Apollo-class frigate

Class overview
Name: Apollo-class frigate
Operators:  Royal Navy
Completed: 27
General characteristics
Type:Fifth-rate frigate
Tons burthen:943 53/94 bm (as designed)
Length:145 ft (44 m) (gundeck)
121 ft 9.375 in (37.11893 m) (gundeck)
Beam:38 ft 2 in (11.63 m)
Draught:13 ft 3 in (4.04 m)
Sail plan:Full-rigged ship
Complement:264
Armament:UD: 26 × 18-pounder guns
QD: 2 × 9-pounder guns + 10 × 32-pounder carronades
FC: 2 × 9-pounder guns + 4 × 32-pounder carronades

The Apollo-class sailing frigates were a series of twenty-seven ships that the British Admiralty commissioned be built to a 1798 design by Sir William Rule. Twenty-five served in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars, two being launched too late.

Of the 25 ships that served during the Napoleonic Wars, only one was lost to enemy action. Of the entire class of 27 ships, only two were lost to wrecking, and none to foundering.

The Admiralty ordered three frigates in 1798–1800. Following the Peace of Amiens, it ordered a further twenty-four sister-ships to the same design between 1803 and 1812. The last was ordered to a fresh 38-gun design. Initially, the Admiralty split the order for the 24 vessels equally between its yards and commercial yards, but two commercial yards failed to perform and the Admiralty transferred these orders to its own dockyards, making the split 14–10 as between the Admiralty and commercial yards.

Ships in class

References