The following ships of the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

were assigned the name ''Calypso'', after Calypso, a sea

nymph A nymph (; ; sometimes spelled nymphe) is a minor female nature deity in ancient Greek folklore. Distinct from other Greek goddesses, nymphs are generally regarded as personifications of nature; they are typically tied to a specific place, land ...

Greek mythology Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories conc ...

: * , a 16-gun sloop of 342

tons burthen Builder's Old Measurement (BOM, bm, OM, and o.m.) is the method used in England from approximately 1650 to 1849 for calculating the cargo capacity of a ship. It is a volumetric measurement of cubic capacity. It estimated the tonnage of a ship b ...

, launched at Graves, Deptford 27 September 1783. She sank during a violent storm on 30 July 1803 with the loss of all her crew when a heavily laden

West Indiaman West Indiaman was a general name for any merchantman sailing ship making runs from the Old World to the West Indies and the east coast of the Americas. These ships were generally strong ocean-going ships capable of handling storms in the Atlantic ...

ran afoul of her. * , an 18-gun sloop of the launched at Dudman,

Deptford Wharf Deptford Wharf in London, United Kingdom, is on the Thames Path southeast of South Dock, Rotherhithe, South Dock Marina, across the culverted mouth of the Earl's Sluice and north of Aragon Tower. In the late 18th and early 19th century this are ...

2 February 1805; not broken up until 1821. * , a 10-gun . Ordered 1824 for construction at

Deptford Dockyard Deptford Dockyard was an important Royal Navy Dockyard, naval dockyard and base at Deptford on the River Thames, operated by the Royal Navy from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. It built and maintained warships for 350 years, and man ...

; renamed ''Hyaena'' in 1826; and cancelled 21 February 1831. * ''Calypso'' was to be a 10-gun brig-sloop of the ''Cherokee'' class. Laid down March 1825 at Chatham Dockyard as HMS ''Hyaena''; launched 19 August 1826 and renamed ''Calypso'' that same year; completed as a yacht for the governor of Malta. Later she became a

Post Office packet service The Post Office Packet Service dates to Tudor times and ran until 1823, when the Admiralty assumed control of the service. Originally, the General Post Office, Post Office used packet ships to carry mail packets to and from British embassies, col ...

brig for Royal Navy. She sailed from

Halifax, Nova Scotia Halifax is the capital and most populous municipality of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Nova Scotia, and the most populous municipality in Atlantic Canada. As of 2024, it is estimated that the population of the H ...

for

Falmouth, Cornwall Falmouth ( ; ) is a town, civil parish and port on the River Fal on the south coast of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. Falmouth was founded in 1613 by the Killigrew family on a site near the existing Pendennis Castle. It developed as a po ...

on 29 January 1833, under the command of Lieutenant Richard Peynton, RN. One day later a fishing crew saw ''Calypso'' surrounded by ice, and firing her guns as a signal of distress. The ice prevented the fishing boat from coming to her rescue. ''Calypso'' was lost on 1 February 1833; all aboard died. * ''Calypso'', to be a 10-gun brig-sloop of the ''Cherokee'' class. Laid down 1829 at Woolwich dockyard; renamed ''Hyaena'' in 1830; cancelled 1831. * , a

sixth rate In the rating system of the Royal Navy used to categorise sailing warships, a sixth-rate was the designation for small warships mounting between 20 and 28 carriage-mounted guns on a single deck, sometimes with smaller guns on the upper works an ...

launched at Chatham Dockyard in May 1845; broken up 29 January 1866.Britain's Navy: HMS Calypso (1845)
Retrieved 2012-03-27 * , a 46-gun

fifth rate In the rating system of the Royal Navy used to categorise sailing warships, a fifth rate was the second-smallest class of warships in a hierarchical system of six " ratings" based on size and firepower. Rating The rating system in the Royal N ...

of 1,103 tons bm. Launched at

12 January 1819. Relegated to harbour service in 1850; renamed HMS ''Calypso'' 9 March 1870, and sold 28 February 1895. * , a launched in 1883, used as a training ship for the Newfoundland Royal Naval Reserve from 1902, renamed HMS ''Briton'' in 1916, sold in 1922 and used as a storage hulk, and now awash north of

Lewisporte Lewisporte is a town in central Newfoundland, Canada, with a population of 3,288. It is situated in Burnt Bay which opens on to the Bay of Exploits. Lewisporte has a deep water port and related facilities that serve many communities in the re ...

. * , a of the ''Caledon'' sub-class; launched in 1917 and sunk in 1940 by the Italian submarine .

Citations

References

* pp. 42, 57, 169. * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Calypso, Hms Royal Navy ship names

See also

Citations

References