HMS Tonnant

Tonnant at the Battle of the Nile, by Louis Lebreton.
History
France
Name	Tonnant
Laid down	November 1787
Launched	12 October 1789
Completed	September 1790
Honours and awards	Participated in: Battle of Genoa Battle of the Nile
Captured	By the Royal Navy on 2 August 1798
Great Britain
Name	HMS Tonnant
Acquired	Captured on 2 August 1798
Honours and awards	Participated in: Battle of Trafalgar Burning of Washington Battle of Baltimore Battle of Lake Borgne (ships' boats)
Fate	Broken up in March 1821
General characteristics [1] [2]
Class and type	80-gun Tonnant-class ship of the line
Tons burthen	22813⁄94 (bm)
Length	194 ft 2 in (59.2 m) (gundeck) 160 ft (48.8 m) (keel)
Beam	51 ft 9+1⁄4 in (15.8 m)
Depth of hold	23 ft 3 in (7.1 m)
Sail plan	Full-rigged ship
Complement	700
Armament	French service: 30 × 36-pounder long guns 32 × 24-pounder long guns 18 × 12-pounder long guns 4 × obusiers de vaisseau British service: Lower deck: 32 × 32-pounder guns Upper deck: 32 × 18-pounder guns QD: 2 × 18-pounder guns + 14 × 32-pounder carronades Fc: 4 × 32-pounder carronades

HMS Tonnant (lit. 'Thundering') was an 80-gun ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She had previously been Tonnant of the French Navy and the lead ship of the Tonnant class. The British captured her in August 1793 during the Siege of Toulon but the French recaptured her when the siege was broken in December. Rear-Admiral Horatio Nelson captured her at Aboukir Bay off the coast of Egypt at the Battle of the Nile on 1 August 1798. She was taken into British service as HMS Tonnant. She went on to fight at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, during the Napoleonic Wars.

Tonnant became the flagship of Vice-Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane when he assumed command of the North American Station in March of 1814 during the War of 1812 with the United States. On 7 September 1814 Francis Scott Key and John Stuart Skinner dined aboard the ship while seeking the release of a captured civilian prisoner, several days before the Battle of Baltimore. Key went on to write what later became the words to the American national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner" after watching the British attack on Baltimore's Fort McHenry. Tonnant was broken up in 1821.