Swallow (1779 EIC packet)

Swallow

East India Company's Packet Swallow, 1788; Thomas Luny
History
Great Britain
Name:	Swallow
Owner:	British East India Company
Builder:	Bombay Dockyard
Launched:	1779
Fate:	Sold 1804
UK
Name:	HMS Lilly
Acquired:	May 1804 by purchase
Nickname(s):	HMS Silly
Fate:	Sold November 1811
United Kingdom
Name:	Swallow
Owner:	1814: J. Lynley
Fate:	Wrecked 16 June 1823
General characteristics
Tons burthen:	331, or 345, or 371 10⁄94 (bm)
Length:	99 ft 0 in (30.2 m) (overall) 80 ft 7 1⁄28 in (24.6 m) (keel)
Beam:	29 ft 5 in (9.0 m)
Complement:	EIC service:50 1799:60 RN service:121
Armament:	EIC service: 8 guns 1799:16 × 6-pounder guns + 6 swivel guns RN service: Upper deck: 16 x 24-pounder carronades Spar deck:6 x 18-pounder carronades + 2 x 6-pounder chase guns

Swallow was a teak-built packet ship that the British East India Company (EIC) launched at Bombay in 1779. She made nine trips between India and Britain for the EIC between 1782 and 1803. Her most notable exploit occurred on her seventh voyage, when she helped capture seven Dutch East Indiamen on 15 June 1795. The Royal Navy purchased her in 1804 and named her Lilly. She served in the navy until she was sold in 1811. During this time she participated in the capture of La Désirade island, and participated in a quixotic and unsuccessful attempt of General Francisco de Miranda to liberate the Province of Venezuela from Spain in 1806. Her whereabouts between 1811 and 1815 are obscure, but in 1815 J. Lyney, of London, purchased her and she sailed to the West Indies and to India as an EIC-licensed vessel until she wrecked on her way to Calcutta in 1823.

Swallow came under the command of Captain Sober Hall. In March 1780 she was dispatched to Britain.

On 24 January 1781, Swallow, under the command of Captain Sober Hall, sailed from Limerick for Madras, with the Right Hon. Lord Macartney, the new governor of Madras, Mr. Staunton and Mr. Lacelles, his Lordship's secretaries, Col. Cowper, Mr. Kerin of the county Clare, and Mr. Exshaw of Dublin, with several other passengers. Lord Macartney arrived at Madras on 22 June 1781.

The first voyage to the UK for which National Archive records exist was in 1782. In that year Captain Sober Hall sailed from India, reaching Limerick, which she left on 4 October 1782, and arriving at The Downs on 10 April 1783.Swallow left the Downs on 16 September 1783 under the command of Captain Richard Bendy. Bendy was carrying to India the preliminary articles of a treaty between George III and the States General of the United Provinces, and the definitive peace treaty between the crowns of Great Britain, France, and Spain (Treaties of Versailles).