HMS Dispatch (1804)
Encyclopedia
HMS Dispatch (also Despatch) was a 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...
Cruizer-class brig-sloop
Cruizer class brig-sloop
The Cruizer class was an 18-gun class of brig-sloops of the Royal Navy. Brig-sloops were the same as ship-sloops except for their rigging...
built by Richard Symons & Co. at Falmouth and launched in 1804. Dispatch was instrumental in the capture of a 40-gun French frigate and was active at the Battle of Copenhagen in 1807
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...
. She also sailed on the Jamaica station. She was broken up relatively early, in 1811.
Initial service
She was commissioned in May 1804 under Commander Edward Hawkins for the Channel and cruising. She then joined a squadron under Captain Thomas DundasThomas Dundas (Royal Navy officer)
Vice-Admiral Sir Thomas Dundas KCB was an officer of the Royal Navy, who saw service during the American War of Independence, and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. An effective frigate captain he made a number of small captures, but not did not see action in any major fleet clashes,...
in Naiad
HMS Naiad (1797)
HMS Naiad was a Royal Navy fifth-rate frigate that served in the Napoleonic Wars. She was built by Hall and Co. at Limehouse on the Thames, launched in 1797 and commissioned in 1798. She served in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, and her last actions occurred in 1824-5. She was paid...
.
On 25 October, Hawkins sighted two strange vessels some five or six leagues
League (unit)
A league is a unit of length . It was long common in Europe and Latin America, but it is no longer an official unit in any nation. The league originally referred to the distance a person or a horse could walk in an hour...
off Pointe du Raz
Pointe du Raz
The Pointe du Raz is a promontory that extends into the Atlantic from western Brittany, in France. The local Breton name is Beg ar Raz. It is the western point of the commune of Plogoff, Finistère....
. Dispatch captured both, which proved to be the French gun-vessels No. 345 and No. 353. Each was armed with two brass guns, one a 32-pounder and the other a 6-pounder. Each had a crew of 20 soldiers. They had left Brest
Brest, France
Brest is a city in the Finistère department in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon...
for Odierne (or Dandiorne) but the wind had blown them out to sea. Conquest arrived on the scene and then the British sighted two more gun-vessels. Dispatch captured one, No. 371, armed like the two already captured, but with a crew of 22. Hawkins thought it too dangerous to try to send the three gun-vessels to England so he sank them after having removed the guns.
At daylight 27 November 1804 while was off Brest, she saw some small vessels open musket fire on boats belonging to that were chasing them. (Aigle had two seamen wounded, one dangerously.) Naiad gave chase and captured French gun-vessels Nos. 361 and 369. They each mounted one long brass 4 pounder gun and one short 12-pounder and had on board a lieutenant from the 63rd infantry regiment, 36 privates and six seamen. They had sailed with fourteen others from Dandiorne to Brest
Brest, France
Brest is a city in the Finistère department in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon...
. Captain Thomas Dundas of Naiad ordered Hawkins and Dispatch to take the gunboats and prisoners in to Plymouth.
On 28 April 1805 Dispatch capture the Spanish vessel of war, Nostra Senora del Anparo, alias Espadarte. Late in the year Dispatch captured a number of merchantmen: Desir de la Paix (30 September), Genevieve (7 October), Louise (15 October), and Spadron (31 October).
President
On 27 September 1806 Dispatch was part of a squadron under Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas LouisThomas Louis
Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Louis, 1st Baronet was an officer of the British Royal Navy who served in three wars and saw numerous actions, notably as one of Horatio Nelson's "Band of Brothers" in the Mediterranean in 1798 who commanded ships at the Battle of the Nile...
that included and Blanche
HMS Amfitrite (1804)
HMS Amfitrite was a 38-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She had previously served with the Spanish Navy before she was captured during the Napoleonic Wars and commissioned into the Royal Navy. The Admiralty renamed her HMS Blanche after she had spent just over a year as Amfitrite...
. The squadron captured the French 40-gun French frigate Président
French frigate Président
The Président was a 40-gun frigate of the Gloire Class in the French Navy, built to a 1802 design by Pierre-Alexandre Forfait. She served with the French Navy from her completion in 1804 until late 1806 when the Royal Navy captured her...
, with Dispatch playing a critical role.
Louis's squadron had sailed to the Bay of Biscay
Bay of Biscay
The Bay of Biscay is a gulf of the northeast Atlantic Ocean located south of the Celtic Sea. It lies along the western coast of France from Brest south to the Spanish border, and the northern coast of Spain west to Cape Ortegal, and is named in English after the province of Biscay, in the Spanish...
to await the return of Admiral Willaumez
Jean-Baptiste Philibert Willaumez
Jean-Baptiste Philibert Willaumez was a French sailor and admiral of the First French Empire....
from the Caribbean. On spotting the Président, the squadron gave chase but the ships of the line were not fast enough to catch her. However, Dispatch was able to get within firing range. Dispatch proceeded to harry Président with her forward guns, forcing Président to turn towards Blanche. Seeing Président turn, Louis ordered Canopus to fire, even though the range was extreme. Realizing that the rest of the British squadron would arrive shortly, Président struck
Striking the colors
Striking the colors is the universally recognized indication of surrender, particularly for ships at sea. Surrender is dated from the time the ensign is struck.-In international law:# "Colors. A national flag . The colors . ....
, surrendering to Dispatch. Président had suffered only minor damage and neither side suffered any casualties. The Royal Navy took her into service as HMS President. Hawkins had been made post-captain
Post-Captain
Post-captain is an obsolete alternative form of the rank of captain in the Royal Navy.The term served to distinguish those who were captains by rank from:...
two days prior to the action.
A few weeks after this action, Dispatch captured two French merchantmen. One of the ships carried sardines and was of so little value that Dispatch promptly scuttled her. The larger ship carried brandy, coffee and some guns and was sent back to England with a prize crew.
Between 10 and 12 February 1807 Captain Hawkins faced a court martial on board Gladiator
HMS Gladiator (1783)
HMS Gladiator was a 44-gun fifth-rate Roebuck-class ship of the Royal Navy. She was launched on 20 January 1783 by Henry Adams of Bucklers Hard. She spent her entire career on harbour service, never putting to sea. Even so, her crew earned prize money for the seizure of two Russian and five...
at Portsmouth. The charges, which had "aroused an unusual degree of interest", stemmed from when he had commanded Dispatch. Thomas Thompson, who had been master of Dispatch, had written an initially anonymous letter charging Hawkins with having willfully murdered a seaman, William Davie. Davie had been ill and Thompson charged that Hawkins's negligence and inattention between 9 and 25 December 1805 had brought about Davie's death. Hawkins advanced evidence that Davie was a skulker and under a surgeon's treatment for venereal disease, while also resorting to quack medicines. Character witnesses attested that Hawkins's behaviour was "always marked with humanity and gentleness"; the court declared the charges to be "scandalous and malicious" and acquitted Hawkins.
Baltic and Copenhagen
In 1807 Dispatch sailed under Commander James Lillicrap for the North Sea, and was at Copenhagen in August. In the spring she convoyed a fleet of transports carrying two divisions of the King's German LegionKing's German Legion
The King's German Legion was a British Army unit of expatriate German personnel, 1803–16. The Legion achieved the distinction of being the only German force to fight without interruption against the French during the Napoleonic Wars....
from the Downs to the island of Rügen
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...
off the German Baltic coast where the French were besieging Stralsund
Stralsund
- Main sights :* The Brick Gothic historic centre is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.* The heart of the old town is the Old Market Square , with the Gothic Town Hall . Behind the town hall stands the imposing Nikolaikirche , built in 1270-1360...
, then the capital of 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...
. She remained off the coast with a small squadron under Lillicrap to protect the troops. With the assistance of Rosamond, Dispatch covered the eventual evacuation of 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...
in a Swedish frigate.Marshall (1823-1835), pp.227-31.
While still on the station, Dispatch, her sister ship , and fired broadsides at the French outposts near Greifswald
Greifswald
Greifswald , officially, the University and Hanseatic City of Greifswald is a town in northeastern Germany. It is situated in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, at an equal distance of about from Germany's two largest cities, Berlin and Hamburg. The town borders the Baltic Sea, and is crossed...
. On 21 August Dispatch escorted the last troops to leave Rugen to Kioge Bay in Zealand to join the rest of the army, which had landed five days earlier to prepare for the attack on Copenhagen. When Dispatch joined Admiral James Gambier
James Gambier, 1st Baron Gambier
Admiral of the Fleet James Gambier, 1st Baron Gambier GCB was an admiral of the Royal Navy, who served as Governor of Newfoundland, and as a Lord of the Admiralty, but who gained notoriety for his actions at the Battle of the Basque Roads.-Early career:Gambier was born in New Providence, The...
off Copenhagen, Lillicrap was ordered to mount four long 18-pounders to give Dispatch a greater capability to fight the Danish gunboats. Lillicrap was also to join the inshore squadron as the senior commander under Captain Puget. Dispatch found herself engaging Danish gunboats almost daily. In the general promotion that followed in the capture of the Danish fleet, 17 commanders junior to Lillicrap received promotion; Lillicrap, despite recommendations, did not.
Dispatch sailed for Jamaica on 29 February 1808. On the night of 2 October, while off Nevis with a convoy of merchantmen, she captured the small 1-gun French privateer schooner Dorade, which had a crew of 20 men and mounted one brass gun. Dispatch later retook a captured British merchant ship.
While on the Jamaica station Lillicrap visited Haiti where he spent time with the two contending Haitian chiefs, Henri Christophe
Henri Christophe
Henri Christophe was a key leader in the Haitian Revolution, winning independence from France in 1804. On 17 February 1807, after the creation of a separate nation in the north, Christophe was elected President of the State of Haiti...
and Christophe’s co-conspirator and rival, Alexandre Pétion
Alexandre Pétion
Alexandre Sabès Pétion was President of the Republic of Haiti from 1806 until his death. He is considered as one of Haiti's founding fathers, together with Toussaint Louverture, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, and his rival Henri Christophe.-Early life:Pétion was born in Port-au-Prince to a Haitian...
. Christophe would in 1811 become the King of Haiti, and with him Lillicrap visited the Citadelle Laferrière
Citadelle Laferrière
The Citadelle Laferrière or, Citadelle Henry Christophe, or simply the Citadelle , is a large mountaintop fortress in northern Haiti, approximately south of the city of Cap-Haïtien and five miles uphill from the town of Milot...
. Lillicrap was promoted to post-captain
Post-Captain
Post-captain is an obsolete alternative form of the rank of captain in the Royal Navy.The term served to distinguish those who were captains by rank from:...
on 21 October 1810, but did not receive official notification until March 1811, at which time he sailed for home in . He would then have to wait until January 1815 for his next command .
In November 1810 Dispatch was under Commander James Aberdouor. She left Negril
Negril
Negril is a small but widely dispersed beach resort town located across parts of two Jamaican parishes of Westmoreland and Hanover. Westmoreland is the westernmost parish in Jamaica, located on the south side of the island...
on 20 May 1811 with a convoy for England and arrived at Portsmouth 24 July from Jamaica and St. George's Channel.
External links
- The Boatswain's Call An article exploring the life and service of HMS Dispatchs boatswain
- Phillips, Michael http://www.ageofnelson.org/MichaelPhillips/info.php?ref=0750 Ships of the Old Navy – HMS Dispatch; accessed 1 January 2010.