The second Hancock was one of the first thirteen frigates of the Continental Navy. A resolution of the Continental Congress dated 13 December 1775 authorized her construction; she was named for the patriot and Continental congressman John Hancock. In her career, she served under the American, British and French flags.
HMS Tartar was a 28-gun sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy.
The Foudroyant was an 80-gun ship of the line of the French Navy. She was later captured and served in the Royal Navy as the Third Rate HMS Foudroyant.
HMS Seahorse was a 24-gun sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy, launched in 1748. She is perhaps most famous as the ship on which a young Horatio Nelson served as a midshipman. She also participated in four battles off the coast of India between 1781 and 1783. The Royal Navy sold her in 1784 and she then became the mercantile Ravensworth. She made one voyage for the British East India Company (EIC) between 1786 and 1788. In 1789, she was sold to the French East India Company which had her refitted and renamed her Citoyen. In 1793 the French Navy purchased her and used her as a frigate. She was last listed in 1801.
HMS Ariel was a 20-gun Sphinx-class sixth-rate post ship of the Royal Navy. The French captured her in 1779, and she served during the American Revolutionary War for them, and later for the Americans, before reverting to French control. Her French crew scuttled Ariel in 1793 to prevent the British from recapturing her.
HMS Amphitrite was a 24-gun Porcupine-class sixth-rate post ship of the Royal Navy. She served during the American Revolution primarily in the economic war. On the one hand she protected the trade by capturing or assisting at the capture of a number of privateers, some of which the Royal Navy then took into service. On the other hand, she also captured many American merchant vessels, most of them small. Amphitrite was wrecked early in 1794.
HMS Santa Margarita was a 36-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She had been built for service with the Spanish Navy, but was captured after five years in service, eventually spending nearly 60 years with the British.
HMS Eurydice was a 24-gun Porcupine-class post ship of the Royal Navy built in 1781 and broken up in 1834. During her long career she saw service in the American War of Independence, the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. She captured a number of enemy privateers and served in the East and West Indies, the Mediterranean and British and American waters.
HMS Lowestoffe was a 32-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. Built during the latter part of the Seven Years' War, she went on to see action in the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary War, and served often in the Caribbean. A young Horatio Nelson served aboard her shortly after passing his lieutenant's examination.
HMS Camilla was a Royal Navy 20-gun Sphinx-class post ship. Camilla was built in Chatham Dockyard to a design by John Williams and was launched in 1776. She served in the American Revolution, the French Revolutionary Wars, and the Napoleonic Wars, before being sold in 1831.
HMS Leith, also known as HM hired armed ship Leith, was launched in 1744 or 1746 in the British "Plantations", more specifically, the colony of Maryland. From 1764 to 1777 she was a Greenlandman, that is a whaler, in the waters east of Greenland. Between 1777 and 1782 she served the Royal Navy as a transport and hired armed naval ship. She was last listed in 1783.
HMS Surprise was a 28-gun Enterprise-class sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy, which served throughout the American Revolutionary War and was broken up in 1783.
HMS Crescent was a 28-gun Enterprise-class sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. Crescent was launched in 1779. The French captured her in 1781. She was wrecked in 1786.
HMS Andromeda was a 32-gun Hermione-class fifth rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She was laid down in 1781 and launched in 1784. She was commissioned for the first time in 1788 when Captain Prince William Henry took command of her and sailed for the West Indies. Prince William Henry paid her off in 1789 and she was not commissioned again until 1790 in response to the Spanish Armament. In 1792 Andromeda joined the Royal Navy's Evolution Squadron in the English Channel before sailing for the Leeward Islands where she stayed until the end of 1793 when Captain Lord Northesk brought her home. She was refitted for much of 1794 before in September joining the Downs Station. Captain William Taylor assumed command in 1795, briefly sailing her to Newfoundland before returning to the North Sea Fleet in 1796. She stayed here for 3 years, seizing the 36-gun Batavian frigate Zefir in the Firth of Forth in March 1798 and participating in the Raid on Dunkirk in July 1800. After another period of service in the Leeward Islands Andromeda returned home at the Peace of Amiens and was laid up at Portsmouth Dockyard where she was broken up in September 1811.
Swallow was a teak-built packet ship that the British East India Company (EIC) launched at Bombay in 1779. She made nine trips between India and Britain for the EIC between 1782 and 1803. Her most notable exploit occurred on her seventh voyage, when she helped capture seven Dutch East Indiamen on 15 June 1795. The Royal Navy purchased her in 1804 and named her Lilly. She served in the navy until she was sold in 1811. During this time she participated in the capture of La Désirade island, and participated in a quixotic and unsuccessful attempt of General Francisco de Miranda to liberate the Province of Venezuela from Spain in 1806. Her whereabouts between 1811 and 1815 are obscure, but in 1815 J. Lyney, of London, purchased her and she sailed to the West Indies and to India as an EIC-licensed vessel until she wrecked on her way to Calcutta in 1823.
HMS Barbuda was commissioned into the Royal Navy in 1780 after having briefly served as an American privateer. Barbuda was one of the two sloops that captured Demerara and Essequibo in 1781, but the French Navy captured her there in 1782 and took her into service as Barboude. The French Navy sold her to private owners in 1786, and she served briefly as a privateer in early 1793 before the French Navy purchased her again and named her Légère. She served them until mid-1796 when the Royal Navy captured her and took her into service as HMS Legere. She was wrecked off the coast of Colombia, without loss of life, in February 1801.
HMS Pearl was a fifth-rate, 32-gun British Royal Navy frigate of the Niger-class. Launched at Chatham Dockyard in 1762, she served in British North America until January 1773, when she sailed to England for repairs. Returning to North America in March 1776, to fight in the American Revolutionary War, Pearl escorted the transports which landed troops in Kip's Bay that September. Much of the following year was spent on the Delaware River where she took part in the Battle of Red Bank in October. Towards the end of 1777, Pearl joined Vice-Admiral Richard Howe's fleet in Narragansett Bay and was still there when the French fleet arrived and began an attack on British positions. Both fleets were forced to retire due to bad weather and the action was inconclusive. Pearl was then despatched to keep an eye on the French fleet, which had been driven into Boston.
The French brig Duc de Chartres was built between 1779 and 1780 at Le Havre as a 24-gun privateer. As a privateer she captured one British warship before in 1781 the Royal Navy captured her. The Royal Navy took her into service as HMS Duc de Chartres. She then captured several American privateers and armed merchant vessels, and one French naval corvette in a noteworthy single-ship action. The Navy sold Duc de Chartres in 1784.
Governor Trumbull was launched at Norwich, Connecticut in 1777 as a purpose-built privateer. There is no record of her having captured any British vessels but she did raid Tobago in 1779. The Royal Navy captured her shortly thereafter and took her into service as HMS Tobago. she served in the Leeward Islands until the Navy sold her in 1783, probably at Jamaica. She was apparently wrecked on 16 August 1787 at Tobago.
Belisarius was launched in Massachusetts in 1781. The British Royal Navy captured later that year and took her into service as HMS Bellisarius. She captured several American privateers, including one in a single ship action, before the Navy sold her in 1783. Her new owners sailed her as a merchantman between London and British Honduras. In 1787 she carried emigrants to Sierra Leone for the Committee for the Relief of the Black Poor, before returning to trading with Honduras. She was wrecked in September 1787.
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