HMS Anson (1781)
| 300px HMS Arethusa and HMS Anson capture the Pomona off Havana, depicted by Thomas Whitcombe | |
| Career (UK) |  |
|---|---|
| Name: | HMS Anson |
| Ordered: | 24 April 1773 |
| Builder: | Plymouth Dockyard |
| Laid down: | January 1774 |
| Launched: | 4 September 1781 |
| Honours and awards: |
Participated in: |
| Fate: | Wrecked, 29 December 1807 |
| General characteristics [1] | |
| Class and type: | Intrepid-class ship of the line |
| Tons burthen: | 1369 bm |
| Length: | 159 ft 6 in (48.62 m) (gundeck) |
| Beam: | 44 ft 4 in (13.51 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 19 ft (5.8 m) |
| Propulsion: | Sails |
| Sail plan: | Full rigged ship |
| Armament: |
64 guns:
|
HMS Anson was a 64-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched at Plymouth on 4 September 1781[1] by Georgina, Duchess of Devonshire.[citation needed]
History
She fought at the Battle of Les Saintes on 9 April 1782 under the flag of Admiral Sir George Rodney against Admiral de Grasse. In this engagement, Captain William Blair was one of the two Royal Navy post captains killed.
In 1794, she was razéed to a large frigate of 44-guns by removing her forecastle and quarterdeck and altering the former upper deck (now weather or spar-deck) to 42-pounder carronades from the 18-pounder long guns previously mounted.
On 18 October 1798 under the command of Captain Philip Charles Durham, in company with Kangaroo, she captured the French frigate Loire, this after having earlier lost her mizzen mast, main lower and topsail yards during the pursuit of a French squadron off Ireland.
She sailed from Plymouth on 26 January 1799, and on 2 February, in company with Ethalion, captured the French privateer cutter Boulonaise, 14, from Dunkirk which had been harassing shipping in the North Sea.
On 9 September 1799 Captain Durham hosted a fête for King George III. During the course of the evening, the king was found on the low deck surrounded by the ship’s company talking to an old sailor.
On 10 April 1800, when north-west of the Canary Islands, Anson detained the Catherine & Anna bound for Hamburg, Holy Roman Empire, from Batavia with a cargo of coffee.
In 1801 Captain W. E. Cacraft assumed command and the ship was placed on the Channel station, cruising from Portsmouth. In 1802 she was in the Mediterranean, and in November she sailed from Malta for Egypt. She went in for repairs in 1805 at Portsmouth.
On the morning of 23 August 1806 Captain Charles Lydiard along with Arethusa made a successful attack near Moro Castle in Cuba.
On 15 September 1806, she encountered the French Foudroyant, 84, under jury rig some 15 miles off Havana. Assuming that she had been damaged in action Captain Charles Lydiard attacked but then after half an hour found that the French ship had only suffered from bad weather and retained all her fire power. He was forced to haul off after 2 men had been killed, 13 wounded, his sails and rigging had been badly damaged and the ships were drifting fast in shore.
Shipwreck
Anson was wrecked off Loe Bar, Cornwall, on 29 December 1807.[2] The previous day she had been driven onto a lee shore by a gale while attempting to return to Falmouth. She had anchored, but when the cable parted at about 8 o'clock in the morning, she ran onto the sand and was soon broken up by the waves. Over 100 lives were lost.[2] Captain Lydiard was among the casualties, his body being recovered on 1 January 1808 and taken to Falmouth for burial.[3]
The loss of the Anson caused controversy at the time, because of the treatment of the dead sailors washed ashore. In those days it was customary to unceremoniously bury drowned seamen without shroud or coffin and in unconsecrated ground, with bodies remaining unburied for long periods of time. This controversy led to a local solicitor, Thomas Grylls, drafting a new law to provide more decent treatment for drowned seamen. This law was introduced to parliament by John Hearle Tremayne, Member of Parliament for Cornwall, and was enacted as the Burial of Drowned Persons Act 1808. A monument to the drowned sailors, and to passing of the Grylls Act, stands near the entrance to the harbour of Porthleven.[4][5]
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Lavery, Ships of the Line, vol. 1, p. 181.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "HMS Anson". BBC Cornwall. http://www.bbc.co.uk/cornwall/content/articles/2007/12/24/aboutcornwall_hmsanson_feature.shtml. Retrieved 2009-11-25.
- ↑ Ships of the Old Navy, Anson.
- ↑ Hitchins, Fortescue (1824). Samuel Drew. ed. The history of Cornwall: from the earlist records and traditions ..., Volume 2. William Penaluna. p. 607. http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=YUYQAAAAYAAJ. Retrieved 2009-09-04.
- ↑ Schofield, Edith (2009). Cornwall Coast Path (third ed.). Trailblazer Publications. ISBN 978-1-905864-19-5.
References
- Robert Gardiner,Frigates of the Napoleonic Wars, Chatham Publishing, London 2006. ISBN 1861762925
- Michael Phillips. Anson (44) (1781). Michael Phillips' Ships of the Old Navy. Retrieved 3 November 2008.
- Lavery, Brian (2003) The Ship of the Line - Volume 1: The development of the battlefleet 1650-1850. Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-252-8.
External links
- Pages with broken file links
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- Articles with unsourced statements from November 2008
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- Royal Navy ships of the line
- Ships of the line of the United Kingdom
- Intrepid class ships of the line
- Shipwrecks in the English Channel
- Cornish shipwrecks
- Frigates of the Royal Navy
- Maritime incidents in 1807
- 1807 in the United Kingdom
- Plymouth-built ships
- 1780s ships
