HMS Lutine

About

Lutine was a frigate which served in both the French Navy and the Royal Navy. She was launched by the French in 1779. The ship passed to British control in 1793 and was taken into service as HMS Lutine. She sank among the West Frisian Islands during a storm in 1799. She was built as a French Magicienne-class frigate with 32 guns, and was launched at Toulon in 1779. During the French Revolution, Lutine came under French Royalist control. On 18 December 1793, she was one of sixteen ships handed over to a British fleet at the end of the Siege of Toulon, to prevent her being captured by the French Republicans. In 1795, she was rebuilt by the British as a fifth-rate frigate with 38 guns. She served thereafter in the North Sea, where she was part of the blockade of Amsterdam. Lutine sank during a storm at Vlieland in the West Frisian Islands on 9 October 1799, whilst carrying a large shipment of gold. Shifting sandbanks disrupted salvage attempts, and the majority of the cargo has never been recovered. Lloyd's of London has preserved her salvaged bell – the Lutine Bell – which is now used for ceremonial purposes at their headquarters in London.

In 1780, Lutine was under Cambray, and called the ports of Foilleri, Smyrna and Malta, before returning to Toulon, escorting a convoy. Later that year, she was under Garnier de Saint-Antonin, conducting missions in the Eastern Mediterranean.

In 1781, she was under Flotte, also escorting convoys in the Eastern Mediterranean and calling Marseille, Malta, Smyrna and Foilleri. At Athens, Flotte was gifted an antique relief, that he reported to Navy Minister Castries. From 13 July 1782 to 16 July 1783, she continued the same missions under Gineste.

With the outbreak of the War of the First Coalition, Lutine was recommissioned as a bomb ship in 1792.

Main article: Siege of Toulon On 27 September 1793, the royalists in Toulon surrendered the city, naval dockyards, arsenal, and French Mediterranean fleet to a British fleet commanded by Vice Admiral Lord Hood. The French vessels included:...seventeen ships of the line (one 120, one 80 and fifteen 74s), five frigates and eleven corvettes. In various stages of refitting in the New Basin were four ships of the line (one 120, one 80, and two 74s) and a frigate. Mainly in the Old Basin and, for the most part, awaiting middling or large repair, were eight ships of the line (one 80 and seven 74s), five frigates and two corvettes.

Lutine was one of the ships from the Old Basin. During the siege of Toulon, the British converted Lutine to a bomb vessel that fired mortars at the besieging French artillery batteries, which were under the command of Napoleon Bonaparte. When they abandoned Toulon on 19 December, the British took Lutine with them.

The ship was sent to Portsmouth in December 1793 for a refit and commissioned as HMS Lutine.

The loss of the Lutine occurred during the Second Coalition of the French Revolutionary Wars, in which an Anglo-Russian army landed in the Batavian Republic (now the Netherlands ), which had been occupied by the French since 1795. (The French had captured the Dutch fleet the previous year in a cavalry charge over the frozen polders.) Admiral Duncan had heavily defeated the Dutch fleet in 1797 at the Battle of Camperdown and the remainder of the Dutch fleet was captured on 30 August 1799 by the Duke of York.

During this period Lutine served as an escort, guiding transports in and out of the shoal waters around North Holland.

In October 1799 under command of Captain Lancelot Skynner she was employed in carrying about £1.2 million in bullion and coin (equivalent in value to £119 million in 2025), from Yarmouth to Cuxhaven in order to provide Hamburg 's banks with funds in order to prevent a stock market crash and, possibly, for paying troops in North Holland. In the evening of 9 October 1799, during a heavy northwesterly gale, the ship under Captain Lancelot Skynner, having made unexpected leeway, was drawn by the tidal stream flowing into the Waddenzee, onto a sandbank in Vlie off the island of Terschelling, in the West Frisian Islands. There, she became a total loss. All but one of her approximately 240 passengers and crew perished in the breaking seas.

Captain Portlock, commander of the British squadron at Vlieland, reported the loss, writing to the Admiralty in London on 10 October:

- Sir, It is with extreme pain that I have to state to you the melancholy fate of H.M.S. Lutine, which ship ran on to the outer bank of the Fly [an anglicisation of 'Vlie'] Island passage on the night of the 9th inst. in a heavy gale of wind from the NNW, and I am much afraid the crew with the exception of one man, who was saved on a part of the wreck, have perished. This man, when taken up, was almost exhausted. He is at present tolerably recovered, and relates that the Lutine left Yarmouth Roads on the morning of the 9th inst. bound for the Texel, and that she had on board a considerable quantity of money.

The wind blowing strong from the NNW, and the lee tide coming on, rendered it impossible with Schowts [probably schuits, local fishing vessels] or other boats to go out to aid her until daylight in the morning, and at that time nothing was to be seen but parts of the wreck.

I shall use every endeavour to save what I can from the wreck, but from the situation she is lying in, I am afraid little will be recovered.

Three officers, including Captain Skynner, were apparently buried in the Vlieland churchyard, and around two hundred others were buried in a mass grave near the Brandaris lighthouse in Terschelling. No memorials mark these graves.

Captain Lancelot Skynner came from Easton on the Hill, near Stamford, England, where his father was rector for many years. Plaques on the former rectory (known for a time as Lutine House) and in the church commemorate this and Captain Skynner.

The failure of the gold to arrive precipitated the very crisis that it had been designed to prevent.

The site of the wreck, the Vlie, was notorious for its strong currents and the danger of storms forcing ships onto the shore. The area is composed of sandbanks and shoals, which the currents continuously shift, with channels through them: in 1666, during the Second Anglo-Dutch War, Admiral Holmes had managed to penetrate these shoals and start Holmes's Bonfire, surprising the Dutch who had considered the shoals impassable. The depth of water also constantly changes, and this has caused much of the difficulty in salvage attempts.

Lutine was wrecked in a shallow channel called the IJzergat, which has now completely disappeared, between the islands of Vlieland and Terschelling. Immediately after Lutine sank, the wreck began silting up, forcing an end to salvage attempts by 1804. By chance, it was discovered in 1857 that the wreck was again uncovered, but covered again in 1859. The wreck was probably partially uncovered between 1915 and 1916, although no salvage was attempted because of World War I. [ citation needed ]

Lloyd's archives were destroyed by the fire at Lloyd's headquarters in 1838, and the amount of cargo lost is based on the estimate made by Lloyd's in 1858: £1.2 million, consisting of both silver and gold 60 years after the disaster. Only the general assessment of the cargo and the amount of insurance are known for sure. The gold was insured by Lloyd's of London, which paid the claim in full. The underwriters therefore owned the gold under rights of abandonment and later authorised attempts to salvage it. However, because of the state of war, the Dutch also laid claim to it as a prize of war.