HMS ''Dragon'' was a 74-gun

third rate In the rating system of the Royal Navy, a third rate was a ship of the line which from the 1720s mounted between 64 and 80 guns, typically built with two gun decks (thus the related term two-decker). Rating When the rating system was f ...

ship of the line A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactics in the Age of Sail, naval tactic known as the line of battl ...

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 ...

, launched on 2 April 1798 at

Rotherhithe Rotherhithe ( ) is a district of South London, England, and part of the London Borough of Southwark. It is on a peninsula on the south bank of the Thames, facing Wapping, Shadwell and Limehouse on the north bank, with the Isle of Dogs to the ea ...

. She was designed by Sir William Rule, and was the only ship built to her draught.

French Revolutionary Wars

In 1799, she sailed to the Mediterranean as part of a squadron under Sir Charles Cotton. In February 1801 she was part of a squadron under Sir John Warren off Cadiz. Because ''Dragon'' served in the navy's Egyptian campaign between 8 March 1801 and 2 September, her officers and crew qualified for the clasp "Egypt" to the Naval General Service Medal that the Admiralty issued in 1847 to all surviving claimants. On 7 September 1800, under command of Captain George Campbell, she made contact with USS George Washington a little north of Gibraltar. 21 July 1802 she was at Gibraltar to prevent Algerian corsairs from passing through the Straits.

Napoleonic Wars

In April 1803, ''Dragon'' was sailing from Gibraltar to Britain in company with and the store ship ''Prevoyante'' when they sighted two French

ships of the line A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which involved the two column ...

off Cape St. Vincent. The French ships veered off rather than engage the British vessels. On 18 June 1803, ''Dragon'' and captured the French naval 12-gun brig ''Colombe''. ''Colombe'' was copper-bottomed and pierced for 16 guns. She had a crew of 65 men under the command of ''lieutenant de vaisseau'' Caro. ''Colombe'' had been returning from Martinique and was bound for Brest when the British captured her off Ouessant. The Royal Navy took her into service as HMS ''Colombe''. In 1805, ''Dragon'' took part in Admiral

Robert Calder Admiral Sir Robert Calder, 1st Baronet, (2 July 174531 August 1818) was a Royal Navy officer who served in the Seven Years' War, the American Revolutionary War, the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. For much of his career he w ...

's action at the Battle of Cape Finisterre.National Maritime Museum Warship Histories
, Vessel ID 365765 From 1806 to 1808, ''Dragon'' she served in the Channel Squadron. On 17 February 1806, she ran aground on the

Île de Ré Île de Ré (; variously spelled Rhé or Rhéa; Poitevin dialect, Poitevin: ''ile de Rét''; , ) is an island off the Atlantic coast of France near La Rochelle, Charente-Maritime, on the northern side of the Pertuis d'Antioche strait. Its high ...

Finistère Finistère (, ; ) is a Departments of France, department of France in the extreme west of Brittany. Its prefecture is Quimper and its largest city is Brest, France, Brest. In 2019, it had a population of 915,090.flagship A flagship is a vessel used by the commanding officer of a group of navy, naval ships, characteristically a flag officer entitled by custom to fly a distinguishing flag. Used more loosely, it is the lead ship in a fleet of vessels, typically ...

of Sir Francis Laforey and she sailed for the

Leeward Islands The Leeward Islands () are a group of islands situated where the northeastern Caribbean Sea meets the western Atlantic Ocean. Starting with the Virgin Islands east of Puerto Rico, they extend southeast to Guadeloupe and its dependencies. In Engl ...

in October 1810. On 18 October 1810, ''Dragon'' was in Hamoaze. There she ran into and dismasted the brig ''Eliza Ann'', Rees, master, which had been sailing from Neath to London.

War of 1812

''Dragon'' participated in the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 was fought by the United States and its allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom and its allies in North America. It began when the United States United States declaration of war on the Uni ...

, under the command of

Robert Barrie Sir Robert Barrie (5 May 1774 – 7 June 1841) was a British naval officer noted for his service in the War of 1812. He was helped early in his naval career by the patronage of his uncle, Sir Alan Gardner, who arranged for him to take part ...

, and took part in a number of engagements. She also captured a number of vessels. On 12 September 1812, ''Dragon'' captured ''Anna Maria''. On 20 or 22 December, ''Dragon'' destroyed the American privateer ''Tartar'', of ten guns and 47 men. In August 1814, ''Dragon'' took part in an expedition up the

Penobscot River The Penobscot River (Abenaki: ''Pαnawάhpskewtəkʷ'') is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed June 22, 2011 river in the U.S. state of Maine. Including the river's W ...

in Maine. The first ships to go were , ''Dragon'', , , , as well as some transports. , , , and joined on the 31st. On the evening of 31 August, ''Sylph'', ''Peruvian'', and the transport ''Harmony'', accompanied by a boat from ''Dragon'', embarked marines, foot soldiers and a detachment from the Royal Artillery, to move up the Penobscot under the command of Captain Robert Barrie of ''Dragon''. The objective was the American frigate , of twenty-six 18-pounder guns, which had taken refuge some 27 miles up stream at

Hampden, Maine Hampden is a town on the Penobscot River estuary in Penobscot County, Maine, Penobscot County, Maine, United States. The population was 7,709 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. Hampden is part of the Bangor, Maine, Bangor metropolita ...

. Here ''Adams'' had landed her guns and fortified a position on the bank with fifteen 18-pounders commanding the river. Moving up the river took two days, but eventually, after the Battle of Hampden, the British were able to capture the American defenders at Bangor, though not until after the Americans had burnt the ''Adams''. The British also captured 11 other ships and destroyed six. The British lost only one man killed, a sailor from ''Dragon'', and had several soldiers wounded.''The Anglo-American Magazine'', (Toronto: Maclear), Vol. 5, pp.418-9. In January 1815, ''Dragon'' was the flagship for Admiral Sir

George Cockburn Admiral of the Fleet Sir George Cockburn, 10th Baronet, (22 April 1772 – 19 August 1853) was a Royal Navy officer and politician. As a captain, he was present at the Battle of Cape St Vincent in February 1797 during the French Revolutionary ...

at the Battle of Fort Peter and the capture of St. Marys, Georgia.

Fate

''Dragon'' was on harbour service in 1824, becoming a Marine

barracks ship A barracks ship or barracks barge or berthing barge, or in civilian use accommodation vessel or accommodation ship, is a ship or a non-self-propelled barge containing a superstructure of a type suitable for use as a temporary barracks for sai ...

at Portland in 1829. She was renamed HMS ''Fame'' in 1842. She was broken up in 1850.

Notes

Citations

References

* * Lavery, Brian (1983) ''The Ship of the Line - Volume 1: The development of the battlefleet 1650-1850.'' Conway Maritime Press. .

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Dragon (1798) Ships of the line of the Royal Navy 1798 ships War of 1812 ships of the United Kingdom Maritime incidents in 1806 Maritime incidents in 1810 Shipwrecks in the Bay of Biscay