HMS Belleisle (1795)

HMS Belleisle after the Battle of Trafalgar
History
France
Name	Lion, Marat, Formidable
Namesake	Jean-Paul Marat
Builder	Rochefort shipyard
Laid down	August 1791 as Lion
Launched	29 April 1794
Commissioned	June 1794
Renamed	Marat on 28 September 1793 Formidable on 25 May 1795
Captured	23 June 1795, by Royal Navy at the Battle of Groix
Great Britain
Name	HMS Belleisle
Acquired	by capture, 23 June 1795
Fate	Broken up, 1814
General characteristics [1]
Class and type	Téméraire-class ship of the line
Displacement	2,966 tonnes 5,260 tonnes fully loaded
Length	55.87 metres (183.3 ft) (172 pied)
Beam	14.90 metres (48 ft 11 in)
Draught	7.26 metres (23.8 ft) (22 pied)
Propulsion	Up to 2,485 m2 (26,750 sq ft) of sails
Armament	Lower gundeck: 28 × 36-pounder long guns Upper gundeck: 30 × 18-pounder long guns Fc and QD: 16 × 8-pounder long guns + :4 × 36-pounder carronades
Armour	Timber

Lion was a Téméraire class 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the French Navy, which later served in the Royal Navy. She was named Lion on 23 April 1790 and built at Rochefort from August 1791 until June 1794. She was renamed Marat on 28 September 1793 (7 months before being launched) and then Formidable on 25 May 1795, with the changing fortunes of the French Revolution.

She took part in the action of 6 November 1794, managing to rake HMS Alexander.

Fighting under captain Linois on 23 June 1795 at the Battle of Groix, she was captured by HMS Barfleur near the French port of Lorient. She was taken into service in the Royal Navy, but because the Navy already had a Formidable, she was renamed Belleisle, apparently in the mistaken belief that she had been captured off Belle Île, rather than the Île de Groix.

Captained by William Hargood, she was the second ship in the British lee column at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, and as such was engaged by the Franco-Spanish ships Achille, Aigle, Neptune, Fougueux, Santa Ana, Monarca and San Juan Nepomuceno. She was soon completely dismasted (the only British ship which suffered that fate), unable to manœuvre and largely unable to fight, as her sails blinded her batteries, but kept flying her flag for 45 minutes until the British ships behind her in the column came to her rescue. With 33 dead and 93 wounded, she was then towed to Gibraltar after the battle by the frigate HMS Naiad.

• 
  Belleisle, fifteen minutes past noon at Trafalgar
• 
  The dismasted Belleisle later on in the battle

Following the concern in Britain that neutral Denmark was entering an alliance with Napoleon, the Belleisle sailed as the flagship of Rear-Admiral Alexander Cochrane, who commanded the squadron of ships that was sent to occupy the Danish West Indies. The squadron, which included HMS Prince George, HMS Northumberland, HMS Canada, HMS Ramillies and HMS Cerberus, captured Telemaco, Carvalho, and Master on 17 April 1807.^[2] The actual occupation of the Danish West Indies did not occur until December, after receipt of news of the second battle of Copenhagen.

From 1811 she was in Portsmouth harbour, and in 1814 the decision was taken to have her broken up.

• Phillips, Michael (2013). "BELLEISLE (74) [1795]". Ships of the Old Navy. Retrieved 4 April 2013.

• (in French) « J’en ris encore », Nicolas Mioque