HMS Dolphin (1781)

Plan of HMS Dolphin
History
Great Britain
Name	HMS Dolphin
Ordered	8 January 1777
Cost	£21,525.10.5d including fitting and coppering
Launched	10 March 1781
Completed	11 May 1781
Commissioned	March 1781
Fate	Broken up
General characteristics
Class and type	fifth-rate Roebuck-Class
Tons burthen	880 47⁄94 (bm)
Length	139 feet 11 inches (42.6 m) (gundeck) 115 feet 6+1⁄4 inches (35.2 m) (keel)
Beam	37 feet 10+1⁄4 inches (11.5 m)
Depth of hold	16 feet 4 inches (5.0 m)
Propulsion	Sails
Sail plan	Fully Rigged Ship
Complement	280-300
Armament	Lower deck: 20 × 18-pounder guns Upper deck: 22 × 9-pounder guns Forecastle: 2 × 6-pounder guns

HMS Dolphin was a 44-gun fifth rate ship of the Royal Navy launched in 1781. Designed by Sir Thomas Slade, she carried her armament on two decks and had a main battery of 18-pound long guns. She made an appearance at the Battle of Dogger Bank in 1781. The rest of her 36-year career was uneventful, much of it being spent as a transport or hospital ship, armed only with twenty or twenty-four, 9-pounders. She was broken up at Portsmouth in 1817.