HMS bacchanteBacchante, 1859-1879
The HMS bacchanteBacchante was a screw-driven steam frigate with 51 guns and a complement of 560 sailors.1
This large ship, at 72 m, frequented Esquimalt in the 1860s under the command of Captain Donald Mackenzie and it served as flagship to Maitland,
commander-in-chief of the Pacific squadron from 1860-62.2
The bacchanteBacchante was launched at Portsmouth in 1859 and commissioned for service on the Pacific station on 18 April 1860.3 Its design, along with several other vessels, including the topazeTopaze, was based on the lines of the Shannon (1855).4
This correspondence from Newcastle to Douglas notes the absence of guns at Victoria
and Esquimalt and reports that arrangements have been made for landing two 68 [pounder] Guns which may be spared
from H.M.S. bacchanteBacchante
and topazeTopaze
.
- 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Placenames (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 54.
- 2. Ibid.
- 3. Bacchante, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
- 4. William Laird Clowes, The Royal Navy: A History (London: Sampson Low, Marston and Company, 1901), 6:199.