HMS Desperate (1849)

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Desperate.

Desperate (centre) parting company with Phoenix (right) and the store ship Diligence (left) off Cape Farewell, 1852
History
United Kingdom
NameDesperate
Ordered9 May 1845
BuilderPembroke Dockyard
Laid downOctober 1845
Launched23 May 1849
Commissioned12 April 1852
Honours and
awards		Baltic 1854 - 55, Crimea, Black Sea 1855[1]
FateBroken at Devonport Dockyard August 1865
General characteristics [2]
TypeFirst-class sloop
Displacement1,628 tons
Tons burthen1,03869/94 bm
Length
  • 192 ft 6+1⁄2 in (58.7 m) (gundeck)
  • 172 ft 3+1⁄2 in (52.5 m) (keel for tonnage)
Beam34 ft 4 in (10.5 m) maximum, 34 ft 4 in (10.5 m) for tonnage
Draught15 ft 9 in (4.8 m) mean
Depth of hold22 ft 8+1⁄2 in (6.9 m)
Installed power
  • 400 nhp
  • 699–772 ihp (521–576 kW)
Propulsion
  • 4-cylinder horizontal single-expansion steam engine
  • Single screw
Sail planFull-rigged ship
Complement175
Armament

HMS Desperate was originally slated to be built to the Sampson designed steam vessel rated as a Steam Vessel First Class (SV1); however, the Admiralty, first rerated the vessels as First Class Sloops on 19 April 1845 then on the 9 May 1845, she was ordered as First-Class screw sloops to be built from a design of Sir William Symonds, Surveyor of the Navy.[3] She would be a 10-gun vessel with 400 NHP engines. She served in the Baltic during the Crimean war, and as a store ship to Edward Augustus Inglefield's Arctic expedition. She was broken up by 1865.[2]

Desperate was the second named vessel since it was introduced for a 12-gun gun brig launched by White at Broadstairs on 2 January 1802, converted to a mortar brig in 1811 and sold on 15 December 1814.[4]

  1. ^ Rif Winfield, Battles and Campaigns
  2. ^ a b Winfield (2004), p.212
  3. ^ Winfield, page 212
  4. ^ Colledge2006