Armenia (1796 ship)

Armenia was a merchant vessel launched at Calcutta in 1796. Captain Thomas Meek (or Meik), was her only captain. In 1799 the East India Company (EIC) took her up for a voyage to Britain. A French privateer captured her on her return voyage to India.

History
Great Britain
NameArmenia
OwnerWalker
BuilderCalcutta
Launched1796,[1] or 1795[2]
FateCaptured 1800
General characteristics
Tons burthen518,[3] or 51870⁄94,[1] or 519[2](bm)
Armament12 × 3-pounder + 4 × 6-pounder guns[2]
NotesTeak-built

Early career

She made one trip to Britain for the EIC. On that trip she left St Helena on 6 July in the company of the East Indiamen Tellicherry, Triton, and Barwell, and under escort by the 18-gun Cornwallis.[4][lower-alpha 1] Armenia arrived in Britain on 27 September.[5]

Armenia was admitted to the Registry in Great Britain on 16 November 1799.[3] Armenia appears in the 1800 issue of the Register of Shipping with T. Meek, master, and Walker, owner, and trade London−India.[2]

Capture and postscript

The French privateer Clarisse captured Armenia on 5 July 1800 and sent her into Mauritius.[6] Clarisse was armed with 16 guns and had a crew of 180 men under the command of Captain François-Thomas Le Même. Armenia encountered Clarisse at 7°30′S 79°30′E; after a five-hour chase Clarisse caught up with Armenia and combat ensued. Captain Meik resisted, but after about 40 minutes of exchanging fire he stuck. Armenia had lost her Third Officer killed and six men wounded, one of whom died later; Clarisse appeared to have had three men killed.[7] Another report has Clarisse's casualties as seven killed and 20 wounded.[8]

Le Même took Captain Meik (or Meek), his second officer, and the crew on board the privateer. The four passengers, one of them a woman, and the wounded remained on Armenia and reached Mauritius on 17 July, where the French government provided good care.[lower-alpha 2] The passengers were then able to return to India in about a month later.[7]

Meik and his crew were apparently left on the Seychelles. On 29 October Meik, his crew, and two midshipmen and 15 men from HMS Adamant and HMS Lancaster were put in a small boat of 35 tons bound to Colombo.[lower-alpha 3] On 9 November, at about midnight, the boat ran into rocks in the Maldives. Five of the navy men, three of Armenia's crew, and five Frenchmen died in an attempt to reach shore on a makeshift raft. The survivors took two Maldivian boats and set sail again. Meik arrived at Cochin on 4 December. Mr. Maddox, a midshipman from Lancaster, died of sickness on the passage. At the time of Meek's letter (6 January 1801) reporting his trials, the second boat, which also had some navy personnel aboard, had not been heard from.[10]

On 20 July 1801, the members of the Bengal Phoenix Insurance Society presented Captain Meik with an elegant, engraved sword worth 1600 sicca rupees.[11][lower-alpha 4] Then on 24 September, the Calcutta Insurance Company voted a donation of £150 to the mother of Armenia's Second Officer, £100 to the Steward, who distinguished himself in the action, and 500 sicca rupees to establish an annuity fund for the two seamen who suffered in the action.[13]

Notes
  1. HMS Cornwallis was an 18-gun brig that did not enter into Admiralty records.[4] A few passing mentions in other contexts are the sole indicators of her existence. She appears to have been purchased at the Cape of Good Hope. Lieutenant Richard Byron was appointed to command her in March 1798 and to Commander on 22 June. He sailed her "with dispatches" to Britain, where she was paid off and seemingly never returned to service.
  2. The Isle de France Gazette noted the arrival of Arménien, Captain Fabre, on the 17th after a 10-day transit.[9]
  3. Although the account offers no explanation for the source of the men from the two Royal Navy ships, the numbers suggest they were prize crews on vessels that the French had recaptured.
  4. The sicca rupee weighed 192 grains and contained 176 grains of pure silver.[12]

Citations
  1. Hackman (2001), p. 222.
  2. Register of Shipping (1800), Seq. №A661.
  3. House of Commons (1814), p. 627.
  4. Naval Chronicle, Vol. 2, p.353.
  5. Hardy (1811), p. 224.
  6. Lloyd's List, no.4117, - accessed 11 November 2014.
  7. Anon. (1868), p.269.
  8. Austen (1935), p. 104.
  9. Piat (2007), p. 93.
  10. Asiatic Annual Register, (1801), Vol. 3, p.56.
  11. The Asiatic Annual Register; Or, A View of the History of Hindustan,: And of the Politics, Commerce, and Literature of Asia, .... (1803;J. Debrett, Piccadilly), p. 6.
  12. Yule & Burnell (1903), pp. 834–5.
  13. Anon. (1868), Vol. 3, pp.285-6.

References
  • Anon. (1868) Selections from the Calcutta Gazettes of the Years 1798, 1799, 1800, 1801, 1802, 1803, 1804, and 1805, Showing the Political and Social Condition of the English in India Sixty Years Ago, Vol. 3.
  • Austen, Harold Chomley Mansfield (1935). Sea Fights and Corsairs of the Indian Ocean: Being the Naval History of Mauritius from 1715 to 1810. Port Louis, Mauritius: R.W. Brooks.
  • Hackman, Rowan (2001). Ships of the East India Company. Gravesend, Kent: World Ship Society. ISBN 0-905617-96-7.
  • Hardy, Horatio Charles (1811). A register of ships, employed in the service of the Honorable the United East India Company, from the year 1760 to 1810: with an appendix, containing a variety of particulars, and useful information interesting to those concerned with East India commerce. Black, Parry, and Kingsbury.
  • House of Commons, Parliament, Great Britain (1814). Minutes of the Evidence Taken Before the Select Committee on Petitions Relating to East-India-Built Shipping. H.M. Stationery Office.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  • Piat, Denis (2007). Pirates and Corsairs in Mauritius. Translated by North-Coombes, Mervyn. Christian le Comte. ISBN 978-99949-905-3-5.
  • Yule, Henry; Burnell, A.C. (1903). Crooke, William (ed.). Hobson-Jobson. London: John Murray. p. 251.
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