The Battle of the Chesapeake, also known as the Battle of the Virginia Capes or simply the Battle of the Capes, was a crucial naval battle in the American Revolutionary War that took place near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay on 5 September 1781. The combatants were a British fleet led by Rear Admiral Sir Thomas Graves and a French fleet led by Rear Admiral François Joseph Paul, the Comte de Grasse. The battle was strategically decisive, in that it prevented the Royal Navy from reinforcing or evacuating the besieged forces of Lieutenant General Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown, Virginia. The French were able to achieve control of the sea lanes against the British and provided the Franco-American army with siege artillery and French reinforcements. These proved decisive in the Siege of Yorktown, effectively securing independence for the Thirteen Colonies.
The Battle of Trafalgar was a naval engagement that took place on 21 October 1805 between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of the French and Spanish Navies during the War of the Third Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815).
The Battle of Cape St. Vincent was one of the opening battles of the Anglo-Spanish War (1796–1808), as part of the French Revolutionary Wars, where a British fleet under Admiral Sir John Jervis defeated a greatly superior Spanish fleet under Admiral Don José de Córdoba y Ramos near Cape St. Vincent, Portugal.
A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which depended on the two columns of opposing warships maneuvering to volley fire with the cannons along their broadsides. In conflicts where opposing ships were both able to fire from their broadsides, the opponent with more cannons firing – and therefore more firepower – typically had an advantage. Since these engagements were almost invariably won by the heaviest ships carrying more of the most powerful guns, the natural progression was to build sailing vessels that were the largest and most powerful of their time.
The Glorious First of June, also known as the Fourth Battle of Ushant, was the first and largest fleet action of the naval conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the First French Republic during the French Revolutionary Wars.
The line of battle is a tactic in naval warfare in which a fleet of ships forms a line end to end. The first example of its use as a tactic is disputed—it has been variously claimed for dates ranging from 1502 to 1652. Line-of-battle tactics were in widespread use by 1675.
A chase gun, usually distinguished as bow chaser and stern chaser, was a cannon mounted in the bow or stern of a sailing ship. They were used to attempt to slow down an enemy ship either chasing (pursuing) or being chased, when the ship's broadside could not be brought to bear. Typically, the chasers were used to attempt to damage the rigging and thereby cause the target to lose performance.
The Battle of Angamos was a naval encounter of the War of the Pacific fought between the navies of Chile and Perú at Punta Angamos, on 8 October 1879. The battle was the culminating point of a naval campaign that lasted about five months in which the Chilean Navy had the sole mission of eliminating its Peruvian counterpart. In the struggle, two armored frigates, led by Commodore Galvarino Riveros Cárdenas and Navy Captain Juan José Latorre battered and later captured the Peruvian monitor Huáscar, under Rear Admiral Miguel Grau Seminario.
HMS Neptune was a 98-gun second-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She served on a number of stations during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and was present at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805.
The Redoutable was a Téméraire-class 74-gun ship of the line of the French Navy. She took part in the battles of the French Revolutionary Wars in the Brest squadron, served in the Caribbean in 1803, and duelled with HMS Victory during the Battle of Trafalgar, killing Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson during the action. She sank in the storm that followed the battle.
Bucentaure was an 86-gun ship of the line of the French Navy, and the lead ship of her class. She was the flagship of Vice-Admiral Latouche Tréville, who died on board on 18 August 1804.
Neptune was a Bucentaure-class 80-gun ship of the line of the French Navy. Built during the last years of the French Revolutionary Wars she was launched at the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars. Her brief career with the French included several major battles, though she spent the last 12 years of her life under the Spanish flag.
Sailing ship tactics were the naval tactics employed by sailing ships in contrast to galley tactics employed by oared vessels. This article focuses on the period from c. 1500 to the mid-19th century, after which sailing warships were replaced with steam-powered ironclads.
The Battle of Genoa was a naval battle fought between French and allied Anglo-Neapolitan forces on 14 March 1795 in the Gulf of Genoa, a large bay in the Ligurian Sea off the coast of the Republic of Genoa, during the French Revolutionary Wars. The French fleet was led by Contre-amiral Pierre Martin and comprised 14 ships of the line while the British Royal Navy and Neapolitan fleet, under Vice-Admiral William Hotham mustered 13 ships of the line. The battle ended with a minor British-Neapolitan victory and the capture of two French ships.
The Atlantic campaign of May 1794 was a series of operations conducted by the British Royal Navy's Channel Fleet against the French Navy's Atlantic Fleet, with the aim of preventing the passage of a strategically important French grain convoy travelling from the United States to France. The campaign involved commerce raiding by detached forces and two minor engagements, eventually culminating in the full fleet action of the Glorious First of June 1794, at which both fleets were badly mauled and both Britain and France claimed victory. The French lost seven ships of the line; the British none, but the battle distracted the British fleet long enough for the French convoy to safely reach port.
The action of 13 January 1797 was a minor naval battle fought between a French ship of the line and two British frigates off the coast of Brittany during the French Revolutionary Wars. During the action the frigates outmanoeuvred the much larger French vessel and drove it onto shore in heavy seas, resulting in the deaths of between 400 and 1,000 of the 1,300 persons aboard. One of the British frigates was also lost in the engagement with six sailors drowned after running onto a sandbank while failing to escape a lee shore.
The action of 18 October 1782 was a minor naval engagement of the American Revolutionary War, in which the French 74-gun ship of the line Scipion, accompanied by the 40-gun frigate Sibylle, was chased by two Royal Navy ships of the line, the 98-gun HMS London and the 74-gun Torbay. Outmanoeuvring her larger opponents, Scipion obtained a favourable position that allowed her to rake London, causing severe damage and allowing her to continue running from the superior British force. Scipion went to anchor in Samaná Bay but while doing so hit a rock and sank, while Sibylle succeeded in escaping the area.
The First Battle of Algeciras was a naval battle fought on 6 July 1801 between a squadron of British Royal Navy ships of the line and a smaller French Navy squadron at anchor in the fortified Spanish port of Algeciras in the Strait of Gibraltar. The British outnumbered their opponents, but the French position was protected by Spanish gun batteries and the complicated shoals that obscured the entrance to Algeciras Bay. The French squadron, under Contre-Amiral Charles Linois, had stopped at Algeciras en route to the major Spanish naval base at Cadiz, where they were to form a combined French and Spanish fleet for operations against Britain and its allies in the French Revolutionary Wars. The British, under Rear-Admiral Sir James Saumarez, sought to eliminate the French squadron before it could reach Cadiz and form a force powerful enough to overwhelm Saumarez and launch attacks against British forces in the Mediterranean Sea.
The action of 24 June 1795 was a minor naval engagement fought in the Western Basin of the Mediterranean Sea on 24 June 1795 during the French Revolutionary Wars. During 1795 the Royal Navy and French Navy Mediterranean Fleets were vying for supremacy in the region, the French operating from the fortified port of Toulon and the British from the allied Spanish base of Port Mahon on Menorca. A minor British victory at the Battle of Genoa in March had not resolved the conflict, both sides suffering damage. The British, under Admiral William Hotham, subsequently withdrew to Menorca to meet a squadron of reinforcements while the French, under Contre-amiral Pierre Martin at Toulon, suffering from ill-discipline, had also been reinforced. By June, both fleets were ready to return to the Ligurian Sea.
Rear-Admiral Richard Byron (1769–1837) was an officer in the British Royal Navy. He served in the American Revolutionary War where he saw action at the Battle of the Saintes, the French Revolutionary Wars where he fought at the Glorious First of June and the Battle of Groix, and the Napoleonic Wars where he served in North-American waters. Byron was in command of HMS Belvidera when she was attacked by a squadron of heavy frigates in one of the first actions of the 1812 Anglo-American War.
