HMS Forester (1806)

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Forester.

HMS Forester was a Royal Navy 18-gun Cruizer class brig-sloop built by John King and launched in 1806 at Dover. After a relatively uneventful career she was sold in 1819.

Service

Forester entered service in 1806 under Captain John Richards and was sent to act as a convoy escort for ships sailing to the Baltic. Off the Netherlands she captured the smuggler Hiram and in 1808 was also tasked with burning the frigate HMS Flora, which had been wrecked in a gale. Soon afterward Forester escorted a convoy to Goree and was then refitted at Spithead, subsequently sailing to Corunna and then the West Indies.

Operating off Barbados, Forester participated in the invasion of Martinique in January 1809 and captured two French privateers at Port de Molas. Command then passed to John E. Watt, and then in 1813 to Alexander Kennedy.

Kennedy and Forester captured the American 2-gun privateer Mary Ann in the Leeward Islands and the 5-gun Lovely Lass off Jamaica. The capture of the Mary Ann took place on 15 May off San Domingo with the assistance of Sapphire and that of Lovely Lass with Circe. In April 1814, Kennedy was dismissed from Forester and suspended from his rank for two years for disobeying orders from Rear-Admiral William Brown and command passed to William Hendry.

Fate

In 1817, following the end of the wars, Forester was paid off at Portsmouth. She was sold there in 1819 to G. Young for ₤1,130.

Notes

• Ships of the Old Navy

References

Winfield, Rif (2008). British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793–1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 1861762461.