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Aguard ship is a warship assigned as a stationary guard in a port or harbour, as opposed to a coastalpatrol boat, which serves its protective role at sea.
In theRoyal Navy of the eighteenth century, peacetime guard ships were usuallythird-rate orfourth-rateships of the line.[1] The larger ships in the fleet would be laid up "in ordinary" with skeleton crews, the spars, sails and rigging removed and the decks covered by canvas – the historic equivalent of areserve fleet. By contrast the guard ships would carry sails and rigging aboard, be cleaned below the waterline to increase their speed under sail, and be manned by at least one quarter of their normal crew.[1]
A port or major waterway may be assigned a single guardship which would also serve as the naval headquarters for the area. Multiple guardships were required at larger ports andRoyal Dockyards, with the largest single vessel routinely serving as thePort Admiral's flagship.[1]
If war was declared, or an enemy fleet was sighted, the guard ships could become fully manned and ready for sea in a matter of hours or days, as opposed to the months it could take to recommission a ship "in ordinary". This was of greatest utility to the British prior to the outbreak of theWar of Jenkins' Ear against Spain. On 10 July, 1739 KingGeorge II authorised preparations for a maritime assault on Spanish colonies. For this purpose, AdmiralEdward Vernon was able to assemble a fleet of eight fully armed and provisioned guardships within ten days of the Royal Command.[2] The fleet was so quickly assembled that it reached the Spanish West Indies on 22 October, one day before war was formally declared.
However, in the modern age, recently theRoyal Navy has deployed many ships to guard theFalkland Islands from the threat of Argentine invasion,HMS Clyde guarded the islands for her whole active service life, replaced byHMS Forth in 2020, a role she holds to this day.
InSoviet terminology, a guard ship (сторожевое корабль,storozhevoj korabl') was a small, general purpose patrol and/or escort vessel.[3] It corresponds tofrigate-type ships.
A guard-boat is a boat which goes the round of a fleet at anchor to see that due watch is kept at night.[4][5]
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Guard-ship".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 12 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 659. | This article about a type of ship or boat is astub. You can help Wikipedia byexpanding it. |