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MALTA
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The French LE GUILLAUME TELL taken by LION, FOUDROYANT and PENELOPE in the Mediterranean on 30 March 1800. Hospital ship 1831. |
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- At the end of the year she was waiting to go into dock for repairs.
- 1801 Capt. V. C. BERKLEY, 01/1801.
2nd Capt. BERTIE, 03/1801.
Following preparations along the French coast for invasion, MALTA received orders in July to be stationed at St. Helen's to examine all vessels coming into Portsmouth harbour.
Captains and other officers of all ships were ordered to sleep on board.
MALTA was also stationed off Brest and in Bantry Bay - On 11 July 1801 Mr Thomas POPPLETON, Master of MALTA, was charged before a court martial on board GLADIAOOR in Portsmouth with having quitted his ship and going to London without leave.
He was acquitted.
At another court martial in August Lieut. Col. Robert Winter of the marine corps appeared on charges preferred by Capt. BERTIE.
The court found that a conversation between the two was private and that the Lieut. Col. could have no other object than the good of the service.
He was given an honourable acquittal. - MALTA went out of the Sound into harbour at Plymouth on the afternoon of Sunday 4 April 1802 to be stripped and paid off.
Since she drew more than any other ship in the Navy the boats of the fleet were assembled by each buoy to make the marks more visible.
Spectators lined all the vantage points to see her pass.
Capt. BERTIE presented a printed certificate of good conduct (particularly during the Bantry Bay mutiny in December 1799) to each seaman and marine recommending them to any of his Majesty's ships or to the merchant service.
On the 13th. 300 of her crew left for the eastern ports and Capt. BERTIE set off for London. - She remained in ordinary through the peace of Amiens until the middle of March 1803 when orders came down for her to be readied for sea and on the 21st.
Capt. Edward BULLER came down to take command of his new ship.
By the 23rd. the lower rigging was completed and her top-masts were up and by 2 April all the standing and running rigging was set up and she was nearly provisioned and stored.
On 7 April she warped down to the lower moorings.
At seven o'clock on the 10th. MALTA, TONNANT and SPARTIATE got under weigh and, with the wind in the N. N.W.
being just enough to fill their sails, they went down the harbour to join the fleet in Cawsand Bay. - In June MALTA sent into Plymouth the American ship LOVINA, of and from New York bound for Amsterdam with tobacco, which she had detained in the Channel.
MALTA, CANOPUS, SCEPTRE and CONQUEROR left the Channel fleet for the Spanish coast at the beginning of July.
Through the summer and winter they cruised off Ferrol and Coruna. - On the morning of Christmas Day 1803 Plymouth was hit by winds of hurricane strength and the MALTA's prize LES DEUX AMIS was wrecked in the Catwater near Deadman's Bay.
The prize master and his crew narrowly escaped with their lives. She had been bound from Martinique to Bordeaux with 178 hogsheads of sugar and 38 casks of coffee and 40 rank and file of the Plymouth Volunteers had to be called out to prevent the water pirate's boats plundering the cargo as it floated inshore. - MALTA returned to Plymouth for a refit after the winter gales and on 16 July 1804 she and TIGRE were warped down the Hamoaze into the Sound and their moorings in Cawsand Bay.
During the night of 19 December it blew a hard gale and MALTA was obliged to veer more cable and touched some rocks in the bay but did not receive any damage.
A King's pilot, Mr Penn ventured out with some Cawsand men to assist her and their boat was nearly blown out of the water.
At the end of the month she made a trip to Ferrol and on the 29th. several barrels containing nearly 60,000 dollars in silver belonging to Spanish merchants were landed at Plymouth and deposited in Russel's wagon warehouse before being sent to London under escort. - Capt. GRANGER was appointed to take temporary command of MALTA, vice Capt. BULLER, at the beginning of 1805.
- On 22 July 1805 MALTA was with Sir Robert CALDER's squadron when they encountered the combined squadrons of France and Spain.
During more than four hours of action in thick fog two enemy ships, ST RAPHAEL and FIRME, were captured.
MALTA lost five killed and 40 wounded.
MALTA was subsequently attached to the fleet under Lord COLLINGWOOD watching Cadiz. - 1807.
To the Mediterranean in January.
Capt. BULLER was obliged to return to England in May when he developed a violent fever.
Superseded by Capt. William SHIELD, with Lord COLLINGWOOD's squadron off the Dardanelles. - 1808 Capt. R. W. OTWAY, Plymouth.
- 1811 Under repair at Plymouth.
- 1812 Capt. Samuel Hood INGLEFIELD, 10/1811, flagship of Rear Ad. HALLOWELL, who was his brother-in-law, in the Mediterranean for the remainder of the war.
- 1815 Capt. INGLEFIELD, Plymouth.
Capt. William FAHIE, Plymouth. - 1816 Capt. Thomas CAULFIELD, Plymouth.
- 1817 Out of commission at Plymouth.
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