In 1603 all English warships with a complement of fewer than 160 men were known as 'small ships'. In 1625/26 to establish pay rates for officers, a six-tier naval ship rating system was introduced. These small ships were divided into three tiers: fourth-, fifth- and sixth-rates. Up to the end of the 17th century, the number of guns and the complement size were adjusted until the rating system was actually clarified. A 'fourth-rate' was nominally a ship of over thirty guns with a complement of 140 men.
HMS Leander was a 50-gun spar-decked frigate of the Royal Navy which saw service in the Napoleonic Wars, the War of 1812, and the Second Barbary War.
HMS Magnanime was a 64-gun third-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 14 October 1780 at Deptford Dockyard. She belonged to the Intrepid-class designed by Sir John Williams and later was razeed into a 44 gun frigate.
HMS Guadeloupe, was a 28-gun sixth-rate Coventry-class frigate of the Royal Navy. The ship was designed by Sir Thomas Slade, and was initially contracted to be built with the Pembrokeshire shipwright John Williams of Neyland; however he became bankrupt and the Admiralty transferred the order to the Plymouth Naval Dockyard.
HMS Atlas was a 98-gun second-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 13 February 1782. She was a Duke-class ship of the line built at Chatham Dockyard by Nicholas Phillips.
Diane was a 38-gun frigate of the French Navy, launched in 1796. She participated in the battle of the Nile, but in August 1800 the Royal Navy captured her. She was taken into British service as HMS Niobe, and broken up in 1816.
HMS Marlborough was a first-rate three-decker 131-gun screw ship built for the Royal Navy in 1855. She was begun as a sailing ship of the line, but was completed to a modified design and converted to steam on the stocks, and launched as a wooden steam battleship.
HMS Inconstant was a 36-gun Perseverance-class fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She had a successful career serving in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, capturing three French warships during the French Revolutionary naval campaigns, Curieux, Unité, and the former British ship HMS Speedy.
Uranie was a 44-gun frigate of the French Navy, lead ship of her two-vessel class.
British Warships in the Age of Sail is a series of four books by maritime historian Rif Winfield comprising a historical reference work providing details of all recorded ships that served or were intended to serve in the (British) Royal Navy from 1603 to 1863. Similar volumes dealing with other navies during the Age of Sail have followed from the same publisher.
HMS Chatham was a 74-gun third-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She had been planned as Royal-Hollandais for the French Navy, but was captured while under construction during the Walcheren Campaign.
Censeur was a 74-gun Pégase-class ship of the line of the French Navy, launched in 1782. She served during the last months of the American War of Independence, and survived to see action in the French Revolutionary Wars. She was briefly captured by the British, but was retaken after a few months and taken back into French service as Révolution. She served until 1799, when she was transferred to the Spanish Navy, but was found to be rotten and was broken up.
HMS Boreas was a modified Mermaid-class sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She was first commissioned in August 1775 under Captain Charles Thompson. She was built at Blaydes Yard in Hull to a design by Sir Thomas Slade at a cost of £10,000. She was fitted out at Chatham Docks.
A number of ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Dee, after one or other of the British rivers called the Dee.
William Taylor was an officer in the Royal Navy who served during the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.
The French frigate Trave was a Pallas-class frigate of the French Navy, launched at Amsterdam in 1812. After the Royal Navy captured her in 1813 in the North Sea, it took her into service as the troopship HMS Trave. She served in the Potomac and her boats participated in the Battle of Lake Borgne during the War of 1812. She was sold on 7 June 1821.
HMS Volage was a sixth-rate sailing frigate launched in 1825 for the Royal Navy. At one point geologist Thomas Abel Brimage Spratt served aboard her.
Gordon Thomas Falcon was an officer in the Royal Navy. He first went to sea in 1794 as an able seaman on board HMS Sheerness. Quickly promoted to midshipman, Falcon transferred to HMS Repulse and then HMS Venerable, Admiral Adam Duncan's flagship, in which he served at the Battle of Camperdown.
HMS Liffey was the name ship of five Liffey class of 51-gun wooden screw frigates of the Royal Navy. She was launched on 6 May 1856, at Devonport Dockyard, Plymouth.
HMS Pylades was the sole member of the Pylades-class of first-class screw corvettes that served in the Victorian Royal Navy. Pylades was a development of the previous Highflyer class with a greater beam. The vessel served under two commanders who later became admirals, Captains Arthur Acland Hood and Edwin Tennyson d'Eyncourt. A third commander was Captain Michael de Courcy, remembered in the name of De Courcy Island, one of the Gulf Islands off the coast of British Columbia along with Pylades Island, which is named for the corvette. In 1855, Pylades served in the Baltic Sea during the Crimean War. In 1859, the vessel was the last Royal Navy warship to visit the San Juan Islands during the San Juan Boundary Dispute. In 1863, the ship's presence helped diffuse the Chesapeake affair that could have led to the British Empire joining the American Civil War. After serving across the British Empire, the ship was decommissioned and sold to be broken up in 1875.
United Kingdom
