Model of a 74-gun ship, 3rd rate, circa 1760. Thought to be either HMS Hercules or HMS Thunderer from 1760.
History
Royal Navy EnsignGreat Britain
NameThunderer
Ordered15 July 1756
BuilderWoolwich Dockyard
Launched19 March 1760
FateWrecked, 1780
General characteristics [1]
Class and typeHercules-class ship of the line
Tons burthen160933⁄94 (bm)
Length166 ft 6 in (50.75 m) (gundeck)
Beam46 ft 6 in (14.17 m)
Depth of hold19 ft 9 in (6.02 m)
PropulsionSails
Sail planFull-rigged ship
Armament
  • 74 guns:
  • Lower gundeck: 28 × 32 pdrs
  • Upper gundeck: 28 × 18 pdrs
  • Quarter deck: 14 × 9 pdrs
  • Forecastle: 4 × 9 pdrs
One of two cannons attributed to HMS Thunderer, displayed at a rum cake factory on Grand Cayman Island
Descriptive plaque at a cannon attributed to Thunderer

HMS Thunderer was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 19 March 1760 at Woolwich.[1] She earned a battle honour in a single-ship action off Cadiz with the French ship Achille (64 guns) in 1761, during the Seven Years' War.

She foundered in the Great Hurricane of 1780 in the West Indies,[1] reportedly 90 miles east of Jamaica on the Formigas Banks with the loss of all 617 on board.[2] Among the lost sailors were the Captain, Robert Boyle-Walsingham (1736–1780), and Midshipman Nathaniel Cook (1764–1780), the second child of Captain James Cook.

Two cannons attributed to the ship are displayed at a rum cake factory on Grand Cayman Island. A plaque states that they were recovered in 1984 by the research vessel Beacon.[2]

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 Lavery, Ships of the Line vol.1, p176.
  2. 1 2 Tippin, pp. 45–50

Media related to HMS Thunderer (ship, 1760) at Wikimedia Commons

References

  • Lavery, Brian (2003). The Ship of the Line – Volume 1: The Development of the Battlefleet 1650–1850. Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-252-8.
  • Tippin, G. Lee; Humphreys, Jr., Herbert (1989). In search of the Golden Madonna: the treasure finders of the RV Beacon. Daring Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-93893-686-2.


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