TheGunboat War (Danish:Kanonbådskrigen,Norwegian:Kanonbåtskrigen,Swedish:Kanonbåtskriget; 1807–1814) was a naval conflict betweenDenmark–Norway andGreat Britain supported bySweden during theNapoleonic Wars. The war's name is derived from the Danish tactic of employing smallgunboats against the materially superiorRoyal Navy. In Scandinavia it is seen as the later stage of theEnglish Wars, whose commencement is accounted as theFirst Battle of Copenhagen in 1801.
The naval conflict between Britain and Denmark-Norway commenced with theFirst Battle of Copenhagen in 1801 whenHoratio Nelson's squadron of AdmiralHyde Parker's fleet attacked the Danish capital. This came as a basis of Denmark-Norway's policy ofarmed neutrality during the latter stages of theFrench Revolutionary Wars, where Denmark used its naval forces to protect trade flowing within, into and out of the Danish-Norwegian waters. Hostilities between Denmark-Norway and the United Kingdom broke out again by theSecond Battle of Copenhagen in 1807, when the British attacked the Danish capital to ensure that the Danish-Norwegian fleet did not fall into the hands ofNapoleon.
As a result of the British capture or scuttling of large parts of the Danish-Norwegian fleet during the assault onCopenhagen, the Dano-Norwegian government decided to build gunboats in large numbers to compensate for the loss. The gunboats were originally designed by a Swede,Fredrik Henrik af Chapman, and the strategic advantage of gunboats lay in the fact that they could be produced rapidly and inexpensively throughout the kingdoms. The tactical advantages were that they were highly manoeuvrable, especially in still and shallow waters and presented small targets. On the other hand, the boats were vulnerable and likely to sink from a single hit. They therefore could not be used in rough seas, and they were less effective against large warships. Still, the Danish-Norwegian government produced more than 200 gunboats in two models: theshallop gunboat which had a crew of 76 men, with an 18- or 24-poundercannon in the bow and another in the stern, and the smallerbarge type that had a total crew of 24 men, armed with a single 24-pounder.
The Danish Commodore (later, Admiral)Steen Andersen Bille (1751–1833) is credited with being the driving force behind the post-1807 Dano-Norwegian strategy of gunboat warfare. Below[7] is a description of each of the four classes of gunboats according to Junior Lieutenant Hans Georg Garde, himself a commander of one of the larger types of gunboats.[8]
Reserve crew who could not be accommodated on board were quartered in buildings on land or in thefrigateTriton which wasin ordinary. Battle-ready gunboats had their crews on board.
Defences on the Norwegian coast in 1808 are listed atRoyal Dano-Norwegian Navy order of battle in Norway (1808). Tenschooner-rigged gunboats capable of operating in the rougher Norwegian Sea were built in Bergen and Trondheim in the years 1808 to 1811.
In the first three years of the Gunboat War, these boats were on several occasions able to seize enemy cargo ships from their convoys and to capture Britishbrigs, though they were not strong enough to overcome largerfrigates andships of the line. The British had control of Danish waters during the whole of the 1807–1814 war, and when the season was suited to navigation they were regularly able to escort large merchant convoys out throughthe Sound and theGreat Belt. Although the discussion below focuses on armed encounters involving an exchange of fire, one must keep in mind that the British also captured numerous Danish privateers without firing a shot, and regularly seized Danishmerchant vessels asprizes. The British also conductedamphibious landings on several Danish islands,[9][10] many populated but lacking garrisons. British warships frequently landed to replenish their stocks of firewood, fresh water and livestock, which were purchased or seized to augment their provisions.
The war overlapped, in time, theAnglo-Russian War. As a result, the British expanded their trade embargo to Russian waters and the British navy conducted forays northwards into theBarents Sea. The British navy conducted successful raids onHasvik andHammerfest and disrupted thePomor trade, the Norwegian trade with Russia.
On 12 August 1807, even before the war had been declared, the Britishsixth-rateHMS Comus took part in a one-sidedsingle-ship action when she captured the 32-gun Danish frigate (fregat)Friderichsværn. In the engagement the British suffered only one man wounded; the Danes lost 12 men while 20 were wounded, some mortally.[11]Lloyd's List described the Danish vessel as a "Danish Frigate, of 32 Guns, late Guardship", and reported that the action, near Elsinor, had been short.[12] The Royal Navy tookFrederiksværn into service asHMS Frederickscoarn.[13]
On 23 August, the BritishHMS Prometheus firedCongreve rockets from her decks against a Danish gunboatflotilla, but the attack had little effect.[14] The British were instead more successful on 11 September whenHMS Carrier brought to theBritish Admiralty the despatches from AdmiralThomas McNamara Russell announcing the capitulation of the small island ofHeligoland to the British.[15] Heligoland later also became a centre for smuggling and for espionage against Napoleon.
In theEast Indies, troops from the14th Regiment of Foot landed fromHMS Russell on theCoromandel Coast on 13 February 1808 and took over the Danish possessions atTranquebar. On 14 March, the 14-gunHMS Childers and the Danish 20-gun sloopHDMSLougen engaged in an inconclusivesingle-ship action.[16]Childers lost two men killed and nine wounded before she could escape and return to Leith.[17] On 22 March the Britishships of the lineHMSNassau andHMS Stately destroyed the last Danish ship of the line,HDMSPrinds Christian Frederik, commanded by CaptainC.W. Jessen, in theBattle of Zealand Point.Nassau was herself a former Danish warship.Nassau had one man killed and 16 men wounded, whileStately had four killed and 27 wounded. The Danes lost 55 men killed and 88 wounded.[17]
Boats fromHMS Daphne andHMS Tartarus, supported by the brigHMS Forward, drove ashore a Dano-Norwegian convoy at Flodstrand, nearThe Skaw on 22 April. The convoy was taking supplies to Norway as a result of supply shortages that had occurred there after the British had begun theirnaval blockade between Denmark and Norway in 1807. The British went in under heavy fire from the shore and a castle there and brought out five brigs, three galliots, a schooner, and a sloop (totalling some 870 tons burthen), for the loss of five men wounded.[18] The BritishfrigateHMS Tartar also approachedBergen underDutchcolours on 15 May in order to attack theDutch frigateGuelderland, which had been undergoing repairs there. Unfortunately for the British theGuelderland had already sailed, so during the night the British sent in boats in an attempt to capture Danish shipping in the harbour. When the boats came under heavy fire,Tartar came in to cover them, only to come under attack by the schoonerOdin and five gunboats. During theBattle of AlvøenTartar's captain and another seaman were killed and twelve men were wounded beforeTartar was able to make her escape.
Thehired armedcutterSwan found herself in action off the island ofBornholm with a Danish 8-gun cutter-rigged vessel on 24 May.[19]Swan had been carrying despatches when she had spotted the Danish vessel and lured her out. The engagement ended with the Danish vessel exploding, whileSwan suffered no casualties despite coming under fire both from the Danish vessel and batteries on Bornholm.[19] The fire from the batteries and the sighting of more Danish vessels forcedSwan to withdraw after the battle without being able to make efforts to rescue survivors.[19] On 4 June four Danish gunboats attackedHMS Tickler and captured her after a four-hour fight.Tickler had lost her captain and 14 other men killed, and 22 other officers and men killed and wounded out of her crew of 50 men; the Danes had one man wounded.[17] The Danes would later useTickler as a cadet training ship.[20]
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The Danes were also victorious on 19 June, when the brigHMS Seagull pursued and caught up with the Danish brigHDMSLougen, which was armed with eighteen short 18-pounder guns and two long 6-pounder guns.[21] About 20 minutes into the engagement six Danish gunboats arrived from behind some rocks and in two divisions of three each took up positions onSeagull's quarter and fired on her with their 24-pounder guns whileLougen fired on her larboard bow. Within half an hour the Danish fire had badly damagedSeagull's rigging and dismounted five of her guns. EventuallySeagullstruck, having lost eight men killed and 20 wounded, including her captain, R.B. Cathcart.Seagull sank soon after the Danes captured her, drowning several of her captors who were aboard.[21] The Danes later recoveredSeagull and added her to their navy. The Danes also capturedHMS Tigress. Sixteen Danish gunboats captured her offLangeland in theGreat Belt on 2 August. In the engagementTigress lost two men killed and eight wounded.[22][23]
Immobilized by a dead calm,HMS Africa, under CaptainJohn Barrett, barely survived an attack by 25 Danish gunboats and seven armed launches under the command ofCommodoreJ.C. Krieger in an action in theØresund on 20 October 1808.[24][25]Africa lost nine men killed and 51 wounded; had night not descended the Danes might well have captured her.[26] The British, however, were less fortunate on 5 December, when the bomb vesselHMS Proselyte was wrecked on Anholt Reef while caught in the ice. The reason that the vessel sank in that area was because the Danes had closed the lighthouse on the island ofAnholt, in theKattegat early during the war, and the Admiralty had ordered her to station herself off the island on 9 November to carry a light for the safety of passing convoys. All her crew was however saved.[27]
The British 64-gunthird rateStandard, under CaptainAiskew Paffard Hollis, and the 18-pounder 36-gun frigateHMS Owen Glendower captured the island ofAnholt on 18 May 1809. A party of seamen and marines under the command of Captain William Selby ofOwen Glendower, with the assistance of CaptainEdward Nicolls of theStandard's marines, landed. The Danish garrison of 170 men put up a sharp, but ineffectual resistance that killed oneBritish marine and wounded two before the garrison then surrendered and the British took immediate possession of the island. The principal objective of the mission was to restore the lighthouse on Anholt to its pre-war state to facilitate the movement of British men of war and merchantmen navigating the dangerous seas there.[28]
On 9 June a Danish and Norwegian flotilla of twenty-onegunboats and seven mortar boats attacked a British convoy of 70 merchant ships off the island ofSaltholm inØresund Strait nearCopenhagen. The Dano-Norwegian flotilla was able to capture 12 or 13 merchant vessels, plusHMS Turbulent, one of the escorts. The Danes also capturedHMSAllart during theBattle of Saltholm on 10 August. During the battleHMSAllart, a former Danish Navy brig, chasedLougen andSeagull intoFredriksvern only to find herself pursued by 15 Danish gunboats, arrayed in three divisions. After a three-hour chase the gunboats closed withAllart and an engagement began. After two hoursAllartstruck, having had her rigging shot away and having lost one man killed and three wounded.[29]
On 12 August, Commander John Willoughby Marshall andHMS Lynx were in the company of the gun-brigHMS Monkey, Lieutenant Thomas Fitzgerald, when they discovered three Danishluggers off the Danish coast.[30] The water was too shallow forLynx, so Marshall sentMonkey and boats fromLynx in to cut them out. The largest of the luggers, which had four guns and four howitzers, opened fire onMonkey before all three luggers ran ashore onceMonkey and the launch's 18-poundercarronade returned fire. The British refloated the luggers and brought them out the next day, having taken no casualties. In their haste to escape the vessel, the Danes failed to fire the fuse on a cask of gunpowder they had left by the fireplace on the largest lugger.[31] Marshall thought the Danes' behaviour in leaving the explosive device disgraceful.[30]
The Danish-Norwegian navy managed to capture another British vessel on 2 September, when a Danish gunboat flotilla fromFladstrand, North Jutland, under the command of Lieutenant Nicolai H. Tuxen, captured the gun-brigHMS Minx. The engagement costMinx two dead and nine wounded.[29] The British Royal Navy had stationed her off theSkaw Reef to show a warning light.HMS Sheldrake reported the loss to the Admiralty.[32]
Early in 1810, the Danes ceased sending provisioning ships to Norway because of British naval activity in Øresund and withdrew the naval officers that were so involved to Zealand. Meanwhile, there were difficulties in transporting grain fromVordingborg, in the south of Denmark, pastMøn to Copenhagen. This was overcome by using gunboats to convoy the merchant vessels, as the gunboats were much more maneuverable in the shallow coastal waters, and restricting the cargo vessels to those which could pass inside of Møn. Larger seagoing ships which would have to go outside, i.e. east ofMøn, were too liable to be caught by the British. These actions, together with a good form of coastal signalling, resulted in a steady supply of grain to the Danish capital.[33]
On 13 April 1810, four Danish gunboats, under the command of First LieutenantPeter Nicolay Skibsted, captured the British gunboatGrinder off theDjursland peninsula nearGrenå.[20]Grinder was armed with one 24-pounder gun and one 24-pounder carronade. She was under the command of Master's Mate Thomas Hester and had over-wintered at Anholt. Of her crew of 34 men, two were killed and two wounded in the action.
On 23 May, seven Danish gunboats engaged theCruizer-class brig-sloopRaleigh,Alban, and His Majesty'shired armedcutterPrincess of Wales, off theSkaw. The engagement cost the Danes the loss of one gunboat, which blew up, and heavy damage to the rest.
TheBattle of Silda was fought on 23 July near theNorwegian island ofSilda. The British frigatesHMS Belvidera andHMS Nemesis attacked the pilot's station on the island and defeated the three gunschoonersOdin,Tor andBalder and the gun bargeCort Adeler, which were stationed there.
On 12 September, six Danish gunboats captured a becalmedAlban after a four-hour battle during which she lost her captain and one man killed and three men wounded. The Danes then took her into service asThe Alban.
Danish gunboats manned by nearly 1,000 men, including infantry forces attempted to recapture Anholt on 27 February 1811. TheBattle of Anholt resulted in a Danish withdrawal toJutland, with heavy losses. The Danes did however emerge victorious on 23 April whenSwan encountered three Danish gunboats inSunningesund.[34] A shot from one of the gunboats damagedSwan and resulted in the wetting of her powdermagazine, forcing her surrender.[34] The Danes boarded her but were able to retrieve little beforeSwan sank offUddevalla, on the Swedish coast north ofGothenburg.[34] The fight costSwan two men killed,[34] as the same battle apparently also resulted in the damaging of thehired armed cutterHero.[35][a] On 11 May,Rifleman recapturedAlban from the Danes. The capture occurred after a 12-hour chase nearShetland. At the time of her captureAlban was armed with 12 guns and had a crew of 58 men, all under the command of a lieutenant of the Danish navy. She was three days out ofFarsund in Norway and had taken no prizes.[36]
On 31 July 1811,HMS Brev Drageren andAlgerine were cruising together inLong Sound, Norway, when they encountered and engaged three Danish brigs: the 20-gunLangeland, the 18-gunLügum, and the 16-gunKiel. Outnumbered and outgunned, the British vessels withdrew.[37] The next dayBrev Drageren unsuccessfully re-engaged first one and then two of the brigs. In the inconclusive engagement each British vessel sustained one man killed, andBrev Drageren also had three wounded.[37] On 17 AugustHMS Manly sailed fromSheerness with a convoy for theBaltic. On 2 September, while she was cruising offArendal on the Norwegian coast in the company ofChanticleer, three Danish 18-gun-brigs (Alsen,Lolland, andSamsø) engaged them.[38]Lolland engagedManly while the other two chasedChanticleer but she maintained a course away from the action and made good her escape.[39] In the engagement withLolland,Manly had her spars and rigging cut to pieces. With only six guns left, and having lost one man killed and three wounded,Manly was forced to strike.[40]
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The last major fight between Danish-Norwegian and British warships took place on 6 July 1812 during theBattle of Lyngør, when a small squadron of British warships met a small squadron of Norwegian warships atLyngør on the Norwegian coast. The British withdrew after destroying the Norwegian frigateNajaden. On 2 August the same year, boats ofHMS Horatio, which was under the command of CaptainLord George Stuart, captured two Danish vessels, under the command of Lieutenant Hans Buderhof, and their prize, an American vessel of about 400 tonsburthen (bm). The two Danish vessels were schooner No. 114 (of six 6-pounders and 30 men), and cutter No. 97 (of four 6-pounders and 22 men). In the action the British lost nine men killed and 16 wounded, of whom two died of their wounds; the Danes lost ten men killed and 13 wounded.[41]
As a result of the Swedish invasion ofHolstein in December 1813 during theWar of the Sixth Coalition, Denmark-Norway was forced to seek peace, and theTreaty of Kiel ended the war on 14 January 1814. Denmark-Norway had tocedeHeligoland toBritain and theKingdom of Norway (except for Greenland, Iceland and the Faroe Islands) to theKing of Sweden, while Denmark did get back the island of Anholt and was compensated for the loss of Norway with the Duchy ofSaxe-Lauenburg. However, this treaty was not accepted by the Norwegian people, who refused to be simply a bargaining chip, and awar between Norway and Sweden broke out on 26 July.[42]
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