Naval/Maritime History 8th of May - Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History

Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History

7th of May

some of the events you will find here,
please use the following link where you will find more details and all other events of this day .....



1694 - Henry Every (also spelled Avery) leads a mutiny aboard the privateer Charles II anchored off La Coruna, Spain.
Henry Every
, also Avery or Evory (20 August 1659 – time of death uncertain), sometimes erroneously given as Jack Avery or John Avery, was an English pirate who operated in the Atlantic and Indian oceans in the mid-1690s. He probably used several aliases throughout his career, including Benjamin Bridgeman, and was known as Long Ben to his crewmen and associates.
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An 18th-century depiction of Henry Every, with the Fancy shown engaging its prey in the background


1765 – Launch of HMS Victory, a 104-gun first-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, ordered in 1758, laid down in 1759 and launched in 1765.
She is best known for her role as Lord Nelson's flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October 1805.

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Scale: 1:60. A model of H.M.S Victory (1765) made entirely in wood that has been painted in realistic colours with metal fittings. The vessel is shown in a launching cradle on a slipway.


1773 – Launch of HMS Orpheus, a British Modified Lowestoffe-class fifth-rate frigate, ordered on 25 December 1770 as one of five fifth-rate frigates of 32 guns each contained in the emergency frigate-building programme inaugurated when the likelihood of war with Spain arose over the ownership of the Falkland Islands
Sir Thomas Slade's design for the Lowestoffe was approved, but was revised to produce a more rounded midships section; the amended design was approved on 3 January 1771 by Edward Hawke's outgoing Admiralty Board, just before it was replaced. The contract to build the Orpheus was awarded to John Barnard at Harwich, the keel being laid in May 1771, and the frigate was launched 7 May 1773, at a cost of £12,654.16.11d. She sailed from Harwich on 24 May for Sheerness Dockyard, where she was completed and fitted out to the Navy Board's needs (for £835.7.7d) by 11 June.
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1779 - The Continental Navy sloop USS Providence, captures the British brig HMS Diligent off Sandy Hook and is later acquired for service in the Continental Navy.
USS Providence
was a sloop-of-war in the Continental Navy, originally chartered by the Rhode Island General Assembly as Katy. The ship took part in a number of campaigns during the first half of the American Revolutionary War before being destroyed by her own crew in 1779 to prevent her falling into the hands of the British after the failed Penobscot Expedition.
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Continental Sloop Providence (1775-1779) Painting in oils by W. Nowland Van Powell.


1794 - The Action of 7 May 1794 was a minor naval action fought between a British ship of the line and a French frigate early in the French Revolutionary Wars. HMS Swiftsure (74), Captain Charles Boyles, captured Atalante (36), Cptn. Charles-Alexandre-Leon Durand-Linois


1798 - Battle of the Îles Saint-Marcouf - HMS Badger (4) and HMS Sandfly gunbrig repulsed 52 gun brigs at Marcon.

The Battle of the Îles Saint-Marcouf was an engagement fought off the Îles Saint-Marcouf near the Cotentin peninsula on the Normandy coast of France in May 1798 during the French Revolutionary Wars. In 1795 a British garrison was placed on the islands, which operated as a resupply base for Royal Navy ships cruising off the coast of Northern France. Seeking to eliminate the British presence on the islands and simultaneously test the equipment and tactics then being developed in France for a projected invasion of Britain, the French launched a massed amphibious assault on the southern island using over 50 landing ships and thousands of troops on 7 May 1798. Although significant Royal Navy forces were in the area, a combination of wind and tide prevented them from intervening and the island's 500-strong garrison was left to resist the attack alone.
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Attack of St Marcou, I. Scatcherd


1803 – Launch of Russian Liogkii ("Лёгкий"), or Legkiy or Legkii, was a 38-gun Russian Speshni-class frigate
Liogkii ("Лёгкий"), or Legkiy or Legkii, was a 38-gun Russian Speshni-class frigate launched in 1803. She served in the Mediterranean during the Anglo-Russian war. The Russians sold her to the French Navy in 1809, which refitted her and put her into service in 1811, renaming her Corcyre. The British captured her in November 1811.
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Model of the frigate O'Higgins from the Museo Naval y Marítimo of the Chilean Navy


1864 – The world's oldest surviving clipper ship, the City of Adelaide is launched by William Pile, Hay and Co. in Sunderland, England, for transporting passengers and goods between Britain and Australia.
City of Adelaide is a clipper ship, built in Sunderland, England, and launched on 7 May 1864. The ship was commissioned in the Royal Navy as HMS Carrick between 1923 and 1948 and, after decommissioning, was known as Carrick until 2001. At a conference convened by HRH The Duke of Edinburgh in 2001, the decision was made to revert the ship's name to City of Adelaide, and the duke formally renamed her at a ceremony in 2013.
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1872 – Launch of French La Galissonnière, lead ship of a class of wooden-hulled, armored corvettes built for the French Navy during the 1870s.
La Galissonnière was lead ship of a class of wooden-hulled, armored corvettes built for the French Navy during the 1870s. She was named after the victor of the Battle of Minorca in 1756, Marquis de la Galissonnière. She bombarded Sfax in 1881 as part of the French occupation of Tunisia and was present in Alexandria shortly before the British bombarded it before the beginning of the 1882 Anglo-Egyptian War. The ship participated in a number of battles during the Sino-French War of 1884–85. La Galissonnière was condemned in 1894.
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1875 - SS Schiller – the ship sank after hitting the Retarrier Ledges in the Isles of Scilly. Most of her crew and passengers were lost, totalling 335 fatalities.
SS Schiller
was a 3,421 ton German ocean liner, one of the largest vessels of her time. Launched in 1873, she plied her trade across the Atlantic Ocean, carrying passengers between New York and Hamburg for the German Transatlantic Steam Navigation Line. She became notorious on 7 May 1875, while operating on her normal route, when she hit the Retarrier Ledges in the Isles of Scilly, causing her to sink with the loss of most of her crew and passengers, totalling 335 fatalities.
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1885 – Launch of SMS Arcona, a member of the Carola class of steam corvettes built for the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy) in the 1880s.
SMS Arcona
was a member of the Carola class of steam corvettes built for the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy) in the 1880s. Intended for service in the German colonial empire, the ship was designed with a combination of steam and sail power for extended range, and was equipped with a battery of ten 15-centimeter (5.9 in) guns. Arcona was laid down at the Kaiserliche Werft (Imperial Shipyard) in Danzig in 1881, she was launched in May 1885, and she was completed in December 1886.
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Arcona in Nagasaki, Japan, c. 1897


1887 – Launch of French Neptune, an ironclad battleship of the French Navy
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The Neptune on Penfeld river, c. 1892, by Edmond Chagot


1902 – Launch of Preußen (usually Preussen in English) (PROY-sin), a German steel-hulled five-masted ship-rigged windjammer built in 1902 for the F. Laeisz shipping company and named after the German state and kingdom of Prussia.
It was the world's only ship of this class with five masts carrying six square sails on each mast.

Until the 2000 launch of the Royal Clipper, a sail cruise liner, she was the only five-masted full-rigged ship ever built.
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1913 – Launch of spanish Alfonso XIII, a Spanish dreadnought battleship, the second member of the España class.
Alfonso XIII was a Spanish dreadnought battleship, the second member of the España class. She had two sister ships, España and Jaime I. Alfonso XIII was built by the SECN shipyard; she was laid down in February 1910, launched in May 1913, and completed in August 1915. Named after King Alfonso XIII of Spain, she was renamed España in 1931 after the king was exiled following the proclamation of the Second Spanish Republic. The new name was the namesake of her earlier sister ship, the España that served in the Spanish fleet from 1913 to 1923.
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1915 - RMS Lusitania torpedoed and sunk
The passenger liner was torpedoed by U-20 on 7 May 1915. She sank in just 18 minutes 8 nmi (15 km) off the Old Head of Kinsale, Ireland killing 1,198 out of over 1,900 of the people aboard.
RMS Lusitania
was a British ocean liner and briefly the world's largest passenger ship. The ship was sunk on 7 May 1915 by a German U-boat 11 mi (18 km) off the southern coast of Ireland. The sinking presaged the United States declaration of war on Germany (1917).
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1934 - The frigate USS Constitution completes her 3-year tour of 76 port cities along the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific coasts and then returns to Boston, Mass. Prior to her journey that began July 1931, the 137-year-old frigate undergoes a refit and overhaul. Congress authorized the restoration of Constitution in March 1925.
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1942 – World War II: During the Battle of the Coral Sea, United States Navy aircraft carrier aircraft attack and sink the Imperial Japanese Navy light aircraft carrier Shōhō;
the battle marks the first time in the naval history that two enemy fleets fight without visual contact between warring ships.

Shōhō (Japanese: 祥鳳, "Auspicious Phoenix" or "Happy Phoenix") was a light aircraft carrier of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Originally built as the submarine support ship Tsurugizaki in the late 1930s, she was converted before the Pacific War into an aircraft carrier and renamed. Completed in early 1942, the ship supported the invasion forces in Operation MO, the invasion of Port Moresby, New Guinea, and was sunk by American carrier aircraft on her first combat operation during the Battle of the Coral Sea on 7 May. Shōhō was the first Japanese aircraft carrier to be sunk during World War II.
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1945 – World War II: General Alfred Jodl signs unconditional surrender terms at Reims, France, ending Germany's participation in the war. The document takes effect the next day.
Jodl and Keitel surrender all German armed forces unconditionally:

Thirty minutes after the fall of "Festung Breslau" (Fortress Breslau), General Alfred Jodl arrived in Reims and, following Dönitz's instructions, offered to surrender all forces fighting the Western Allies. This was exactly the same negotiating position that von Friedeburg had initially made to Montgomery, and like Montgomery the Supreme Allied Commander, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, threatened to break off all negotiations unless the Germans agreed to a complete unconditional surrender to all the Allies on all fronts. Eisenhower explicitly told Jodl that he would order western lines closed to German soldiers, thus forcing them to surrender to the Soviets. Jodl sent a signal to Dönitz, who was in Flensburg, informing him of Eisenhower's declaration. Shortly after midnight, Dönitz, accepting the inevitable, sent a signal to Jodl authorizing the complete and total surrender of all German forces.
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The first instrument of unconditional surrender signed at Reims on 7 May 1945.
 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History

5th of May

some of the events you will find here,
please use the following link where you will find more details and all other events of this day .....



1757 – Launch of HMS Southampton, the name ship of the 32-gun Southampton-class fifth-rate frigates of the Royal Navy.
She was launched in 1757 and served for more than half a century until wrecked in 1812.
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George III in HMS Southampton reviewing the fleet off Plymouth, 18 August 1789


1794 - The Action of 5 May 1794 was a minor naval engagement fought in the Indian Ocean during the French Revolutionary Wars.
HMS Orpheus (32), Cptn Henry Newcome, captured french Duguay-Trouin (34) off the Isle of France

The Action of 5 May 1794 was a minor naval engagement fought in the Indian Ocean during the French Revolutionary Wars. A British squadron had been blockading the French island of Isle de France (now Mauritius) since early in the year, and early on 5 May discovered two ships approaching their position. As the strange vessels came closer, they were recognised as the French frigate Duguay Trouin, which had been captured from the East India Company the year before, and a small brig. Making use of a favourable wind, the British squadron gave chase to the new arrivals, which fled. The chase was short, as Duguay Trouin was a poor sailor with many of the crew sick and unable to report for duty. The British frigate HMS Orpheus was the first to arrive, and soon completely disabled the French frigate, successfully raking the wallowing ship. After an hour and twenty minutes the French captain surrendered, Captain Henry Newcome of Orpheus taking over the captured ship and bringing his prize back to port in India.


1806 – Launch of HMS Shannon, a 38-gun Leda-class frigate of the Royal Navy.
HMS Shannon
was a 38-gun Leda-class frigate of the Royal Navy. She was launched in 1806 and served in the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812. She won a noteworthy naval victory on 1 June 1813, during the latter conflict, when she captured the American Navy's USS Chesapeake in a singularly bloody battle.
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Ship portrait. Oil painting by A. de Simone, entitled 'HMS Shannon'.


1813 – Launch of HMS Wolfe (later HMS Montreal, originally HMS Sir George Prevost), a 20-gun sloop-of-war, launched at the Kingston Royal Naval Dockyard at Kingston, Upper Canada
HMS Wolfe
(later HMS Montreal, originally HMS Sir George Prevost) was a 20-gun sloop-of-war, launched at the Kingston Royal Naval Dockyard at Kingston, Upper Canada, on 22 April 1813. She served in the British naval squadron in several engagements on Lake Ontario during the War of 1812. Upon her launch, Wolfe was made the flagship of the squadron until larger vessels became available. Along with the naval engagements on Lake Ontario, Wolfe supported land operations in the Niagara region and at the Battle of Fort Oswego (as Montreal). Following the war, the vessel was laid up in reserve and eventually sold in 1832.
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1829 – Launch of French Créole, a 24-gun Créole-class corvette of the French Navy
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1/40th scale model of Créole, on display at the Musée national de la Marine in Paris

A very good monographie of the LA CREOLE - Corvette - 1823 made by famous Jean Boudriot is available from ancre:
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1840 – Launch of HMS Maeander, a Seringapatam-class sailing frigate of the British Royal Navy
HMS Maeander
was a Seringapatam-class sailing frigate of the British Royal Navy. Her service included the suppression of piracy, the Russian War, and support for the suppression of slavery with the West Africa Squadron. She was wrecked in a gale in 1870.
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1937 – Launch of MV Wilhelm Gustloff, a German cruise ship converted into a hospital ship and which while functioning as a military transport ship was sunk on 30 January 1945 by Soviet submarine S-13 in the Baltic Sea while evacuating German civilians, German officials, refugees from Prussia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Estonia and Croatia and military personnel from Gotenhafen (now Gdynia) as the Red Army advanced.
By one estimate, 9,400 people died, which makes it the largest loss of life in a single ship sinking in history.

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german Docu:

film:

Die Gustloff - good movie with English subs.​

 
Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History

8th of May

some of the events you will find here,
please use the following link where you will find more details and all other events of this day .....



1711 – Launch of HMS Bristol, a 50-gun fourth rate ship of the line built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 18th century
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1744 - HMS Northumberland (70), Cptn. Thomas Watson (mortally wounded), captured by a French squadron of Content (62) and Mars (64).
The Action of 8 May 1744 was a minor naval engagement of the War of the Austrian Succession in which two French ships of the line, the 60-gun Content, and the 64-gun Mars, captured the British ship of the line HMS Northumberland, after a desperate action lasting four hours. Northumberland's captain, Thomas Watson, and her second-lieutenant were among those killed.
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The Description of ye Loss of His Majestys Ship Northumberland Taken by ye French May ye 8th 1744 (PAF4581)


1781 - HMS Port Royal (18) captured by the Spaniards at Pensacola and HMS Mentor (16), Robert Deans, burnt to avoid capture
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A 1783 engraving depicting the exploding magazine which marked the end of the Siege of Penascola


1793 – Launch of French Tigre, a 74-gun ship of the line of the French Navy
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Scale model of Achille, sister ship of French ship Tigre (1793), on display at the Musée de la Marine in Paris.

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Scale: 1:48. Plan showing the body plan with stern board outline, sheer lines with inboard detail, and longitudinal half-breadth for 'Tigre' (1795), a captured French Third Rate,


1794 - HMS Placienta (6), a single-masted forty-six foot Newfoundland hoy, wrecked off Newfoundland
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Scale: 1:48. A plan showing the body plan, sheer lines, and longitudinal half-breadth for 'Placentia' [Pleanica] (1790) and 'Trepassey' [Trepassee] (1790), both single-masted forty-six foot Newfoundland hoys


1794 - French Patriote (74), part of a French squadron under Rear-Admiral Joseph-Marie Nielly, captures HMS Castor (32), Cptn. Thomas Troubridge, off Cape Clear. 20 days later she was recaptured by Francis Laforey's HMS Carysfort
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Hand-coloured. The Castor, a British vessel captured by the French (and flying French colours) is shown on the left of the picture, just before her re-capture by the British vessel Carysfort


1804 - HMS Vincejo (16), John Westly Wright, captured by French flotilla of 6 brigs and 5 luggers off the mouth of the Morbihan
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Second View of HM Sloop El Vincego I W Wright Esqr, Commander, taken in the Bay of Quiberon by Six Brigs & Eleven Gun Boats of the French, on the 8th of May 1804 (PAG9022)


1812 - american Baltimore pilot schooner Arrow was seized by HMS Andromache under Orders in Council, for trading with the French.
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Technique includes scratching out.; Medium includes sepia ink.; Heightened with white. This anonymous watercolour, presumably of an incident in the Anglo-American ware of 1812-14 is inscribed at the bottom: 'The American Schooner bore down on the Pylades Sloop of war, mistaking her, but on receiving a shot made sail & escaped hoisting a white flag at her fore 'Catch me who can' G.H'


1876 – Launch of Caio Duilio, the lead ship of the Caio Duilio class of ironclad turret ships built for the Italian Regia Marina (Royal Navy).
Caio Duilio was the lead ship of the Caio Duilio class of ironclad turret ships built for the Italian Regia Marina (Royal Navy). Named for the Roman admiral Gaius Duilius, the ship was laid down in January 1873, was launched in May 1876, and was completed in January 1880. She was armed with a main battery of four 17.7-inch (450 mm) guns, then the largest gun afloat, and she was capable of a top speed of around 15 kn (28 km/h; 17 mph).
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Caio Duilio while fitting out in 1880


1895 – Launch of HMS Renown, a second-class predreadnought battleship built for the Royal Navy in the early 1890s.
HMS Renown
was a second-class predreadnought battleship built for the Royal Navy in the early 1890s. Intended to command cruiser squadrons operating on foreign stations, the ship served as the flagship of the North America and West Indies Station and the Mediterranean Fleet early in her career. Becoming obsolete as cruiser speeds increased, Renown became a royal yacht and had all of her secondary armament removed to make her more suitable for such duties. She became a stoker's training ship in 1909 and was listed for disposal in 1913. The ship was sold for scrap in early 1914.
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Scale: 1:192


1899 – Launch of Russian Gromoboi (Russian: Громобой, meaning: "Thunderer") was an armoured cruiser built for the Imperial Russian Navy in the late 1890s.
Gromoboi (Russian: Громобой, meaning: "Thunderer") was an armoured cruiser built for the Imperial Russian Navy in the late 1890s. She was designed as a long-range commerce raider and served as such during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05. When the war broke out, she was based in Vladivostok and made several sorties in search of Japanese shipping in the conflict's early months without much success.
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A beautiful and amazing model of the Gromoboi in scale 1:700 built by an old friend of mine Jim Baumann
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1918 - The Action of 8 May 1918 was a small naval engagement which occurred off Algiers, North Africa during World War I.
The Action of 8 May 1918 was a small naval engagement which occurred off Algiers, North Africa during World War I. In the action, an American armed yacht and a British destroyer encountered the German U-boat UB-70. Initially, the engagement was thought to be inconclusive, but later on the allied warships were credited with sinking the German submarine.


1940 - HNLMS Buffel and HNLMS Schorpioen, both monitors ironclad ram ships, captured by germans
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1941 – action of 8 May 1941
German auxiliary cruiser Pinguin, which served as a commerce raider in World War II that captured or sunk 32 ships. On 8 May 1941 she was sunk in a battle with HMS Cornwall in the Indian Ocean.
Of 401 crew, 341 were lost along with 214 of the 238 prisoners aboard.


1942 – World War II: The Battle of the Coral Sea comes to an end with Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier aircraft attacking and sinking the United States Navy aircraft carrier USS Lexington.

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Aerial view of Lexington on 14 October 1941

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USS Lexington explodes on 8 May 1942, several hours after being damaged by a Japanese carrier air attack.


1945 - The unconditional surrender of Germany was ratified by Allies in Berlin. This event is remembered as V-E Day (Victory in Europe Day) !
Victory in Europe Day, generally known as VE Day (Great Britain) or V-E Day (North America), is celebrated on Tuesday, 8 May 1945 to mark the formal acceptance by the Allies of World War II of Nazi Germany's unconditional surrender of its armed forces.
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United States military policemen reading about the German surrender in the newspaper Stars and Stripes
 
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