HMS Vengeance (1824)

For other ships of the same name, see HMS Vengeance.
Career (UK)
Name: HMS Vengeance
Ordered: 23 January 1817
Builder: Pembroke Dockyard
Laid down: July 1819
Launched: 27 July 1824
Fate: Sold, 1897
General characteristics [1]
Class and type:Canopus-class ship of the line
Tons burthen:2284 bm
Length:193 ft 10 in (59.08 m) (gundeck)
Beam:52 ft 4.5 in (15.964 m)
Depth of hold:22 ft 6 in (6.86 m)
Propulsion:Sails
Sail plan:Full rigged ship
Armament:84 guns:
  • Gundeck: 28 × 32 pdrs, 2 × 68 pdr carronades
  • Upper gundeck: 32 × 24 pdrs
  • Quarterdeck: 6 × 24 pdrs, 10 × 32 pdr carronades
  • Forecastle: 2 × 24 pdrs, 4 × 32 pdr carronades

HMS Vengeance was an 84-gun second rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 27 July 1824 at Pembroke Dockyard.[1] The Canopus-class ships were all modelled on a captured French ship, the Franklin, which was renamed HMS Canopus in British service. Some of the copies were faster than others, though it was reported that none could beat the original.[2]

In August 1851 Vengeance, commanded by Captain Lord Edward Russell, left Portsmouth for the Mediterranean. After stops at Lisbon and Gibraltar, she arrived at Malta on 2 October. The ship was nicknamed 'the wind's-eye liner', and was faster than all the other ships except HMS Phaeton. Vengeance‍ '​s commander during 1851 and 1852 was William Robert Mends.[3] Vengeance returned to England at Christmas 1852, before returning to the Mediterranean with a new second in command, Commander George Le Geyt Bowyear (1818–1903),[4][5] in the spring. By June she had rejoined the fleet at Malta, and then accompanied the whole Mediterranean fleet under Vice-Admiral James Dundas to Bashika Bay outside the Dardanelles as political tension increased before the Crimean War. In October the fleet moved through the Dardanelles to the Bosphorus and moored at Beikos Bay.[6] In January she visited Sinope, where the Battle of Sinop had been fought the previous November between a Turkish squadron and the Russian fleet, resulting in a Turkish defeat. Vengeance moved to Varna in March, and then took part in the bombardment of Odessa on 22 April. The ship assisted with the transportation of the army across the Black Sea to the Crimea before attending at the Battle of Alma on 20 September.[7]

She became a receiving ship in 1861, and was eventually sold out of the navy in 1897.[1]

Notes

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Lavery, Ships of the Line vol.1, p190.
  2. ↑ Fitzgerald p.30-31
  3. ↑ Fitzgerald p.30-
  4. ↑ "Obituary. Vice-Admiral George Le Geyt Bowyear". Annual Register for 1903. Longmans, Green, and Co. 1904. p. 122.
  5. ↑ "Bowyear, Vice-Admiral George le Geyt". Who's who, biographies, 1901: p. 185.
  6. ↑ Fitzgerald p. 41
  7. ↑ Fitzgerald p.43-45

References

  • Lavery, Brian (2003) The Ship of the Line - Volume 1: The development of the battlefleet 1650-1850. Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-252-8.
  • Fitzgerald, Charles Cooper Penrose (1897) Life of Vice-Admiral Sir George Tryon K.C.B. William Blackwood and sons, Edinburgh and London.