HMS Renown was a 74-gun third-rate

Third-rate

In the British Royal Navy, a third rate was a ship of the line which from the 1720s mounted between 64 and 80 guns, typically built with two gun decks . Years of experience proved that the third rate ships embodied the best compromise between sailing ability , firepower, and cost...

 ship of the line

Ship of the line

A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed from the 17th through the mid-19th century to take part in the naval tactic known as the line of battle, in which two columns of opposing warships would manoeuvre to bring the greatest weight of broadside guns to bear...

 of the Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

. She was to have been named HMS Royal Oak, but the name was changed to Renown on 15 February 1796.

She was launched at Deptford Wharf on 2 May 1798 and served in 1800-1801 as the flagship of Sir John Borlase Warren

John Borlase Warren

Sir John Borlase Warren, 1st Baronet , was an English admiral, politician and diplomat. Born in Stapleford, Nottinghamshire, he was the son and heir of John Borlase Warren of Stapleford and Little Marlow...

, initially in the English Channel

English Channel

The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...

.

On 1 July 1800, Renown, and , with the hired armed cutter Lord Nelson

Hired armed cutter Lord Nelson

During the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars the Royal Navy used several vessels that bore the designation hired armed cutter Lord Nelson, all named for Lord Horatio Nelson.-First Hired armed cutter Lord Nelson:...

 in company, were in in Bourneuf Bay when they sent in their boats to attack a French convoy at Île de Noirmoutier

Île de Noirmoutier

The island of Noirmoutier is off the Atlantic coast of France in the Vendée department.Parts of the island have been reclaimed from the sea. In 2005 it served as the finish of the Tour de France prologue....

. The British destroyed the French ship Therese (of 20 guns), a lugger (12 guns), two schooners (6 guns each) and a cutter (6 guns), of unknown names. The cutting out party also burned some 15 merchant vessels loaded with corn and supplies for the French fleet at Brest

Brest, France

Brest is a city in the Finistère department in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon...

. However, in this enterprise, 92 officers and men out of the entire party of 192 men, fell prisoners to the French when their boats became stranded. Lord Nelson had contributed no men to the attacking force and so had no casualties. She did share in the head money with an Able Seaman receiving 3s 11¾d, and her commander receiving £6 8s 7½d, in 1825.

Next, Renown participated in an abortive invasion of Ferrol. On 29 August, in Vigo Bay, Admiral Sir Samuel Hood assembled a cutting-out party from the vessels under his command consisting of two boats each from , , , and , four boats from , as well as the boats from Renown, and Impetueux The party went in and after a 15-minute fight captured the French privateer Guêpe, of Bordeaux and towed her out. She was of 300 tons burthen and had a flush deck. Pierced for 20 guns, she carried eighteen 9-pounders, and she and her crew of 161 men were under the command of Citizen Dupan. In the attack she lost 25 men killed, including Dupan, and 40 wounded. British casualties amounted to four killed, 23 wounded and one missing. A first-class share of the prize money was worth ₤42 19s

Shilling

The shilling is a unit of currency used in some current and former British Commonwealth countries. The word shilling comes from scilling, an accounting term that dates back to Anglo-Saxon times where it was deemed to be the value of a cow in Kent or a sheep elsewhere. The word is thought to derive...

 6½d; a fifth-class share, that of an able seaman, was worth 1s 9½d. In 1847 the Admiralty awarded the Naval General Service Medal with clasp "29 Aug. Boat Service 1800" to all surviving claimants from the action.

She then served at the abortive attack on Cadiz

Cádiz

Cadiz is a city and port in southwestern Spain. It is the capital of the homonymous province, one of eight which make up the autonomous community of Andalusia....

.

Armed en flute, she transferred to the Mediterranean in 1801, still as Warren's flagship. During this time Charles John Napier, the future admiral, was a midshipman

Midshipman

A midshipman is an officer cadet, or a commissioned officer of the lowest rank, in the Royal Navy, United States Navy, and many Commonwealth navies. Commonwealth countries which use the rank include Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Kenya...

 in her. In 1803 she was at Malta

Malta

Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...

 and in 1805 was under repair at Plymouth. After a further spell in the Channel Fleet, 1807-8, she transferred again to the Mediterranean.

Fate

Renown was laid up at Plymouth in 1811 and hulked

Hulk (ship)

A hulk is a ship that is afloat, but incapable of going to sea. Although sometimes used to describe a ship that has been launched but not completed, the term most often refers to an old ship that has had its rigging or internal equipment removed, retaining only its flotational qualities...

 in 1814. She was broken up in May 1835.

Renown in fiction

In the Horatio Hornblower

Horatio Hornblower

Horatio Hornblower is a fictional Royal Navy officer who is the protagonist of a series of novels by C. S. Forester. He was later the subject of films and television programs.The original Hornblower tales began with the 1937 novel The Happy Return Horatio Hornblower is a fictional Royal Navy...

 novels of C. S. Forester

C. S. Forester

Cecil Scott "C.S." Forester was the pen name of Cecil Louis Troughton Smith , an English novelist who rose to fame with tales of naval warfare. His most notable works were the 11-book Horatio Hornblower series, depicting a Royal Navy officer during the Napoleonic era, and The African Queen...

, a ship of the line named the Renown (unrelated to the historical Renown of this period), is featured in the novel Lieutenant Hornblower

Lieutenant Hornblower

Lieutenant Hornblower is a Horatio Hornblower novel written by C. S. Forester, ISBN 1-85998-976-4.It is the second book in the series chronologically, but the seventh by order of publication....

. In the story, the ship's mad captain is injured after falling through a hatch, and the junior officers must take over on adventures in the West Indies. The mysterious circumstances of the Captain's fall become of great importance to the court martial panel later on in the story. In Hornblower (TV series)

Hornblower (TV series)

Hornblower is the umbrella title of a series of television drama programmes based on C. S. Forester's novels about the fictional character Horatio Hornblower, a Royal Naval officer during the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars....

this story was related in the fifth and sixth episodes, Mutiny and Retribution.