Belle (or Belle Packet, or Bell) was a brig constructed at Calcutta in 1802. Gilmore and Wilson built her at a cost of Sicca Rupees 50,000.[4] There is a little ambiguity about her purpose. One source states that she was built for the British East India Company (EIC) as a fast-sailing dispatch vessel.[5] The EIC may have used her for that purpose in 1804, but a contemporary account gives her another purpose. The Asiatic Annual Register reported for January 1803 that Gilmore and Wilson had launched "a remarkably beautiful vessel of 272 tons...named the Belle". She was "built purposely for the Bussorah trade, for Samuel Manesty, esq. resident at that place" and her master was to be Alexander Foggo.[2][a]
| History | |
|---|---|
 United Kingdom | |
| Name | Belle |
| Owner | Samuel Manesty[1] |
| Builder | Gilmore & Wilson, Calcutta |
| Launched | 1802 |
| Fate | Captured October 1805 |
| General characteristics | |
| Tons burthen | 272 (carpenter's measurement),[2] or 281[3][4][5] (bm) |
| Propulsion | Sail |
| Sail plan | Ship-rigged |
| Complement | 40,[3] |
| Armament | 8 × 12 + 2 × 42-pounder carronades[6] |
| Notes | Teak built. |
Captain Alexander Foggo (or Fogo, or Fogge) sailed her from Calcutta on 29 November 1804 for London. She was at Kedgeree on 1 April 1805. She reached Saint Helena on 28 June and arrived at Long Reach on 17 August.[7]
Captain Alexander Fogge acquired a letter of marque on 4 September 1805.[3] The Register of Shipping for 1805 shows A. Fogge as master and owner, and her trade as London–India.[6]
In October 1806 the French Navy's Rochefort squadron captured the "Belle Packet, from London to Bengal", in the Bay of Biscay and took her into La Rochelle.[8][b] She was 10 days out of Portsmouth when the French captured her around the end of October. She had been carrying EIC dispatches and private mail. Foggo apparently succeeded in destroying the dispatches as the correspondence that the French papers published was only of a private nature.[9][10] (Other accounts give a date of January 1806 for the capture.[4][5]) The Register of Shipping for 1806 has the notation "captured" by Belle's entry.
Postscripts
editIn March 1806, Foggo married a Miss Stewart, aged 17, who had been a passenger on Belle when the French captured Belle and carried her into La Rochelle.[11] Miss Stewart was probably Miss Margaret Stuart.[12]
In addition to Miss Stewart, Belle had been carrying to Calcutta eight Anglo-Indian women as passengers. The appropriate assistance from the French State for them generated some discussion. They ranged in age from 24 to 50, three were Catholic and five were Hindu, they were indigent, and they were "coloured women" "devoid of any attachment to a master".[13]
Notes
editCitations
edit- ^ East-India register and directory (1803), p.96.
- ^ a b The Asiatic Annual Register: Or a View of the History of Hindustan and of the Politics, Commerce and Literature of Asia, for the year 1803 (1804), p.7.
- ^ a b c "Letter of Marque, p.15 - accessed 25 July 2017" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 20 October 2016. Retrieved 2 December 2017.
- ^ a b c Phipps (1840), pp. 100 & 130.
- ^ a b c Hackman (2001), p. 224.
- ^ a b Register of Shipping (1804), Seq.№B122.
- ^ British Library: Belle.
- ^ Lloyd's List, №4294, 4 February 1806.
- ^ Scots Magazine ..., (1806), Vol. 68, p.229.
- ^ "From The French Papers." Times [London, England] 10 Mar. 1806: 3. The Times Digital Archive. Accessed 1 Dec. 2017.
- ^ Selections..., p.421.
- ^ "Yesterday morning the dispatches for Bengal, Madras, and St. Helena, by the Belle packet, were." Times [London, England] 22 Nov. 1805: 3. The Times Digital Archive. Accessed 1 Dec. 2017.
- ^ Duché (2014), p. 112.
References
edit- Duché, Elodie Marie (September 2014). A passage to imprisonment: The British prisoners of war in Verdun under the First French Empire. PhD Thesis, University of Warwick.
- Hackman, Rowan (2001). Ships of the East India Company. Gravesend, Kent: World Ship Society. ISBN 0-905617-96-7.
- Phipps, John (1840). A Collection of Papers Relative to Ship Building in India ...: Also a Register Comprehending All the Ships ... Built in India to the Present Time ... Scott.
- Selections from Calcutta Gazettes of the years ... (1868) O. T. Cutter, Military Orphan Press [ab Bd. 3:] Office of Superintendent Government Printing.