Fire ship
Encyclopedia
Sailing ship
The term sailing ship is now used to refer to any large wind-powered vessel. In technical terms, a ship was a sailing vessel with a specific rig of at least three masts, square rigged on all of them, making the sailing adjective redundant. In popular usage "ship" became associated with all large...
s, was a ship filled with combustibles, deliberately set on fire and steered (or, where possible, allowed to drift) into an enemy fleet, in order to destroy ships, or to create panic and make the enemy break formation. Ships used as fire ships were usually old and worn out or purpose-built inexpensive vessels. An explosion ship or hellburner
Hellburners
Hellburners were specialised fireships used in the Siege of Antwerp during the Eighty Years' War between the Dutch rebels and the Habsburgs. They were floating bombs, also called "Antwerp Fire", and did immense damage to the Spanish besiegers...
was a variation on the fire ship, intended to cause damage by blowing up in proximity to enemy ships; for example the English used the fire ship technique on the Spanish Armada
Spanish Armada
This article refers to the Battle of Gravelines, for the modern navy of Spain, see Spanish NavyThe Spanish Armada was the Spanish fleet that sailed against England under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia in 1588, with the intention of overthrowing Elizabeth I of England to stop English...
during the Battle of Gravelines.
Ancient era, first uses
Possibly the oldest account of the military use of a fire ship is recorded by the Greek
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...
historian Thucydides
Thucydides
Thucydides was a Greek historian and author from Alimos. His History of the Peloponnesian War recounts the 5th century BC war between Sparta and Athens to the year 411 BC...
on the occasion of the failed Athenian
Classical Athens
The city of Athens during the classical period of Ancient Greece was a notable polis of Attica, Greece, leading the Delian League in the Peloponnesian War against Sparta and the Peloponnesian League. Athenian democracy was established in 508 BC under Cleisthenes following the tyranny of Hippias...
Sicilian Expedition
Sicilian Expedition
The Sicilian Expedition was an Athenian expedition to Sicily from 415 BC to 413 BC, during the Peloponnesian War. The expedition was hampered from the outset by uncertainty in its purpose and command structure—political maneuvering in Athens swelled a lightweight force of twenty ships into a...
(415–413 BC). In the episode, the Athenian expeditionary force successfully repels an attack by the Syracusans:
The rest [of the Athenian force] the enemy tried to burn by means of an old merchantman which they filled with faggots and pine-wood, set on fire and let drift down the wind which blew full on the Athenians. The Athenians, however, alarmed for their ships, contrived means for stopping it and putting it out, and checking the flames and the nearer approach of the merchantman, thus escaped the danger.
A fire ship was used in the Battle of Red Cliffs
Battle of Red Cliffs
The Battle of Red Cliffs, otherwise known as the Battle of Chibi, was a decisive battle at the end of the Han Dynasty, immediately prior to the Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history. It was fought in the winter of 208/9 AD between the allied forces of the southern warlords Liu Bei and Sun Quan...
(208
208
Year 208 was a leap year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Aurelius and Geta...
AD) on the Yangtze River
Yangtze River
The Yangtze, Yangzi or Cháng Jiāng is the longest river in Asia, and the third-longest in the world. It flows for from the glaciers on the Tibetan Plateau in Qinghai eastward across southwest, central and eastern China before emptying into the East China Sea at Shanghai. It is also one of the...
when Huang Gai
Huang Gai
Huang Gai was a military general who served the warlord Sun family of Eastern Wu for three generations during the late Han Dynasty and Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history...
assaulted the enemy naval force with a fire ship filled with bundles of kindling, dry reeds, and fatty oil.
The invention of Greek fire
Greek fire
Greek fire was an incendiary weapon used by the Byzantine Empire. The Byzantines typically used it in naval battles to great effect as it could continue burning while floating on water....
in 673
673
Year 673 was a common year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 673 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.- Europe :* Hlothhere becomes king of Kent.* The city...
increased the use of fire ships, at first by the Greeks and afterward by other nations as they came into possession of the secret of manufacturing this compound
Chemical compound
A chemical compound is a pure chemical substance consisting of two or more different chemical elements that can be separated into simpler substances by chemical reactions. Chemical compounds have a unique and defined chemical structure; they consist of a fixed ratio of atoms that are held together...
. In 951
951
Year 951 was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar.- Europe :* The king of Italy dies and his widow, Adelaide of Italy, is overthrown by an usurper, Berengar of Ivrea.- Asia :...
and again in 953
953
Year 953 was a common year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar.- Europe :* Liudolf, Duke of Swabia and Conrad the Red rebel against German King Otto I....
Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n fleets narrowly escaped destruction by fire ships.
Age of Fighting Sail, refinement
While fire ships were used in the Medieval period, notably during the CrusadesCrusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
, these were typically ships that were set up with combustibles on an ad hoc basis. The career of the modern fire ship, as a naval vessel type designed for this particular function and made a permanent addition to a fleet, roughly parallels the era of cannon-armed sailing ships, beginning with the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 and lasting until the English victory over the Turks at the Battle of Navarino
Battle of Navarino
The naval Battle of Navarino was fought on 20 October 1827, during the Greek War of Independence in Navarino Bay , on the west coast of the Peloponnese peninsula, in the Ionian Sea. A combined Ottoman and Egyptian armada was destroyed by a combined British, French and Russian naval force...
in 1827. The first modern fireships were put to use in early seventeenth century Dutch and Spanish fleet actions during the Thirty Years War. Their use increased throughout that century, with purposely-built fireships a permanent part of many naval fleets, ready to be deployed whenever necessary. While only used sparingly during the Napoleonic Wars, fire ships as a distinct class were part of the British Royal Navy until 1808, at which point the use of permanently designated fire ships attached to British squadrons disappeared. Fire ships continued to be used, sometimes to great effect such as by the U.S. Navy at the Battle of Tripoli Harbor
Battle of Tripoli Harbor
The Second Battle of Tripoli Harbor, was a naval action during a naval blockade which took place in Tripoli Harbor in 1804. The battle is part of the First Barbary War between forces of the United States and the forces of Tripoli.-Background:...
in 1804 and by the British Navy's Thomas Cochrane
Thomas Cochrane
Thomas Cochrane may refer to:*Thomas Cochrane, 8th Earl of Dundonald , Scottish nobleman and politician*Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald , Marquis of Maranhão, naval officer and radical politician...
at the Battle of the Basque Roads
Battle of the Basque Roads
The Battle of the Basque Roads, also Battle of Aix Roads was a naval battle during the Napoleonic Wars off the Island of Aix...
in 1809, but for the most part they were considered an obsolete weapon by the early nineteenth century.
Warships of the age of sail
Age of Sail
The Age of Sail was the period in which international trade and naval warfare were dominated by sailing ships, lasting from the 16th to the mid 19th century...
were highly vulnerable to fire. Made of wood, with seams caulked with tar, ropes greased with fat, and stores of gunpowder, there was little that would not burn. Accidental fires destroyed many ships, so fire ships presented a terrifying threat. With the wind in exactly the right direction a fire ship could be cast loose and allowed to drift onto its target, but in most battles fire ships were equipped with skeleton crews to steer the ship to the target (the crew were expected to abandon ship at the last moment and escape in the ship's boat). Fire ships were most devastating against fleets which were at anchor or otherwise restricted in movement. At sea, a well-handled ship could evade a fire ship and disable it with cannon fire. Other tactics were to fire at the ship's boats and other vessels in the vicinity, so that the crew could not escape and therefore might decide not to ignite the ship, or to wait until the fire ship had been abandoned and then tow it aside with small maneuverable vessels such as galleys.
The role of incendiary vessels changed throughout the age of the modern fire ship. The systematic use of fire ships as part of naval actions peaked around the Third Anglo-Dutch War
Third Anglo-Dutch War
The Third Anglo–Dutch War or Third Dutch War was a military conflict between England and the Dutch Republic lasting from 1672 to 1674. It was part of the larger Franco-Dutch War...
. Whereas just twenty years before a naval fleet might have six to seven fire ships, by the Battle of Solebay
Battle of Solebay
The naval Battle of Solebay took place on 28 May Old Style, 7 June New Style 1672 and was the first naval battle of the Third Anglo-Dutch War.-The battle:...
in 1672 both the Dutch and English fleets employed typically between 20 and 30 fire ships, and sometimes more. By this time, however, admirals and captains had become very experienced with the limitations of fire ship attacks and had learned how to avoid them during battle. Great numbers of fire ships were expended during the Third Dutch War without destroying enemy men-of-war, and fire ships had become a way to harrass and annoy the enemy, rather than destroy him. The successful use of fire ships at the Battle of La Hogue and Cherbourg in 1692 marked both the greatest achievement of a fire ship attack since the Spanish Armada, and also the last significant success for fire ships. Though fire ships as a specified class sailed with the British Royal Navy for another century, they would never have a significant impact on a naval victory. Once the most feared weapons in naval arsenals, fire ships had declined in both importance and numbers, so that by the mid-eighteenth century only five to six British fire ships would be at sea at a time, and the Royal Navy attempted only four attacks using modern fire ships between 1697 and 1800. Hastily outfitted ad hoc fire ships continued to be used in naval warfare; for example, a large number of fire rafts were used in mostly ineffective attacks on the British fleet by American forces during the American Revolution at Philadelphia, on the Hudson River, and elsewhere. The end of the modern fire ship came in the early nineteenth century, when the British began to use hastily outfitted fire ships at engagements such as Boulogne and Dunkirk despite the presence of purpose-built fire ships in the fleet. The last modern fire ship in the British Royal Navy was Thais, the only designated fire ship out of the entire navy of 638 warships when she was converted to a ship sloop in 1808.
Use in the Greek War of Independence
In the Greek War of IndependenceGreek War of Independence
The Greek War of Independence, also known as the Greek Revolution was a successful war of independence waged by the Greek revolutionaries between...
, 1821-1832, Greek fire ships were manned and sailed alongside a small and medium Turkish ship attached to her with hooks, ropes and grips, and then set on fire by the captain alone when the crew was in the escape boat. As the small fire ships were much more manoeuvrable than enemy ships of the line, especially in the coasts of the Aegean Sea where the islands, islets, reefs, gulfs and straits restrained big ships from being easily moved, they were a serious danger for the ships of the Turkish fleet. Many naval battles of the Greek war of independence were won by the use of fire ships.
Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, obsolescence
Steam engine
A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid.Steam engines are external combustion engines, where the working fluid is separate from the combustion products. Non-combustion heat sources such as solar power, nuclear power or geothermal energy may be...
propulsion and the use of iron, rather than wood, in shipbuilding gradually came into use, making fire ships less of a threat. During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
in September 1940, there was a British sortie codenamed Operation Lucid
Operation Lucid
Operation Lucid was a British plan to use fire ships to attack invasion barges that were gathering in ports on the northern coast of France in preparation for a German invasion of Britain in 1940...
to send old oil tanker
Oil tanker
An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a merchant ship designed for the bulk transport of oil. There are two basic types of oil tankers: the crude tanker and the product tanker. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crude oil from its point of extraction to refineries...
s into French ports to destroy barges intended for the planned invasion of Britain
Operation Sealion
Operation Sea Lion was Germany's plan to invade the United Kingdom during the Second World War, beginning in 1940. To have had any chance of success, however, the operation would have required air and naval supremacy over the English Channel...
; it was abandoned when both tankers broke down. Ships or boats packed with explosives could still be effective. Such a case was Operation Chariot of 1942, in which the old destroyer HMS Campbeltown
HMS Campbeltown (I42)
HMS Campbeltown was a "Town"-class destroyer of the Royal Navy during the Second World War. She was originally an American destroyer , and, like many other obsolescent U.S. Navy destroyers, she was transferred to the Royal Navy in 1940 as part of the Destroyers for Bases Agreement. Campbeltown...
was packed with explosives and rammed into the dry dock at Saint-Nazaire
Saint-Nazaire
Saint-Nazaire , is a commune in the Loire-Atlantique department in western France.The town has a major harbour, on the right bank of the Loire River estuary, near the Atlantic Ocean. The town is at the south of the second-largest swamp in France, called "la Brière"...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, to deny its use to the battleship Tirpitz
German battleship Tirpitz
Tirpitz was the second of two s built for the German Kriegsmarine during World War II. Named after Grand Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, the architect of the Imperial Navy, the ship was laid down at the Kriegsmarinewerft in Wilhelmshaven in November 1936 and launched two and a half years later in April...
, which could not drydock anywhere else on the French west coast. In the Mediterranean, the Italian Navy
Regia Marina
The Regia Marina dates from the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861 after Italian unification...
made good use of high-speed boats filled with explosives, mostly against moored targets. Each boat, called by the Italians MTM (Motoscafo da Turismo Modificato), carried a 300 kilograms (661.4 lb) explosive charge inside their bow
Bow (ship)
The bow is a nautical term that refers to the forward part of the hull of a ship or boat, the point that is most forward when the vessel is underway. Both of the adjectives fore and forward mean towards the bow...
. Their best-known action was the 1941 assault on Souda Bay
Sinking of HMS York
The Raid on Souda Bay was an Italian Navy's small craft assault on Souda Bay, Crete, during the first hours of 26 March 1941. The Royal Navy heavy cruiser and the Norwegian tanker Pericles were disabled by Italian motor launches and eventually lost....
, which resulted in the destruction of cruiser HMS York
HMS York (90)
HMS York, pennant number 90, was a heavy cruiser of the Royal Navy built in the late 1920s. She mostly served on the North America and West Indies Station before World War II. Early in the war the ship escorted convoys in the Atlantic and participated in the Norwegian Campaign in 1940...
and the Norwegian
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
tanker Pericles, of 8,300 tons
Tonnage
Tonnage is a measure of the size or cargo carrying capacity of a ship. The term derives from the taxation paid on tuns or casks of wine, and was later used in reference to the weight of a ship's cargo; however, in modern maritime usage, "tonnage" specifically refers to a calculation of the volume...
.
In 1946, as part of Operation Crossroads
Operation Crossroads
Operation Crossroads was a series of nuclear weapon tests conducted by the United States at Bikini Atoll in mid-1946. It was the first test of a nuclear weapon after the Trinity nuclear test in July 1945...
, the American landing ship
Landing craft
Landing craft are boats and seagoing vessels used to convey a landing force from the sea to the shore during an amphibious assault. Most renowned are those used to storm the beaches of Normandy, the Mediterranean, and many Pacific islands during WWII...
demonstrated the potential of explosives ships containing nuclear weapons. Eight vessels were sunk in the test in addition to LSM-60, including the aircraft carrier
Aircraft carrier
An aircraft carrier is a warship designed with a primary mission of deploying and recovering aircraft, acting as a seagoing airbase. Aircraft carriers thus allow a naval force to project air power worldwide without having to depend on local bases for staging aircraft operations...
. The successful attack
USS Cole bombing
The USS Cole Bombing, or the USS Cole Incident, was a suicide attack against the United States Navy destroyer on October 12, 2000 while it was harbored and refueled in the Yemeni port of Aden. Seventeen American sailors were killed, and 39 were injured...
by terrorists in a speedboat packed with explosives on the USS Cole
USS Cole (DDG-67)
The second USS Cole is an Arleigh Burke-class Aegis-equipped guided missile destroyer homeported in NS Norfolk, Virginia. The Cole is named in honor of Marine Sergeant Darrell S. Cole, a machine-gunner killed in action on Iwo Jima on 19 February 1945, during World War II...
in 2000 is another extension of the idea. Another remarkable incident took place in April 2004, during the Iraq War, when three motor craft laden with explosives attempted the bombing of Khawr Al Amaya Oil Terminal in the Persian Gulf
Persian Gulf
The Persian Gulf, in Southwest Asia, is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.The Persian Gulf was the focus of the 1980–1988 Iran-Iraq War, in which each side attacked the other's oil tankers...
. It instead sank a rigid inflatable boat from USS Firebolt
USS Firebolt (PC-10)
USS Firebolt is the 10th member of the Cyclone-class of coastal patrol boats. She is a vessel with a crew of approximately 30 sailors, normally homeported at Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek, Norfolk, Virginia. Her armament includes two Mk38 chain guns, two Mk19 automatic grenade launchers, and...
as it pulled up along side, killing two US Navy personnel and one member of the US Coast Guard.
Notable uses
Notable fire ship attacks include:- Alexander the Great's Siege of TyreSiege of TyreThe Siege of Tyre was a siege of the city of Tyre, a strategic coastal base on the Mediterranean Sea, orchestrated by Alexander the Great in 332 BC during his campaigns against the Persians. The Macedonian army was unable to capture the city through conventional means because it was on an island...
in 332 BC. The Tyrians used the fire ship in attempt to destroy Alexander's moleMole (architecture)A mole is a massive structure, usually of stone, used as a pier, breakwater, or a causeway between places separated by water. The word comes from Middle French mole and ultimately Latin mōlēs meaning a large mass, especially of rock and has the same root as molecule.Historically, the term "mole"...
. - Syracuse in their battle with the Athenian fleet
- Huang GaiHuang GaiHuang Gai was a military general who served the warlord Sun family of Eastern Wu for three generations during the late Han Dynasty and Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history...
's attack on Cao CaoCao CaoCao Cao was a warlord and the penultimate chancellor of the Eastern Han Dynasty who rose to great power during the dynasty's final years. As one of the central figures of the Three Kingdoms period, he laid the foundations for what was to become the state of Cao Wei and was posthumously titled...
at the Battle of Red CliffsBattle of Red CliffsThe Battle of Red Cliffs, otherwise known as the Battle of Chibi, was a decisive battle at the end of the Han Dynasty, immediately prior to the Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history. It was fought in the winter of 208/9 AD between the allied forces of the southern warlords Liu Bei and Sun Quan...
, 208208Year 208 was a leap year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Aurelius and Geta...
. - Battle of San Juan de UlúaBattle of San Juan de Ulúa (1568)The Battle of San Juan de Ulúa was a battle between English privateers and Spanish forces at San Juan de Ulúa . It marked the end of the campaign carried out by an English flotilla of 6 ships that had systematically conducted illegal trade in the Caribbean Sea, including the slave trade, imposing...
in 1568. John HawkinsJohn HawkinsAdmiral Sir John Hawkins was an English shipbuilder, naval administrator and commander, merchant, navigator, and slave trader. As treasurer and controller of the Royal Navy, he rebuilt older ships and helped design the faster ships that withstood the Spanish Armada in 1588...
' flagship Jesus of Lúbeck was attacked by a fire ship before being stormed by Spanish seamen - Siege of AntwerpSiege of Antwerp (1584-1585)This Siege of Antwerp took place during the Eighty Years' War from July 1584 until August 1585. At the time Antwerp was not only the largest Dutch city but was also the cultural, economic and financial centre of the Seventeen Provinces and of north-western Europe...
in 1585. Both fire ships and exploding vesselsHellburnersHellburners were specialised fireships used in the Siege of Antwerp during the Eighty Years' War between the Dutch rebels and the Habsburgs. They were floating bombs, also called "Antwerp Fire", and did immense damage to the Spanish besiegers...
were employed together for the first time. - Francis DrakeFrancis DrakeSir Francis Drake, Vice Admiral was an English sea captain, privateer, navigator, slaver, and politician of the Elizabethan era. Elizabeth I of England awarded Drake a knighthood in 1581. He was second-in-command of the English fleet against the Spanish Armada in 1588. He also carried out the...
's attack on the Spanish ArmadaSpanish ArmadaThis article refers to the Battle of Gravelines, for the modern navy of Spain, see Spanish NavyThe Spanish Armada was the Spanish fleet that sailed against England under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia in 1588, with the intention of overthrowing Elizabeth I of England to stop English...
moored at GravelinesGravelinesGravelines is a commune in the Nord department in northern France.It lies at the mouth of the river Aa 15 miles southwest of Dunkirk. There is a market in the town square on Saturdays. The "Arsenal" approached from the town square is home to an extensive and carefully displayed art collection....
in 1588. The fire ships did no damage, but the Spanish scattered in panic and were easy prey for English ships. - Maarten TrompMaarten TrompMaarten Harpertszoon Tromp was an officer and later admiral in the Dutch navy. His first name is also spelled as Maerten.-Early life:...
's attack on the Spanish fleet moored off the Kent coast in the Battle of the DownsBattle of the DownsThe naval Battle of the Downs took place on 31 October 1639 , during the Eighty Years' War, and was a decisive defeat of the Spanish, commanded by Admiral Antonio de Oquendo, by the United Provinces, commanded by Lieutenant-Admiral Maarten Tromp.- Background :The entry of France in the Thirty...
in 1639. The Spanish fleet was destroyed. - Michiel de RuyterMichiel de RuyterMichiel Adriaenszoon de Ruyter is the most famous and one of the most skilled admirals in Dutch history. De Ruyter is most famous for his role in the Anglo-Dutch Wars of the 17th century. He fought the English and French and scored several major victories against them, the best known probably...
's attack on the anchored English fleet at the battle of SolebayBattle of SolebayThe naval Battle of Solebay took place on 28 May Old Style, 7 June New Style 1672 and was the first naval battle of the Third Anglo-Dutch War.-The battle:...
in 1672 in which HMS Royal JamesHMS Royal James (1658)The Richard was a 70-gun second-rate ship of the line of the navy of the Commonwealth of England, built by the Master Shipwright Christopher Pett at Woolwich Dockyard, and launched in 1658...
was burned, killing Vice-Admiral Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of SandwichEdward Montagu, 1st Earl of SandwichEdward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich, KG was an English Infantry officer who later became a naval officer. He was the only surviving son of Sir Sidney Montagu, and was brought up at Hinchingbrooke House....
, and wounding Royal Jamess captain, Richard HaddockRichard HaddockSir Richard Haddock was an officer of the Royal Navy. He served during the Anglo-Dutch Wars, eventually rising to the rank of Admiral in August 1690.-Family and early life:...
. - The destruction of 15 French ships of the line, including Soleil RoyalFrench ship Soleil-Royal (1670)Soleil Royal was a French 104-gun ship of the line, flagship of Admiral Tourville.She was built in Brest between 1668 and 1670 by engineer Laurent Hubac, was launched in 1669, and stayed unused in Brest harbour for years...
, Admirable and Triomphant, in 1692, after the Battle of La Hougue. - US attack on TripoliTripoliTripoli is the capital and largest city in Libya. It is also known as Western Tripoli , to distinguish it from Tripoli, Lebanon. It is affectionately called The Mermaid of the Mediterranean , describing its turquoise waters and its whitewashed buildings. Tripoli is a Greek name that means "Three...
during the First Barbary WarFirst Barbary WarThe First Barbary War , also known as the Barbary Coast War or the Tripolitan War, was the first of two wars fought between the United States and the North African Berber Muslim states known collectively as the Barbary States...
in 1804 by USS IntrepidUSS Intrepid (1798)The first USS Intrepid was a captured ketch in the United States Navy during the First Barbary War.Intrepid was built in France in 1798 for Napoleon's Egyptian expedition. She was subsequently sold to Tripoli, whom she served as Mastico...
. - The Russian attack on the Turkish fleet at the Battle of ChesmaBattle of ChesmaThe naval Battle of Chesma took place on 5 -7 July 1770 near and in Çeşme Bay, in the area between the western tip of Anatolia and the island of Chios, which was the site of a number of past naval battles between the Ottoman Empire and the Republic of Venice...
, 1770. - Thomas CochraneThomas CochraneThomas Cochrane may refer to:*Thomas Cochrane, 8th Earl of Dundonald , Scottish nobleman and politician*Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald , Marquis of Maranhão, naval officer and radical politician...
's attack on the French in the Battle of the Basque RoadsBattle of the Basque RoadsThe Battle of the Basque Roads, also Battle of Aix Roads was a naval battle during the Napoleonic Wars off the Island of Aix...
, 1809. - Many Greek attacks on large Turkish ships during the Greek War of IndependenceGreek War of IndependenceThe Greek War of Independence, also known as the Greek Revolution was a successful war of independence waged by the Greek revolutionaries between...
, 1821-1832. - Chinese attacks on British ships during the First Opium WarFirst Opium WarThe First Anglo-Chinese War , known popularly as the First Opium War or simply the Opium War, was fought between the United Kingdom and the Qing Dynasty of China over their conflicting viewpoints on diplomatic relations, trade, and the administration of justice...
, 1839-1842.
See also
- HellburnersHellburnersHellburners were specialised fireships used in the Siege of Antwerp during the Eighty Years' War between the Dutch rebels and the Habsburgs. They were floating bombs, also called "Antwerp Fire", and did immense damage to the Spanish besiegers...
- Shinyo (suicide boat)
- List of fireships of the Royal Navy
- Operation LucidOperation LucidOperation Lucid was a British plan to use fire ships to attack invasion barges that were gathering in ports on the northern coast of France in preparation for a German invasion of Britain in 1940...