3rd rate 64 (3m).
L/B:
160 × 45 (48.8m × 13.7m). Tons:
1,348 bm. Hull:
wood. Comp.:
520. Arm.:
26 × 24pdr, 26 × 12pdr, 12 × 6pdr. Built:
Henry Adams, Buckler's Hard, Eng.; 1781.
HMS Agamemnon first saw action in the West Indies with Rear Admiral Richard Kempenfelt's squadron when it captured fifteen ships from a French convoy under Admiral Count Luc Urbain de Guichen, who was bound for the Caribbean. Four months later she was in Admiral Sir George Rodney's squadron at the Battle of the Saintes, April 11, 1782, in which the British defeated the French fleet under Rear Admiral Count François J. P. de Grasse, recouping a little of the glory (but none of the nation) they had lost at the Battle of the Chesapeake the previous summer. When the revolutionary French government declared war on Great Britain in 1793, Agamemnon came under command of Captain Horatio Nelson. Nelson sailed with Lord Howe's Mediterranean Fleet in the blockade of Toulon and in the capture of the Corsican ports of Bastia and Calvi, where Nelson lost his right eye. Agamemnon remained in the Mediterranean until 1796, a period during which Nelson molded his "band of brothers" and began to establish himself as an innovative, resolute, and daring commander. Nelson was quite fond of his command, and described Agamemnon as "without exception the finest 64 in the service."
The following year, Agamemnon was with the Channel Fleet when her crew were implicated in the mutiny of the Nore. Present at Nelson's great victory in the Battle of Copenhagen in 1801, her next significant assignment was in 1805 when she sailed with Vice Admiral Sir John Orde's fleet off Cadiz. In July she took part in Admiral Sir Robert Calder's action with the Combined Fleet off El Ferrol. Her squadron later came under the command of Admiral Lord Nelson. During the Battle of Trafalgar against the Franco-Spanish fleet, Agamemnon sailed in Nelson's weather column but escaped with relatively few casualties. After further service off Cadiz, she sailed for the West Indies where she took part in several engagements against French naval units and privateers. Over the next few years she sailed variously in the West Indies, the Baltic, off Portugal, and off South America. On June 20, 1809, while putting into the River Plate in a storm, she grounded on an unmarked reef and was lost, though without loss of life.
Hepper, British Warship Losses. Mackenzie, Trafalgar Roll.
