The Rover (privateering ship)
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The Rover was a privateer brig out of Liverpool, Nova Scotia. She was built in Brooklyn in from 1799-1800. The Rover was 100 tones and carried fourteen 4 pound cannon.
Captained by Alexander Godfrey under a British letter of marque, The Rover won fame with the engagement of the Spanish schooner, Santa Rita, and three accompanying gunboats. The Rover's crew of 55 was made up mostly of Newfoundland sailors and boys. Off the coast of Venezuela in 1800, The Rover captured Santa Rita of ten 6 pounders with two carronades and two gunboats, totaling a crew of 125. The Rover did not lose a single man. The capture made Godfrey a hero in England, which offered him his own ship in the Royal Navy.
A subsequent captain, Benjamin Collins, lost his letter of marque and created trouble for The Rover's owners with the illegal capture of several merchants. After 1803, she was sold and converted to a merchant ship, retaining much of her armament.
[edit] References
- Raddall, Thomas H. (1958). The Rover: The Story of a Canadian Privateer. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart.
