HMS Anaconda (1813)
| Career (UK) |  |
|---|---|
| Name: | HMS Anaconda |
| Builder: | Middletown, Connecticut |
| Launched: | 1812 |
| Acquired: |
Captured on 11 July 1813 Purchased in September 1813 |
| Fate: | Sold on 5 May 1815 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | 18-gun brig-sloop |
| Tons burthen: | 383 91/94 bm |
| Length: |
102 ft 6 in (31.2 m) (overall) 85 ft 10 in (26.2 m) (keel) |
| Beam: | 29 ft (8.8 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 10 ft 2 in (3.10 m) |
| Armament: |
|
HMS Anaconda was an 18-gun brig-sloop of the Royal Navy during the War of 1812. She was cruising as an American privateer until sailors from HMS Sceptre captured her in 1813.
American career
In late 1812, Captain Nathanial Shaler took command of Anaconda in New York. On 16 January 1812, while Capt. Shaler was ashore on business, Anaconda's First Lieutenant, George W. Burbank, encountered the American schooner Commodore Hull and fired a broadside into her, seriously wounding her commander, before realizing his mistake. A court martial, however, absolved Burbank from blame.[1][2].
On 14 May 1813, while in the latitude of the Cape Verde Islands, he was able to capture the British packet ship Express, an 8, 11, or 12-gun brig with a crew of 38, sailing from Rio de Janeiro to England.[3] After a fight lasting over half-an-hour, the Express struck. In June, Anaconda took the 8-gun brig Mary, sailing from Gibraltar. Later that month, Anaconda took the brig Harriet, sailing from Buenos Aires to London, delivering her to New Bedford. However, in early July Captain Shaler took refuge in Ocracoke Inlet.[4]
Capture
On the 11th (or 12th) July 1813, Lieut. George Augustus Westphal, the First Lieutenant of Sceptre, led a group of boats into Ocracoke Inlet during Rear Admiral Sir George Cockburn's campaign against Portsmouth and Ocracoke Island in North Carolina. Their targets were Anaconda and a second privateer, the 13-gun schooner Atlas under Captain David Mafitt, as well as a revenue cutter. The British captured both privateers, but the revenue cutter escaped up the Neuse River to New Bern, where she gave warning of the British forces, permitting the preparation of defences that forestalled the Royal Navy from any further advance. Captain Shaler escaped with his crew. The British took both the privateers into service, the Anaconda under her name, and the Atlas as HMS St Lawrence. Anaconda was purchased in September for £3,879.2.2d and commissioned under her captor, Commander George Westphal.
British career
After refitting at Halifax, Anaconda escorted twelve merchant vessels from there to the West Indies. While doing so she engaged two large American privateers. One of the privateers struck after losing her jib-boom and fore-top-mast but then escaped when Anaconda lost her own fore-top-mast chasing after the second privateer.
In March 1814, Anaconda was stationed off the Mississippi delta under the orders of Capt. Clement Milward of HMS Herald. On September 15, Captain William H. Percy took HMS Hermes (22 guns), HMS Sophie (18 guns), HMS Carron (20 guns), and Anaconda, to bombard Fort Bowyer on Mobile Point in support of a land attack. The British attack was unsuccessful, with Hermes running aground and blowing up after being set on fire and abandoned by Percy and her crew. The British lost 162 men killed (including six on Sophie and 17, plus five mortally wounded, on Hermes), while the Americans lost only four dead.[5]
During Sir Alexander Cochrane's expedition against New Orleans in December, Westphal took Anaconda five miles over a bank with only eight feet of water in order to enter Lake Borgne. This put him some 20 miles ahead of the other brigs and he was able to protect the open boats carrying troops and supplies from the fleet to the army moving against New Orleans.[6]
After Captain Nicholas Lockyer's successful attack on an American flotilla in the Lake, Anaconda evacuated the wounded, who numbered some 77 men. Westphal later landed with the greater part of his officers and men and fought in the naval brigade under Captain Edward Troubridge, serving the batteries before New Orleans during the battle.[7]
In February 1815, Anaconda, together with the schooner Shelburne, cruised off the Florida coast north of Havana.
Fate
Anaconda was paid off in April 1815, and condemned after she underwent a survey at Jamaica that found that she had received too much damage in the operations against New Orleans to merit retention in service. Anaconda was condemned and sold on 5 May 1815.
References
- ↑ Edgar Stanton Maclay. 1899. A History of American Privateers. (D. Appleton & Co.), pp. 259-260.
- ↑ James H Ellis. 2009. A ruinous and unhappy war : New England and the War of 1812. (New York : Algora Pub.), pp.87-8.
- ↑ Arthur H Norway. 1895. History of the post-office packet service between the years 1793-1815 compiled from records,chiefly official. (London), p. 243.
- ↑ Edgar stanton Maclay. 1899. A History of American Privateers. (D. Appleton & Co.), pp. 259-260.
- ↑ Benson J. Lossing. 1869. Pictorial Field-Book of the War of 1812., Chap. 42.
- ↑ http://www.ageofnelson.org/MichaelPhillips/info.php?ref=0161
- ↑ http://www.ageofnelson.org/MichaelPhillips/info.php?ref=0161
- 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. ISBN 9781861762818. OCLC 67375475.
- Winfield, Rif (2007). British Warships of the Age of Sail 1794–1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 1861762461.
