Class of Ships present at Trafalgar

[Cpt Kangaroo]

I was reading some Stats for Trafalgar, and I wanted to see the ship classes listed along with the rates and guns.

Does anyone know if such a list exists, links, etc.

I recall a lot of great compilations have been presented by our members, but I don't recall a list that specific for Trafalgar.

I am sure I am not the only person who would enjoy this.

Maybe the same resource would include other battles.
:minis:

[TexaS]

Something along these lines?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_battle_at_the_Battle_of_Trafalgar

[Cpt Kangaroo]

Something along these lines?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_battle_at_the_Battle_of_Trafalgar



That is a great list, but the ship class is not included, such as the Victory being a Royal George class of ship.

[Nightmoss]

They do list ship classes in some cases, but you have to click on the name of each ship to see it in the next page that opens up. Including an extra column with ship classes would have been nice, too bad they didn't do so?

[Walram]

Another very good site (my favorite) is:
http://threedecks.org/index.php?display_type=show_battle&id=157

As with the one mentioned above, you will need to click on the ship name to get ship specific data.

Best of luck with your research.

[Diamondback]

Actually, Victory is not a Royal George--she's a one-off, keel initially laid using RG draughts but basically a Slade 74 on anabolic steroids.

Here's what I have so far... Existing, announced or close-enough in bold, announced with reservations in italic.

RatingBritishFrenchSpanish
1st
1745 Est 100-gun: HMS Britannia
Mod 1745 Est 100-gun: HMS Victory
RS/Umpire 100-gun: 1786 HMS Royal Sovereign
SP one-off 136 Nuestra Senora de la Santisima Trinidad
SP Santa Ana 112-gun: Santa Ana, Principe de Asturias
SP Rayo 100-gun: Rayo
2nd
1797 Neptune 98-gun: HMS Neptune, HMS Temeraire, HMS Dreadnought
London 98-gun: HMS Prince
3rd
ex-FR Tonnant 80-gun: HMS Tonnant
Slade Common 74: Defence, Bellerophon, Defiance, Thunderer
Canada 74-gun: HMS Orion
Ajax 74L: HMS Ajax (SGN104)
ex-FR Temeraire/clone 74: Spartiate, Belleisle, Achille
one-off 74 Revenge
Colossus 74: HMS Colossus
Courageux 74: HMS Leviathan, HMS Minotaur
Mars-cl and mod Mars 74: HMS Mars, HMS Conqueror
Swiftsure-cl 74-gun SOL: HMS Swiftsure (NOT a Slade)
Intrepid-cl 64-gun SOL: HMS Polyphemus
Inflexible-cl 64-gun: HMS Africa
Ardent-cl 64-gun SOL: HMS Agamemnon
FR Tonnant 80-gun: Formidable, Indomptable
FR Bucentaure 80-gun SOL: Bucentaure, Neptune
FR Temeraire 74-gun SOL: Scipion, Duguay-Trouin, Mont-Blanc, Aigle, Achille, Algesiras, Fougueux, Argonaute, Redoutable, Heros, Pluton
FR ex-UK Slade 74: Berwick, Swiftsure
SP Montanes 80-gun SOL: Neptuno, Montanes, Monarca, Argonauta
SP San Pedro de Alcantara upgun 64->74: Bahama
Ildefonsino 74: SP San Ildefonso, FR Intrepide
SP San Juan Nepomuceno and related 74: San Agustin, San Francisco de Asis, San Juan Nepomuceno, San Justo
SP “Landa 64”: San Leandro
5th
1795 Amazon 38 frigate: HMS Naiad
Apollo 36 frigate: HMS Euryalus
Phoebe 36 frigate: HMS Phoebe (both SGN103 near)
Sirius 36 frigate (based on ex-FR Minerve HMS San Fiorenzo): HMS Sirius
FR Coquille 40-gun frigate: Themis
FR Virginie 40-gun frigate: Cornelie, Rhin
FR Hortense 40-gun frigate: Hortense, Hermione (both SGN105)
Unrated8-gun schooner HMS Pickle
ex-FR 10-gun cutter EntreprenanteFR Abeille 16/18-gun brig: Furet
FR Vigilant 16-gun brig: Argus

ThreeDecks is generally very good, but inconsistent, incomplete and occasionally has transcription errors--for example, based on an error in their pages Ares once asked me about a French captured UK Portland as a 64 which I had to reply with "I have the book they cite for that and it's a mistranscription--never went above a 50 or maybe 52." If memory serves, I actually have a thread in my "Historical Orders of Battle" series about this one... I also don't just look at "class" but related design families--many designers liked to iterate on existing designs rather than go back to clean sheets of paper, this explains why the 1744 French Invincible (the ancestor of almost all Thomas Slade's 74's and a half-dozen of his 64s) didn't see its final derivative built until 1811 with the three-decker HMS Union, a slightly-downgunned but dimensionally and structurally identical near-sister to Victory.

[Cpt Kangaroo]

David, thanks for the input. I had seen this site but dismissed it as I didn't click on the ships name. That is quite a lot of info compiled on each. Wow!

[Cpt Kangaroo]

Diamondback, as always, you have the 'Skinny' on ships stats. Thanks for sharing. It is a pity that other reference lists don't have this tied in with their charts so you don't have to go searching for it.

[7eat51]

DB, please remind me - have you uploaded the various charts you have assembled? You do great work. :thumbsup:

[Diamondback]

Thanks, Eric--actually they're coded as tables right into the post they appear in. I could very easily convert them to Excel and upload them to the Files section, though... Orders of Battle I usually start as a Word doc, makes for easier copy-pasting of the raw data which gets deleted as I reformat it into the table.

Erin, the part that doesn't help is that the concept of "class" as "built to common plans," along with "standardized designs" is a relatively recent concept--phase-in started around the 1760s in Britain and France, and before that individual Master Shipwrights at building yards were told "here's your dimensional requirements, here's what the gundecks need to be laid out to take, design and build as you see fit to meet those requirements."

[csadn]

Looking forward to seeing _Rayo_, for no other reason than her Captain was Irish (Henry Macdonnell, whose first name was usually rendered "Enrique").

[Walram]

Diamondback, You are right about ThreeDecks - very good, incompletes in some areas, etc.

But Erin's thread may be a good starting place for us to post good references we all could use. Best would be what is available on the web and that we all would have access to, but book references would be OK. There are a number of things I look for in my research of ships involved in a battle. Class of ship is one, but also broadside weight (I convert the various nations pounds to kg's [to three decimal points] for consistency in comparison), Crew strength (on day of battle if possible), Length of ship at Gun deck (converted to meters to the 4th decimal point), rating (in the British rating system.)
I've started working on Trafalgar myself for next year's Enfilade! 2016.

Here are a couple of good Spanish web sites I've found:

http://www.todoababor.es/articulos/index_traf.htm
Good Spanish source of information on the Battle of Trafalgar.

http://www.batalladetrafalgar.com/esp.htm
Excellent source of information on Spanish ships at Trafalgar. Probably enough to put you in information overload.

http://www.batalladetrafalgar.com/artilleria.htm
Good breakout of guns of the Spanish ships.

There appears to be a point of contention on the number of carronades on the ships at the battle. (Would be rather important considering the close in action for much of the battle.) One of the Spanish sites lists the amount of ammunition on each of the Spanish ships [VERY good record keeping!] Several of the SOL didn’t carry any carronade ammunition.

I know we have many out there that like doing the research (I'm one of them!) - How about posting your reference/source material?:question:

[Diamondback]

My primary data sources:
David Lyon and Rif Winfield - The Sail & Steam Navy List (covers the Royal Navy from Napoleon's final defeat to just before the coming of turret Dreadnoughts--useful as a "snapshot" at game's end and what was left)
Rif Winfield - British Warships in the Age of Sail 1714-1792 (the BWAS series builds on S&SNL, but is better detail-wise)
From those, I fill in with ThreeDecks then search individual ships on Wikipedia as an interim stopgap until Barnes & Noble and Naval Institute Press perform a Cranio-Rectal Extraction on making e-editions of the rest of the _WAS series available--Ares relies on ThreeDecks, frankly over-relies on it just a bit IMO.