HMS Victory
The fifth Victory, the last of the series, Horatio Nelson's immortal flagship, and her sister ships were essential to Britain's continued superiority on the seas during the Napoleonic Wars. Her dimensions were two thousand one hundred and sixty-four tons, one hundred and eighty-six feet length of keel, and fifty-two and a half feet of breadth by twenty-one and a half of depth; giving the Victory once more the distinction of being the largest and finest ship of war yet constructed.
On December 13th, 1758, the Board of the Admiralty ordered the construction of a new 100 gun first rate ship of the line. Her designer was Thomas Slade, Surveyor of the Navy. The keel was laid on July 23rd, 1759 at Chatham Dockyard's No 2 Dockyard, supervised by Master Shipwright, Edward Allen, from designs by Sir Thomas Slade, and launched on May 17, 1765. She was christened Victory and she was the largest Royal Naval vessels commissioned. More than 2000 oak trees - 60 acres of forest - were needed for her hull and three masts, With her 27 miles of rigging and four acres of canvas sails, she was a floating gun platform with 104 guns to fire broadsides from her three decks. She took six years to build and had a crew of more than 800 officers and men. She was very maneuverable for her size because of the innovative shape of her lower hull and in certain weather she was as fast as some of the smaller ships.
She was launched on May 7th, 1765 but placed in reserve for 13 years. HMS Victory cost £63,174 to build in 1765; in that period the navy spent f26,000 a year to maintain a first-rate battleship.
One point worthy of note in connection with the Victory is, that while the ship turned out to be perhaps the most perfect and smartest line-of- battle man-of-war England ever possessed, try as they might, naval constructors never could manage to build another exactly similar or of equal efficiency. The great success which the Victory proved - as evidenced by her sobriquet of 'the smartest three-decker afloat' - is made still more remarkable when one considers the low ebb at which the art of naval construction was between 1740 and 1790. British home-built vessels were surpassed, both for speed and mancenvring capabilities, by the ships of Spain and France during this period. Indeed, the best ships in the British service were either captured vessels, recommissioned under our flag, or else vessels built with slavish exactness on the lines of these. On the other hand, British ships, when taken, were invariably rated in the enemy's service in a lower grade than they originally occupied.
HMS Victory carried long 32-pounders on her lower deck, 24-pounders on her middle deck, and 12-pounders on her main and upper decks. In the three- decker the heaviest ordnance was placed naturally nearest to the waterline ; and in her case it will be observed that she had not the same remarkable number of types as were carried in the Elizabethean ships. Owing to the extremely short range of these smooth-bore cannon, it was necessary to fight in close proximity to the foe, and resolute captains made a practice of getting as near as they could in order that when, or even before, the fire of the enemy began to slacken his ship might be taken by the primitive-but eminently satisfactory-method of boarding.
In 1793 four 32 pounder carronades were substituted on upper deck and six 18 pounder carronades were added on poop, making her total number of guns at this time 110. The last six were subsequently removed, and at Trafalgar she had no guns on the poop. In 1803 two 68 pounder carronades were placed on the forecastle, instead of two 32 pounders, when the weight of her broadside fired from 52 guns was l,I601b. The word "carronade," as applied to cannon, is often puzzling ; it was used to denote the short but powerful guns which were manufactured at the Carron Ironworks in Scotland, not far from Edinburgh. The weight of the broadside of the 52 guns of the Victory was l,160 1b.
HMS VICTORY, the Flag Ship of Admiral Lord Nelson, is still in commission and situated in Portsmouth Naval Base.
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