HMS ''Ferret'' was a

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 ...

built by Benjamin Tanner at Dartmouth and launched in 1806, 19 months late. She served on the

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

, Halifax, and

Leith Leith (; ) is a port area in the north of Edinburgh, Scotland, founded at the mouth of the Water of Leith and is home to the Port of Leith. The earliest surviving historical references are in the royal charter authorising the construction of ...

(

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. A sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian Se ...

) stations during which time she took three privateers as prizes before she was wrecked in 1813.

Service

She was commissioned in March 1806 under Commander George Cadogan. On 21 June he sailed for the Leeward Islands. In early 1807 Lieutenant John Bowker may have briefly commanded ''Ferret'' before being promoted to commander and captain of . Commander George Gustavus Lennock then took command of ''Ferret'' in Jamaica. On 23 August 1807, ''Ferret'', in company with , captured the French privateer schooner ''Mosquito'', out of

Santo Domingo Santo Domingo, formerly known as Santo Domingo de Guzmán, is the capital and largest city of the Dominican Republic and the List of metropolitan areas in the Caribbean, largest metropolitan area in the Caribbean by population. the Distrito Na ...

. She had eight guns and a crew of 58 men, and had been cruising for some time without success. Commander Samuel John Pechell took command of ''Ferret'' on 23 March 1808, on the Jamaica station. In April he sailed her for the Halifax station. On 16 June 1808, he received a promotion to

post-captain Post-captain or post captain is an obsolete alternative form of the rank of captain in the Royal Navy. The term "post-captain" was descriptive only; it was never used as a title in the form "Post-Captain John Smith". The term served to dis ...

. From June 1808 she was under Commander Richard Walter Wales. On 26 October ''Ferret'' chased a French privateer schooner for four hours before ''Ferret'' was able to take her. The schooner was named ''Becune'', and she was armed with one long 9-pounder gun amidships and two

carronade A carronade is a short, smoothbore, cast-iron cannon which was used by the Royal Navy. It was first produced by the Carron Company, an ironworks in Falkirk, Scotland, and was used from the last quarter of the 18th century to the mid-19th cen ...

s, and carried a crew of 38 men. She was ten days out of Martinique and had made one capture. In March 1809, ''Ferret'' and captured three French schooners. They were ''June Rose'' (3 March), ''Rivals'' (12 March), and ''Duguay-Trouin'' (30 March). ''Duguay Trouin'' was a

letter of marque A letter of marque and reprisal () was a Sovereign state, government license in the Age of Sail that authorized a private person, known as a privateer or French corsairs, corsair, to attack and capture vessels of a foreign state at war with t ...

schooner. She was commissioned in April in the Royal Navy to carry eight guns. She then served in Sir

John Borlase Warren Admiral Sir John Borlase Warren, 1st Baronet (2 September 1753 – 27 February 1822) was a Royal Navy officer, diplomat and politician who sat in the British House of Commons between 1774 and 1807. Early life Born in Stapleford, Nottinghamshir ...

's squadron as . Between November 1811 and February 1812 ''Ferret'' underwent repairs at Portsmouth, with Commander Francis Alexander Halliday assuming command in December 1811.

Fate

On 6 January 1813 ''Ferret'' left Leith and sailed for Portsmouth. The next evening she grounded and bilged near

Newbiggin-by-the-Sea Newbiggin-by-the-Sea is a seaside town and civil parish in Northumberland, England, located on the North Sea coast. The town is a fishing port and formerly a part of a trade route for shipping grain. Newbiggin Colliery operated from 1908 unti ...

(

Northumberland Northumberland ( ) is a ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in North East England, on the Anglo-Scottish border, border with Scotland. It is bordered by the North Sea to the east, Tyne and Wear and County Durham to the south, Cumb ...

), due to the inattention and ignorance of her pilot. The pilot, Robert Muckle, was barred from ever serving as a pilot again and was sentenced to three months in the

Marshalsea The Marshalsea (1373–1842) was a notorious prison in Southwark, just south of the River Thames. Although it housed a variety of prisoners—including men accused of crimes at sea and political figures charged with sedition—it became known, ...

prison. The court martial reprimanded the Master, Charles Lupton, for failing to keep track of her position and sentenced him to the loss of one year's seniority. Her crew was saved and ten days later she was abandoned as a wreck. One boat crew from ''Ferret'' took advantage of the opportunity to desert. A

press gang Impressment, colloquially "the press" or the "press gang", is a type of conscription of people into a military force, especially a naval force, via intimidation and physical coercion, conducted by an organized group (hence "gang"). European nav ...

picked up three of the deserters, who received sentences of 100 lashes on their bare backs with a

cat o' nine tails The cat o' nine tails, commonly shortened to the cat, is a type of multi-tailed whip or flail. It originated as an implement for physical punishment, particularly in the Royal Navy and British Army, and as a judicial punishment in Britain and ...

Notes

Citations

References

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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ferret (1806) 1806 ships Ships built in Dartmouth Cruizer-class brig-sloops Maritime incidents in 1813 Ships sunk with no fatalities