HMS Sabrina was an 18-gun 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...

 ship-sloop

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...

 of the Cormorant class

Cormorant class ship-sloop

The Cormorant class were built as a 16-gun class of ship-sloops for the Royal Navy, although an extra 2 guns were added soon after completion.-Design:...

, launched in 1806 at Southampton

Southampton

Southampton is the largest city in the county of Hampshire on the south coast of England, and is situated south-west of London and north-west of Portsmouth. Southampton is a major port and the closest city to the New Forest...

 and sold in 1816.

Design

The Cormorant class

Cormorant class ship-sloop

The Cormorant class were built as a 16-gun class of ship-sloops for the Royal Navy, although an extra 2 guns were added soon after completion.-Design:...

 was designed by Sir William Rule and Sir John Henslow as 16-gun ship-sloops. The first batch, ordered in 1793 was armed with 6-pounder long guns, but Sabrina was one of the second batch ordered in 1805, and carried 32-pounder carronades instead. In 1810 she was reclassed as a 20-gun sixth rate ship, and again re-rated as 24 guns in 1816, just before she was broken up. Under the rating system of the day

Rating system of the Royal Navy

The rating system of the Royal Navy and its predecessors was used by the British Royal Navy between the beginning of the 17th century and the middle of the 19th century to categorise sailing warships, initially classing them according to their assigned complement of men, and later according to the...

 her number of guns could be largely nominal (in this case the number of long guns she would have carried had she been so-armed); the re-rating included her carronades in the total and did not involve any actual change to her armament. She was of 426 tons (Builder's Old Measurement

Builder's Old Measurement

Builder's Old Measurement is the method of calculating the size or cargo capacity of a ship used in England from approximately 1720 to 1849. It estimated the tonnage of a ship based on length and maximum beam...

) and carried a crew of 121 men.

Mediterranean

In 1807 under the command of Commander E Kittoe she served in the Mediterranean, and in 1808, under the same captain, in South America.

Sabrina Island

During June and July of 1811 a volcanic eruption in the sea formed a new island off São Miguel Island

São Miguel Island

São Miguel Island , nicknamed "The Green Island", is the largest and most populous island in the Portuguese Azores archipelago. The island covers and has around 140,000 inhabitants, 45,000 of these people located in the largest city in the archipelago: Ponta Delgada.-History:In 1427, São Miguel...

. Captain Tillard of Sabrina went ashore on 4 July and claimed the island for Great Britain, naming it Sabrina Island

Sabrina Island (Azores)

Sabrina Island was an islet formed during the months of June and July 1811 by a submarine volcanic eruption off Ponta da Ferraria, São Miguel Island, Azores, one of many that have been felt in the Sete Cidades Massif over time...

. This gave rise to considerable diplomatic wrangling that proved moot when the island subsided into the sea a few months later.

Spain and Portugal

From 1812 to 1815 under the command of Commander A R M'Kenzie she served off the coast of Spain and Portugal, supporting the Peninsular War

Peninsular War

The Peninsular War was a war between France and the allied powers of Spain, the United Kingdom, and Portugal for control of the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars. The war began when French and Spanish armies crossed Spain and invaded Portugal in 1807. Then, in 1808, France turned on its...

.