Naval/Maritime History - 11th of August - Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History (2025)

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History

23rd of October

some of the events you will find here,
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1707 - Squadron, under Admiral Sir Clowdsley Shovell, HMS Association (90), Cptn. Edmund Loades (1st. captain) and Cptn. Samuel Whitaker, HMS Eagle (70), Cptn. John Leake, HMS Romney (54), Cptn. William Coney, and HMS Firebrand fireship (8), wrecked on the Scilly Islands.

1762 - HMS Brune (32), Cptn. Tobyn, took French frigate Oiseau (26), Chevalier de Mode, off Cartagena.

Brune

was a Blonde class 30-gun frigate of the French Navy. She took part in the naval battles of the Seven Year War, and was captured by the British. Recommissioned in the Royal Navy as the 32-gun HMS Brune, she served until 1792.

1764 – Death of Emmanuel-Auguste de Cahideuc, Comte Dubois de la Motte, French admiral (b. 1683)

1777 - HMS Augusta (64) and the sloop HMS Merlin, Cdr. Samuel Reeve, took the ground, while attacking American Fort Mifflin, Delaware. Augusta accidentally caught fire and blew up and Merlin was also set on fire and abandoned.

On the evening of 22 October 1777, the Augusta and several other warships had sailed up the Delaware River to a point a short distance below some man-made chevaux de frise obstructions[3] in order to fire at Fort Mercer the following day. As the tide fell, both Augusta and HMS Merlin (16) went aground. Despite attempts during the night by HMS Roebuck (44) to free Augusta from its predicament, the warship remained hard aground. About 9:00 AM on 23 October, a general action started with HMS Pearl (32) and HMS Liverpool (28) joining other vessels in the bombardment. The British ships were engaged by Fort Mifflin and the Pennsylvania Navy, which launched four fire ships. At about 2:00 PM, the Augusta caught fire near its stern, according to an American eyewitness. The fire spread rapidly and soon the entire vessel was wrapped in flames. After about an hour the fire reached the magazine and the ship exploded. The blast smashed windows in Philadelphia and was heard 30 miles (48 km) away in Trappe, Pennsylvania. The loss of the Augusta was attributed to various causes. The British claimed that the blaze was started when wadding from the guns set the rigging on fire or that the crew intentionally set the blaze. Some Americans asserted that Augusta was ignited by a fire ship while others stated that its loss was caused by red-hot shot from Fort Mifflin. John Montresor, the British officer in charge of the Siege of Fort Mifflin, wrote that one lieutenant, the ship's chaplain and 60 of Augusta's ratings were killed while struggling in the water. Soon after, the crew of Merlin abandoned ship and set their ship on fire. It blew up later in the day.

1790 - William Bligh court martialled for loss of HMS Bounty.

1804 - HMS Conflict (12), Lt. Charles Cutts Ormsby, lost in engagement off Ostend.

HMS Conflict

(1801) was a 12-gun gun-brig launched in 1801 that grounded in 1804, enabling the French to capture her; the French Navy commissioned her in October 1806, renamed her Lynx in September 1814, reverted to Conflict in March 1815, and Lynx again in July 1815. She was struck from the Navy at Rochefort in October 1834 and broken up in November.

1805 - Trafalgar prizes Santisima Trinidad (136), Rayo (100), Bucentaure (80), Neptuno (80), L'Aigle (74), Redoutable (74) and San Francisco de Asis (74) wrecked or foundered in a storm after the battle.

Santísima Trinidad

(officially named Nuestra Señora de la Santísima Trinidad by royal order on 12 March 1768, nicknamed La Real, sometimes confused with the galleon Santísima Trinidad y Nuestra Señora del Buen Fin) was a Spanish first-rate ship of the line with 112 guns. This was increased in 1795–96 to 130 guns by closing in the spar deck between the quarterdeck and forecastle, and around 1802 to 140 guns, thus creating what was in effect a continuous fourth gundeck although the extra guns added were actually relatively small. She was the heaviest-armed ship in the world when rebuilt, and bore the most guns of any ship of the line outfitted in the Age of Sail.

1813 - HMS Andromache (38), Capt. G. Tobin, captured French frigate Trave (44)

On 23 October 1813 Andromache captured the French frigate Trave after an engagement of only 15 minutes. Trave, although a new vessel, had lost her masts in a storm and was sailing under jury-rigged masts and so unable to maneuver. She was armed with twenty-eight French 18-pounder long guns sixteen 18-pounder carronades, and had a crew of 321 men, almost all Dutch. Before she struck she had one man killed, and 28 men wounded, including her commander capitaine de frégate Jacob Van Maren. Andromache had little damage and only two men wounded. The Royal Navy took Trave into service as the troopship Trave. At the time of the capture the ketch HMS Gleaner was in sight, though it is not clear what she could have added had the engagement lasted longer.

The French frigate Trave was a Pallas-class frigate of the French Navy, launched at Amsterdam in 1812. After the Royal Navy captured her in 1813 in the North Sea, it took her into service as the troopship HMS Trave. She served in the Potomac and her boats participated in the Battle of Lake Borgne during the War of 1812. She was sold on 7 June 1821.

1862 - CSS Alabama, commanded by Capt. Raphael Semmes, captures and burns the American bark Lafayette south of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

CSS Alabama was a screw sloop-of-war built in 1862 for the Confederate States Navy at Birkenhead on the River Mersey opposite Liverpool, England by John Laird Sons and Company. Alabama served as a successful commerce raider, attacking Union merchant and naval ships over the course of her two-year career, during which she never docked at a Southern port. She was sunk in June 1864 by USS Kearsarge at the Battle of Cherbourg outside the port of Cherbourg, France.

1864 - During the Civil War, the blockade-runner Flamingo, which is run aground off Sullivans Island, S.C., is destroyed by shell fire from Fort Strong and Putnam, Battery Chatfield, and ships of Rear Adm. John A. Dahlgren's South Atlantic Blockading Squadron.

1942 - USS Kingfish (SS 234) sinks Japanese gunboat at the entrance to Kii Suido, Honshu, Japan.

1944 - The Battle of Leyte Gulf, considered the largest naval battle of World War II, begins with the U.S. submarines attacking two elements of the Japanese armada moving towards Leyte. In the Palawan Passage, USS Darter and USS Dace sink heavy cruisers Maya and Atago. Takao is also hit, but survives. Off Manila Bay, USS Bream's torpedoes damage the heavy cruiser Aoba.

1983 - A suicide truck bomb explodes at the Marine Barracks at Beirut Airport and kills 241 Americans (220 Marines, 18 Sailors, and three Army Soldiers).