HMS Cuckoo (1806)
| Career (UK) |  |
|---|---|
| Name: | HMS Cuckoo |
| Ordered: | 11 December 1805 |
| Laid down: | January 1806 |
| Launched: | 11 April 1806 |
| Fate: | Wrecked 4 April 1810 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Cuckoo-class schooner |
| Tonnage: | 75 34/94 bm |
| Length: |
56 ft 3 in (17.15 m) (overall) 42 ft 4.125 in (12.9 m) (keel) |
| Beam: | 18 ft 3.5 in (5.575 m) |
| Draught: |
|
| Depth of hold: | 8 ft 5 in (2.57 m) |
| Sail plan: | Schooner |
| Complement: | 20 |
| Armament: | 4 x 12-pounder carronades |
HMS Cuckoo (1806) was a Royal Navy Cuckoo-class schooner of four 12-pounder carronades and a crew of 20. She was built by James Lovewell at Great Yarmouth and launched in 1806.[1] Like many of her class and the related Ballahoo-class schooners, she succumbed to the perils of the sea relatively early in her career.
Contents
Service
She was commissioned in May 1806 under Lieutenant Silas Hiscutt Paddon for the Channel and the North Sea.[1]
In March 1808 Cuckoo was part of a squadron off Lorient. She was about midway between the island of Groix and the Glénan islands when she sighted enemy vessels in the south-east. She signaled this to the squadron and the frigate Aigle and the 74-gun third rate Impetueux sailed to intercept. Aigle exchanged fire with one, which ran herself aground on Groix under the protection of French batteries there. Aigle suffered 22 wounded, including her captain who was severely wounded, and seven men who then were invalided out of the service. The British observed seven coffins being carried from the French frigate to a church on a nearby hill. The British believed that the vessel that ran ashore was the Seine and that the one that escaped was the Italienne.[2][Note 1]
Cuckoo accompanied the unsuccessful 1809 expedition to Walcheren.
Fate
Cuckoo was wrecked on 4 April 1810 on the Haak Sands off the Texel at Callantsoog. She had been under orders to capture all foreign vessels employed in the herring or other fisheries.[3]
She wrecked at 11pm and by 1am she was awash and her crew was forced to take to the rigging.[3]. Two members of her crew died.[1] The rest were captured, including Paddon. During the sinking a falling spar broke Paddon’s right shoulder-blade and two of his ribs, injuries that would bother him for the rest of his life. The Dutch rescued the surviving crew who then surrendered to troops from Amsterdam.[4]
A later court martial admonished Paddon for relying too heavily on the pilot Joseph Delaby who, by then, had deserted.[3][5][Note 2]
Note
References
- Gossett, William Patrick (1986) The lost ships of the Royal Navy, 1793-1900. (London:Mansell).ISBN 0-7201-1816-6
- Grocott, Terence (1997) Shipwrecks of the revolutionary & Napoleonic eras (Chatham). ISBN 1-86176-030-2
- James, William (1837). The Naval History of Great Britain, from the Declaration of War by France in 1793, to the Accession of George IV.. 5. R. Bentley.
- Roche, Jean-Michel (2005) Dictionnaire des Bâtiments de la Flotte de Guerre Française de Colbert à nos Jours. (Group Retozel-Maury Millau).
- Winfield, Rif (2008). British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793–1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 1861762461.
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