HMS Chanticleer (1808)

HMS "Chanticleer" was a "Cherokee" class 10-gun brig of the Royal Navy. "Chanticleer" was built by Daniel List at East Cowes on the Isle of Wight, where she was launched on 26 July, 1808, weighing in with a displacement of 237 tons, and was initially based at Great Yarmouth under Commander Charles Harford (who drowned 19 October 1808) and then Commander Richard Spear. The ship saw action in the Baltic Sea, becoming involved in an action with three warships of the Royal Danish Navy on September 2, 1811. [cite web
last = | first = | authorlink = | coauthors = | title = 1811 - Manly with Loland and consorts | work = Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels | publisher = | date = | url = http://www.pbenyon.plus.com/Naval_History/Vol_V/P_347.html | format = | doi = | accessdate = 2008-01-22]

"Chanticleer" served chiefly as an escort vessel and cruised off the European coast. In 1813, "Chanticleer" was responsible for taking three prizes near the German archipelago of Heligoland in the North Sea.

"Chanticleer" was dispatched on a scientific expedition of the Pacific Ocean in 1828 under the command of Captain Henry Foster who was lost off the coast of Panama. After Foster's loss, the ship was commanded by the First Lieutenant. On the 1828 expedition, the ship circumnavigated along the Southern Hemisphere, visiting the River Plate and Isla de los Estados of Argentina, Cape Horn at the southernmost tip of South America, New Zealand, South Georgia, circled the Cape of Good Hope near the southern tip of the African continent, and made port at Trinidad before returning across the Atlantic Ocean to Falmouth in 1830.

"Chanticleer" had originally been scheduled to make the second South America survey of 1831, but due to the exceedingly poor condition of the ship, the "Beagle", one of "Chanticleer's" sister ships in the "Cherokee" class, was selected instead. [ [http://www.aboutdarwin.com/voyage/voyage02.html Events leading up to Darwin's Beagle Voyage] , AboutDarwin.com. Accessed January 24, 2008. "H.M.S. Chanticleer (one of the six survey ships built in 1817) was scheduled for the second South America survey, but because she was in such poor condition the Beagle was selected instead."] Thus it was the "Beagle", and not the "Chanticleer", that became that ship upon which Charles Darwin established his reputation as a naturalist.

In 1832, John Frost obtained an Admiralty grant to establish "Chanticleer" as a hospital ship to be moored off Millbank, intended to serve as a refuge for Thames boatmen. However, Frost overextended himself and the plan fell through. [Citation | last = | first = | author-link = | title = Obituary: John Frost, esq. | journal = The Gentleman's Magazine | volume = XIV | pages = pp. 665 - 666 | date = | year = 1840 | url = http://books.google.com/books?id=psghAAAAMAAJ&pg=RA1-PA665&lpg=RA1-PA665&dq=%22hms+chanticleer%22+%22john+frost%22&source=web&ots=Wp7XLcrvjA&sig=TNFfqf9Ki7Cr6S18DGd49w9jARg ]

In 1848, "Chanticleer" was towed to Burnham-on-Crouch in Essex, for use in the River Crouch as a Customs watch ship. She was re-named "WV5" on May 25, 1863 and broken up in June 1871 at Sheerness.

Notes

References

*cite web | last = | first = | authorlink = | coauthors = | title = Mid-Victorian RN vessel HMS Chanticleer | work = William Loney RN - Background | publisher = | date = | url = http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=2501 | format = | doi = | accessdate = 2008-01-22
*cite web | last = | first = | authorlink = | coauthors = | title = HMS Chanticleer | work = Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels | publisher = | date = | url = http://www.pbenyon.plus.com/18-1900/C/00916.html | format = | doi = | accessdate = 2008-01-22