HMS Boston (1762)

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Boston.

Boston
History
Great Britain
Name	HMS Boston
Ordered	24 March 1761
Builder	Robert Inwood, Rotherhithe
Laid down	5 May 1761
Launched	11 May 1762
Completed	16 July 1762 at Deptford Dockyard
Commissioned	May 1762
Fate	Taken to pieces at Plymouth, May 1811
General characteristics
Class and type	Richmond-class fifth-rate frigate
Tons burthen	676 67⁄94 bm
Length	127 ft 5 in (38.84 m) (gundeck) 107 ft 8 in (32.82 m) (keel)
Beam	34 ft 4+1⁄2 in (10.478 m)
Depth of hold	12 ft 0+1⁄2 in (3.670 m)
Sail plan	Full-rigged ship
Complement	210 officers and men
Armament	Upperdeck: 26 × 12-pounder guns QD: 4 × 6-pounder guns Fc 2 × 6-pounder chase guns

L'Embuscade severely damaged Boston in the Port of New York in 1793

HMS Boston was a 32-gun Richmond-class fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She was launched in 1762. She served during the American Revolutionary War and the French Revolutionary War, and was broken up in 1811.

On 16 April 1797, Boston was 18 leagues (87 km) north north east of Cape Finisterre when after a six-hour chase she captured the French privateer Enfant de la Patrie, of 16 guns and 130 men. Enfant de la Patrie was eight days out of Bordeaux but had not taken anything. The captain of the privateer was drunk, and so decided to resist, firing his guns, small arms, and running his vessel into Boston. His rashness resulted in five of his crew being killed, ten wounded, and he himself drowning.

References

• Robert Gardiner, The First Frigates, Conway Maritime Press, London 1992. ISBN 0-85177-601-9.
• David Lyon, The Sailing Navy List, Conway Maritime Press, London 1993. ISBN 0-85177-617-5.
• Winfield, Rif (2007). British Warships in the Age of Sail 1714–17927: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 978-1844157006.

External links

• Media related to HMS Boston (ship, 1762) at Wikimedia Commons