HMS Berwick (1775) - Royal Navy Service

Royal Navy Service

As one of the newest ships of the line, she was commissioned in December 1777. On the entry of France into the American War of Independence in 1778 Berwick joined the Channel Fleet. In July, she took part in the Battle of Ushant under the command of Captain the Hon. Keith Stewart. She served with the Channel Fleet throughout 1779.

In 1780 she was sent out to the West Indies as part of a squadron under Commodore Walshingham that was sent out to reinforce the fleet under Sir George Rodney. But Walshingham's ships arrived too late for the battles of that year and she was then sent to Jamaica. The lieutenant on this trip was John Hunter who later became an admiral and the second Governor of New South Wales.

While Berwick was on the Jamaica station, she received serious damage from the October 1780 West Indies hurricane, which completely dismasted her and drove her out to sea. The damage forced her to return across the Atlantic to England for repairs.

After repairs, the Berwick sailed to the North Sea where Captain Stewart became commander in chief of the station. The North Sea was becoming an increasingly important convoy route because French and Spanish squadrons cruising in the Western Approaches to the Channel had made that route unsafe for British convoys.

In 1781 Berwick was under the command of Captain John Ferguson. On 17 April she, with Belle Poule, captured the privateer Callonne, under the command of Luke Ryan. Calonne was only two years old, a fast sailer, and well equipped for a voyage of three months and a crew of 200 men. She was armed with twenty-two 9-pounder guns, six 4-pounder guns and six 12-pounder carronades.

When the British Admiralty received news that the Dutch, who had joined the war at the beginning of 1781, were fitting out a squadron for service in the North Sea, it reinforced the Berwick with a squadron under Vice-Admiral Sir Hyde Parker, who had hoisted his flag in Fortitude.

On 15 August, while escorting a convoy of 700 merchantmen from Leith to the Baltic, Parker's squadron of seven ships of the line met a Dutch squadron under Rear-Admiral Johan Zoutman, also consisting of seven ships of the line, and also encumbered with a convoy. In the ensuing Battle of Dogger Bank, Berwick suffered a total of 16 killed and 58 wounded.

After the war, Berwick was paid off in 1783 and laid up in ordinary.

She was commissioned again on 1 January 1793 under Captain Sir John Collins. At the outbreak of the French Revolutionary Wars he sailed her out for the Mediterranean on 22 May to join the fleet under Admiral Lord Hood. Under Hood, Berwick participated in Toulon operations late in the year.

Collins died in March 1794. His successors were, in short order, Captains William Shield, George Campbell, George Henry Towry, and lastly, William Smith.