Career
Sylvia was commissioned in March 1806 under the command of Lieutenant Lewis Krumpholtz. In 1807 Lieutenant Augustus Vere Drury took command and sailed her for the Channel station.
On 18 August Sylvia captured the Danish vessel Generalindo Waltersloff. [4] Then on 7 September she was at the Battle of Copenhagen. [lower-alpha 1] From there Sylvia carried the British ambassador back to Britain.
Between 30 November 1807 and 6 March 1808 Sylvia was at Sheerness undergoing repairs. Drury then sailed on 7 May 1808 for the Cape of Good Hope.
Then on 8 April 1809 she sailed for the East Indies. One year later, in April 1810, Sylvia had a most demanding month. She was proceeding through the Sunda Strait when near Krakatoa she had three times to deal with attacks by pirate proas.
The first attack occurred on 6 April. Sylvia drove the proa ashore and destroyed it after first removing the vessel's 6-pounder gun. The proa had had a crew of some 50 men. [6]
The second attack took place the next day. Drury sent out a boat manned by volunteers and under the command of an officer, to harass the attacker. Eventually the British captured the proa, which was armed with two 6-pounder guns and had a crew of 30 men. Pirate casualties amounted to two men killed and one wounded; the British had no casualties. [6]
The last attack occurred on 11 April. Sylvia sighted a lugger proa at anchor under Krakatoa that got under weigh as the British approached. Drury sent Sub-Lieutenant Chesnaye and another party of volunteers in the proa that Sylvia had captured on 7 April. As the British proa approached the lugger, the lugger took flight and both proas passed behind an island that shielded them from Sylvia's sight. When Sylvia finally caught up with the two, the British were about to board the pirate lugger proa, which was putting up a stiff resistance. Sylvia opened fire on the enemy until the lugger sank. She had been armed with three 18-pounders and had had a crew of 72 men; pirate casualties were unknown. The British suffered eight men severely wounded, one of whom later died. [6]
However, Sylvia's greatest fight was yet to come. On 26 April she sighted three armed brigs and two lug sail vessels near Edam Island (now Damar Besam in Indonesia's Thousand Islands), making all haste towards Batavia. Sylvia was able to catch up with and bring to action the last-most brig, the Dutch navy brig Echo, of eight 6-pounder guns and 46 men, under the command of Lieutenant Christian Thaarup. Echo surrendered after a sharp engagement of 20 minutes duration. In the action, the Dutch lost three men killed and seven wounded; the British lost four men killed and three wounded. [6]
As soon as she could return to the pursuit Sylvia did so, but the two Dutch brigs were able to escape to the shelter of the batteries on Onrust Island (now Kelor in the Thousand Islands). Still, she was able to capture the two transports, each of which had a crew of 60 men and was armed with two 9-pounder guns. The two transports were 12 days out of Surabaya and were carrying "Artillery Equipage and valuable European Goods." [6] Drury received promotion to commander for his victory, with a date of 2 May 1810. In 1847, the Admiralty awarded the Naval General service Medal with clasp "Sylvia 26 April 1810" to the single surviving claimant from the action.
In 1811 Lieutenant Richard Crawford replaced Drury. By 1812 Sylvia was on the Downs station under the command of Lieutenant Robert Palk. He commanded her at the siege of San Sebastián, which took place between 7 July and 8 September 1813. In January 1819 Parliament voted a grant to the crews of the vessels, including Sylvia, that had served under the command of Lord Viscount Keith in the Channel in 1813 and 1814. [7] November 1822 saw the last (third) payment of the grant. [lower-alpha 2]
Between August 1814 and July 1815 Sylvia was at Portsmouth being fitted out as a dispatch vessel. In June 1815 Lieutenant Joseph Griffiths recommissioned her.
Disposal: In January 1816 the Admiralty put Sylvia up for sale at Plymouth. [9] She was sold for £710 on 30 May 1816.
HMS Indefatigable was one of the Ardent-class 64-gun third-rate ships-of-the-line designed by Sir Thomas Slade in 1761 for the Royal Navy. She was built as a ship-of-the-line, but most of her active service took place after her conversion to a 44-gun razee frigate. She had a long career under several distinguished commanders, serving throughout the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. She took some 27 prizes, alone or in company, and the Admiralty authorised the issue of four clasps to the Naval General Service Medal in 1847 to any surviving members of her crews from the respective actions. She was broken up in 1816.
HMS Melampus was a Royal Navy fifth-rate frigate that served during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. She captured numerous prizes before the British sold her to the Royal Netherlands Navy in 1815. With the Dutch, she participated in a major action at Algiers and, then, in a number of colonial punitive expeditions in the Dutch East Indies.
Sibylle was a 38-gun Hébé-class frigate of the French Navy. She was launched in 1791 at the dockyards in Toulon and placed in service in 1792. After the 50-gun fourth rate HMS Romney captured her in 1794, the British took her into service as HMS Sybille. She served in the Royal Navy until disposed of in 1833. While in British service Sybille participated in three notable single ship actions, in each case capturing a French vessel. On anti-slavery duties off West Africa from July 1827 to June 1830, Sybille captured numerous slavers and freed some 3,500 slaves. She was finally sold in 1833 in Portsmouth.
Néréide was a Sibylle-class, 32-gun, copper-hulled frigate of the French Navy. On 22 December 1797 HMS Phoebe captured her and she was taken into British service as HMS Nereide. The French recaptured her at the Battle of Grand Port, only to lose her again when the British took Isle de France, in 1810. After the Battle of Grand Port she was in such a poor condition that she was laid up and sold for breaking up in 1816.
HMS Olympia was an Adonis-class schooner of the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic War. She was built at Bermuda using Bermudan cedar and completed in 1806. In March 1811 the French captured her, but the British recaptured her in October. During her career, she served as far afield as Buenos Aires, Île Bourbon, and Cape of Good Hope. The Admiralty sold her in 1815.
HMS Favourite was a 16-gun Cormorant-class sloop of the Royal Navy, launched in 1794 at Rotherhithe. The French captured her in 1806 and renamed her Favorite. However, the British recaptured her in 1807 and renamed her HMS Goree. She became a prison ship in 1810 and was broken up in Bermuda in 1817.
HMS Lynx was a 16-gun ship-rigged sloop of the Cormorant class in the Royal Navy, launched in 1794 at Gravesend. In 1795 she was the cause of an international incident when she fired on USRC Eagle. She was at the Battle of Copenhagen in 1801, and during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars took numerous prizes, mostly merchant vessels but also including some privateers. She was also at the second Battle of Copenhagen in 1807. She was sold in April 1813. She then became the whaler Recovery. She made 12 whaling voyages in the southern whale fishery, the last one ending in 1843, at which time her owner had her broken up.
HMS Sappho was a Cruizer class brig-sloop built by Jabez Bailey at Ipswich and launched in 1806. She defeated the Danish brig Admiral Yawl in a single-ship action during the Gunboat War, and then had a notably successful two months of prize-taking in the first year of the War of 1812. She was wrecked in 1825 off the Canadian coast and then broken up in 1830.
HMS Admiral Rainier was a Dutch 16-gun brig that the British captured on 23 August 1800 at Kuyper's Island, Java. They took her into service and named her after Admiral Peter Rainier, the leader of the British expedition. After the British sold her in 1803 apparently the French captured her in 1804 and sold her to the Dutch colonial government in Batavia for anti-piracy patrol. Her Javanese crew mutinied in 1806 and eventually sailed to Penang where vessels of the British East India Company (EIC) seized the vessel. She returned to British service, only to be captured and recaptured by vessels of the EIC. Her ultimate fate is unknown.
HMS Telegraph was built in 1812 in New York as the American letter of marque Vengeance. The Royal Navy captured her in 1813 and took her into service as the 14-gun schooner or gunbrig Telegraph. Over a period of only about two years she took numerous small prizes and caused the destruction of a French 16-gun brig. A gale caused the wrecking of Telegraph in 1817.
HMS Snapper was a Royal Navy Ballahoo-class schooner of four 12-pounder carronades and a crew of 20. The prime contractor for the vessel was Goodrich & Co., in Bermuda, and she was launched in 1804. She cruised for some seven years, sharing in several captures of merchant vessels and taking some herself, before a French privateer captured her.
His Majesty's hired armed cutter Courier appears twice in the records of the British Royal Navy. The size and armament suggests that both contracts could represent the same vessel, but other information indicates that the second Courier had been captured from the French in the West Indies. On the first contract the captain and crew were awarded clasps to the Naval General Service Medal, one for a boat action and one for a single ship action in which they distinguished themselves.
HMS Cruizer was a Royal Navy Cruizer-class brig-sloop built by Stephen Teague of Ipswich and launched in 1797. She was the first ship of the class, but there was a gap of 5 years between her launch and the ordering of the next batch in October 1803; by 1815 a total of 105 other vessels had been ordered to her design. She had an eventful wartime career, mostly in the North Sea, English Channel and the Baltic, and captured some 15 privateers and warships, and many merchant vessels. She also participated in several actions. She was laid up in 1813 and the Commissioners of the Navy sold her for breaking in 1819.
HMS Piercer was a Royal Navy Archer-class gun-brig launched in 1804. She served against the French, Danes and Dutch in the Napoleonic Wars and was assigned to the Downs station. She participated in a number of operations in the Bay of Biscay, the English Channel, and the North Sea. In 1814 the British government transferred Piercer to the Kingdom of Hanover for use as a guard ship. Hanover decommissioned her in 1850.
HMS Linnet was originally His Majesty’s revenue cutter Speedwell, launched in 1797, that the Royal Navy purchased in 1806. Linnet captured a number of privateers before the French frigate Gloire captured her in 1813. The French sold or transferred her to the Americans, who operated her as the privateer Bunkers Hill. In March 1814 the British recaptured her, but did not return her to service.
HMS Procris was a Cruizer-class brig-sloop launched in 1807. She served at the second battle of Copenhagen. She then went out to the East Indies where she spent the rest of her active service, including participating in the 1811 invasion of Java. She returned to Britain in 1814 and was sold the next year. She then became a merchantman, while retaining her name. She traded primarily with North America but on a voyage in the Mediterranean an armed Greek brig captured her. However, her master was able to regain control. She was wrecked on 25 August 1839.
The French brig Observateur, which was launched in 1800 for the French Navy, was a Vigilant-class 16-gun brig, one of six built to a design by Pierre-Alexandre-Laurent Forfait. The Royal Navy captured her in 1806 and took her into service as HMS Observateur. She participated in two actions, one for the French Navy and one for the Royal Navy, and one campaign before she was laid up in 1810. The Navy did not succeed in selling her until 1814.
His Majesty's hired armed schooner Lady Charlotte served the British Royal Navy on contract between 28 October 1799 and 28 October 1801. She had a burthen of 120 85⁄94 tons (bm), and was armed with twelve 12-pounder carronades. As a hired armed vessel she captured several privateers and recaptured a number of British merchant vessels. After her service with the Royal Navy, she apparently sailed as a letter of marque until the French captured her in 1806.
HMS Acteon, was the brig Actéon, launched in France in 1804 as the second of the two-ship Lynx-class. The British Royal Navy captured her in 1805 but laid her up. The Navy finally commissioned her in 1809. She was at the British invasion of Île de France and later served in the Channel, the North Sea, the Baltic, and the Chesapeake. She was broken up in 1816.
HMS Monkey was launched in 1801 at Rochester. She served in the Channel, North Sea, and the Baltic, and was wrecked in December 1810.
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