The Africaine was one of two 40-gun Preneuse class frigate

Preneuse class frigate

The Preneuse class was a type of two 42-gun frigates.* PreneuseThe Preneuse class was a type of two 42-gun frigates.* PreneuseThe Preneuse class was a type of two 42-gun frigates.* Preneuse:Builder::Ordered:...

 of the French Navy

French Navy

The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...

 built to a design by Raymond-Antoine Haran. She carried 28 18-pounder and 12 8-pounder guns. The British captured her in 1801, only to have the French recapture her in 1810. They abandoned her at sea as she had been demasted and badly damaged, with the result that the British recaptured her the next day. She was broken up in 1816.

French service

She was commissioned on 14 September 1799 under Capitaine de frégate Magendie

Jean-Jacques Magendie

Jean-Jacques Magendie was a French Navy officer. He famously captained the flagship Bucentaure at the Battle of Trafalgar.- Early career :...

. In 1800, she sailed to Saint-Domingue

Saint-Domingue

The labour for these plantations was provided by an estimated 790,000 African slaves . Between 1764 and 1771, the average annual importation of slaves varied between 10,000-15,000; by 1786 it was about 28,000, and from 1787 onward, the colony received more than 40,000 slaves a year...

. She then sailed from Rochefort

Rochefort, Charente-Maritime

Rochefort is a commune in southwestern France, a port on the Charente estuary. It is a sub-prefecture of the Charente-Maritime department.-History:...

 with Regénérée

French frigate Régénérée (1794)

Régénérée was a 40-gun Cocarde class frigate of the French Navy. The British captured her in 1801 at the fall of Alexandria but never commissioned her...

 to try to resupply the French forces in Egypt. She was carrying ordnance, stores and 400 soldiers reinforcing Napoleon's army in Egypt

Egypt

Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...

.

At the Action of 19 February 1801

Action of 19 February 1801

The Action of 19 February 1801 was a minor naval battle fought off Ceuta in Spanish North Africa in February 1801 between a French Navy frigate and British Royal Navy frigate during the French Revolutionary Wars...

, HMS Phoebe

HMS Phoebe (1795)

HMS Phoebe was a 36-gun fifth rate of the British Royal Navy. She had a career of almost twenty years and fought in the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812...

, under Captain Robert Barlow

Robert Barlow (Royal Navy officer)

Admiral Sir Robert Barlow GCB was a senior and distinguished officer of the British Royal Navy who saw extensive service in the American Revolutionary War, the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. He made his name in small ship actions, especially fighting French frigates, or which...

, captured her east of Gibraltar

Gibraltar

Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...

. Phoebe, which had the weather gage

Weather gage

The weather gage is a nautical term used to describe the advantageous position of a fighting sailing vessel, relative to another. The term is from the Age of Sail, and is now antiquated. A ship is said to possess the weather gage if it is in any position, at sea, upwind of the other vessel...

, overtook Africaine and engaged her at close range, despite the French soldiers, who augmented the frigate's guns with their musket

Musket

A musket is a muzzle-loaded, smooth bore long gun, fired from the shoulder. Muskets were designed for use by infantry. A soldier armed with a musket had the designation musketman or musketeer....

 fire. Phoebe's guns inflicted more than 340 casualties on the soldiers and seaman of Africaine before she struck at 9:30PM. The Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 took her into service as HMS Africaine.

British service: the English Channel

Africaine was commissioned under Commander J. Stewart in April. Then in July Captain Stevenson took command, only to be replaced in September by Captain George Burlton. On 31 January 1802 she arrived in Portsmouth from Malta and sailed again to Chatham on 7 February to be paid off before being re-fitted. She arrived in at Deptford on 17 February 1802 for refitting.

In November Captain Thomas Manby

Thomas Manby

Thomas Moore Manby was a British naval officer who fought in the French Revolutionary Wars and Napoleonic Wars and later rose to the rank of rear admiral...

 took command, though Africaine was not yet ready. When Earl St. Vincent

Viscount St Vincent

Viscount St Vincent, of Meaford in the County of Stafford, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1801 for the noted naval commander John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent, with remainder to his nephews William Henry Ricketts and Edward Jervis Ricketts successively, and...

 gave Manby the appointment St. Vincent said that he did not like to see an active officer idle on shore. He had a point as while Manby was waiting for the vessel to be ready Lady Townshend presented him to Caroline

Caroline of Brunswick

Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel was the Queen consort of King George IV of the United Kingdom from 29 January 1820 until her death...

, the Princess of Wales, who became friendly towards him. Rumours abounded that the Princess became too familiar with Manby and that Manby was even the father of one of her children. An investigation followed during which Manby swore an affidavit on 22 September 1806 that the rumours were "a vile and wicked invention, wholly and absolutely false".

Africaine was commissioned at Deptford for the North Sea in 1803. On his way to the Nore, Manby stopped at Gravesent where he landed a press gang

Impressment

Impressment, colloquially, "the Press", was the act of taking men into a navy by force and without notice. It was used by the Royal Navy, beginning in 1664 and during the 18th and early 19th centuries, in wartime, as a means of crewing warships, although legal sanction for the practice goes back to...

. Between midnight and sunrise they garnered 398 seamen. From the Nore she sailed to Hellevoetsluis

Hellevoetsluis

Hellevoetsluis is a small city and municipality on Voorne-Putten Island in the western Netherlands, in the province of South Holland...

 where there were two French frigates; Africaine maintained a blockade there for two years until the French dismantled the frigates.

One day while Africaine was maintaining this blockade, the French general at Scheveningen had four boys shrimping in Africaines jolly boat fired upon. Manby immediately seized sixty fishing boats that he then sent to Yarmouth. This cost The Hague

The Hague

The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...

 its supplies of fish for some weeks. Also, on 20 July 1803, Africaines First Lieutenant

First Lieutenant

First lieutenant is a military rank and, in some forces, an appointment.The rank of lieutenant has different meanings in different military formations , but the majority of cases it is common for it to be sub-divided into a senior and junior rank...

, William Henry Dillon, landed at Hellevoetsluis in a boat from Leda

HMS Leda (1800)

HMS Leda, launched in 1800, was the lead ship of a successful class of forty-seven British Royal Navy 38-gun sailing frigates. Ledas design was based on the French frigate Hébé, which the British had captured in 1782. HMS Leda, launched in 1800, was the lead ship of a successful class of...

 under a flag of truce. The Dutch commodore there detained Dillon until men from Furieuse could take him prisoner. Dillon caught a fever that almost killed him while he was on board Fureiuse; when he was well again the French transferred him to their prison camp at Verdun. There he remained until September 1807 when he was exchanged. On 1 August a lightning strike on the foremast killed one man and injured three others.

Manby sailed from Yarmouth on 4 October 1804 to deliver Rear Admiral Thomas Macnamara Russell out to Eagle

HMS Eagle (1804)

HMS Eagle was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 27 February 1804 at Northfleet.In 1830 she was reduced to a 50-gun ship, and became a training ship in 1860. She was renamed HMS Eaglet in 1919, when she was the Royal Naval Reserve training centre for North West...

, one of the vessels of the British flotilla watching the Dutch fleet in the Texel. Manby returned on 7 October with Rear Admiral Edward Thornborough. While she was serving in the blockade off the Texel, a gale caused broke of part of Africaines rudder, which then damaged the stern post. Glatton

HMS Glatton (1795)

HMS Glatton was a 56-gun fourth rate of the Royal Navy. She was launched as the Glatton, an East Indiaman, on 29 November 1792 by Wells & Co. of Blackwell. The Royal Navy bought her in 1795 and converted her into a warship. Glatton was unusual in that for a time she was the only ship-of-the-line...

 had to escort Africaine to Yarmouth, where winds almost drove Africaine ashore; her crew had to cut away all her masts to save her.

On 31 December a court martial took place in Sheerness on Africaine to try Captain the Honorable John Colville, the officers and ship's company of Romney

HMS Romney (1762)

HMS Romney was a 50-gun fourth rate of the Royal Navy. She served during the American War of Independence, and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars in a career that spanned forty years....

 for the loss of their ship off the Texel on 19 November.

In May 1805 Africaine was on the Irish Station. She was then re-fitted at Sheerness and escorted a large convoy to the West Indies on 19 June 1805, calling at Suriname

Suriname

Suriname , officially the Republic of Suriname , is a country in northern South America. It borders French Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, Brazil to the south, and on the north by the Atlantic Ocean. Suriname was a former colony of the British and of the Dutch, and was previously known as...

, Demerara

Demerara

Demerara was a region in South America in what is now Guyana that was colonised by the Dutch in 1611. The British invaded and captured the area in 1796...

, and various islands. When she arrived in Barbados

Barbados

Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles. It is in length and as much as in width, amounting to . It is situated in the western area of the North Atlantic and 100 kilometres east of the Windward Islands and the Caribbean Sea; therein, it is about east of the islands of Saint...

 her crew of 340 men were all healthy. Then Sir Alexander Cochrane

Alexander Cochrane

Admiral Sir Alexander Forrester Inglis Cochrane GCB RN was a senior Royal Navy commander during the Napoleonic Wars.-Naval career:...

 had her return to England with invalids from the hospitals in Barbados as passengers. Within two days of leaving Barbados, yellow fever broke out on board Africaine. The surgeon and the assistant surgeon died on the second day; Manby himself carried out their duties dispensing, large doses of calomel on the advice of a doctor at St Kitts. Manby had an attack of the fever and it affected his subsequent health. In all, fever killed one third of the crew of 340 men during the six weeks it took to reach Falmouth. Africaine then spent almost six weeks in quarantine off the Scilly Islands. She then was taken out of commission at Sheerness.

In Spring 1807, Africaine fitted out at Chatham. Later, at Plymouth, Captain Richard Raggett took command. On 5 July 1807 Africaine sailed from England with General Lord William Cathcart

William Cathcart, 1st Earl Cathcart

General William Schaw Cathcart, 1st Earl Cathcart KT, PC, PC , Scottish soldier and diplomatist, was born at Petersham, and educated at Eton.-Military career:...

 to Swedish Pomerania

Swedish Pomerania

Swedish Pomerania was a Dominion under the Swedish Crown from 1630 to 1815, situated on what is now the Baltic coast of Germany and Poland. Following the Polish War and the Thirty Years' War, Sweden held extensive control over the lands on the southern Baltic coast, including Pomerania and parts...

 where King Gustavus

Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden

Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden also Gustav Adolph was King of Sweden from 1792 until his abdication in 1809. He was the son of Gustav III of Sweden and his queen consort Sophia Magdalena, eldest daughter of Frederick V of Denmark and his first wife Louise of Great Britain. He was the last Swedish...

 was defending his territory against an invading French army. Cathcart would take command of the land-forces for the forthcoming siege and bombardment of Copenhagen.

Africaine arrived at the island of Rugen

Rügen

Rügen is Germany's largest island. Located in the Baltic Sea, it is part of the Vorpommern-Rügen district of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.- Geography :Rügen is located off the north-eastern coast of Germany in the Baltic Sea...

 on 12 August where she joined Admiral Gambier's fleet for the attack on Copenhagen

Battle of Copenhagen (1807)

The Second Battle of Copenhagen was a British preemptive attack on Copenhagen, targeting the civilian population in order to seize the Dano-Norwegian fleet and in turn originate the term to Copenhagenize.-Background:Despite the defeat and loss of many ships in the first Battle of Copenhagen in...

. Africaines boat operated as part of the advanced squadron and had one man wounded in an action on 23 August. As part of the capitulation, the Danes surrendered their fleet. A prize crew from Africaine took the captured Danish frigate Iris into the Medway.

By 24 December she was at Madeira

Madeira

Madeira is a Portuguese archipelago that lies between and , just under 400 km north of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the north Atlantic Ocean and an outermost region of the European Union...

, having accompanied Sir Samuel Hood there. The British occupation was a friendly affair and the garrison surrendered without resistance on 26 September.

On 11 Jan 1808 Africaine captured the Spanish felucca Paloma. Africaine then sailed to the Baltic to serve under Vice-Admiral Sir James Saumarez.

East Indies: capture and recapture

In spring 1810, Africaine had returned to Plymouth from Annapolis after having delivered Mr. Jackson, the British ambassador to the United States. During this period the crew threatened mutiny when informed that Captain Robert Corbet

Robert Corbet

Captain Robert Corbet RN , often spelled Corbett, was an officer of the British Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars who was killed in action in highly controversial circumstances...

, who had a reputation for brutality, was to take command of Africaine. The Navy quickly suppressed the incipient mutiny and Africaine sailed for the East Indies with Corbet in command. During the voyage Corbet reportedly failed to train his men in the accurate and efficient use of their cannon, preferring to maintain the order and cleanliness of his ship than exercise his gun teams.

After the Battle of Grand Port

Battle of Grand Port

The Battle of Grand Port was a naval battle between squadrons of frigates from the French Navy and the British Royal Navy. The battle was fought during 20–27 August 1810 over possession of the harbour of Grand Port on Île de France during the Napoleonic Wars...

, which was a disaster for the British, Commodore Josias Rowley

Josias Rowley

Admiral Sir Josias Rowley, 1st Baronet GCB, GCMG , known as "The Sweeper of the Seas", was a naval officer who commanded the campaign that captured the French Indian Ocean islands of Réunion and Mauritius in 1810.-Naval career:...

 sent urgent messages to Madras and Cape Town requesting reinforcements. The first to arrive were Africaine and HMS Ceylon

HMS Bombay (1805)

HCS Bombay, later HMS Bombay and HMS Ceylon, was a 672 ton fifth rate, 38-gun wooden warship built in the Bombay Dockyard for the Honourable East India Company and launched in 1793. The Royal Navy purchased her in 1805 and renamed her HMS Bombay. She served with the Royal Navy under that name...

, both of which were sailing alone.

Africaine was still on her way from England to Madras when on 9 September she stopped at the island of Rodrigues

Rodrigues

Rodrigues is a common surname in the Portuguese language. It was originally a Patronymic, meaning Son of Rodrigo or Son of Rui. The "es" signifies "son of". The name Rodrigo is the Portuguese form of Roderick, meaning "famous power" or "famous ruler", from the Germanic elements "hrod" and "ric" ,...

 to replenish her water. There she heard of the debacle. By 11 September she had arrived off the Île de France

Mauritius

Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...

 where she sent her boats in shore to find a passage through the reef with a view to capturing a French schooner. The boats' crews succeeded in boarding the vessel, which turned out to be French dispatch vessel No. 23, but had to abandon it in the face of fire from soldiers on shore that killed two men and wounded 16. Africaine then sailed for the Île de Bourbon

Réunion

Réunion is a French island with a population of about 800,000 located in the Indian Ocean, east of Madagascar, about south west of Mauritius, the nearest island.Administratively, Réunion is one of the overseas departments of France...

, which Corbett had learned was in British hands and where Rowley was located to drop off the casualties. Africaine arrived on 12 September and then sailed that evening in pursuit of some French vessels that had been sighted.

Next day Iphigénie and Astrée captured Africaine. She had been sailing with HMS Boadicea

HMS Boadicea (1797)

HMS Boadicea was a frigate of the Royal Navy. She served in the Channel and in the East Indies during which service she captured many prizes. She participated in one action for which the Admiralty would award the Naval General Service Medal...

, HMS Otter

HMS Otter (1805)

HMS Otter was a Royal Navy 16-gun Merlin-class ship sloop, launched in 1805 at Hull. She participated in two notable actions in the Indian Ocean and was sold in 1828.-Armament:...

, and HMS Staunch

HMS Staunch (1804)

HMS Staunch was a Royal Navy 14-gun , built by Benjamin Tanner and launched in 1804 at Dartmouth, Devon. She served in the Indian Ocean and participated in the Action of 18 September 1810 before she foundered with the loss of all hands in 1811.-Service:...

 trailing some distance behind. When she chased the French frigates and the brig Entreprenante early on the morning of 13 September, she outdistanced her companions, with unfortunate results. Early in the battle a shot took off Corbet's foot and his crew took him below decks. Africaine fought on under her remaining officers with First Lieutenant Joseph Crew Tullidge having taken command. After about two hours, with Tullidge having suffered four wounds, she struck.

Africaine had 295 men and boys aboard, including 25 soldiers from the 86th Regiment

86th (Royal County Down) Regiment of Foot

The 86th Regiment of Foot was an infantry regiment of the British Army, formed in 1793 and amalgamated into The Royal Irish Rifles following the Childers Reforms in 1881....

. Of these 49 had been killed and 114 wounded. The French took Tullidge and about 90 survivors prisoner and conveyed them to Mauritius where they remained until the British took the island in December. The French lost nine killed and 33 wounded in Iphigénie and one killed and two wounded in Astrée.

The next day Boadicea and her two companions recaptured Africaine. Because she was dismasted and damaged the French did not try to tow her. Also, Astrée had to take Iphigénie into tow. Africaine still had 70 of her wounded and some 83 uninjured of her crew aboard, as well as a ten-man French prize crew.

By the time the British had recaptured Africaine Corbet was dead; he had died some six hours after his foot was amputated. Later, rumors circulated that he had committed suicide because of the dishonor of defeat, or that members of the crew had killed him. From the amount of shot that was still on the vessel there was also reason to suspect that the crew had stopped shotting the cannons after the first few broadsides, perhaps in protest against Corbet. Regardless, a court martial on 23 April 1811 honorably acquitted the surviving officers and crew of the Africaine for the loss of their ship. In August Tullidge received a promotion to Commander.

The French also captured Ceylon, but Boadicea quickly retook her too. Rowley was able to seize Jacques Hamelin  and his flagship Vénus

French frigate Vénus (1808)

The Vénus was a Junon class frigate of the French Navy.On 10 November 1808, she departed Cherbourg, bound for Île de France, where she served as Hamelin's flagship, leading a squadron also comprising the frigate Manche and the sloop Créole....

 at the Action of 18 September 1810

Action of 18 September 1810

The Action of 18 September 1810 was a naval battle fought between British Royal Navy and French Navy frigates in the Indian Ocean during the Napoleonic Wars. The engagement was one of several between rival frigate squadrons contesting control of the French island base of Île de France, from which...

.

To get Africiane ready for sea again, Bertie appointed Lieutenant Edward Lloyd of Boadicea to supervise the repairs. To give Africiane new masts, Lloyd took a recaptured East Indiaman and salvaged her lower masts, yards and sails. On 14 December she sailed again with an ad hoc crew made up of 30 sailors, a company from the 87th. Regiment

87th (Royal Irish Fusiliers) Regiment of Foot

The 87th Regiment of Foot was an infantry regiment of the British Army, formed in 1793 and amalgamated into the Princess Victoria's in 1881....

 instead of marines, and some 120 blacks recruited from plantations on the island. During the subsequent Invasion of Île de France

Invasion of Île de France

The Invasion of Île de France was a complicated but successful amphibious operation in the Indian Ocean, launched in November 1810 during the Napoleonic Wars. During the operation, a substantial British military force was landed by the Royal Navy at Grand Baie on Île de France...

, Africaine, under Captain Charles Gordon

Charles Gordon (Royal Navy officer)

Admiral Charles Gordon, CB was an officer of the British Royal Navy during the nineteenth century. Gordon's most notable action was the Action of 18 September 1810, when he was seriously wounded in battle and his frigate HMS Ceylon captured by the French frigate Vénus...

, late of Ceylon, was Vice Admiral Bertie's

Sir Albemarle Bertie, 1st Baronet

Admiral Sir Albemarle Bertie, 1st Baronet, KCB, was a long-serving and at time controversial officer of the British Royal Navy who saw extensive service in his career but also courted controversy with several of his actions....

 flagship. She arrived in Portsmouth on 21 March with Vice Admiral Bertie.

East Indies again, and return to England

In July 1811 Capt. Brian Hodgson took command, only to be replaced the next month by Captain Edward Rodney, whose appointment was dated September 1810. On 26 November 1811 Rodney and Africaine sailed for the East Indies again.

On 28 August 1813, Rodney sent in boats to take the Annapoorny, a merchant vessel belonging to Prince of Wales Island

Penang

Penang is a state in Malaysia and the name of its constituent island, located on the northwest coast of Peninsular Malaysia by the Strait of Malacca. It is bordered by Kedah in the north and east, and Perak in the south. Penang is the second smallest Malaysian state in area after Perlis, and the...

 that the King of Acheen had seized and which claimed to be British. Some correspondence between Rodney and the King had preceded the seizure, and afterwards the King entertained the lieutenant in charge of the cutting out party and Richard Blakeny. The King was a relatively young man and had a few years earlier served for three years as a midshipman on HMS Caroline.

In May 1815, Africaine and the brig Victor were escorting six East Indiamen

East Indiamen

An East Indiaman was a ship operating under charter or license to any of the East India Companies of the major European trading powers of the 17th through the 19th centuries...

 from Ceylon to England. One of the vessels was the ill-fated Arniston

Arniston (ship)

The Arniston was an East Indiaman ship that was wrecked on 30 May 1815 during a storm at Waenhuiskrans, near Cape Agulhas, South Africa with the loss of 372 lives and only 6 survivors...

, which got separated from the convoy and was wrecked on the coast of South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

 with the loss of 372 lives. When Africaine returned to Portsmouth on 6 December 1815, only 42 of her original crew of 350 were still on board.

Earlier in 1815, James Cooper and three of his shipmates were publicly court martialed, then hanged on 1 February 1816 following their being found guilty of sodomy

Sodomy

Sodomy is an anal or other copulation-like act, especially between male persons or between a man and animal, and one who practices sodomy is a "sodomite"...

 on board the ship. Two other members of her crew received a flogging for deviant sexual behavior.

Further reading

HMS Africaine features prominently in The Mauritius Command

The Mauritius Command

The Mauritius Command is a historical naval novel by British author Patrick O'Brian. It is fourth in the Aubrey-Maturin series of stories that follow the partnership of Captain Jack Aubrey and the naval surgeon Stephen Maturin. It retells in fictional form the real campaign carried out by the Royal...

 by Patrick O'Brian

Patrick O'Brian

Patrick O'Brian, CBE , born Richard Patrick Russ, was an English novelist and translator, best known for his Aubrey–Maturin series of novels set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars and centred on the friendship of English Naval Captain Jack Aubrey and the Irish–Catalan physician Stephen...

.