HMS Fama was the Danish brig

Brig

A brig is a sailing vessel with two square-rigged masts. During the Age of Sail, brigs were seen as fast and manoeuvrable and were used as both naval warships and merchant vessels. They were especially popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries...

 Fama, of fourteen guns, built in 1802, which the British captured in 1808. She was wrecked in 1809.

Danish origins

Fama was built in Copenhagen to a design by F.C.H. Hohlenberg. She was the second of three vessels of the -class and was launched 1802.

Capture

When word of the uprising of the Spanish against the French in 1808 reached Denmark, some 12,000 Spanish troops stationed in Denmark and under the Marquis de la Romana decided that they wished to leave French service and return to Spain. The Marquis contacted Rear-Admiral Keats

Richard Goodwin Keats

Admiral Sir Richard Goodwin Keats was a British naval officer who fought throughout the American Revolution, French Revolutionary War and Napoleonic War. He retired in 1812 due to ill health and was made Commodore-Governor of Newfoundland from 1813 to 1816. In 1821 he was made Governor of...

, on , who was in command of a small British squadron in the Kattegat

Kattegat

The Kattegat , or Kattegatt is a sea area bounded by the Jutland peninsula and the Straits islands of Denmark on the west and south, and the provinces of Västergötland, Scania, Halland and Bohuslän in Sweden on the east. The Baltic Sea drains into the Kattegat through the Øresund and the Danish...

. They agreed a plan and on 9 August 1808 the Spaniards seized the fort and town of Nyborg

Nyborg

Nyborg is a city in central Denmark, located in Nyborg Municipality on the island of Funen and with a population of 16,492 . Nyborg is one of the 14 large municipalities created on 1 January 2007...

. Keats then prepared to take possession of the port and to organize the departure of the Spanish. Keats informed the Danish authorities that if they did not impede the operation he would spare the town. The Danes agreed, except for the captains of two small Danish warships in the harbour.

On 11 August Keats sent in the boats from , under the command of her captain, James Macnamara

James Macnamara

James Macnamara was an officer of the Royal Navy who served during the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars....

. The boats captured the Fama, of 18 guns and under the command of Otto Frederick Rasch, and the cutter Søormen

HMS Salorman (1808)

HMS Salorman was the Danish cutter Søormen, of twelve guns, built in 1789, which the British captured in 1808. In British records her name also appears as Sacormen and Salomen. She was wrecked in 1809.-Danish origins:...

, of 12 guns and under the command of Thøger Emil Rosenørn. Despite the odds Rasch and Rosenørn refused to surrender and put up a stiff resistance before they struck.Translation from the Danish websites http://runeberg.org/dbl/13/0489.html and http://runeberg.org/dbl/14/0318.html. British losses were an officer killed and two men wounded; the Danes lost seven men killed and 13 wounded. In 1847 the Admiralty authorized the issue of the Naval General Service Medal with clasp "11 Aug. Boat Service 1808" to all surviving claimants of the action.

The British organized the evacuation of the Spanish troops using some 50 or so local boats. Some 10,000 troops returned to Spain via Britain. Not all the Spaniards got away. Two squadrons of Spanish cavalry based as far away as Horsens on Jutland tried, on 10 August 1808, to make their way to Nyborg, but were stopped at the Little Belt crossing where Danish and French troops had reacted quickly to prevent further deserters crossing to the island of Funen.(from Danish website)

The British commissioned Fama under her existing name and on 7 November appointed Lieutenant Charles Topping to command her.

Fate

On 22 December 1808, Fama left Karlskrona

Karlskrona

Karlskrona is a locality and the seat of Karlskrona Municipality, Blekinge County, Sweden with 35,212 inhabitants in 2010. It is also the capital of Blekinge County. Karlskrona is known as Sweden's only baroque city and is host to Sweden's only remaining naval base and the headquarters of the...

 as part of the escort of the last British convoy of the year leaving the Baltic. She was in company with four other British warships - the frigate , the brig-sloop , the gun-brig , and the Salorman - three Swedish naval vessels and twelve merchant vessels.The Naval Chronicle lists the gun-brig as Ardent, but there was no gun-brig by that name and other sources give the name as Urgent. It is difficult to read the name of the cutter but it appears to be Sacorner. Unfortunately, the convoy left after an unusually severe winter had set in. Furthermore, a storm coming from the north drove already formed ice onto the convoy.

On 23 December Fama ran aground on the NE point of the island of Bornholm

Bornholm

Bornholm is a Danish island in the Baltic Sea located to the east of the rest of Denmark, the south of Sweden, and the north of Poland. The main industries on the island include fishing, arts and crafts like glass making and pottery using locally worked clay, and dairy farming. Tourism is...

, in the Baltic. Lieutenant Topping, a crew man and a woman died of exposure over night. The next day the Danes passed lines to the brig. Although four man and a woman died trying to reach the shore, the Danes were able to rescue, and capture, the survivors. The subsequent court martial blamed the master, for having altered course without notifying Topping and for having lost sight of Salsette. The board ordered that the master be reprimanded.

The convoy and its escorts were ill-fated, with Magnet and Salorman also being lost, as were most of the merchantmen, many of which the Danes captured or destroyed.