Ten 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 ...
have borne the name HMS ''Serpent'', after the synonym for
snake
Snakes are elongated limbless reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (). Cladistically squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales much like other members of the group. Many species of snakes have s ...
, whilst another two were planned, and one appears to have been a spurious report:
* was a 60-ton
pinnace captured in 1562 and last recorded in 1653.
* was a 12-gun
bomb vessel
A bomb vessel, bomb ship, bomb ketch, or simply bomb was a type of wooden sailing naval ship. Its primary armament was not cannons (Naval long gun, long guns or carronades) – although bomb vessels carried a few cannons for self-defence – but ...
launched in 1693 and wrecked in 1694. She ran aground in Gibraltar Bay during a storm and was wrecked; 15 men died.
* was a 4-gun bomb vessel launched in 1695 and captured by a French
privateer
A privateer is a private person or vessel which engages in commerce raiding under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign o ...
in 1703.
* was a bomb vessel (carrying 2 mortars and 8 guns) launched in 1742 and wrecked in 1748. She was Heading for Barbados when she ran aground on the island. Despite efforts to lighten her, her crew had to abandon her and were ferried ashore over a three-day period; seven drowned when their boat overturned. The loss was blamed on strong currents.
* HMS ''Serpent'' was a 12-gun bomb vessel reported as being built in 1771, but no such vessel was built.
* HMS ''Serpent'' was to have been a 16-gun ship-
sloop. She was laid down in February 1783 and cancelled in October of that year when the builder (Phineas Jacobs of Sandgate) went out of business.
* was a 16-gun ship-sloop launched in 1789 that foundered in September 1806 on the
Jamaica station.
* HMS ''Serpent'' (1793) was a French gun-boat taken at Toulon in 1793, and in September commissioned and given a crew of 26 men from under the command of Lieutenant John Davie; the British scuttled her at the evacuation of the city on 18 December.
* was a 4-gun gun vessel, formerly a Dutch
hoy
Hoy may refer to:
People
Given name
* Hoy Menear (died 2023), American politician
* Hoy Phallin (born 1995), Cambodian footballer
* Hoy Wong (1920–2009), American bartender
Surname
* Hoy (surname), a Scottish and Irish surname
* HÃ ...
purchased in 1794. She paid off in 1796 and is believed to have been sold around 1802.
* HMS ''Serpent'' was to have been an 18-gun sloop, laid down in 1810 and cancelled later that year.
* was a 16-gun
brig-sloop
During the 18th and 19th centuries, a sloop-of-war was a warship of the Royal Navy with a single gun deck that carried up to 18 guns. The rating system of the Royal Navy covered all vessels with 20 or more guns; thus, the term encompassed all ...
launched in 1832. She was used as a target from 1857 and was broken up in 1861.
* was a wood screw
gunvessel
A gunboat is a naval watercraft designed for the express purpose of carrying one or more guns to bombard coastal targets, as opposed to those military craft designed for naval warfare, or for ferrying troops or supplies.
History Pre-steam ...
launched in 1860 and sold in 1875. Surveyed
Pratas Island
Pratas Island,, United States National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency also known as the Tungsha Islands or the Dongsha Islands (), is a coral island situated in the northern part of the South China Sea administered as part of Cijin District, K ...
in 1867.
* was a
torpedo cruiser
A torpedo cruiser is a type of warship that is armed primarily with torpedoes. The major navies began building torpedo cruisers shortly after the invention of the locomotive Whitehead torpedo in the 1860s. The development of the torpedo gave ri ...
launched in 1887 and wrecked in November 1890 near
Camariñas
Camariñas is a municipality in the province of A Coruña in the autonomous community of Galicia in northwestern Spain. It belongs to the comarca of Terra de Soneira. An important fishing center, it is renowned all over Spain by the bobbin lace w ...
with the loss of 173 of her crew of 176 men. The cause was an error in judgment on the part of those responsible for the ship's navigation. Still, her officers and men obeyed orders and maintained good discipline to the end, with her officers obeying the Captain's orders to "stand by the ship", and going down with her.
[Agnes Weston: My Life among the Bluejackets, James Nisbett: London, 1909. Page 163]
Citations
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Serpent
Royal Navy ship names