The Invincible Navy?

Sloops were the smallest ships commanded by captains.

Originally posted by Temujin Originally posted by gcle2003   The ship that carried the most guns in this period was Spain's Santissima Trinidad, which was the only four-decked[1] battle ship in the world, and carried either 130 or 136 guns (sources vary:she probably carried slightly different numbers at different times.   She was captured at Trafalgar, but sank in the storm that followed.   [1] I.e. four gun decks.     do you have information on the Russian Blagodat? it had the same number of guns as the Santissima Trinidad and i suspect it was a sister ship of the ST bought by the Czar from Spain or so. if not it is still the largest three-decker of the Nap Wars.

Edited by gcle2003 - 20-Aug-2006 at 05:48

Originally posted by gcle2003 Agreed. However, I don't know why 74 guns were common and as far as I know 72-gun and 76-gun ships never existed.

I think we agree with all that.

Edited by Mosquito - 27-Aug-2006 at 06:15

One on One and fleet movements is something totally different. A frigate isnt much in a fleet formation compared to heavier gunned ships. Also a good captain in a one on one would know the limits of his ship and wouldnt play to any advantages of the other ship. Frigates wouldnt challenge a ship of the line unless the situation was perfect and even then it was risky. Even if it loses the bottom 30 guns it still has 44 guns and is a big ship and can take alot more damage.

Originally posted by gcle2003 Even more critical however was the rate and accuracy with which the guns were fired.

Originally posted by Mosquito Not always the ships with bigger guns were victorious against smaller ships. Sometimes frigates could have even win in combat with ship of the line with 74 canons. There were such events. When the waves were high the ships of line couldnt use its lower gun deck. �

I just finished "Ship of the Line" by Brian Lavery. The only recorded instance I could find was the 74 gun French Droite Du Homme sunk by Sir Edward Pellew the only case on record of a 74 being attacked and sunk by a frigate. Though I think this was in a specific timeframe basically most of the 18th century. I was kind of surprised to see only that one as I also read the British felt they could take on anything with up 50% more superior firepower with success.

It was a good book and a little bit on the British biased of things but hey they were the masters of the sea so cant go wrong from their point of view to much. It also showed the skill of British naval architects and the fact they disliked using any foreign designs. Most of the French ships they captured were actually poorly maintained and usually had to be gunned down because the wear and tear on the haul was so bad. British designers seemed to be just another reason why the British were so dominant on the seas. They took alot of pride in there ships and in building them.

I was kind of wrong with the 74 gun thing apparantly there was alot of bickering between the admiralty and architects. The admiralty wanted a 74 gun ship like the French had while the architects wanted to keep using the 80 gun triple deckers saying it was better. The comprimise was doing away with the 80 gun boats and the architects pretty much added 4 guns to 70 gun ship designs in progress to please the admiralty. Eventually later on they designed many different types of 74 gun ships under various British hull designs. 64 gun ships were quite frequent in the British and other European navies as well as they were quite cheaper then their 74 gun ship sisters. Thomas Slade kind of standardized British ship building with the main four 100,90,74,64gun ships being the standard builds for most ship of the lines during his time as naval surveyor.
    

What would be the position of the Brit navy today ? Will they be able to beat the Chinese ?

Originally posted by Barbarroja Powerful and strong but not invincible. For example in 1797 Nelson was defeated in Tenerife (Spain) and he lost his arm in this episode.