HMS Viper

Last updated April 22, 2022

Sixteen ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Viper, or HMS Vipere, after the members of the Viperidae family:

HMS Viper (1746) was a 14-gun sloop launched in 1746. She was converted into a fireship in 1755 and renamed HMS Lightning. She was sold in 1762.
HMS Viper (1756) was a 10-gun sloop launched in 1756. She was wrecked in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence in bad weather while escorting a convoy in 1779.
HMS Viper (1777) was the Massachusetts privateer schooner Viper that HMS Perseus captured on 26 September 1776. She was purchased in 1777 and broken up in New York in 1779.
HMS Viper (1779) was a 6-gun galley, the former South Carolina navy's Rutledge, captured on 4 November 1779 at Tybee and listed until 1785.
HMS Viper was a 14-gun cutter purchased in 1780 as Greyhound; in 1781 she was renamed Viper. She was sold in 1809.
HMS Vipere (1793) was a 4-gun xebec, formerly a French privateer. She was captured in 1793, but foundered in Hyères Bay later that year during the evacuation of Toulon.^[1]
HMS Vipere (1794) was a 16-gun brig-sloop, formerly a French privateer, which Flora captured in 1794.^[2]Vipere foundered in the estuary of the River Shannon on 2 January 1797 with the loss of her entire crew of 120 men.^[3]
HMS Viper (1794) was a 4-gun Dutch hoy purchased in 1794 and broken up in 1802.
HMS Viper (1807) was launched at Cowes in 1805 as the mercantile schooner Princess Charlotte. The Royal Navy purchased her in 1807. The 4-gun schooner disappeared in February 1809 while sailing from Cadiz to Gibraltar and was presumed to have foundered with all hands.
HMS Viper (1809) was an 8-gun cutter launched in 1809 as the civilian vessel Niger. She was purchased that same year and sold in 1814.
HMS Viper (1810) was a 10-gun gun-brig purchased in 1810. She was possibly renamed Mohawk later that year, and is not present on the navy list of 1811.
HMS Viper - tender to Ramillies, c. 1820-21.^[4]
HMS Viper (1831) was a 6-gun schooner launched in 1831 and broken up in 1851.
HMS Viper (1854) was an Arrow-class wooden-hulled screw gunvessel launched in 1854 and sold in 1862.
HMS Viper (1865) was an iron armoured gunvessel launched in 1865. She was used for harbour service from 1890, as a tank vessel from 1901 and was sold in 1908.
HMS Viper (1899) was a Viper-class destroyer launched in 1899 and wrecked in 1901.

Other vessels

HM Customs and Excise and the Bombay Marine, the naval arm of the East India Company, also had cutters or other vessels named Viper.

Related Research Articles

Nineteen ships of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Lion or HMS Lyon, after the lion, an animal traditionally associated with courage, and also used in several heraldric motifs representing England, Scotland and the British Monarchy. Another ship was planned but never completed:

Ten ships of the Royal Navy have carried the name HMS Spitfire, while an eleventh was planned but renamed before entering service. All are named after the euphemistic translation of Cacafuego, a Spanish treasure galleon captured by Sir Francis Drake.

Thirteen ships of the British Royal Navy have been named HMS Surprise or HMS Surprize, including:

Twelve ships of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Active or HMS Actif, with a thirteenth announced:

Fifteen ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Ranger

Ten ships of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Scourge :

Nine ships and one shore establishment of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Wasp, with one other government vessel using the name:

Eleven ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Hawk after the bird of prey, the hawk:

Sixteen ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Alert, while another was planned:

Ten ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Serpent, after the synonym for snake, whilst another two were planned, and one appears to have been a spurious report:

Nine ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Racehorse:

Twelve ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Mosquito, or the archaic HMS Musquito, after the tropical insect, the Mosquito:

Thirty-nine vessels of the Royal Navy and its predecessors have borne the name Swallow, as has one dockyard craft, one naval vessel of the British East India Company, and at least two revenue cutters, all after the bird, the Swallow:

Eight ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Seagull or HMS Sea Gull, after the gull:

Seventeen ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Dispatch, or the variant HMS Despatch:

Sixteen ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Hope:

Several vessels of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Nimble.

HMS Swift has been the name of numerous ships of the Royal Navy:

Ten ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Renard, or HMS Reynard, after the French for fox, and the anthropomorphic figure of Reynard:

Nine ships of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Lily or HMS Lilly:

References

Citations

↑ Hepper (1994), p.75.
↑ "No. 13622". The London Gazette . 8 February 1794. p. 130.
↑ Hepper (1994), p.83.
↑ "No. 17705". The London Gazette . 12 May 1821. p. 1025.

Bibliography

Colledge, J. J.; Warlow, Ben (2006) [1969]. Ships of the Royal Navy: The Complete Record of all Fighting Ships of the Royal Navy (Rev. ed.). London: Chatham Publishing. ISBN 978-1-86176-281-8.
Grocott, Terence (1997) Shipwrecks of the revolutionary & Napoleonic eras (Chatham). ISBN 1-86176-030-2
Hepper, David J. (1994). British Warship Losses in the Age of Sail, 1650-1859. Rotherfield: Jean Boudriot. ISBN 0-948864-30-3.
Winfield, Rif (2008). British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793–1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 978-1-86176-246-7.

This article includes a list of ships with the same or similar names. If an internal link for a specific ship led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended ship article, if one exists.

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[1] Hepper (1994), p.75.

[2] "No. 13622". The London Gazette . 8 February 1794. p. 130.

[3] Hepper (1994), p.83.

[4] "No. 17705". The London Gazette . 12 May 1821. p. 1025.

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