View source for USS Tigress (1813)

{{other ships|USS Tigress}}
{|{{Infobox ship begin}}
{{Infobox ship image
|Ship image=
|Ship caption=
}}
{{Infobox ship career
|Hide header=
|Ship country=United States
|Ship flag={{USN flag|1814}}
|Ship name=USS ''Tigress''
|Ship namesake= 
|Ship ordered=
|Ship builder=[[Adam and Noah Brown]], [[Erie, Pennsylvania]]
|Ship laid down=
|Ship launched=1813
|Ship sponsor=
|Ship christened=
|Ship completed= 
|Ship acquired=
|Ship commissioned=1813
|Ship in service=
|Ship out of service=
|Ship renamed=
|Ship reclassified=
|Ship refit=
|Ship struck=
|Ship reinstated=
|Ship homeport=
|Ship motto=
|Ship nickname=
|Ship honors=
|Ship fate=Captured by the British, 3 September 1814
|Ship notes=
}}
{{Infobox ship career
|Hide header=title
|Ship country= United Kingdom
|Ship flag={{shipboxflag|United Kingdom|naval}}
|Ship name=HMS ''Surprise''
|Ship acquired=
|Ship commissioned=
|Ship decommissioned=
|Ship in service=
|Ship out of service=
|Ship struck= 
|Ship reinstated=
|Ship homeport=
|Ship motto= 
|Ship nickname=
|Ship honours=
|Ship fate= Sunk at her moorings
|Ship notes=
}}
{{Infobox ship characteristics
|Hide header=
|Header caption=
|Ship type= [[Schooner]]
|Ship tonnage={{convert|52|LT|t|0|lk=in|abbr=on}}
|Ship length={{convert|50|ft|m|abbr=on}} [[Length between perpendiculars|p/p]] 
|Ship beam={{convert|17|ft|m|abbr=on}}
|Ship draft=
|Ship depth=
|Ship hold depth={{convert|5|ft|m|abbr=on}}
|Ship propulsion=
|Ship sail plan=
|Ship speed=
|Ship boats=
|Ship complement=27
|Ship armament=1 × 32-pounder gun
|Ship notes=
}}
|}

'''USS ''Tigress''''' was a [[schooner]] of the [[United States Navy]] which took part in the [[Battle of Lake Erie]] in 1813. In September 1814, the schooner was captured by the British and subsequently served in the [[Royal Navy]] as '''HMS ''Surprise'''''.

==Service history==

===Battle of Lake Erie===

Built at [[Erie, Pennsylvania]], by [[Adam and Noah Brown]], as the schooner ''Amelia''. She was launched in the spring of 1813, probably in April. The ship was then acquired by the Navy for service with Master Commandant [[Oliver Hazard Perry]]'s forces on [[Lake Erie]], it was renamed ''Tigress'' and was placed under the command of Lt. Augustus H. M. Conkling.
[[File:Battle of Lake Erie -- Commodore Perry's victory - Ballou's Pictorial 1856.jpg|thumb|Battle of Lake Erie, [[Gleason's Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion|Ballou's Pictorial]] 1856]]
''Tigress'' took part in the [[Battle of Lake Erie]] at [[Put-in-Bay, Ohio]] on 10 September 1813, being one of several gunboats which caused heavy damage to {{HMS|Detroit|1813|6}}, the [[flagship]] of Commander [[Robert Heriot Barclay]], and other British ships.

===Battle of the Thames===
Perry consequently convoyed American troops into the territory formerly held by the British, investing [[Fort Malden|Malden]] on 23 September and [[Detroit]] (which the British had captured in 1812) four days later. On 2 October, a small naval flotilla, consisting of ''Tigress'', {{USS|Scorpion|1813|2}} and {{USS|Porcupine|1813|2}}, under the command of Lieutenant [[Jesse Elliott]], ascended the [[Thames River (Ontario)|Thames River]] to support an overland expedition under General [[William Henry Harrison]]. In the ensuing [[Battle of the Thames]], Harrison's army routed the mixed British and Indian force. The Indian leader [[Tecumseh]] was killed in the battle.

===Lake Huron===
{{see also|Engagements on Lake Huron}}
''Tigress'' subsequently sailed for [[Lake Huron]], where she took part in blockading operations into the summer of 1814. She and ''Scorpion'' drew the task of standing watch over the entrance to the [[Nottawasaga River]], the sole supply source for the British garrison on [[Mackinac Island]]. By early September, the situation in this town was desperate. If the blockade were not lifted within a fortnight, dwindling food supplies would force the British to surrender.{{citation needed|date=December 2011}}

By late summer, Tigress and Scorpion were patrolling between Manitoulin Island and the Straits of Mackinac.

To break the blockade, four boatloads of British soldiers, sailors and Indigenous warriors set out from Mackinac Island on the night of 3 September 1814. Members of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, led by Captain Andrew Bulger partook in the operation. They slipped alongside ''Tigress'', which was anchored close inshore, and boarded the schooner. A brief and bloody battle followed and although "warmly received" by the vessel's crew, the British captured the ship in five minutes. "The defense of this vessel," wrote Lieutenant [[Miller Worsley]], in command of the attackers, "did credit to her officers, who were all severely wounded." (This included the vessel's commander, Sailing Master [[Stephen Champlin]].)

While the surviving officers and men were sent ashore as prisoners of war, Worsley retained the greater part of the boarding party on board and kept the ship's American flag flying. ''Scorpion'' soon arrived on 6 September and anchored some two miles distant. Worsley, in a daring stroke, ran the captured ''Tigress'' alongside ''Scorpion'' and captured her, too. Both American vessels and their captured crews were later taken to Mackinac.

===Fate===
The British renamed their prizes soon thereafter. ''Tigress'' became HMS ''Surprise'', an appropriate name in view of the nature of her capture,  and ''Scorpion'' became HMS ''Confiance''. Both subsequently served the Royal Navy until the end of the war, when they were laid up and allowed to sink at their moorings in the Grand River. One of the wrecks retrieved from Penetanguishene Bay in 1953 was not ''Tigress'', as was reported in ''Time'' Magazine, but was in fact HMS ''Tecumseth'', which is now housed in the Tecumseth Centre located at the north end of the historical site Discovery Harbour.

==References==
* {{DANFS|http://www.history.navy.mil/research/histories/ship-histories/danfs/t/tigress-i.html}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tigress (1813)}}
[[Category:Schooners of the United States Navy]]
[[Category:1813 ships]]
[[Category:Ships built in Erie, Pennsylvania]]