomac 17 Augt. 1814" to all surviving claimants from the campaign; the listing of the vessels qualifying gives the name of Anna Maria's commander as "Jackson".

Anna Maria also shared in the prize money for the schooner Mary and the goods from the transports Lloyd and Abeona, captured in the Chesapeake between 29 November and 19 December 1814. [lower-alpha 2]

HMS Express

The Admiralty purchased Anna Maria in May of 1815. [2] She was then commissioned in June as HMS Express under the command of Lieutenant E. Garrett. Thereafter she served in the Mediterranean as a tender. [9]

Express was at the bombardment of Algiers on 27 August 1816. [10] [lower-alpha 3]

From September 1821 Express served as a tender to Revenge with Mate James Gordon as her commander. [11] From March to July 1824 she was at the blockade of Algiers. [12] Lloyd's List reported that on 29 February, The Express Ship of War, one of the English Squadron blockading Algiers, arrived at Marseilles. [13] Gordon left Express on 27 June 1826, on his promotion to Lieutenant. [11]

Fate

The Royal Navy sold Express on 26 July 1827 at Malta. [2]

Notes

  1. ↑ A first-class share of the prize money for the campaign was worth £183 9s 1+3⁄4d; a sixth-class share was worth £1 19s 3+1⁄2d. [5] For a second and final payment, the respective amounts were £42 13s 10+3⁄4d and 9s 1+3⁄4d. [6] For the capture of the Chesapeake in August, there was a separate award of £2 6s 3d and 6d, respectively. [7]
  2. ↑ A first-class share of the prize money was worth £26 15s 10+1⁄2 d; a sixth-class share, that of an ordinary seaman, was worth 6s 1+1⁄2d. [8]
  3. ↑ She is not among the vessels whose crews qualified for the NGSM with clasp Algiers that the Admiralty authorized in 1847. [1] However, as a tender, all of her crew would have been drawn from the vessel she was serving and would have qualified in that capacity.

Citations

  1. 1 2 "No. 20939". The London Gazette . 26 January 1849. p. 245.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Winfield (2008), p. 371.
  3. ↑ "No. 16865". The London Gazette . 8 March 1814. pp. 511–512.
  4. ↑ "No. 16947". The London Gazette . 17 October 1814. pp. 2080–2082.
  5. ↑ "No. 17305". The London Gazette . 15 November 1817. p. 2316.
  6. ↑ "No. 17482". The London Gazette . 1 June 1819. p. 955.
  7. ↑ "No. 19255". The London Gazette . 3 April 1835. p. 644.
  8. ↑ "No. 17376". The London Gazette . 7 July 1818. p. 1224.
  9. ↑ "NMM, vessel ID 366550" (PDF). Warship Histories, vol vi. National Maritime Museum. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2 August 2011. Retrieved 30 July 2011.
  10. ↑ Anon. (1941), p. 332, Fn. 1.
  11. 1 2 O'Byrne (1849), p. 408.
  12. ↑ Blofeld (1844), p. 372.
  13. ↑ Lloyd's List No. 5889.

Related Research Articles

HMS <i>Euryalus</i> (1803) Frigate of the Royal Navy

HMS Euryalus was a Royal Navy 36-gun Apollo-class frigate that saw service in the Battle of Trafalgar and the War of 1812. During her career she was commanded by three prominent naval personalities of the Napoleonic and post-Napoleonic period, Henry Blackwood, George Dundas and Charles Napier. After the end of the Napoleonic Wars she continued on active service for a number of years, before spending more than two decades as a prison hulk. She ended her career in Gibraltar where, in 1860, she was sold for breaking up.

HMS <i>Aetna</i> (1803) Royal Navy bomb vessel

HMS Aetna was the mercantile Success launched in 1803 at Littlehampton. The Admiralty purchased her in 1803 for conversion into a Royal Navy bomb vessel. Aetna participated in the second Battle of Copenhagen in 1807 and the Battle of the Basque Roads in 1809. Later, she participated in the attack on Fort McHenry in the Battle of Baltimore and the bombardment of Fort Washington, Maryland in 1814, during the War of 1812. The Navy sold her in 1816 and she returned to mercantile service under her original name. She sailed to Calcutta, to Rio de Janeiro, and more locally until she was wrecked in 1823.

HMS <i>Erebus</i> (1807) Sloop of the Royal Navy

HMS Erebus was originally built as a Royal Navy fireship, but served as a sloop and was re-rated as such in March 1808. She served in the Baltic during the Gunboat and Anglo-Russian Wars, where in 1809 she was briefly converted to a fireship, and then served in the War of 1812. In 1814 she was converted to a rocket vessel to fire Congreve rockets. While serving off America, Erebus participated in the sack of Alexandria, Virginia, and launched the rockets that bombarded Fort McHenry in Baltimore on 13 September 1814. In March 1815, off Georgia, she fired the second-to-the-last-shot of the war. She was laid up in 1816 and sold for breaking up in 1819.

HMS <i>Starr</i> (1805) Sloop of the Royal Navy

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.

HMS <i>Cherub</i> (1806) Sloop of the Royal Navy

HMS Cherub was an 18-gun Royal Navy Cormorant-class sloop built in Dover in 1806. She participated in two major campaigns in the West Indies during the Napoleonic Wars, and one major engagement in the Pacific during the War of 1812, all each of which earned her crews clasps to the Naval General Service Medal. The Navy sold her in 1820.

HMS <i>Forester</i> (1806) Brig-sloop of the Royal Navy

HMS Forester was a Royal Navy 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop built by John King and launched in 1806 at Dover. She had a relatively uneventful career before the Navy sold her in 1819.

HMS Amaranthe was an 18-gun Royal Navy Cruizer-class brig-sloop built by John Dudman at Deptford Wharf and launched in 1804. She served in the Caribbean, taking part in an action and two campaigns that gained those members of her crew that survived until 1847 the NGSM. She was sold in 1815.

HMS Circe was a Royal Navy 32-gun fifth-rate frigate, built by Master Shipwright Joseph Tucker at Plymouth Dockyard, and launched in 1804. She served in the Caribbean during the Napoleonic Wars, and participated in an action and a campaign for which in 1847 in the Admiralty authorised the issuance of the Naval General Service Medal with clasps. The action, off the Pearl Rock, near Saint-Pierre, Martinique, was a debacle that cost Circe dearly. However, she also had some success in capturing privateers and a French brig. She was sold in 1814.

HMS <i>Manly</i> (1812) Brig of the Royal Navy

HMS Manly was a 12-gun Bold-class gun-brig of the Royal Navy, launched in 1812. She served in the War of 1812, her boats participating in the Battle of Lake Borgne. She was sold in 1833.

French brig <i>Palinure</i> (1804)

Palinure was the nameship for the Palinure-class of 16-gun brigs of the French Navy, and was launched in 1804. In French service she captured Carnation before Circe captured her in turn. After being taken into the Royal Navy as HMS Snap, she participated in two campaigns that qualified her crew for the Naval General Service Medal (NGSM). She was broken up in 1811.

HMS Fairy (1812) was a Cruizer-class brig-sloop, built by William Taylor at Bideford and launched in 1812. She escorted convoys during the War of 1812 and participated in the Raid on Alexandria, the Royal Navy’s incursion up the Potomac in 1814. She was broken up in 1821.

HMS <i>Redwing</i> (1806) Brig-sloop of the Royal Navy

HMS Redwing was a Cruizer-class brig-sloop of the British Royal Navy. Commissioned in 1806, she saw active service in the Napoleonic Wars, mostly in the Mediterranean, and afterwards served off the West Coast of Africa, acting to suppress the slave trade. She was lost at sea in 1827.

HMS <i>Superieure</i> (1803)

HMS Superieure was the French privateer Supérieure, which was built in 1801 in Baltimore, Maryland, and which the British captured in 1803 in the West Indies, and took into the Royal Navy. She spent most of her career on the Jamaica and Leeward Islands stations, where she captured numerous privateers. She participated in several notable single-ship actions, including one in which she harassed a frigate, and two campaigns that would, in 1847, earn her surviving crew members the Naval General Service Medal (NGSM). She was laid-up in Britain in 1810 and sold in 1814.

HMS <i>Rover</i> (1808) Brig-sloop of the Royal Navy

HMS Rover was a Royal Navy Cruizer-class brig-sloop laid down in 1804 but not launched until 1808. She served in the North Sea, off the north coast of Spain, in the Channel, and on the North American station. She captured two letters-of-marque and numerous merchant vessels before being laid-up in 1815. She then sat unused until she was sold in 1828. She became a whaler that made four voyages to the British southern whale fishery between 1830 and 1848. She was last listed in 1848.

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.

HMS Redbreast was an Archer-class brig of the British Royal Navy. She captured some small merchant vessels and privateers. She also participated in two actions that would in 1847 earn her surviving crew members clasps to the Naval General service Medal (NGSM). The Navy transferred in 1816 to His Majesty's Customs. She was finally sold in 1850.

HMS Attentive was an Archer-class gun-brig of the Royal Navy, launched in 1804. she captured a small privateer and participated in some other captures in the Leeward Islands before returning to Britain, where she was broken up in 1812.

HMS Elizabeth was a French privateer schooner that the Royal Navy captured in 1805 and took into service under her existing name. She participated in an engagement and a campaign that earned her crews clasps to the Naval General Service Medal. She was lost with all hands in 1814 when she capsized in the West Indies.

HMS Thunder was an 8-gun bomb vessel of the Royal Navy, previously the mercantile Dasher. Dasher, launched at Bideford in 1800, had made two voyages as a slave ship in the triangular trade in enslaved people before the Royal Navy purchased her in 1803 and renamed her HMS Thunder. Thunder served in the Mediterranean and the Baltic; among other actions, she participated in a battle and one single-ship action, each of which resulted in her crew later qualifying for clasps to the Naval General Service Medal (1847). The Navy sold her in 1814.

HMS Cockchafer was a United States schooner, formerly named Spencer, that the Royal Navy (RN) captured and employed as a ship's tender. She captured two American armed brigs, one in a single-ship action. The Navy sold her in 1815.

References

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.