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View Full Version : On This Day 13 June



Coog
06-13-2012, 05:55
On 13 June 1796, about 12 leagues south of Cape Clear, Ireland, the 36-gun frigate HMS Dryad, under the command of Captain Lord Amelius Beauclerk, captured the 38-gun French frigate Proserpine following a relatively brief chase but a bitter action. In the engagement, Proserpine, under the command of Citizen Pevrieu, lost 30 men killed and 45 wounded out of her crew of 348 men. Dryad had two men killed and seven wounded. In 1847 the Admiralty awarded the Naval General Service Medal with clasp "Dryad 13 June 1796" to all surviving claimants from the action.

As the Royal Navy already had a Proserpine, the Admiralty renamed the captured vessel HMS Amelia. The Royal Navy classified her as a fifth rate of a nominal thirty-eight guns.
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