Artois-class frigate
| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Artois |
| Operators: |
 Royal Navy |
| Preceded by: | Pallas class |
| Succeeded by: | Alcmene class |
| Completed: | Nine |
| Lost: | Five (one of which after transfer to the Dutch Navy) |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | frigate |
| Tons burthen: | 776 77⁄94 bm (as designed) |
| Length: |
|
| Beam: | 39 ft 0 in (11.9 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 13 ft 9 in (4.19 m) |
| Sail plan: | Full-rigged ship |
| Complement: | 270 (altered later to 315) |
| Armament: |
|
The Artois class sailing frigates were a series of nine ships built to a 1793 design by Sir John Henslow, which served in the Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.
Seven of these ships were built by contract with commercial builders,while the remaining pair (Tamar and Clyde) were dockyard-built - the latter built using "fir" (pitch pine) instead of the normal oak.
They were armed with a main battery of 28 eighteen-pounder cannon on their upper deck, the main gun deck of a frigate. Besides this battery, they also carried two 9-pounders together with twelve 32-pounder carronades on the quarter deck, and another two 9-pounders together with two 32-pounder carronades on the forecastle.
Ships in class
- HMS Artois
- Builder: John & William Wells, Rotherhithe
- Ordered: 28 March 1793
- Laid down: March 1793
- Launched: 3 January 1794
- Completed: 3 March 1794 at Deptford Dockyard
- Fate: Wrecked on the Ballieu rocks off Brittany on 31 July 1797
- HMS Diana
- Builder: Randall & Co, Rotherhithe
- Ordered: 28 March 1793
- Laid down: March 1793
- Launched: 3 March 1794
- Completed: 6 June 1794 at Deptford Dockyard
- Fate: Sold to new Dutch Navy on 7 March 1815;
burnt in fire at Willemsoord, Den Helder on 16 January 1839.
- HMS Apollo
- Builder: Perry & Hankey, Blackwall
- Ordered: 28 March 1793
- Laid down: March 1793
- Launched: 18 March 1794
- Completed: 23 September 1794 at Woolwich Dockyard
- Fate: Wrecked on the Haak sands off the Dutch coast on 7 January 1799
- HMS Diamond
- Builder: William Barnard, Deptford
- Ordered: 28 March 1793
- Laid down: April 1793
- Launched: 17 March 1794
- Completed: 6 June 1794 at Deptford Dockyard
- Fate: Broken up at Sheerness Dockyard in June 1812
- HMS Jason
- Builder: John Dudman, Deptford
- Ordered: 1 April 1793
- Laid down: April 1793
- Launched: 3 April 1794
- Completed: 25 July 1794 at Deptford Dockyard
- Fate: Wrecked on rocks off Brittany on 13 October 1798
- HMS Seahorse
- Builder: Marmaduke Stalkart, Rotherhithe
- Ordered: 14 February 1793
- Laid down: March 1793
- Launched: 11 June 1794
- Completed: 16 September 1794 at Deptford Dockyard
- Fate: Broken up at Plymouth Dockyard in July 1819
- HMS Tamar
- Builder: Chatham Royal Dockyard
- Ordered: 4 February 1795
- Laid down: June 1795
- Launched: 26 March 1796
- Completed: 21 June 1796
- Fate: Broken up in January 1810 at Chatham Dockyard.
- HMS Clyde
- Builder: Chatham Royal Dockyard
- Ordered: 4 February 1795
- Laid down: June 1795
- Launched: 26 March 1796
- Completed: 21 June 1796
- Fate: Sold to be broken up August 1814.
- HMS Ethalion
- Builder: Joseph Graham, Harwich
- Ordered: 30 April 1795
- Laid down: October 1795
- Launched: 14 March 1797
- Completed: 11 July 1797 at Chatham Dockyard
- Fate: Wrecked on the Penmarcks on 25 December 1799
References
Robert Gardiner, The Heavy Frigate, Conway Maritime Press, London 1994.
Rif Winfield, British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793-1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. 2nd edition, Seaforth Publishing, 2008. ISBN 978-1-84415-717-4.