HMS Pendennis (1679)
HMS Pendennis was a 70-gun third rate ship of the line of the English Royal Navy, built by Phineas Pett II at Chatham Dockyard and launched in 1679.[1]
| History | |
|---|---|
 England | |
| Name: | HMS Pendennis |
| Builder: | Phineas Pett II, Chatham Dockyard |
| Launched: | 1679 |
| Fate: | Wrecked, 1689 |
| General characteristics [1] | |
| Class and type: | 70-gun third rate ship of the line |
| Tons burthen: | 1,093 long tons (1,110.5 t) |
| Length: | 150 ft (45.7 m) (gundeck) |
| Beam: | 40 ft 1 in (12.2 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 17 ft (5.2 m) |
| Propulsion: | Sails |
| Sail plan: | Full-rigged ship |
| Armament: | 70 guns of various weights of shot |
She had a brief career that involved a failed attempt by one captain to defect her to France and participation in the Battle of Bantry Bay before she was wrecked on the Kentish Knock during a storm in late 1689.
Design and construction
Pendennis was one of twenty new third rate ships of the line ordered in April 1677 under the naval programme of that year, known as the Thirty Ships Programme, which was requested by Samuel Pepys in response to the Dutch and French navies surpassing England in the total number of ships of the line despite the English victory in the Third Anglo-Dutch War.[2]
She had a length of 150 ft 10 in (46.0 m) at her gundeck, a beam of 40 ft 3.5 in (12.281 m), and a hold depth of 17 ft (5.2 m). She measured 1,051 31⁄94 tons burthen and had a draught of 17 ft (5.2 m). She carried 70 guns with 13 gunports on the sides of each deck and had a crew of 460 men, reduced from a planned 470. According to the 1685 gun establishment, on her lower gun deck, Pendennis carried 22 demi-cannon and four culverin guns. Her upper deck originally had twenty-six twelve-pounder guns. There were 14 sakers on the forecastle and the quarterdeck, as well as four 3-pounders on the roundhouse.[2]
Built under the supervision of naval architect Master Shipwright Phineas Pett II at Chatham Dockyard, Anne, possibly named after James II of England's daughter, the future Queen Anne,[3] was launched in 1679,[4] part of the first batch of twelve third rates of the 1677 programme.[2]
Service
Pendennis was commissioned on 25 September 1688 under the command of Captain Sir William Booth, and by October was part of Dartmouth's fleet. On 16 March 1689, Booth, a secret Jacobite, attempted to involve the lieutenants of the ship in an attempt to defect to France while the ship was lying at Sheerness. However, he was unsuccessful in persuading them and instead fled to France, fearing discovery.[5] George Churchill replaced Booth as captain and under his command she fought in the Battle of Bantry Bay on 1 May. Pendennis was wrecked on the Kentish Knock on 26 October.[4][1]
Notes
- Lavery, Ships of the Line vol.1, p162.
- Winfield, p. 61
- "Anne Wreck". Shipwreck Museum. 2 August 2010. Retrieved 4 May 2020.
- Winfield, p. 64
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: John Knox Laughton (1886). . In Stephen, Leslie (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. 5. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p. 391.