British Warships in the Age of Sail, 1714-1792: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates

958 Pages·2007·24.05 MB·English

by  Rif Winfield

After the unparalleled successes of the Seven Years War, the Royal Navy of the American
Revolutionary period found itself heavily outnumbered and operating against massive
odds. Nevertheless, despite the eventual loss of much of British North America, by the end
of the war the Royal Navy had asserted its supremacy over its traditional European rivals.
It proved capable of mounting large-scale and complicated operations like the relief of
Gibraltar in October 1782, as celebrated in this engraving after a painting by Richard
Paton. Gibraltar had been under siege by the Spanish since July 1779, and could not have
held out much longer when the Channel Fleet escorting a large mercantile convoy broke
the Spanish blockade. Admiral Viscount (Richard) Howe conducted this brilliant operation
from his flagship, the famous First Rate Victory, the centrepiece of this illustration.

Copyright © Rif Winfield 2007
First published in Great Britain in 2007 by
Seaforth Publishing
An imprint of Pen & Sword Books Ltd
47 Church Street, Barnsley
S Yorkshire S70 2AS
Distributed in the United States of America by
MBI Publishing Company
Galtier Plaza, Suite 200, 380 Jackson Street
St Paul, MN 55101-3885, USA
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Winfield, Rif
British warships of the age of sail, 1714–1792 : design,
construction, careers and fates
1. Great Britain. Royal Navy - History - 18th century
2. Warships - Great Britain - History - 18th century
3. Great Britain - History, Naval - 18th century
I. Title
359.8′32′0941′09033
ISBN-13: 9781-844157006
PRINT ISBN 978-1-84415-700-6
EPUB ISBN: 978-1-78346-925-3
PRC ISBN: 978-1-78346-692-4
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system,
without prior permission in writing of both the copyright owner and the above publisher.
The right of Rif Winfield to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with
the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Designed and Typeset by Eden Valley Press, Kirkby Stephen
Printed and bound in China
Contents
Preface
Acknowledgements
Sources
Illustrations
The Data
Bibliography
Introduction
Chronology and Fleet Actions
Glossary and Abbreviations
Abstract of Annual Statistics
Chapter 1 First Rates of 100 guns
Chapter 2 Second Rates of 90 and 98 guns
Chapter 3 Third Rates
Ships of 80 guns
Ships of 66 to 70 guns
Ships of 74 guns
Ships of 64 guns
Chapter 4 Fourth Rates
Ships of 60 guns
Ships of 50 guns
Chapter 5 Fifth Rates
Ships of 40 to 44 guns
Ships of 32 to 38 guns
Chapter 6 Sixth Rates
Frigates of 28 or 30 guns
Post Ships of 20 to 24 guns
Chapter 7 Ship (three-masted) Sloops
Chapter 8 Two-masted Sloops
Chapter 9 Cutters and Schooners
Chapter 10 Miscellaneous Vessels
Bomb Vessels
Fireships
Hired Vessels
Exploration and Discovery Vessels
Armed Store Ships and Transports
Yachts
Miscellaneous Harbour Craft
Appendix A The American Navy 1775-1785
Appendix B Construction Costs for British Warships 1789
Appendix C Dockyard Launchings (and Master Shipwrights) 1714–1793
Preface
This book is the second volume in a series covering the ships and vessels of
the British Navy during the age of sail; it provides a guide to every vessel
which served in or was ordered for the Royal Navy between the accession of
King George I (and the start of the Hanoverian Era) in August 1714 and the
outbreak of the French Revolutionary War in 1792. A similar volume covering
the period from 1793 to 1817 is already in print.
As with the previous volume dealing with the post-1792 fleet, this book
gives a summary of the main technical details of each ‘class’ (design) of vessel
built for the Navy, from the huge three-deckers down to the minute brigs,
schooners and gunboats, together with building data for each vessel ordered to
those designs, as well as equivalent details of the hundreds of enemy warships
and privateers captured and added to the British Navy, and large numbers of
merchant vessels purchased from civilian sources to augment British naval
strength. All vessels already in service in August 1714, and those ordered
before 1792 but not completed in time for war service, are also covered.
Altogether, some two thousand individual vessels are separately detailed.
This volume likewise includes – as far as space allows – fairly detailed
notes on service histories for each vessel during the years covered, including
details of their commanding officers, main deployments, actions in which they
were involved (including information on all enemy warships and privateers in
whose capture or destruction the British vessel was involved), details and
dates of dockyard refits and major repairs – with the expenditure if known,
and a variety of other relevant information. Details of the dimensions of every
vessel (illustrating divergences from the design data), and of the individual
shipbuilders involved – in the Royal Dockyards as well as the commercial
contractors – complete this comprehensive singlevolume reference source for
every vessel.
Acknowledgements
This book, like its predecessor, was made possible by the collective work of a
number of individuals, who generously supplied me with the results of their
own research, and offered constructive suggestions for improvements and
pointed out the errors that inevitably accumulate in a volume of this size. The
service histories for individual vessels, in particular, owe a massive debt to the
copious archives of the late David Lyon, whose many years at the National
Maritime Museum enabled him to compile detailed records on every vessel; I
remain most grateful to Leo (Eleanor) Sharpston, for providing me with these
archives.
A number of good friends have again provided an amazing amount of
material from their own records. I would in particular pay thanks to Fred
Dittmar, David Hepper and John Houghton, who have additionally read
through a number of versions of this ever-expanding book and added or
corrected regular batches of material. Further additional research has been
forthcoming from others too numerous to single out, although John Tredrea
deserves special mention for his data on Spanish warships. My sister Jane
Winfield and Isabelle Guillou have again exhaustively checked the
orthography of French names, often badly misrecorded in British records. If I
have forgotten to include anyone in this list, I hope they will accept my
apologies.
This work has relied also on the earlier research of a number of writers.
David Syrett and R. L. DiNardo’s Commissioned Sea Officers of the Royal
Navy 1660-1815 (Navy Records Society publication, 1994) has been a
constant source of reference to verify the full names and ranks (at dates stated)
of commanding officers, while David Hepper’s British Warship Losses in the
Age of Sail 1650-1859 (Jean Boudriot Publications, 1994) has provided
reliable precise dates for ship’s fates (often misquoted in many secondary
sources). With significant numbers of French and other enemy warships and
privateers being incorporated into the British Navy, the published répertoires
of Jacques Vichot, Frank Lecalvé and more recently of Alain Demerliac
provided substantial verification of much material.
A number of museums and libraries have over the years been of vital
assistance in helping my own researches and solving the frequent queries that
arose, primarily the staff at the Public Records Office at Kew and the Caird
Library in the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich, but also a range of
museums overseas.
Inevitably much of the effort has been supplied by my publishers, and I am
most grateful for the patience and careful production work of Robert Gardiner
and Julian Mannering. Robert has selected and arranged use of all the
illustrations which have contributed so much to the final appearance of this
volume. Finally but most essentially, I need to thank my wife Ann for her
patience during the research and writing for this book, and for her constant
help and encouragement.