HMS Tartar (1756) facts for kids

Tartar (original plan)
Quick facts for kids History
Great Britain
Name	Tartar
Operator	Royal Navy
Ordered	12 June 1755
Builder	John Randall's yard, Nelson Dock, Rotherhithe
Laid down	4 July 1755
Launched	3 April 1756
Completed	2 May 1756 at Deptford Dockyard
Fate	Wrecked 1 April 1797
General characteristics
Class and type	Lowestoffe-class sixth-rate frigate
Tons burthen	587 19⁄94 (bm) (4 tons more than designed)
Length	117 ft 10 in (35.9 m) (gundeck) 96 ft 11 in (29.5 m) (keel)
Beam	33 ft 9 in (10.3 m)
Depth of hold	10 ft 3 in (3.1 m)
Sail plan	Full-rigged ship
Complement	200 officers and men
Armament	Upperdeck: 24 × 9-pounder guns QD: 4 × 3-pounder guns 12 × swivel guns

HMS Tartar was a 28-gun sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy.

Naval career

Tartar was designed by Sir Thomas Slade and based on Lyme of 1748, "with such alterations as may tend to the better stowing of men and carrying for guns."

The ship was first commissioned in March 1756 under Captain John Lockhart, and earned a reputation as a fast sailer during service in the English Channel. She made many captures of French ships during the Seven Years' War, including 4 in 1756 and 7 the following year.

During the peace that followed, the ship sailed to Barbados carrying a timekeeper built by John Harrison, as a part of a series of experiments used to determine longitude at sea.

Roebuck with Phoenix, Tartar and three smaller vessels passing forts Washington and Lee on the Hudson River, in the run up to the Battle of Fort Washington

She also served in the American Revolutionary War, destroying an American vessel off New Jersey 1 April 1777 and capturing the Spanish Santa Margarita of 28 guns off Cape Finisterre on 11 November 1779.

She went on to see further service during the French Revolutionary War. On 14 December the French frigate Minerve captured off the island of Ivica the collier Hannibal, which was sailing from Liverpool to Naples. However, eleven days later, Tartar recaptured Hannibal off Toulon and sent her into Corsica.

Tartar, showing alterations made in 1990 during repairs at Chatham by Mr Nicholson's Yard. The decks were raised, as shown by the ticked red lines.

Tartar was part of the fleet under Lord Hood that occupied Toulon in August 1793. With HMS Courageux, Meleager, Egmont and Robust, she covered the landing, on 27 August, of 1500 troops sent to remove the republicans occupying the forts guarding the port. Once the forts were secure, the remainder of Hood's fleet, accompanied by 17 Spanish ships-of-the-line which had just arrived, sailed into the harbour. Tartar was wrecked off Saint-Domingue on 1 April 1797.