French frigate Minerve (1794)
Capture of Minerve off Toulon
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| History | |
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 France
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| Name: | Minerve |
| Builder: | Toulon |
| Laid down: | January 1792 |
| Launched: | 5 September 1794 |
| Captured: | 23 June 1795 by the Royal Navy |
 United Kingdom
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| Name: | Minerve |
| Acquired: | 23 June 1795 |
| Captured: | 3 July 1803 by the French Navy |
 France
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| Name: | Canonnière |
| Acquired: | 3 July 1803 |
| Renamed: |
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| Captured: | 3 February 1810 by the Royal Navy |
 United Kingdom
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| Name: | Confiance |
| Acquired: | 3 February 1810 |
| Fate: | Struck from navy lists by 1814 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Minerve-class frigate |
| Tons burthen: | 1101 79⁄94 (bm) |
| Length: | 48.4 m (159 ft) |
| Beam: | 12.2 m (40 ft) |
| Draught: | 5.6 m (18 ft) |
| Armament: |
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Minerve was a 40-gun Minerve-class frigate of the French Navy. The British captured her twice and the French recaptured her once. She therefore served under four names before being broken up in 1814:
Her keel was laid in January 1792, and she was launched in 1794.
On 14 December, off the island of Ivica, she captured the collier Hannibal, which was sailing from Liverpool to Naples. However, eleven days later, HMS Tartar recaptured Hannibal off Toulon and sent her into Corsica.
Minerve took part in combat off Noli. At the action of 24 June 1795, she and the 36-gun Artémise engaged the frigates HMS Dido and Lowestoffe. Minerve surrendered to the British, Artémise having fled, and was commissioned in the Royal Navy as HMS Minerve.
On 19 December 1796, Minerve, under the command of Captain George Cockburn, was involved in an action with HMS Blanche against the Spanish frigates Santa Sabina and Ceres. Minerve captured the Santa Sabina, which lost 164 men killed and wounded. Minerve herself lost eight killed, 38 wounded and four missing. Minerve also suffered extensive damage to her masts and rigging. Blanche went off in pursuit of Ceres. Early the next morning a Spanish frigate approached Minerve, which made ready to engage. However, two Spanish ships of the line and two more frigates approached. Skillful sailing enabled Cockburn to escape with Minerve but the Spaniards recaptured Santa Sabina and her prize crew.
On the evening of 1 August 1799, at 9 P.M., Minerve's boats came alongside Peterel. Captain Francis Austen of Peterel sent these boats and his own to cut out some vessels from the Bay of Diano, near Genoa. Firing was heard at around midnight and by morning the boats returned, bringing with them a large settee carrying wine, and the Virginie, a French warship. Virginie was a Turkish-built half-galley that the French had captured at Malta the year before. She had provision for 26 oars and carried six guns. She was under the command of a lieutenant de vaisseau and had a crew of 36 men, 20 of whom had jumped overboard when the British approached, and 16 of whom the British captured. She had brought General Joubert from Toulon and was going on the next day to Genoa where Joubert was to replace General Moreau in command of the French army in Italy.Minerve and Peterel shared the proceeds of the capture of Virginie with Santa Teresa and Vincejo.
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Wikipedia