HMS Childers (1812)
| History | |
|---|---|
 United Kingdom | |
| Name: | HMS Childers |
| Namesake: | Childers |
| Ordered: | 19 January 1811 |
| Builder: | Nicholas Diddams, Portsmouth Dockyard |
| Laid down: | August 1811 |
| Launched: | 9 July 1812 |
| Commissioned: | 22 August 1812 |
| Fate: | Broken up 1822 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Cruizer-class brig-sloop |
| Tons burthen: | 383 51⁄94 (bm) |
| Length: |
|
| Beam: | 30 ft 6 1⁄2 in (9.309 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 12 ft 10 in (3.91 m) |
| Sail plan: | Brig |
| Complement: | 121 |
| Armament: |
|
HMS Childers was a Royal Navy 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop, built by Nicholas Diddams at Portsmouth Dockyard and launched in 1812.[1] She was broken up in 1822.
Royal Navy service
Childers was commissioned in July 1812 under Commander Buckland Bluett.[1] When news of the outbreak of the War of 1812 reached Britain, the Royal Navy seized all American vessels then in British ports. Childers was among the 42 Royal Navy vessels then lying at Spithead or Portsmouth and so entitled to share in the grant for the American ships Belleville, Janus, Aeos, Ganges and Leonidas seized there on 31 July 1812.[2][Note 1]
Commander John Bedford replaced Bluett in August and sailed for the Leeward Islands on 29 September.[1] On 3 November she captured the American schooner Snapper, along with Acasta, Aeolus and Maidstone.[4] Snapper was a privateer of 172 tons, out of Philadelphia. She carried 11 guns and had a crew of 90 men under the command of Captain J. Green.[5][Note 2] That same day Childers captured the brig Isabella, which was sailing from New York to Puerto Rico.[4] Some six weeks later, on 16 December, Childers captured the brig Baltimore, which was on her way to Bermuda.[4]
From December 1813 onwards, she was under Commander John Brand Umfreville.[1] In September 1814, she took part in the first, unsuccessful attack on Fort Bowyer.[Note 3] For much of the autumn, Carron was at Pensacola, until General Andrew Jackson's numerically superior forces expelled the British in the battle of Pensacola at the start of November 1814.
Commander Richard Wales assumed command in October 1815, in the Leeward Islands. Lieutenant Edward W. Corry Astley (acting) assumed command in September 1816 while Wales was ill, giving up command on Wales's return. During Astley's command, yellow fever attacked the crew of Childers, forcing him to bring her into English Harbour, Antigua, with only 15 men available for duty.[11] According to the The Naval Chronicle, within a month she lost over 35 officers and men dead from fever.[12]
In January 1817 Commander Amos Freeman Westropp assumed command.[1]
Fate
Childers was broken up at Chatham on 7 March 1822.[1]
Notes, citations, and references
- Notes
- ↑ A first-class share was worth £20 19s 0d; a sixth-class share, that of an ordinary seaman, was worth 4s 1d; the Commander in Chief received £230 10s 8d.[3]
- ↑ A first-class share of the prize money was worth £20 8s 11d; a sixth-class share was worth 2s 11d.[6]
- ↑ Arsene Latour mistakenly named Anaconda as the fourth vessel present during the Battle of Fort Bowyer,[7] rather than the Childers, and this error has persisted in some accounts.[8][9] James, in mentioning the many inaccuracies of Latour's book in relation to the failed attack on Fort Bowyer, does refer to Latour 'misnaming one vessel'.[10]
- Citations
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 Winfield (2008), pp.300-1.
- ↑ The London Gazette: no. 17124. p. 327. 2 April 1816.
- ↑ The London Gazette: no. 17135. p. 880. 30 October 1821.
- 1 2 3 The London Gazette: no. 16713. p. 579. 20 March 1813.
- ↑ War of 1812 privateers
- ↑ The London Gazette: no. 17306. p. 2347. 11 November 1817.
- ↑ "Niles' National Register, volume 7". 22 October 1814. p. 93.
Letter from Jackson to the US Secretary of War dated 17 September 1814: 'The ship, which was destroyed, was the Hermes...the brig so considerably damaged is the Sophie...The other ship was the Carron...the other brig's name unknown.'
- ↑ Eaton and Van Crowninshield Smith (1834), pp. 174–176.
- ↑ Lossing (1868), pp.1020–1021.
- ↑ James (1837), p.345.
- ↑ Marshall (1832), Vol. 3, Part 2, pp.83-4.
- ↑ Naval Chronicle, Vol. 36, p.514.
- References
- Eaton, John Henry, and Jerome Van Crowninshield Smith (1834) Memoirs of Andrew Jackson: late major general and commander in chief of the Southern division of the army of the United States. (Philadelphia)
- James, William (1818) A Full and Correct Account of the Military Occurrences of the Late War Between Great Britain and the United States of America. (London, Printed for the Author). ISBN 0-665-35743-5.
- Latour, Arsène Lacarrière (1816) Historical memoir of the war in West Florida and Louisiana in 1814-15. (Philadelphia: John Conrad & Co)
- Lossing, Benson J. (1869) Pictorial Field-Book of the War of 1812.
- Marshall, John (1823–1835) Royal naval biography, or, Memoirs of the services of all the flag-officers, superannuated rear-admirals, retired-captains, post-captains, and commanders, whose names appeared on the Admiralty list of sea officers at the commencement of the present year 1823, or who have since been promoted ... (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown).
- Winfield, Rif (2008). British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793–1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 1-86176-246-1.
External links
- Michael Phillips' Ships of the Old Navy
- The letters that Captain John Brand Umfreville of the Royal Navy wrote and received while commanding HMS Childers, held at The University of Michigan
- Transcript of the log for HMS Childers, reference ADM 52/4443, for Thursday 15 September 1814