Career
Gladiator was commissioned in December 1792 under Lieutenant Samuel Hayter as a convalescent ship. Then, still under Hayter, she was recommissioned in February 1794 as a guardship. In December 1795 she was under the command of Lieutenant Stephen Parker, followed by Lieutenant Emanuel Hungerford from September 1799. She was Rear-Admiral Sir Richard Bickerton's flagship from February 1800 to May. Lieutenant Joseph Bromwich then took command of Gladiator, being succeeded in September by Lieutenant John Connolly. From December 1801 she was again a convalescent ship and the flagship for Rear-Admiral Sir John Holloway until April 1802 when she was paid off.
Gladiator was recommissioned in April 1803 under Lieutenant Thomas Harrison. From May she was again Holloway's flagship until June 1804 when she became Rear-Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin's flagship. In February 1807 she came under the command of Lieutenant John Price as a convalescent ship.
On 26 October 1807, Tsar Alexander I of Russia declared war on Great Britain. The official news did not arrive there until 2 December, at which time the British declared an embargo on all Russian vessels in British ports. Gladiator was one of some 70 vessels that shared in the seizure of the 44-gun Russian frigate Speshnoy (Speshnyy), then in Portsmouth harbour. The British seized the Russian storeship Wilhelmina (Vilghemina) at the same time. [2] The Russian vessels were carrying the payroll for Vice-Admiral Dmitry Senyavin’s squadron in the Mediterranean. [lower-alpha 1]
In 1811 Gladiator was under the command of Lieutenant Thomas Dutton and served as flagship for Rear-Admiral William Hargood. Lieutenant-Commander Charles Hewitt took command in July 1812, and Gladiator successively bore the flags of Rear Admirals Hargood, Edward Foote and Peter Halkett.
When news of the outbreak of the War of 1812 reached Britain, the Royal Navy seized all American vessels then in British ports. Gladiator was among the Royal Navy vessels then lying at Spithead or Portsmouth and so entitled to share in the grant for the American ships Belleville, Janus, Aeos, Ganges and Leonidas seized there on 31 July 1812. [5] [lower-alpha 2]
Courts-martial
Because Gladiator spent her entire career in port, she provided a convenient venue for courts-martial. In 1800 alone she was the venue for over 30. [7] In that year alcohol was causative in many cases, but not all.
On 3 July a court-martial tried John Duncan, seaman on HMS Hermione, for having murdered officers of that ship, or aiding and abetting thereof in September 1797, and then conveying the ship to the enemy at La Guaira. The charges were proven so the court directed that Duncan be hanged.
The court-martial ordered one man hanged for desertion, which was an unusually harsh verdict. However, the man had deserted three times, after having enlisted three times (under different names) and taken the bounty money. Also, there had been a large number of desertions at Portsmouth and the court's intent was to send a message.
On 10 December a court-martial tried John Hubbard and George Hynes, seamen from HMS St George, for an unnatural crime. The court found them guilty and sentenced them to death.
At least three courts-martial involved charges against Admirals. The first occurred between 23 and 26 December 1805, after the Battle of Cape Finisterre (1805). Admiral Robert Calder requested a court-martial to review his decision not to pursue the enemy fleet after the engagement. The court ruled that Calder's failure to pursue was an error of judgement, not a manifestation of cowardice or disaffection, and severely reprimanded him. [8]
The second occurred between 6 and 11 March 1807. The accused was Sir Home Popham and the charge was that he had conducted an unapproved (and notably quixotic and unsuccessful) expedition to Buenos Ayres, leaving his duty station, the Cape of Good Hope, undefended. The charge was found proven and the court reprimanded Sir Home. [9]
The third was the court-martial of Admiral Lord Gambier for his conduct of the Battle of the Basque Roads. Admiral Sir Eliab Harvey, who had commanded "The Fighting Temeraire" at the Battle of Trafalgar, believed that Gambier had missed an opportunity to inflict further damage upon the French fleet. He told Gambier "I never saw a man so unfit for the command of a fleet as Your Lordship." Thomas Cochrane threatened to use his parliamentary vote against Gambier for not committing the fleet to action. Gambier called for a court-martial to examine his conduct. The court, on 26 July 1809 exonerated Gambier. Consequently, neither Harvey nor Cochrane were appointed by the Admiralty to command for the duration of the war.
Another notable court-martial took place on 5–6 February 1810. The court-martial assembled to try Captain Warwick Lake for having marooned a sailor named Robert Jeffery of HMS Recruit on the desert island of Sombrero. Some months after Lake had abandoned the sailor, Lake's commanding officer, Sir Alexander Cochrane, discovered what had happened and immediately ordered Lake to retrieve Jeffery. When Recruit arrived at Sombrero, Jeffery could not be found. (An American ship had picked up Jeffery and he was eventually discovered some three years later in Massachusetts. He returned to Britain where Lake provided compensation in lieu of a suit.) The subsequent court-martial ordered that Lake be dismissed from the service.
On 23 April 1813, Gladiator was the venue for the court-martial of the officers and men of Java for the loss of their ship in the action with the Constitution on 29 December 1812. The court honourably acquitted Lieutenant Henry Ducie Chads and the other surviving officers and men of Java.
What was probably one of the last courts-martial held on Gladiator occurred between 18 and 21 August 1815. The subject was the conduct of Captain Daniel Pring, of Linnet, and the officers and men of the squadron at the Battle of Plattsburgh on Lake Champlain. The court honourably acquitted Captain Pring and the others.
Admiral of the Fleet James Gambier, 1st Baron Gambier, was a Royal Navy officer. After seeing action at the capture of Charleston during the American Revolutionary War, he saw action again, as captain of the third-rate HMS Defence, at the battle of the Glorious First of June in 1794, during the French Revolutionary Wars, gaining the distinction of commanding the first ship to break through the enemy line.
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.
HMS Leander was a Portland-class 50-gun fourth rate of the Royal Navy, launched at Chatham on 1 July 1780. She served on the West Coast of Africa, West Indies, and the Halifax station. During the French Revolutionary Wars she participated in the Battle of the Nile before a French ship captured her. The Russians and Turks recaptured her and returned her to the Royal Navy in 1799. On 23 February 1805, while on the Halifax station, Leander captured the French frigate Ville de Milan and recaptured her prize, HMS Cleopatra. On 25 April 1805 cannon fire from Leander killed an American seaman while Leander was trying to search an American vessel off the US coast for contraband. The resulting "Leander affair" contributed to the worsening of relations between the United States and Great Britain. In 1813 the Admiralty converted Leander to a hospital ship under the name Hygeia. Hygeia was sold in 1817.
Sir John Thomas Duckworth, 1st Baronet, GCB was an officer of the Royal Navy, serving during the Seven Years' War, the American War of Independence, the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars, as the Governor of Newfoundland during the War of 1812, and a member of the British House of Commons during his semi-retirement. Duckworth, a vicar's son, achieved much in a naval career that began at the age of 11.
Admiral Sir Robert Stopford, was a distinguished officer in the Royal Navy whose career spanned over 60 years, from the French Revolutionary Wars to the Syrian War.
Africaine was one of two 40-gun Preneuse-class frigates of the French Navy built to a design by Raymond-Antoine Haran. She carried twenty-eight 18-pounder and twelve 8-pounder guns. The British captured her in 1801, only to have the French recapture her in 1810. They abandoned her at sea as she had been demasted and badly damaged, with the result that the British recaptured her the next day. She was broken up in 1816.
Admiral of the White Sir William Hargood was a British naval officer who served with distinction through the American War of Independence, the French Revolutionary War and the Napoleonic Wars, during which he gained an unfortunate reputation for bad luck, which seemed to reverse following his courageous actions at the battle of Trafalgar in command of HMS Belleisle.
Admiral of the Fleet Sir George Francis Seymour was a Royal Navy officer. After serving as a junior officer during the French Revolutionary Wars, Seymour commanded the third-rate HMS Northumberland under Admiral Sir John Duckworth at the Battle of San Domingo during the Napoleonic Wars. He also commanded the sloop HMS Kingfisher at the blockade of Rochefort and the fifth-rate HMS Pallas under Admiral Lord Gambier at the Battle of the Basque Roads. He then saw active service during the War of 1812.
HMS Centaur was a 74-gun third rate of the Royal Navy, launched on 14 March 1797 at Woolwich. She served as Sir Samuel Hood's flagship in the Leeward Islands and the Channel. During her 22-year career Centaur saw action in the Mediterranean, the Channel, the West Indies, and the Baltic, fighting the French, the Dutch, the Danes, and the Russians. She was broken up in 1819.
HMS Donegal was launched in 1794 as Barra, a Téméraire class 74-gun ship of the line of the French Navy. She was renamed Pégase in October 1795, and Hoche in December 1797. The British Royal Navy captured her at the Battle of Tory Island on 12 October 1798 and recommissioned her as HMS Donegal.
HMS Frolic was an 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop of the Royal Navy. She was built by Boole, of Bridport and was launched on 9 February 1806. Although she took part in the capture of Martinique, Guadaloupe, and Saint Martin, she appears to have had an uneventful career until 8 October 1812, when the American sloop-of-war USS Wasp captured her after a fierce fight. Later that day the British recaptured Frolic and captured Wasp. Frolic was broken up in 1813.
HMS Recruit was an 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop of the Royal Navy, launched in 1806 at Sandwich, Kent. She is best known for an act of pique by Commander Warwick Lake, who marooned a seaman, and for an inconclusive but hard-fought ship action under Commander Charles John Napier against the French corvette Diligente. She captured a number of American vessels as prizes during the War of 1812 before being laid up in 1815 and sold for breaking up in 1822.
HMS Jason was a 32-gun fifth rate Thames-class frigate of the Royal Navy, launched in 1804 at Woolwich. She was broken up in 1815.
Surveillante entered service as a 40-gun Virginie-class frigate of the French Navy. She was surrendered to the British in 1803, after which she served in the Royal Navy, classed under the British system as a 38-gun vessel, until 1814 when she was decommissioned. HMS Surveillante had a long and active career under two successful and distinguished commanders, from the Baltic to the northwestern coasts of France, Spain and Portugal, and was present at the Battle of Copenhagen (1807) and throughout the Peninsula War. Her record as a taker of prizes is notable for its success, particularly towards the end of her career.
The Russian ship Vsevolod was a 74-gun ship of the line launched in 1796. She served in the North Sea and the Baltic until the British 74-gun third rates Implacable and Centaur destroyed her in 1808 during the Anglo-Russian War (1807–1812).
Sir James Athol Wood CB, was an officer of the Royal Navy. After serving on merchant ships for the East India Company from a young age, he entered the Royal Navy in 1774. Wood served in the navy for almost his whole life, and took part in several of the wars fought by Kingdom of Great Britain throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth century. During his career he was involved in several personal conflicts and feuds, which resulted in him being the subject of two courts-martial.
Puissant was built in 1781-82 to a design by Antoine Groignard as a Pégase class 74-gun ship of the line. Her captain handed her over to the British at Toulon on 29 August 1793. She arrived at Portsmouth on 3 May 1794. She then remained there as an unarmed receiving ship, sheer hulk, and flagship until her sale in 1816.
Rear-Admiral Edward Sneyd Clay was an officer of the Royal Navy who served during the American War of Independence, and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.
Rear-Admiral John Bligh CB was an officer in the Royal Navy who served during the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.
The Court-martial of James, Lord Gambier, was a notorious British naval legal case during the summer of 1809, in which Admiral Lord Gambier requested a court-martial to examine his behaviour during the Battle of Basque Roads in April of the same year. Noted for the acrimony and corruption of proceedings, it has been described as "one of the ugliest episodes in the internal history of the Royal Navy."
Great Britain