HMS Bellona (1760)
HMS Bellona was a 74-gun ship of the line,designed by Sir Thomas Slade,from which the Bellona-class took its name. Ordered on the 28th of December,1757 and built by M/shipwright John Locke, she was a prototype for the iconic 74-gun ships of the latter part of the 18th century. "The design of the Bellona class was never repeated precisely, but Slade experimented slightly with the lines, and the Arrogant, Ramillies, Egmont, and Elizabeth classes were almost identical in size, layout, and structure, and had only slight variations in the shape of the underwater hull. The Culloden class ship of the line was also similar, but slightly larger. Thus over forty ships were near-sisters of the Bellona." Bellona was built at Chatham, starting on the10th of May.1758, and launched on the 19th of February, 1760.
Great Britain Name: HMS Bellona Ordered: 28 December 1757 Builder: Chatham Dockyard Laid down: 10 May 1758 Launched: 19 February 1760 Honours and
awards:Battle of Copenhagen Fate: Broken up, 1814 Class and type: Bellona-class74-gunship of the line Tons burthen: 1615 bm Length: 168 ft (51 m) (gundeck), 138 ft (42 m) (keel) Beam: 46 ft 11 in (14.30 m) Draught:
21 ft 6 in (6.55 m) Depth of hold: 19 ft 9 in (6.02 m) Propulsion: Sails Sail plan: Full rigged ship Complement: 650 officers and men Armament: ·Lower gundeck: 28 × 32 pounder guns
·Upper gundeck: 28 × 18 pounder guns
·QD: 14 × 9 pounder guns
·Fc: 4 × 9 pounder guns
Bellona was commissioned in the February of 1760 under Captain Peter Denis and sailed to join the squadron blockading Brest during the Seven Years' War on the 8th of April. She was later detached to patrol off the Tagus River in Spain, and on 13th of August 1761, while sailing in company with the frigateBrilliant, she sighted the French 74-gun ship Courageux and two frigates. The British ships pursued, and after 14 hours, caught up with the French ships and engaged them in combat on the14th of August . The Brilliant attacking the frigates, and Bellona the Courageux. The frigates managed to slip away. Not so the Courageux who was forced into striking her colours, taken as a prize and purchased into the Royal Navy.
The action of 14 August 1761 off Cape Finisterre at which HMS Bellona captured the French ship Courageux
In 1763 Bellona was paid off and became a guard ship at Portsmouth until 1771 when she underwent a large refit there, including having her bottom coppered, being one of the first British ships to receive this hull-protecting layer. This notwithstanding she did not see action again until 1780, during the American Revolutionary War. She spent the time until 1783 cruising in the North Sea and the West Indies, and participated in reliefs of Gibraltar.
Bellona was once again paid off, recommissioned briefly in the July of 1789 as a guard ship once more, then recommissioned in the expectation of war with Russia, but didn't get into action again until the March of 1793, when after yet another recommissioning under Captain George Wilson she finally set out for the West Indies on the 13th of October 1794.
In company with the Alarm she took the 36 gun Le Duquensne and the 20 gun Le Duras on the 5th of January, 1795. On the 11th of May she took the privateer schooner La Bellone, returned home and the was assigned to the Leeward Islands on the13th of February 1796.
She was next attached to Elphinstone's squadron at the Cape of Good Hope in time for the surrender of the Dutch squadron at Saldanha Bay on the 17th of August.
On the 10th of January, 1797, Bellona and Babet encountered Legere, a small French privateer schooner of six guns and 48 men, which they drove ashore on Deseada. They then tried to use a second captured privateer to retrieve the schooner Legere that was beached on the shore. In the effort, both French privateers were destroyed. Then Babet chased a brig, which had been taken as a prize by the schooner,and drove that ashore also. The British were unable to re float her, so they also destroyed the Brig. Babet and Bellona were eventually paid head money for these two actions in 1828, more than 30 years after the event took place.
In the February of 97,Bellona was present at the capture of Trinidad, and in 1798 she was back in the Channel Fleet under Captain Sir Thomas Thompson, from the February of 1799. In the May of that year she sailed with Markham's squadron and took part in the Action of the 18th of June,1799, where she forced the surrender of the frigates Le Junonand L' Alceste, and helped HMS Centaur in the capturing of La Courageuse, plus the18 gun La Salamine and 14 gun L'Alerte.
In the expedition to Denmark during 1801, she took part in the Battle of Copenhagen on the second of May of that year, in spite of having run aground on a shoal. In this action Bellona suffered casualties of 11 killed and and 72 wounded including Captain Thompson.
Under Captain Thomas Bertie from the May of 1801,she served in the Irish sea, at Cadiz, and then the West Indies until being paid off in the July of 1802.
Recommissioned in the July of 1805 under Captain Charles Painter she joined Strachan's squadron, but left before the 3rd 0f November. Under Captain John Erskine Douglas she re joined Strachan in the February of 1806 for the pursuit of Leissegues and Willaumez. She was in at the destruction of the 74 gun L'Impetueux off Cape Henry on the 14th of September, 1806.
For the action at Basque Roads in 1809 she was commanded by Captain Stair Douglas, and also for the operations off the Scheldt.
After a refit at the end of 1809, still under Douglas she took the French Privateer Le Heros du Nord in the North Sea on the 18th of December 1810.
In 1813 she was paid off for the final time and went into ordinary at Chatham, She was broken up in the September of 1814, having served in the navy for over 50 years, an uncharacteristically long time for one of the old wooden warships to have survived.
Bellona in fiction.
Bellona appears in the Patrick O'Brian novels The Commodore and The Yellow Admiral as the pennant ship of a squadron led by the character Jack Aubrey
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