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The Action of 28 February 1799 was a minor naval engagement of the French Revolutionary Wars, fought off the mouth of the Hooghly River in the Bay of Bengal between the French frigate ''Forte'' and the Royal Navy frigate HMS ''Sybille''. ''Forte'' was an exceptionally large and powerful ship engaged on a commerce raiding operation against British merchant shipping off the port of Calcutta in British India. To eliminate this threat, ''Sybille'' was sent from Madras in pursuit. Acting on information from released prisoners, Edward Cooke, captain of ''Sybille'', was sailing off Balasore when distant gunfire alerted him to the presence of ''Forte'' on the evening of 28 February. The French frigate was discovered at anchor in the sandbanks at the mouth of the Hooghly with two recently captured British merchant ships. For unclear reasons the French captain Hubert Le Loup de Beaulieu did not properly prepare ''Forte'' to receive the attack from Cooke's frigate and he was consequently killed in the first raking broadside from the British ship. ''Forte''s crew continued to resist for more than two hours, only surrendering when their ship had been reduced to a battered wreck and more than a third of the crew killed or wounded. British losses by contrast were light, although Cooke had been struck by grape shot during the height of the action and suffered a lingering death three months later from his wounds. The captured merchant ships subsequently escaped under their French prize crews while Cooke's executive officer Lieutenant Lucius Hardyman repaired ''Sybille '' and ''Forte''. Hardyman took both ships into Calcutta, where ''Forte'' was commissioned into the Royal Navy under the same name, although the frigate was accidentally wrecked in the Red Sea two years later. ==Background== In the spring of 1796 the Royal Navy enjoyed naval supremacy in the East Indies, the French Navy presence limited to two frigates loosely blockaded in Port Louis on Île de France.〔Parkinson, p.75〕 In April 1796 reinforcements were sent from Rochefort comprising four frigates commanded by Contre-amiral Pierre César Charles de Sercey.〔Parkinson, p.98〕 The squadron avoided the blockade and arrived at Île de France in July and sailed eastwards during the summer, intending to raid British trading ports in the East Indies. On 9 September the squadron was intercepted and driven off by a British squadron off the northeastern coast of Sumatra, sheltering in Batavia over the winter.〔Clowes, p.503〕 In January Sercey sailed once more, encountering the large annual convoy of East Indiamen from Macau in the Bali Strait on 28 January. In the ensuing Bali Strait Incident the British commander managed to deceive Sercey into believing that the convoy was made up of warships, the French admiral retreating back to Île de France.〔Parkinson, p.106〕 Sercey's flagship during these operations was the 40-gun frigate ''Forte''. ''Forte'', commanded by the elderly Captain Hubert Le Loup de Beaulieu, had been built in 1794 based on the hull and frame of a ship of the line: the frigate weighed 1,400 tons bm, the largest purpose-built frigate at sea. The main battery of ''Forte'' consisted of 28 24-pounder long guns, only the second frigate ever built (after ''Pomone'') which could manage such a heavy armament.〔James, p.326〕 This was augmented by fourteen 8-pounder long guns on the upper deck and eight 36-pounder carronades on the quarterdeck, totaling 52 heavy cannon complemented by eight 1-pounder swivel guns.〔 Uniquely, the sides of the ship were lined with cork matting to prevent splinters while the more common precaution had been taken of stringing netting over the deck to protect the crew from falling debris.〔James, p.329〕 The ship was however weakened by an ill-disciplined crew, and Sercey had expressed doubts about the ability of the aged Beaulieu.〔Clowes, p.520〕 After Sercey returned to Île de France his squadron broke up. Four ships were sent back to France in 1797 and 1798 as Île de France could no longer supply repairs, manpower or provisions in support of Sercey.〔Parkinson, p.121〕 This dispersal of the squadron was encouraged by the Colonial Assembly of Île de France and Governor Malartic neither of whom were well-disposed to the Directory then ruling France. With his remaining crews becoming rebellious, Sercey sent ''Forte'' and ''Prudente'' on a commerce raiding operation during the autumn of 1798, during which they achieved some success in the Bay of Bengal.〔Parkinson, p.123〕 By the time this force returned to Île de France Sercey had sailed to Batavia, leaving instructions for ''Forte'' and ''Prudente'' to follow him. Malartic countermanded this order, seizing ''Prudente'' and selling the frigate to a privateer concern and ordering ''Forte'' to operate independently in the Bay of Bengal in the autumn of 1798. Sercey was furious, but could do nothing to alter Malartic's arrangements.〔 At the start of 1799 the Bay of Bengal was largely undefended. The British naval commander, Rear-Admiral Peter Rainier, had taken most of his ships westwards to the Red Sea to participate in opposition to Napoleon Bonaparte's campaign in Egypt, leaving only a single frigate to protect trade shipping in the region.〔Parkinson, p.139.〕 This ship was the 40-gun HMS ''Sybille'', a large, powerful ship captured from the French at the Battle of Mykonos in 1794.〔Clowes, p.486.〕 Weighing more than 1,000 tons bm and with a maindeck battery of 28 18-pounder long guns supplemented by six 9-pounder long guns and fourteen 32-pounder cannonades, ''Sybille'' was a formidable ship, but significantly weaker than the massive ''Forte''.〔 Many of ''Sybille'' 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Action of 28 February 1799」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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