The Galathée was a 32-gun frigate of the French Navy

French Navy

The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...

, lead ship of her class

Galathée class frigate

The Galathée class was a type of 32-gun frigates of the French Navy, designed by Raymond-Antoine Haran, with 26 x 12-pounder and 6 x 6-pounder guns...

.

Galathée took part in the Naval operations in the American Revolutionary War

Naval operations in the American Revolutionary War

The naval operations of the American Revolutionary War , divide themselves naturally into two periods...

, taking part to the capture of Sint Eustatius and to the Battle of the Saintes

Battle of the Saintes

The Battle of the Saintes took place over 4 days, 9 April 1782 – 12 April 1782, during the American War of Independence, and was a victory of a British fleet under Admiral Sir George Rodney over a French fleet under the Comte de Grasse forcing the French and Spanish to abandon a planned...

.

During the French Revolution

French Revolution

The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...

, she took part in the Combat du 13 prairial

Glorious First of June

The Glorious First of June [Note A] of 1794 was the first and largest fleet action of the naval conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the First French Republic during the French Revolutionary Wars...

, where she took Terrible

French ship Terrible (1779)

The Terrible was a 110-gun ship of the line of the French Navy, lead ship of her class.She took part in the Bataille du 13 prairial an 2, where she was dismasted by HMS Royal Sovereign...

 in tow, under fire, preventing her capture by the British.

On 14 July 1794 she and Seine

HMS Seine (1798)

Seine was a 38-gun Seine-class French frigate that the Royal Navy captured in 1798 and commissioned as the fifth rate HMS Seine. On 20 August 1800, Seine captured the French ship Vengeance in a single ship action that would win for her crew the Naval General Service Medal...

captured the 16-gun sloop-of-war

Sloop-of-war

In the 18th and most of the 19th centuries, a sloop-of-war was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. As the rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above, this meant that the term sloop-of-war actually encompassed all the unrated combat vessels including the...

  in the Atlantic.

In the night of 23 to 24 April 1795, Galathée ran aground off Penmarch

Penmarch

Penmarc'h or Penmarch is a commune in the Finistère department of Brittany in north-western France. It lies 18 km south-west of Quimper by road.-History:...

, becoming a total loss.

Sources and references

• Les bâtiments ayant porté le nom de Galatée, netmarine.net