HMS Sphinx (1748)

Last updated

History
Naval Ensign of Great Britain (1707-1800).svg Great Britain
NameHMS Sphinx
Operator Royal Navy
Ordered26 September 1747
BuilderJohn Allen, Rotherhithe
Laid downNovember 1747
Launched10 December 1748
Completed6 February 1748 at Rotherhithe
CommissionedSeptember 1748
FateSold 28 August 1770 to break up
General characteristics
Class and type sixth-rate frigate
Tons burthen520 5794 (bm)
Length
  • 113 ft 8 in (34.65 m) (gundeck)
  • 93 ft 6 in (28.50 m) (keel)
Beam32 ft 4.25 in (9.8616 m)
Depth of hold11 ft 0 in (3.35 m)
Sail plan Full-rigged ship
Complement160 officers and men
Armament
  • Lower deck: 2 × 9-pounder guns (aft)
  • Upper deck: 20 × 9-pounder guns
  • Quarterdeck: 2 × 3-pounder guns

HMS Sphinx was a 24-gun sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. The ship was built to the 1745 Establishment design drawn by the Surveyor of the Navy.

The ship was commissioned in September 1748 under Captain William Lloyd, and transported Governor Edward Cornwallis to Nova Scotia where he established Halifax. [1] The ship served in Nova Scotia until early 1750, before being refitted at Sheerness. She then moved to the Mediterranean, before returning to Home Waters in 1751, where she was briefly off Ireland. In late 1751, now under Captain Edward Wheeler, she was deployed to the African coast and thence to Jamaica. Returned to England, she was refitted at Deptford in 1755 and then recommissioned under Captain James Gambier for a fresh deployment to Jamaica. On 3 December 1755, the Sphinx brought a French merchant vessel she had captured into Kingston. She returned to England in late 1758 under Captain John Dalrymple to pay off into reserve, seeing no further service until she was sold for breaking up in 1770.

Notes

  1. Also traveled on the Sphinx with Timothy Edwards

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edward Boscawen</span> Royal Navy admiral and politician (1711–1761)

Admiral of the Blue Edward Boscawen, PC was a British admiral in the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament for the borough of Truro, Cornwall, England. He is known principally for his various naval commands during the 18th century and the engagements that he won, including the siege of Louisburg in 1758 and Battle of Lagos in 1759. He is also remembered as the officer who signed the warrant authorising the execution of Admiral John Byng in 1757, for failing to engage the enemy at the Battle of Minorca (1756). In his political role, he served as a Member of Parliament for Truro from 1742 until his death although due to almost constant naval employment he seems not to have been particularly active. He also served as one of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty on the Board of Admiralty from 1751 and as a member of the Privy Council from 1758 until his death in 1761.

USS <i>Plymouth</i> (1867) Sloop-of-war of the United States Navy

USS Plymouth, a wooden-hulled screw sloop-of-war, was the second ship of the United States Navy to be named for Plymouth, Massachusetts.

HMS <i>Kempthorne</i> Frigate of the Royal Navy

HMS Kempthorne (K483) was a Captain-class frigate of the Royal Navy and named after Captain John Kempthorne of HMS Mary Rose in 1669.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fort Edward (Nova Scotia)</span>

Fort Edward is a National Historic Site of Canada in Windsor, Nova Scotia, and was built during Father Le Loutre's War (1749-1755). The British built the fort to help prevent the Acadian Exodus from the region. The Fort is most famous for the role it played both in the Expulsion of the Acadians (1755) and in protecting Halifax, Nova Scotia from a land assault in the American Revolution. While much of Fort Edward has been destroyed, including the officers' quarters and barracks, the blockhouse that remains is the oldest extant in North America. A cairn was later added to the site.

HMS <i>Centurion</i> (1732) Ship of the line of the Royal Navy

HMS Centurion was a 60-gun fourth rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built at Portsmouth Dockyard by Joseph Allin the younger and launched on 6 January 1732. At the time of Centurion's construction, the 1719 Establishment dictated the dimensions of almost every ship being built. Owing to concerns over the relative sizes of British ships compared to their continental rivals, Centurion was ordered to be built 1 ft (0.3 m) wider across the beam than the Establishment prescribed. HMS Rippon was similarly built to non-Establishment dimensions at the same time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Royal Naval Dockyard, Halifax</span>

Royal Naval Dockyard, Halifax was a Royal Navy base in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Established in 1759, the Halifax Yard served as the headquarters for the Royal Navy's North American Station for sixty years, starting with the Seven Years' War. The Royal Navy continued to operate the station until it was closed in 1905. The station was sold to Canada in 1907 becoming His Majesty's Canadian Dockyard, a function it still serves today as part of CFB Halifax.

HMS <i>Foudroyant</i> (1758) Ship of the line 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 <i>Kempenfelt</i> (I18) British C-class and afterward Canadian destroyer

HMS Kempenfelt was a C-class destroyer built for the Royal Navy in the early 1930s. A flotilla leader, she saw service in the Home Fleet before World War II and the ship made several deployments to Spanish waters during the Spanish Civil War, enforcing the arms blockade imposed by Britain and France on both sides of the conflict.

HMS <i>Inconstant</i> (1783) Frigate of the Royal Navy

HMS Inconstant was a 36-gun Perseverance-class fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She had a successful career serving in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, capturing three French warships during the French Revolutionary naval campaigns, Curieux, Unité, and the former British ship HMS Speedy.

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.

SS <i>Letitia</i>

SS Letitia was an ocean liner built in Scotland for service with the Anchor-Donaldson Line. She continued to serve with its successor company Donaldson Atlantic Line. At the start of the Second World War in September 1939, the British Admiralty requisitioned the ship for service and had it converted to serve as an armed merchant cruiser. She was withdrawn from this service in 1941 to become a troop ship.

HMS <i>Adamant</i> (1780) British Portland-class fourth rate warship

HMS Adamant was a 50-gun Portland-class fourth rate warship of the British Royal Navy. She served during the American War of Independence, the French Revolutionary Wars, and the Napoleonic Wars in a career that spanned thirty years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Father Le Loutre's War</span> Colonial war between Britain and France

Father Le Loutre's War (1749–1755), also known as the Indian War, the Mi'kmaq War and the Anglo-Mi'kmaq War, took place between King George's War and the French and Indian War in Acadia and Nova Scotia.c On one side of the conflict, the British and New England colonists were led by British officer Charles Lawrence and New England Ranger John Gorham. On the other side, Father Jean-Louis Le Loutre led the Mi'kmaq and the Acadia militia in guerrilla warfare against settlers and British forces. At the outbreak of the war there were an estimated 2500 Mi'kmaq and 12,000 Acadians in the region.

Sir George Augustus Alexander Westphal was a Nova Scotian admiral in the Royal Navy who served in more than 100 actions. He was midshipman on HMS Victory during the Battle of Trafalgar.

HMS <i>Trial</i> (1744) Sloop of the Royal Navy

HMS Trial or Tryall was a 10-gun two-masted Hind-class sloop of the Royal Navy, designed by Joseph Allin and built by him at Deptford Dockyard on the Thames River, England. She was launched on 17 July 1744. She and her sister ship, Jamaica, were the only sloops to be built in the Royal Dockyards between 1733 and 1748.

HMCS Mahone was a Bangor-class minesweeper constructed for the Royal Canadian Navy during the Second World War. Entering service in 1941, the ship took part in the Battle of the Atlantic and the Battle of the Saint Lawrence as a convoy escort. Following the war, the minesweeper was decommissioned and placed in reserve. Reacquired during the Korean War, Mahone was never recommissioned into the Royal Canadian Navy and was instead sold to the Turkish Navy in 1958. Renamed Beylerbeyi, the minesweeper remained in service until 1972 when she was discarded.

HMS <i>Intrepid</i> (1747) Royal Navy ship

HMS Intrepid was a 64-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, originally built in Toulon for the French Navy. She was launched in 1740, as Sérieux and fought at the Battle of Toulon before her capture by the British at the First Battle of Cape Finisterre in 1747. After being renamed and refitted by the Royal Navy, she entered British service in late 1747. Between 1748 and 1752 she was assigned as a guard ship off the coast of Kent in south-east England.

HMS <i>Scarborough</i> (1756)

HMS Scarborough was a 20-gun ship built in 1756 which served the Royal Navy until 1780. She had a crew of 160 men.

HMS <i>Success</i> (1740) 20-gun Royal Navy ship

HMS Success was a 20-gun Royal Navy ship launched in 1740 as the first government contract for the Blaydes Yard in Hull. She had a crew of 140 men. She had several famous commanders over her lifetime.

HMS <i>Chichester</i> (1785) Fifth-rate ship of the Royal Navy, in service 1785–1815

HMS Chichester was a two-deck, fifth-rate ship of the Royal Navy. One of the Adventure-class ships designed by Edward Hunt, she was built to carry 44 guns but for her entire career she served as a troopship, never carrying more than 22. In 1803, she was part of the squadron under Samuel Hood that captured the French held islands of St Lucia and Tobago, and the Dutch colonies of Demerara, Essequibo and Berbice.

References