HMS_Grinder_(1809)

HMS <i>Grinder</i> (1809)

HMS Grinder (1809)

Gunboat of the Royal Navy

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Grinder.

Grinder was a gunboat serving as a tender, rather than a commissioned warship, to HMS Anholt, the British garrison on the island of Anholt during the Gunboat War. Grinder's origins are obscure, but the Danes captured her in 1810 and the British recaptured her in 1811.[lower-alpha 1] She was sold in 1832.

Quick Facts History, United Kingdom ...

Prelude - capture of Anholt

On 18 May 1809, the 74-gun third rate HMS Standard, under Captain Askew Hollis, led in a squadron that also included the frigate Owen Glendower, and the four smaller ships Avenger, Ranger, Rose, and Snipe. Together they captured the island.[5] A landing party of seamen and marines under the command of Captain William Selby of Owen Glendower, with the assistance of Captain Edward Nicolls of the Standard's marines, landed. The Danish garrison of 170 men put up a sharp but ineffectual resistance that killed one British marine and wounded two; the garrison then surrendered. The British took immediate possession of the island.[5]

Tender to HMS Anholt

In 1810 Captain Nicolls, now Governor of Anholt, was concerned about reports of a Danish force gathering in Jutland to retake Anholt.[6] He therefore ordered boats off Anholt to maintain a watch over Randers Fjord and Grenå whenever the wind was fair. To this end he re-launched "GB Grinder", which had overwintered on the island. Nicolls gave Grinder a crew made up of 30 seamen and marines from the island's garrison and captained by Master's Mate Thomas Hester.[6][lower-alpha 2] Nicolls also assigned Grinder the mission of intercepting trade along the shore.[6]

Grinder captured a Danish trading sloop "on the Swedish coast" on 17 March. On the following day Nicolls sent her "to look into the harbour of Harrup", where she discovered a number of small Danish trading vessels and proceeded to capture five of them "...in sight of the enemies flotilla of gunboats".[6][lower-alpha 3] Reportedly, these six were among 12 merchantmen that Grinder had captured.

Capture by the Danes, (1810)

On 13 April 1810 Grinder was pursuing two small ships when Senior Lieutenant Peter Nicolay Skibsted,[9][10] who with four Danish gunboats was convoying eight transport ships from Udbyhøj (at the mouth of the Randers Fjord, Jutland) to Samsø, spotted her. He immediately concealed his gunboats behind the transports, thus tricking Grinder into drawing closer. As soon as Hester noticed the stratagem, he tried to escape, but Skibsted was successful in the next 90 minutes in rowing up to him, and after a few shots were exchanged, forcing Hester to surrender.[11] The muster rolls for HMS Anholt record Hester and 27 men as "discharged - prisoner in Denmark" on 17 April 1810. One man was recorded as having died.[7]

The Times reported that

"A Gottenburg mail has brought letters and papers to the 3rd inst. An article, under the date April 21, gives a long account of the capture of an English gun brig in the Baltic. This vessel had wintered at Anholt. Her loss was two men killed and two wounded. She proved to be the Grinder, Lieutenant Esher."[12][13]

Danish service (21 April 1810 to 5 July 1811)

The Danes brought Grinder into Samsø where they repaired her battle damage. They renamed her Prise No.5, and Midshipman Oldelan then commissioned her on 21 April 1810; in Danish service she was armed with:

  • One 24-pounder cannon
  • One 24-pounder carronade and
  • One 4-pounder howitzer.[14]

On 23 June 1810 Prise No.5 sailed to Fladstrand (modern name Frederikshavn). There she joined the flotilla under Senior Lieutenant Falsen,[15] which already included two large and two smaller gunboats, plus the captured Minx. Prise No.5 then moved to Skagen, (Northern Jutland) where on 4 and 5 August, a storm forced her aground. She was refloated and in December she sailed to Fladstrand, where she was laid up. From March 1811 Prise No.5 was based at Fladstrand.

Recapture (1811)

The Danes record that on 5 July 1811 the British recaptured Prise No.5 between the islands of Hjelmen and Sejerø when the Fladstrand flotilla attacked a British convoy.[16] On that day HMS Sheldrake was in company with the third rates Cressy, Defence, and Dictator, and the gun-brig Bruizer, with the British warships protecting a convoy of merchantmen. As they passed Hjelm Island a flotilla of 17 Dano-Norwegian gunboats and 10 rowboats came out to attack the convoy. The attackers lost four gunboats; the convoy had no losses. During the action, Sheldrake captured the Danish gunboats No. 2 and No. 5.[17]

Fate

While laid up at Sheerness, Grinder was offered for sale by the Admiralty on 24 July 1832,[18] and sold on 22 August the same year.[19]

Notes

  1. Another ship named Grinder was also captured in 1810, but by a French privateer not the Dano-Norwegian navy. The sloop Favorite then recaptured this Grinder on 3 October 1810[2] and she was probably the merchant vessel referred to in the press in January 1811 arriving at Whitehaven - "The Grinder, Turner, loaded with a cargo of wool from Lisbon; taken by a French privateer but retaken by an English sloop of war and carried into Plymouth..."[3][4]
  2. Danish and German sources, and English language sources based on these, name the captain as Lieutenant Thomas Ester or Esther. Neither of these names appears in British records as a commissioned officer. However, the muster book for HMS Anholt does list Master's Mate Thomas Hester.[7]
  3. Harrup may be the English rendering of the Danish place name Hurup, now marked on maps as Øster Hurup, on the east coast of Jutland. Many inner harbours on Jutland were still frozen in at mid-March 1810 and gunboat crews were often on winter leave during the period when the seas were frozen – so the gunboats seen may have been iced in or unmanned.[8]

Citations

  1. [1]
    Wandell (1815) p.260
  2. [2]
    "No. 16464". The London Gazette. 16 March 1811. p. 513.
  3. [3]
    Lancaster Gazette, 19 January 1811.
  4. [4]
    Caledonian Mercury (Edinburgh), 24 January 1811.
  5. [5]
    "No. 16260". The London Gazette. 23 May 1809. p. 736.
  6. [6]
    National Archives, Kew, London: ADM 1/10 - letters from Admiral commanding, Baltic 1810
  7. [7]
    National Archives, Kew, London: ADM/37/2397 - muster book for HMS Anholt 1810.
  8. [8]
    Wandell (1815), pp.261-262.
  9. [9]
    Topsøe-Jensen og Marquard, Vol. 2, pp. 519-20
  10. [10]
    With I P page 119
  11. [11]
    Garde p.548
  12. [12]
    The Times, 14 May 1810
  13. [13]
    Morning Chronicle (London), 14 May 1810.
  14. [14]
    Record card for Grinder 1810, renamed Prize No 5
  15. [15]
    Wandell (1815), p.268.
  16. [16]
    Degenkolv (1906), p.216.
  17. [17]
    "No. 16692". The London Gazette. 12 January 1813. p. 112.
  18. [18]
    "No. 18965". The London Gazette. 10 August 1832. p. 1838.
  19. [19]
    J. J. Colledge; Ben Warlow (28 February 2010). Ships of the Royal Navy: The Complete Record of All Fighting Ships of the Royal Navy. Casemate Publishers. p. 170. ISBN 978-1-935149-07-1. Retrieved 3 October 2011.

References

  • (in Danish) Degenkolv, H. (1906) Oplysninger vedrørende den danske flaades skibe i sidste aarhundrede. (Information concerning The Danish fleet's ships in the last century). (København).
  • (in Danish) Garde, Hans Den dansk-norske Sömagts historie 1700-1814. (The History of Danish-Norwegian Naval Power).
  • (in Danish) With, J.P. Danske og norske søheltes Bedrifter fra Aar 1797 - 1813. (The exploits of Danish and Norwegian sea-heroes in the years 1797 - 1813). page 119
  • (in Danish) Topsøe-Jensen, T.A., og Emil Marquard (1935) Officerer i Den dansk-norske søetat 1660-1814 og Den danske søetat 1814-1932. (Andet bind Kloppenborg-Ørsted. H. Hagerup). (Officers of the Danish-Norwegian Naval service). Vol 2. Page 519
  • (in Danish) Wandell, C.F. (1815) Søkrigen i de dansk-norske farvande 1807-14 (The War at sea in Danish-Norwegian Waters 1807-14), (Copenhagen: Carlsbergsfonden for Jacob Lund).
  • (in Danish)With I P (1819) Danske og Norske Søheltes Bedrifter 1797 - 1813 (Tales of Danish Naval Heroes from 1797 - 1813)

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