French frigate Rhin (1802)
Encyclopedia
Rhin was a 44-gun Virginie-class
Virginie class frigate
The Virginie class was a class of ten 44-gun frigates of the French Navy, designed in 1793 by Jacques-Noël Sané. An eleventh vessel begun in 1794 was never completed.* Virginie...
frigate
Frigate
A frigate is any of several types of warship, the term having been used for ships of various sizes and roles over the last few centuries.In the 17th century, the term was used for any warship built for speed and maneuverability, the description often used being "frigate-built"...
of the French Navy
French Navy
The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...
launched in 1802. She was present at two major battles while in French service. Then the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
captured her in 1806. Thereafter Rhin served until 1815 capturing numerous vessels. After the end of the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
she was laid up and then served as a hospital for many years. She was finally broken up in 1884.
French service
Rhin took part in the Battle of Cape FinisterreBattle of Cape Finisterre (1805)
In the Battle of Cape Finisterre off Galicia, Spain, the British fleet under Admiral Robert Calder fought an indecisive naval battle against the Combined Franco-Spanish fleet which was returning from the West Indies...
and in the Battle of Trafalgar
Battle of Trafalgar
The Battle of Trafalgar was a sea battle fought between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of the French Navy and Spanish Navy, during the War of the Third Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars ....
.
captured Rhin on 28 July 1806, after a chase of 26 hours and 150 miles. Her commander, M. Chesneau, struck just before Mars was about to fire her first broadside. was present or in sight at the capture of the Rhin.
Rhin arrived at Plymouth on 8 August. She was repaired and fitted there from March through August 1809. The Royal Navy commissioned her in June 1809 as HMS Rhin under Captain Frederick Alymer for the Channel. Captain Charles Malcolm replaced Alymer in July 1809, and would remain her captain until Rhin paid off in 1815.
British service: Napoleonic Wars
On 16 November 1809, Rhin was in company with Pheasant when Pheasant recaptured the brig Trust.On 22 March 1810 Rhin captured the French privateer Navarrois. Navarrois was four days out of Bayonne, was armed with 16 guns and carried a crew of 132 men.
On 27 September had been in pursuit of a French brig when Rhin joined the chase and after two and a half hours captured the quarry off the Lizard
Lizard Point, Cornwall
Lizard Point in Cornwall is at the southern tip of the Lizard Peninsula. It is situated half-a-mile south of Lizard village in the civil parish of Landewednack and approximately 11 miles southeast of Helston....
. The French vessel was the privateer San Joseph, of Saint Malo, under the command of a Joseph Wittevronghel, a Dane. San Joseph was one year old, about 100 tons burthen (bm), and armed with 14 guns though she was pierced for 16. She had only been out one day when the British captured her and had taken nothing. had been in company with Wolverine at the time.
On 9 October Rhin captured the French privateer brig Comtesse de Montalivet, of Saint Malo. The capture followed a chase of two and a half hours and only ended when the brig lost her maintop-mast. Comtesse de Montalivet was pierced for 16 guns but only mounted 14. She had a crew of 57 men but only 40 were on board as 17 were in prize crews. She was a new vessel on her first cruise and had taken two prizes, one a Portuguese ship and the other an American brig.
On 14 October Rhin recaptured the ship Fama.
On 2 February 1811 Rhin captured the French privateer brig Brocanteur.
On 5 April Rhin captured the schooner Bonne Jeanette. Six days later Rhin captured the American ship Projector. Almost two months later, on 27 May, Rhin was in company with the hired armed
Hired armed vessels
right|thumb|250px|Armed cutter, etching in the [[National Maritime Museum]], [[Greenwich]]During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the Royal Navy made use of a considerable number of hired armed vessels...
schooner Princess Charlotte when they captured the American ship Fox. Then on 12 December Rhin captured the French chasse maree Dorade.
On 27 March 1812 Rhin captured the American brig Eclipse.
On 21 June Rhin and Medusa
HMS Medusa (1801)
HMS Medusa was a 38-gun 5th rate frigate of the Royal Navy that served in the Napoleonic Wars. Launched on 14 April 1801, she took part in the Action of 5 October 1804 against a Spanish squadron, in the River Plate Expedition in 1807, and made several captures of enemy ships, before being converted...
supported an attack by Spanish guerrillas on French forces Lequitio and the nearby island of San Nicholas. Venerable
HMS Venerable (1808)
HMS Venerable was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 12 April 1808 at Northfleet.-Career:On 13 December 1810 Venerable was in company with the hired armed cutter Nimrod and several other vessels at the capture of the Goede Trouw.On 31 December 1813, she captured the...
landed a gun whose fire enabled the guerrillas to capture the fort above the town. Medusa and Rhin landed a carronade
Carronade
The carronade was a short smoothbore, cast iron cannon, developed for the Royal Navy by the Carron Company, an ironworks in Falkirk, Scotland, UK. It was used from the 1770s to the 1850s. Its main function was to serve as a powerful, short-range anti-ship and anti-crew weapon...
each to support their marines and those from Surveillante, who captured the island. Although the guerrillas suffered losses, British casualties were nil. On 24 June, landing parties from Rhin and Medusa destroyed fortified works at Plencia.
On 8 November Rhin was in company with the sloop Helicon when they captured the French privateer Courageuse. The capture took place off the Eddystone after a four-hour chase during which the privateer schooner threw overboard her 14 guns, her anchors and part of her provisions. Courageuse was of 90 tons and carried a crew of 70 men.
British service: War of 1812
On 5 January 1813 Rhin, ColossusHMS Colossus (1803)
HMS Colossus was a 74-gun third-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched from Deptford Dockyard on 23 April 1803. She was designed by Sir John Henslow as one of the large class 74s, and was the name ship of her class, the other being . As a large 74, she carried 24 pdrs on her upper gun...
and the brig Goldfinch captured the American ship Dolphin. A little over a month later, on 11 February, Rhin and Colossus captured the American ship Print.
On 24 February 1814, Rhin recaptured the Robert. Then on 11 March Rhin captured the American letter of marque
Letter of marque
In the days of fighting sail, a Letter of Marque and Reprisal was a government licence authorizing a person to attack and capture enemy vessels, and bring them before admiralty courts for condemnation and sale...
brig Rattlesnake.
A satisfying capture occurred on 5 June when Rhin sighted and gave chase to an American privateer schooner. After an eleven-hour chase Rhin captured the Decatur
Decatur (privateer)
The Decatur was an American schooner built in Charleston, South Carolina for privateering during the Atlantic Ocean theater of the War of 1812. She was named for the United States Navy Commodore Stephen Decatur who served with distinction in many of America's earliest conflicts...
in the Mona Passage about four leagues
League (unit)
A league is a unit of length . It was long common in Europe and Latin America, but it is no longer an official unit in any nation. The league originally referred to the distance a person or a horse could walk in an hour...
from Cape Engaño
Cape Engaño (Dominican Republic)
Cape Engaño is a cape containing dangerous reefs near Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic....
. Her captain was Dominique Diron, who had also commanded Decatur when she had captured the schooner HMS Dominica
HMS Dominica (1810)
HMS Dominica was the French letter of marque schooner Duc de Wagram, which the British captured in 1809 in the Leeward Islands and took into the Royal Navy in 1810. The American privateer Decatur captured her in 1813 in a notable single-ship action...
in 1813. Decatur had sailed from Charleston on 30 March and had made no captures.
On 27 June 1815 Rhin captured French transport No. 749, Leon, and Marie Joseph. Then on 19 July, Rhin was in company with , , , Ferret
HMS Nova Scotia (1812)
The American privateer Rapid was captured by and in 1812 and taken into service as the 14-gun gun-brig HMS Nova Scotia. She was renamed HMS Ferret in 1813 and sold in 1820.-Privateer Rapid:...
and when they captured the French vessels Fortune, Papillon, Marie Graty, Marie Victorine, Cannoniere, and Printemis. The attack took place at Corrijou, near Brest
Brest, France
Brest is a city in the Finistère department in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon...
on the coast of Brittany, and during the action Ferret was able to prevent the escape of a French man-of-war brig that she force ashore. Apparently, this cutting out expedition was the last of the war.
Later career
Rhin underwent a large repair at Sheerness between May 1817 and August 1820. She was then laid up (roofed over).In 1822 Rhin was among the many vessels that had served on the north coast of Spain and the coast of France in the years 1812, 1813 and 1814 that received their respective proportions of the sum reserved to answer disputed claims from the Parliamentary grant for services during those
years.
From May to October 1838 she was fitted at Chatham as a lazaretto
Lazaretto
A lazaretto or lazaret is a quarantine station for maritime travellers. Lazarets can be ships permanently at anchor, isolated islands, or mainland buildings. Until 1908, lazarets were also used for disinfecting postal items, usually by fumigation...
for Sheerness.