Amphitrite, 1816
Type: 5th rate ; Armament 46
Launched : Bombay 14 Apr 1816 ;
Disposal date or year : 1875
BM: 1064 tons
Notes:

I note that in the 1814 Navy List there is mention of at 38 gun frigate with this name, as if she'd been built, but can only assume that, what with the lines of communication to India being what they were in those days, she's been included f.w.i.w., being as she hadn't even been launched at this date.

24 Dec 1816 Spithead (Captain Plumridge), arrived on Tuesday from Bombay, last from Plymouth, and awaiting a fair wind to go into harbour to pay off.

1 Jan 1820 built of teak.

1830 Portsmouth

26 Mar 1832 arrived Portsmouth from Deptford.

21 Jul 1832 the Nelson, along with the Hibernia, Bellerophon, Edinburgh, Benbow, Spartiate, Pembroke, President, Naiad, Amphitrite, and Trincomalee, it is noted, in the Hampshire Telegraph, were brought forward to be commissioned last summer, at considerable expense, and except for the Spartiate, Edinburgh, and President, and are now to be put back into Ordinary, also at some expense.

5 Dec 1832 arrived Portsmouth from Woolwich.

21 Oct 1847 Squadron Exercises see below

Jun-Jul 1848 Off the Slave Coast (Sierra Leone). See article from the Morning Chronicle, for 11 Sep 1848 below.

19 May 1848 detained slave vessel Triumpho de Brazil. Her condition was as follows: rope, scarcely any; sails so bad, that the sailmaker of the frigate pronounced them beyond repair. She had none of the equipment for a slaver; but could not account for herself, nor explain why she should carry a number of empty casks. Although condemnable, she could not well be burnt, as legal condemnation before a Court was then by no means sure; and should her owners gain a cause, damages would be heavy. Accordingly she was ordered to St. Helena, but being unable to fetch, she bore up and reached Sierra Leone; the prize crew living on farinha and water, and the sails being patched with the bed-linen of the second master in charge of her. The captain of the Triumfo stated that a new suit of sails and rigging was ready at Lagos, where she was to ship her slaves ; with thanks to the book "Six Months' Service in the African Blockade," by Lt Forbes, commanding officer of HMS Bonetta, available in Google books. She was presented to the Vice-Admiralty Court at Sierra Leone for adjudication and condemned. 29 Oct 1850 Tonnage Bounty became due for payment.

24 Jun 1848 detained the slave schooner Curioso, 161 tons, master M. F. de Oliveira Barras, with 337 slaves on board, taken to the Vice-Admiralty Court at Sierra Leone for adjudication and condemned, and her surviving 303 slaves emancipated. 29 Oct 1850 Tonnage Bounty and proceeds from hull etc. became due for payment.

2 Jul 1848 detained slave schooner Secundo de Julho / Dois de Julho, 138 tons, master J. R. Viana, with 303 slaves, which was taken by a prize crew to the Vice-Admiralty Court at Sierra Leone and subsequently condemned and her surviving 299 slaves emancipated. 29 Oct 1850 Tonnage Bounty and Slave and Tonnage Bounties became due for payment.

10 Sep 1848 detained slave brigantine S. Ant�nio Triunfo, masters J P da Silva ; followed by Joaquim Pinto de Sa, which was sent to the Vice-Admiralty Court, at Sierra Leone for adjudication and condemned.

18 Sep 1848 detained in lat 4� 4' S. long 3� 15' E., the slave brig Josefa / Josepha, 220 tons, master M. F. de Azevedo, which was sent to the Vice-Admiralty Court at St. Helena for adjudication and condemned : no slaves embarked.

30 Aug 1851 Pacific

20 Dec 1848 Pacific Station(B)

19 Jun 1852 At Sydney it is reported by a visiting ship that this vessel was at Honolulu

11 May - 7 Sep 1854, when news of the war being declared against the Russians was received the British force on the China and Japan station consisted of the President, Pique, Amphitrite, Trincomalee, Virago and the French the Forte, Eurydice, Artemise, and Obligado. A number of operations appear to have been carried out, none of which were carried through to a satisfactory conclusion - see p. 429-> at www.archive.org/details/royalnavyhistory06clow

18 Dec 1854 It is reported that this vessel arrived on the morning of the 12th Oct per Polynesian of Oct 14, having departed from San Fransico on 2 Sep and have been cruising for the past 6 weeks, but have seen no Russians. They have been in at Monterey, and again returned to SF, whence they departed the second time and arrived here nearly direct

12 June 1855, the squadron, including the Pique, Dido, Brisk, Encounter, Barracouta, FNS Alceste, and the American store put to sea, but having met with the Amphitrite, and FNS Eurydice, returned to Petropalovski departing a day or so later.

27 Jun 1855, joined the Barracouta and Pique, as senior officer, off the coast of Siberia, and experiencing floating ice, and parts of the coast that were still ice-bound.

30 Jun 1855, off the river Amoor, where it was thought that some Russian vessels may have been hidden, and where the masters of the 3 ships carried out a survey to see how navigable the river was.

7 Jul 1855, departed for the port of Ayan in Siberia, and on the 8th experienced visibility of about 50 miles, and not long afterwards arrived at their destination.

15 Jul 1855, the Barracouta and Pique departed Ayan, leaving the Amphitrite to sail later.

1860 Devonport.

1862 lent to contractors at Plymouth

1870 Devonport, In Ordinary

The Slave Trade
(From the Morning Chronicle, September 11. [1848])
By the Prince Regent, arrived off Falmouth on the 7th, from Sierra Leone, we have advices from the slave coast to the middle of July, and from the more remote stations to the latter end of Jane. A letter from the Bight of Benin, dated the 22nd of June, states that her Majesty's ships Amphitrite, 26 guns; Captain Thomas Rodney Eden; the Cygnet brigantine, 6 guns, Commander Kenyon ; the Blazer steamer, Lieutenant G. T. C. Smith, R.N. ; the Star, 8-gun brig, Commander Riley; and the brigantine Dolphin, 3 guns, Lieutenant the Hon. F. Boyle, R.N., commanding, were in the Bight then ; and that the Firefly steamer, Lieutenant Ponsonby, R.N., commanding, was daily expected there to reinforce the squadron under Captain Eden's superintendence. The Britomart, 12-gun sloop. Commander Chamberlain, and the Grappler steamer, Lieutenant Lysaght, R.N., departed from Benin to join the Commodore-in-Chief at the southward on the above day. The Sealark, 10 guns. Commander Moneypenny, the Bonetta brigantine, 3 guns, Lieutenant F. E. Forties, R.N., commanding , and the Philomel, 10-gun brig, Commander W. C. Wood, were at Sierra Leone on the same date. The pendant ship Penelope, steam-frigate, Commodore Sir Charles Hotham, K.C.B., Commander-in-Chief: together with the Water Witch, 8-gun brig, Commander Quin ; the Syren, 16-gun sloop, Commander Chaloner ; the Rapid, 8-gun brig, Commander Dickson ; the Contest, 12-gun sloop, Commander Macmurdo ; the Bittern, 16 gun sloop, Commander Hope ; the Dart, 3-gun brigantine, Lieutenant Glynn ; and the Pluto steamer, Lieutenant Richardson - were on the southern division of the station at the date of our letters.

The Dolphin captured a slaver a few days back, with 450 slaves on board, after a very hard chase of seven hours. Upwards of 80 shot from her long pivot 32-pounder were fired at the slaver, and about forty of the number, it is said, struck, committing fearful havoc with the vessel and horrible slaughter among her human cargo, affording another proof of the humanity (?) of our system for the suppression of this wicked trade. One shot is stated to have literally taken the heads off six slaves, and wounded double that number, in addition to which, in the hurry of shipment, no fewer than fifty poor enchained wretches were drowned in the surf. It is no uncommon thing to lose, 150 lives in that manner where the surf is bad.

The Star chased a slaver (a schooner) for twelve hours on the 21st of June, from Badagry to Palms, but the fleetness of the slaver saved her, and she got away - a very frequent occurrence. The Britomart this month (June) chased two full slaver schooners off Whydah, and after a most spirited run lost them both. A slave schooner, well rigged and handled, will elude the grasp of any sailing ship in chase of her, unless the latter get within range and knock the spars away ; but what an awful sacrifice of life and limb, even in that case, may follow the striking her, as seen in capture made by the Dolphin above mentioned. The captain of the vessel taken by the Dolphin has lately made several successful runs ; and the same man was taken in a slaver captured by the Grappler in last December. Such is only a trifling sample of the success (?) attending the efforts of the cruizers to put down the slave trade on this pestilential coast, and such the result of the risk of life of some of Britain's bravest defenders in the futile effort. " Verily," says our correspondent, " if the prayers of the poor coast cruizers will prove of any avail, our Exeter Hall friends will stand but a sorry chance of salvation." Commodore Sir Charles Hotham is in the south, and the Dart had just left the Bight to join him ; Lieutenant Hill, of the Rapid, is appointed to relieve Lieutenant Glynn in the command. Sir Charles was expected at the Bight in August. The Amphitrite detained a schooner last month off Cape Lopez - her name was the Triumpho de Brazil ; she was sent to St. Helena for condemnation. The Amphitrite crew had been sickly, but were much better at the date of these advices ; she had sent six men to hospital at Fernando Po, on the 22nd of June, by the Grappler. Captain Eden did not seem to have such good health on the station this time as he had during the first commission he served on it. The coast threatened to be sickly, but the British squadron generally was free from contagion at the last dates. The Nimrod, 20-gun corvette, Commander Belgrave, arrived at St. Helena, from the Cape of Good Hope, on the 12th of July.