Hired armed cutter Duke of Clarence

Last updated

His Majesty's hired armed cutter Duke of Clarence, named for William Henry, Duke of Clarence, served the British Royal Navy under two contracts, one during the French Revolutionary Wars, and one at the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars. She was lost on 25 November 1804, but without loss of life.

Contents

First contract

Duke of Clarence served the Royal Navy under contract from 12 June 1794 until 11 November 1801. She was of 6541⁄94 tons (bm), and carried eight 3-pounder guns. [1]

Second contract

Duke of Clarence served from 14 June 1803 until her loss on 25 November 1804. [2] From early 1804, Lieutenant John Harper commanded her for many months on the Jersey and Guernsey station. He had transferred from the hired armed cutter Admiral Mitchell. [3]

From 1803 on HMS Africaine maintained a blockade at Hellevoetsluis where there were two French frigates. One day while Africaine was maintaining this blockade, the French general at Scheveningen had four boys shrimping in Africaine's jolly boat fired upon. Captain Thomas Manby of Africaine immediately seized sixty fishing boats that he then sent to Yarmouth. This cost The Hague its supplies of fish for some weeks. (In late 1799 Britain and The Netherlands had agreed to leave, within limits, each other's fishing boats unmolested. [4] In July 1807 Africaine was awarded prize money for sundry fishing boats captured in May 1803. She shared the prize money with Duke of Clarence. [5]

On 26 September 1804 Duke of Clarence left Portsmouth with a convoy for Guernsey.

On 5 October 1804, the brig Polante, arrived at Portsmouth. Polante had been sailing from Lisbon to "Charleburg" when Duke of Clarence detained her. [6] Lloyd's List gave the brig's name as Volante, and her destination as Cherbourg. [7]

On 27 October 1804 Lieutenant Harper was appointed to Wasp. [3] His replacement was Lieutenant Nicholas Brent Clements.

Loss

Clements received the mission to take Duke of Clarence to patrol between the Minquiers and Chausey to meet a boat bringing intelligence from France. On 24 November 1804, Duke of Clarence sighted a large French lugger and set off in chase, with the hired armed cutter Albion joining in. The lugger's crew ran their boat on shore near Granville, Manche. Duke of Clarence sent a boat in to examine the lugger, which turned out to have a cargo of oysters and cider. As Duke of Clarence awaited her boat's return she hit a submerged rock with the result that she started to fill with water. Clements gave up on any attempt to recover the lugger as Albion came up to rescue him, his officers, and crew. [8]

On 8 December the Lisbon packet arrived at Portsmouth with news of the loss of Duke of Clarence. The report stated that she had been lost off the coast of Portugal about a month earlier. Lieutenant N. Clements, his officers, and crew had been saved, but with the loss of all their possessions. [9]

An erroneous identification of the coast of Portugal as the location of the wreck made its way into many historical accounts.

Citations

  1. ↑ Winfield (2008), p. 388.
  2. ↑ Winfield (2008), p. 391.
  3. 1 2 O'Byrne (1849), p. 465.
  4. ↑ Marshall (1832), p. 315.
  5. ↑ "No. 16046". The London Gazette . 11 July 1807. p. 932.
  6. ↑ Naval Chronicle, vol. 12, p.506.
  7. ↑ "Lloyd's List №4495". 1812privateers.org. Retrieved 4 April 2021.
  8. ↑ Hepper (1994), p. 107.
  9. ↑ Naval Chronicle, Vol. 12, p.505.

Related Research Articles

French frigate <i>Africaine</i> (1798)

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.

HMS Atalante was a 16-gun brig-sloop of the Royal Navy. She was formerly the French Atalante, captured in 1797. She served with the British during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, and was wrecked in 1807.

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.

HMS <i>Wolverine</i> (1798) Brig-sloop of the Royal Navy

HMS Wolverine, was a Royal Navy 14-gun brig-sloop, formerly the civilian collier Rattler that the Admiralty purchased in 1798 and converted into a brig sloop, but armed experimentally. She served during the French Revolutionary Wars and participated in one action that won for her crew a clasp to the Naval General Service Medal. A French privateer captured and sank Wolverine on 21 March 1804 whilst she was on convoy duty.

His Majesty's Hired armed cutter Brave served the British Royal Navy from 29 August 1798 until 22 April 1799, when the transport Eclipse ran her down off Beachy Head. Brave is sometimes described as a lugger and sometimes as a cutter.

The Royal Navy used several vessels that were described as His Majesty's hired armed cutter King George. Some of these may have been the same vessel on repeat contract.

HMS Nemesis was a 28-gun Enterprise-class sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. The French captured her in 1795 at Smyrna, but in 1796 a squadron led by Barfleur brought her out of the neutral port of Tunis. Throughout her career she served under a number of commanders who would go on to have distinguished careers. She was converted to a troopship in 1812 and was sold in 1814.

HMS Moucheron was a French privateer, built in 1799, that the British captured in 1801 and that the British government purchased in 1802 for the Royal Navy. She foundered in 1807 in the Mediterranean without leaving a trace.

HMS Alphea was built of Bermudan pencil cedar as a cutter and launched in 1804. Later she was converted to a schooner. She captured a number of small prizes before September 1813 when she blew up in a single-ship action with the loss of her entire crew.

His Majesty's hired armed cutter Admiral Mitchell served under two contracts for the British Royal Navy, one at the end of the French Revolutionary Wars and the second at the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars. She participated in several notable small engagements and actions. In 1806 the Admiralty purchased her and took her into service as the Sir Andrew Mitchell in 1807.

Two vessels have borne the designation, His Majesty's hired armed cutter Constitution. The first served the British Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary Wars. The second served briefly at the start of the Napoleonic Wars and was sunk in 1804. The two cutters are similar enough that may have been the same vessel; at this juncture it is impossible to know.

HMS Merlin was launched in 1801 in South Shields as the collier Hercules. In July 1803, with the resumption of war with France, the Admiralty purchased her. She was one of about 20 such vessels that the navy would then employ primarily for convoy escort duties. She served on active duty until 1810, capturing one small privateer. She then served as a receiving ship until 1836 when the navy sold her for breaking up.

His Majesty's hired armed lugger Spider served the Royal Navy from 15 August 1795 to 4 April 1796. She was armed with eighteen 4-pounder guns and had a burthen of 172 51⁄94 tons (bm). She took part in one notable action before she was lost in a collision with the 74-gun Ramillies.

His Majesty's Hired armed cutter Sandwich served the Royal Navy from 23 May 1798 until the French frigate Créole captured her on 14 June 1799. She then served in the French Navy until the Royal Navy recaptured her on 15 October 1803. The Navy purchased her in 1804 and she served for some months in 1805 as HMS Sandwich before she was sold in Jamaica. During this period she captured three small French privateers in two days.

HMS Speedwell was a mercantile vessel that the Admiralty purchased in 1780. During the American Revolutionary War she served at Gibraltar during the Great Siege. In 1796 she was converted to a brig. Although she did capture two French privateers and participate in an incident in which the Royal Navy violated Swedish neutrality, her service in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars was apparently relatively uneventful. A storm in February 1807 destroyed her with the loss of her entire crew.

During the period of the Napoleonic Wars, the British Royal Navy twice employed a vessel named His Majesty's hired armed cutter Albion, though these are probably the same vessel:

HMS Jackal was a Bloodhound-class brig of the Royal Navy, launched in 1801. She captured a number of small prizes in the Channel, including one armed sloop, before she was lost in 1807.

HMS Starling was launched in 1801. She grounded in December 1804 and burnt to avoid her falling into enemy hands.

HMS <i>Monkey</i> (1801) Brig of the Royal Navy

HMS Monkey was launched in 1801 at Rochester. She served in the Channel, North Sea, and the Baltic, and was wrecked in December 1810.

HMS Requin was the French Navy cutter Requin, launched at Boulogne in 1794. HMS Thalia captured Requin in 1795. Requin captured one small French privateer and participated in the capture of Suriname before wrecking in 1801.

References

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.