HMS Belleisle (1795)

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Career (France)
HMS Belleisle after the Battle of Trafalgar
Name:	Lion, Marat, Formidable
Launched:	Rochefort
Captured:	23 June 1795, by Royal Navy at the Battle of Groix
Career (UK)
Name:	HMS Belleisle
Fate:	Broken up, 1814
General Characteristics
Propulsion:	Sails
Armament:	74 guns of various weights of shot
Honours and awards:	Present at: Battle of Groix (French side) Battle of Trafalgar (British side)

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

HMS Belleisle was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She was built at Rochefort for the French Navy, and initially named Lion. She was later renamed Marat, and then Formidable, with the changing fortunes of the French Revolution.

She was captured on 23 June 1795 at the Battle of Groix, near the French port of Lorient. She was taken into service in the Royal Navy, but because the Navy already had a Formidable, she was renamed Belleisle, apparently in the mistaken belief that she had been captured off Belle Île, rather than the Île de Groix.

Captained by William Hargood, she was the first ship in the British lee column at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, and as such was engaged by the French ships Achille, Aigle, Neptune and Fougeux. She was soon completely dismasted (the only British ship which suffered that fate), unable to manœuvre and largely unable to fight, as her sails blinded her batteries, but kept flying her flag for 45 minutes until the British ships behind her in the column came to her rescue. With 33 dead and 93 wounded, she was then towed to Gibraltar after the battle by the frigate HMS Naiad.

From 1811 she was in Portsmouth harbour, and in 1814 the decision was taken to have her broken up.