HMS Racoon (1782)

History
Great Britain
Name: HMS Racoon
Commissioned: August 1782
Out of service: 12 September 1782
General characteristics
Class and type: brig-sloop
Armament: 14 guns

HMS Racoon was a 14-gun two-masted brig-sloop of the Royal Navy, purchased for service during the American Revolutionary War. She was commissioned in August 1782 under the command of Lieutenant (and later Admiral) Edmund Nagle, but was captured and destroyed four weeks later by the French frigate Aigle.

Racoon was one of at least forty North American merchant vessels purchased by the Royal Navy between 1775 and 1784 to bolster Britain's offensive capacity against the combined naval forces of France, Spain and the American colonies. Prior to her purchase in mid-1782, she had been the mercantile brig Lovely Sally. She was two-masted, but her age and dimensions are otherwise unrecorded.[1] She was commissioned on 1 August 1782 under Lieutenant Edmund Nagle who was transferred aboard after four months in command of the 14-gun sloop Polecat.[2][3]

Britain's naval capacity was tested by France's successful Hudson Bay raids in the week after Racoon's launch. The newly purchased brig was immediately put to sea, and was cruising off the mouth of the Delaware River when she encountered the 38-gun French frigate Aigle and her sister ship the Gloire. Racoon was smaller and slower than the French frigates, and Nagle had few alternatives other than surrender. He and his crew were held aboard Aigle until it in turn was captured by larger British vessels.[4] All of Racoon's crew were freed, except the ship's pilot who chose to remain with the French when they fled in Aigle's boats ahead of the British capture.[5]

References

  1. ↑ Winfield 2007, p.319
  2. ↑  Laughton, John Knox (1894). "Nagle, Edmund". In Lee, Sidney. Dictionary of National Biography. 40. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
  3. ↑ Marshall 1835, p. 277
  4. ↑ "No. 12381". The London Gazette. 12 October 1782. p. 1.
  5. ↑ "No. 12388". The London Gazette. 12 November 1782. p. 4.

Bibliography

  • Winfield, Rif (2007). British Warships of the Age of Sail 1714–1792: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 9781844157006.
  • Marshall, John (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. 1. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. OCLC 367981229.
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