USS Chesapeake (1799)

Type

Frigate

Period

19th Century

Nation

United States

Overview: USS Chesapeake was one of the original six frigates authorized by the Naval Act of 1794 for the fledgling United States Navy, designed by Joshua Humphreys. She is best remembered for her stunning defeat and capture by HMS Shannon during the War of 1812, and for the dying words of her captain, James Lawrence, "Don't give up the ship." Specifications: Chesapeake was originally planned as a 44-gun frigate, but construction delays, material shortages, and budget problems led builder Josiah Fox to redesign her as a 38-gun ship. As built she measured 152 ft 6 in in length with a 40 ft 11 in (sometimes cited as 41 ft 4 in) beam, displaced roughly 1,244 tons, and carried a mixed armament of 18-pounder long guns and 32-pounder carronades with a complement of around 340 men. Her reduced dimensions made her noticeably shorter than sister ships Constitution and Constellation, but with a proportionally wider beam that made her comparatively heavy and slow. Service History: Launched 2 December 1799 at Gosport Navy Yard and commissioned in 1800, Chesapeake served in the Quasi-War with France and the First Barbary War. In 1807 she was infamously fired upon by HMS Leopard when her captain refused a search for deserters, an incident that helped inflame tensions leading to the War of 1812. On 1 June 1813, under Captain James Lawrence, she engaged HMS Shannon off Boston in a brutal single-ship action; the action lasted only about ten to fifteen minutes, but ended with Chesapeake disabled, boarded, captured, and taken into British service. Notable Facts: After capture, the ship was taken into the Royal Navy as HMS Chesapeake, and was broken up in 1819. Much of her timber was used to build the Chesapeake Mill in Wickham, Hampshire, which still stands today as a preserved structure incorporating the frigate's original wood. The ship was already considered something of an "unfortunate ship" by contemporaries even before her final, famous defeat, and Shannon's captain Philip Broke was renowned for having drilled his gun crews to an exceptionally high standard of accuracy before the encounter.