Enters the American Revolutionary War
The disastrous English defeat at Saratoga in 1777 was followed by war in 1778 with . had already given private help to the American privateers and to their forces in the field. The rupture came in March when the British ambassador, Lord Stormont, was recalled from , but actual conflict did not take place until July.
Neither fleet was ready for service but the French were somewhat more ready. On the 13th of April a squadron of twelve sail of the line and four frigates was dispatched, under the command of the Comte d’Estaing, from Toulon to . As no attempt was made to stop him in the Straits of Gibraltar, he passed them on the 16th of May, and though the rawness of his crews and his own error in wasting time in pursuit of prizes delayed his passage, he reached the mouth of the Delaware on the 8th of July unopposed.
The French fleet arrived off the entrance to Narragansett Bay on July 29, 1778, setting the stage for a combined French-American attack on . On August 4 and 5, two of d’Estaing’s ships ran the West Passage and rounded the northern end of . On August 8, the main body of the French fleet, led by d’Estaing’s flagship, , ran the East Passage under fire from British batteries and anchored off . Having already evacuated , Major General Sir Robert Pigot, the British commander, began to withdraw his forces from the northern part of Aquidneck Island back to the lines around in anticipation of a siege. The forcing of the Narragansett channel resulted in the complete destruction of the British fleet of 6 frigates (Grand Duke, 40 guns, Orpheus, Lark, Juno, Flora, each 32 guns, and Cerberus, 28 guns), 3 corvettes, 220 guns and the corvette Sengal, and a bomb ketch, to prevent their capture by the French and To hinder the movement of the French fleet. Then on August 9, Admiral Howe’s fleet, reinforced by four vessels, appeared before the entrance to the main channel. The next day, taking advantage of a favorable wind extremely rare at that time of year, D’Estaing cut his anchor lines and stood out to sea. The two fleets maneuvered for two days, each trying to gain the advantage over the other. On July 12 gale winds scattered the ships. Skirmishes occurred later between isolated vessels of the two fleets, but Howe escaped and on July 20 D’Estaing’s fleet, which had not weathered the storm too well, dropped anchor off . Meanwhile Admiral Byron had arrived in with a fleet of 13 vessels. This alarming news was brought to D’Estaing by the Marquis de La Favette, who boarded the flagship as soon as it was ready to receive visitors. D’Estaing’s fleet was therefore obliged to leave General Sullivan and the American troops to go to for supplies and repair work. The American general, rendered vulnerable by this decision, was nevertheless able to extricate himself and withdraw his men and artillery without great loss. The light frigate La Flore returned to in December, 1778 with dispatches from d’Estaing’s squadron which remained on the western side of the .
French Frigate La Flora, Scouting for Comte de Grasse off , sights a detachment of the English Fleet anchored in , July 29, 1778.
La Flore was part of the squadron under d’Estaing that forced the British to scuttle several ships at in August, 1778. La Flore returned to in December, 1778 with dispatches from d’Estaing’s squadron which remained on the western side of the . She served in the until she was taken out of service in 1787.
La Flora, 1768 until 1787, was a typical light frigate of the19th Century. She had a 125 feet long gun deck, a total length of 180 feet and was 600 tons burden. Her rating was 26 guns, but she actually carried 30 eight pound and 6 four pound long guns. Her crew was 11 officers and 196 men. The term “frigate” in the seventeenth century indicating a ship that was faster than usual. In the age of sail, it referred to a ship smaller and faster than a battleship, used for scouting, patrolling, and escort work rather than fighting fleet actions. The classic sailing frigate can be traced back to French developments in the second quarter of the 18th century. These ships were full rigged and carried all their main guns on a single gun deck. The lower deck, where the crew lived, carried no armament and near the waterline. The sailing frigates were able to fight with all their guns when the seas were so rough that comparable two-deckers had to close the gun-ports on their lower decks. They sailed very well and were good fighting vessels due to a combination of long hulls and low upper works compared to vessels of comparable size and firepower.
Paul Hunter 2006