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ATALANTE
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Taken by PHOEBE off Scilly Is. on 10 January 1797.
Lost in 1807. |
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- 1799 Anselm John GRIFFITHS, 12/1798, Channel.
The French privateer cutter MILAN (14) was captured on 20 February by ATALANTE and BOADICEA. Capt. KEATES of the latter ordered Capt. GRIFFITHS to take the prize into port and return after landing the prisoners. - At half past eight on the morning of 4 December 1799 ATALANTE saw a lugger in the act of boarding a brig off Dungerness and immediately gave chase. When the enemy discovered that they were being overhauled they cast off the tow and Capt,. GRIFFITHS sent the master in the jollyboat to take possession of the brig while he continued after the lugger, by now some four or five miles ahead.
The lugger was taken about four PM and proved to be LE SUCCES of Boulogne, Francois Matthieu Blondin, of six carriage guns and 48 men. Edward LEWINGTON, the master of the prize brig and his crew were found to be prisoners aboard. She was the MARTHA of London bound for Belfast. - In the spring of 1800 ATALANTE, PLOVER and the hired brig TERRIER were employed watching four French frigates which had been in Dunkirk Basin for two years. When they saw the largest come out into the Roads on the 26 March Capt. GRIFFITHS used a Nieuport fishing vessel to take a letter to the French Commodore. He offered congratulations on the Frenchman's release from a long inactivity and issued a challenge for a trial of strength between the two squadrons. In spite of the apparent French superiority he did not receive an answer.
- Doing convoy duty in the Channel ATALANTE arrived at Portsmouth on 20 November 1800 escorting nearly 200 sail of outward-bound merchantmen from the Downs. She sailed again for the Channel fleet on 3 December.
ATALANTE was off Land's End in company with the VIPER cutter on the 1 April 1801 when they fell in with four French privateers. Three of them hauled off but Capt. GRIFFITHS chased one, the brig HEROS, for seventeen hours before capturing her. Mounting 14 guns and manned by 73 men, her master was Renne Crosse of St. Malo. - ATALANTE's six-oared cutter, commanded by Mr Francis SMITH with eight men, captured a French armed lugger in Quiberon Bay on the 10 August 1801. They boarded her under a hail of grape and canister from the lugger and two small batteries only a musket-shot from the shore without loss to themselves, the crew escaping ashore as the boarders came over the side. She was L'EVEILLE mounting two 4-pounders and four swivels capable of firing a pound and a half ball.
- 1802 J. O. MASEFIELD, 05/1802, cruising, based at Plymouth.
At the end of February she sailed with dispatches after a convoy which had recently sailed from Torbay. She parted from them on 6 March some 75 miles to the S. W. of Ushant and returned to Plymouth on the 10th. and on 10 May SYLPH, ATALANTE, CHILDERS and MEGAERA arrived in Portsmouth from Torbay. - In the first week of October 1802 he took, and sent into Portsmouth, a smuggling lugger with 170 ankers of spirits, a sloop with 120, a large boat with 400 and another with 360 casks of spirits and 20 bales of tobacco and on the 14 October he brought into Plymouth a smuggling cutter, ADMIRAL POLE of Exeter, with 170 ankers of spirits on board, which had been captured after a long chase. The smuggler had been seized previously at Weymouth some months earlier and released on bond.
- ATALANTE paid off in the Hamoaze on Saturday the 8 January 1803 and her crew was discharged.
Captain MASEFIELD immediately re-commissioned her with men eager to rejoin, since in the past six months she had taken eight smugglers with nearly 8,000 ankers (One anker equals eight and a third gallons) of spirits and prize money had exceeded a seaman's wages. She sailed with AGRESSOR on 3 February in search of more smugglers. - Although Britain did not end the Peace of Amiens until the 16 May there was great activity in the ports during March to bring ships into commission. ATALANTE sailed from Plymouth the 14th. to tow GALGO back from Mount's Bay where she had lost her foremast. She was back in Plymouth Sound the following day and left GALGO in Cawsand Bay. ATALANTE sent a French brig into Plymouth on 16 June.
- ATALANTE was taken into dock in Plymouth on 31 August to have her bottom inspected.
At the beginning of October she took four French ketches, three laden with timber and one with wine, and brought them into Plymouth on the 4th. The timber consisted of scantlings for 1st. and 2nd. rate ships and was being taken to L'Orient. On the 8th. her boats cut out a large cutter near Brest which was loaded with brandy, wine and soap.
The following day, when Capt. ELPHINSTONE in DIAMOND ordered him to go in chase of part of a convoy, two ketches and a brig, that was running under St. Gildas de Rhuys, Capt. MASEFIELD stood after them and forced them to run ashore at the mouth of the Pennerf (Panerf). As the wind was offshore he considered that there was a good chance of getting them off, so as soon as it got dark he sent in Lieut. HAWKINS in the six-oared cutter and the master, Mr Richard BURSTAL in the five-oared cutter. When Lieut. HAWKINS boarded the inshore vessel he found her aground with a number of troops armed with muskets and field pieces on the beach keeping up a heavy fire on his boat. Since he could not move her he went to the assistance of the other boat from which the master, the sergeant of marines and five other men had boarded the brig, killed six of the soldiers which had embarked from the shore, thrown two overboard and driven the other two below with the crew. The brig too was firmly aground so, not thinking it proper to set her on fire with wounded below, both boats returned to ATALANTE.
There were three casualties, Henry BRENMAN, sailmaker, who was killed, and two seamen who were slightly wounded. The next morning Capt. MASEFIELD had the satisfaction of seeing the brig high and dry and apparently bilged. - From 25 to 27 December 1803 a hurricane caused a great deal of damage to shipping at the mouth of the Channel.
ATALANTE arrived at Plymouth on 1 January 1804 a perfect wreck after a cruise off the coast of France. She had lost her main and mizzen top-masts and had to throw her guns overboard to avoid a capsize. After repairs and re-fitting she sailed again for Brest and returned on 11 March. Three days later the Port Admiral, in response to an urgent message from the merchants of St Ives, sent her and GANNET after two privateers, a lugger and a cutter, which had taken several vessels off the coast. - 1806 Lieut. John BOWKER. (First Lieut. of SAN JOSEF he was ordered to act as commander of ATALANTE by Sir Chas. COTTON)
In the autumn of 1806, ATALANTE was stationed off Rochefort under the orders of Sir Samuel HOOD where, on a dark winter night, she fell in with a French coasting convoy of 12 vessels, eight of which she captured and destroyed. - In February 1807 the blockading squadron was blown off the land. ATALANTE was the first to regain her station and found two warships under weigh in the Basque Roads and others in the anchorage preparing to sail so BOWKER made a great show of signalling to an imaginary squadron over the skyline and succeeded in deterring the French from coming out. The same night, through the ignorance of her pilot, ATALANTE ran aground and at daylight came under gun and musket fire which was kept up until they were rescued by two British frigates.
BOWKER was cleared of blame at his court-martial on 23 March and he was appointed to command EPERVIER on the Leeward Island station.
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