HMS Thames (1758)
The Action of 24 October 1793 between Uranie and HMS Thames
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| History | |
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 Great Britain
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| Name: | HMS Thames |
| Ordered: | 11 January 1757 |
| Builder: | Henry Adams, Bucklers Hard |
| Laid down: | February 1757 |
| Launched: | 10 April 1758 |
| Completed: | 29 May 1758 at Portsmouth Dockyard |
| Commissioned: | April 1758 |
| Captured: | 25 October 1793 |
| Fate: | captured |
 France
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| Name: | Tamise |
| Acquired: | 25 October 1793 |
| Captured: | 8 June 1796 |
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Great Britain
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| Name: | HMS Thames |
| Acquired: | 8 June 1796 (recaptured) |
| Commissioned: | December 1796 |
| Fate: | Taken to pieces at Woolwich September 1803 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Richmond-class fifth-rate frigate |
| Tons burthen: | 656 46⁄94 bm |
| Length: |
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| Beam: | 34 ft 4 in (10.5 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 11 ft 9 in (3.6 m) |
| Sail plan: | Full-rigged ship |
| Complement: | 210 officers and men |
| Armament: |
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HMS Thames was a 32-gun Richmond-class fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy built by Henry Adams and launched at Bucklers Hard in 1758. She served in several wars, including for some four years in French service (as Tamise) after her capture. She was recaptured in 1796 and was broken up in 1803.
Thames was commissioned in April 1758. On 18 May 1759, she assisted in the capture of the French frigate Aréthuse, which was commissioned into the Royal Navy as HMS Arethusa. She was deployed in the Mediterranean from August 1763 and paid off in March 1766 after wartime service.
She was repaired and recommissioned in October 1770 for the Falkland Islands dispute. She participated in the Spithead Review of 22 June 1773, and in a mission to Morocco in 1774. Paid off in July 1775, she was recommissioned in August 1776, and then paid off again in September 1782 after wartime service.
After several repairs at various times, she was recommissioned under Captain Thomas Troubridge in June 1790. She was again paid off, repaired and refitted.
At the Action of 24 October 1793, while sailing to Gibraltar under Captain James Cotes, she met Jean-François Tartu's Uranie, off Gascony. In the ensuing engagement she lost her rigging and most of her starboard battery, yet killed Tartu and forced Uranie to disengage. The next day the frigate Carmagnole, under Zacharie Allemand, and accompanying vessels captured Thames, which was essentially a defenseless hulk. She was brought into French service as Tamise.
Tamise was entrusted to Captain Jean-Marthe-Adrien l'Hermitte, who ordered some technical improvements. She went for two short cruises in the Channel where she succeeded in taking 22 British merchant vessels of various sizes. She also escaped a British squadron that ignored her because of her British construction lines. She was then the admiral's frigate, repeating orders, in Villaret de Joyeuse's fleet. She was charged with the reconnaissance of Lord Howe's fleet in the morning of the Glorious First of June 1794.
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Wikipedia