HMS Clio (1807)

HMS ''Clio'' was a of the Royal Navy, launched at James Betts' shipyard in Mistleythorn in Essex on 10 January 1807. Her establishment was 71 officers and men, 24 boys and 20 marines. She served in the Baltic during the Napoleonic Wars, accomplished the re-establishment of British rule on the Falkland Islands in 1833, and participated in the First Opium War. She was broken up in 1845.

Napoleonic Wars

In February 1807 Commander Thomas Folliott Baugh commissioned her and sailed her to the Leith Station on the North Sea. Here he succeeded in taking several prizes, but not until 1808.

The first appears to have been the ''Helyra'', Hook, master, from Bergen, which ''Clio'' sent into Leith in July. Then on 21 September 1808, while she was cruising off Fleckoro, ''Clio'' captured a small Danish privateer armed with six guns and carrying a crew of eleven men. The captured vessel arrived at Leith on 12 October.

On 7 December she captured the ''Vrouw Heltya''.

On 30 March 1808, during the Gunboat War, ''Clio'' entered Tórshavn, the capital of the Faroe Islands, and briefly captured the fort at Skansin. The fort surrendered without firing a shot as the landing party approached. The landing party spiked the fort's eight 18-pounder guns and took all the smaller guns and weapons before leaving. Shortly after, on 6 May, a German privateer who had assumed the name "Baron von Hompesch" plundered the defenceless city and seized the property of the Danish Crown Monopoly. The Admiralty Prize Court, however, refused to condemn it as a lawful prize. Later, after the Jørgen Jørgensen affair (see also HMS ''Talbot''), Britain declared the Faroese, the Icelanders, and the settlers in Greenland as "stranger friends" who were to be left in peace.

After this adventure ''Clio'' captured some more Danish vessels. On 10 August she captured the ''Vrou Sophia''. On 1 September she captured the ''Junge Jacob'' and the ''Wilhelmina Frederica''. On 21 September she captured two more, names unknown, which she sent in to Gothenburg.

More small prizes followed in 1809. On 23 February 1809, ''Clio'' took five Danish vessels. Another account has her capturing seven Danish privateers and arriving at Whitby with one of them on 26 February.

She detained an American vessel that was sailing from Hambro to Petersburg and sent her into Leith, where the vessel arrived on 23 May. On 7 September she captured the Danish galliot ''Providentia'' and on 14 September the sloop ''Speculation''. On 7 November she, with in company, captured Danish schooner No. 32. Then on 15 and 16 November she captured the Danish vessels ''Three Children'', ''Perlin'', ''St Ola'', and ''Fine Smaakin''. One of these may have been the vessel that arrived at Leith on the 17th. Two more Danish vessels arrived at Leith on 5 December.

Baugh was promoted to Post-captain on 21 October 1810. While temporarily under the command of Lieutenant M.J. Popplewell (acting), she captured the ''Henrietta'' on 3 December. That same day she was in company when ''Pyramus'' captured the Danish vessel ''Fanoe''.

Baugh's replacement was Commander William Farrington. He too captured small prizes. On 12 March 1811, ''Clio'', with in company, captured the Danish brig ''Krabbes Minde''. Then on 5 May she captured Danish Crown schooner No. 51. On 11 May two Danish vessels arrived at Leith that the frigate and ''Clio'' had captured.

Unknown to the British, Danish Captain Hans Peter Holm had returned to Egersund (SW Norway) with ''Lolland'' and four other brigs. On 1 May 1811, the British sent four boats from ''Clio'', , and , into the western end of the sound, expecting to capture some shipping or do other mischief. The circumstances of locality and wind did not permit the Danish brigs to enter the sound from the further end, but Holm sent the Danish ships’ boats under Lieutenant Niels Gerhardt Langemach, up the sound to oppose the British. Some of the Danes landed to set an ambush from the cliff tops, whilst the armed boats were hidden behind a skerry. As the British rowed boldly in, they met unexpected fire from howitzers and muskets; they immediately withdrew, with the Danish boats in pursuit. The Danes captured one of the British boats and her crew of an officer and 17 men, who had come from ''Belette'', and would have captured more but for the confusion that an explosion of a powder keg on one of the Danish boats caused. This enabled the remaining British boats to reach the protection of their squadron.

''Clio's'' primary occupation was escorting convoys to and from the Baltic. Still, on 12 April 1812, ''Clio'' and ''Ethalion'' captured the ''Opsloe''. ''Clio'' was also in sight when ''Ethalion'' captured the ''Unitas'' and ''Gunilde Maria'' that same day. On 25 September she was in company, together with the gun-brig ''Bruizer'', when recaptured the galliot ''Expedition''.

On 7 October, ''Clio'' captured the Danish sloop ''Sorenen''. About a week later, on 13 or 14 October 1812 in the Baltic, off Hermeren, boats from ''Clio'' and ''Hamdryad'' captured the French privateer lugger ''Pilotin'', which was carrying four 12-pounder carronades and had a crew of 31 men. Three Danish luggers, each mounting two guns, came out from Rødby

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