HMS Superieure (1803)

Lines of Superieure, from the National Maritime Museum, Greewich
History
France
Name	Superior
Launched	1801
Acquired	By purchase
Renamed	Supérieure on purchase[1]
Captured	2 July 1803
United Kingdom
Name	HMS Superieure
Acquired	2 July 1803 (by capture)
Honours and awards	Naval General Service Medal (NGSM) with clasps "Martinique"[2] "Superieure 10 Feby. 1809" "Guadaloupe"[3]
Fate	Sold 1814
General characteristics [4]
Type	Schooner
Tons burthen	197 (bm)
Length	86 ft 4 in (26.3 m) (overall) 67 ft 0 in (20.4 m) (keel)
Beam	23 ft 6 in (7.2 m)
Depth of hold	9 ft 5 in (2.9 m)
Propulsion	Sails
Sail plan	Schooner
Complement	70
Armament	Initial British service: 8 × 18-pounder carronades + 2 × 12-pounder bow chasers Later: 12 × 4-pounder guns (by 1810)

HMS Superieure was the French privateer Supérieure, which was built in 1801 in Baltimore, Maryland, and which the British captured in 1803 in the West Indies, and took into the Royal Navy. She spent most of her career on the Jamaica and Leeward Islands stations, where she captured numerous privateers. She participated in several notable single-ship actions, including one in which she harassed a frigate, and two campaigns that would, in 1847, earn her surviving crew members the Naval General Service Medal (NGSM). She was laid-up in Britain in 1810 and sold in 1814.