View source for Ranger (1791 ship)

{{short description|British merchant and slave ship 1797–1805}}
{{other ships|Ranger (ship)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2022}}
{{Use British English|date=January 2022}}
{| {{Infobox ship begin}}
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| Ship country=Great Britain
| Ship flag={{shipboxflag|Kingdom of Great Britain|civil}}
| Ship name = ''Ranger''
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| Ship launched = 1791, [[New Providence]]<ref name=LR1791/>
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| Ship captured = *29 August 1797
*Circa May 1805
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| Ship country=United States of America
| Ship flag= {{USN flag|1805}}
| Ship name = ''Delaware''
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| Ship owner = Francis Bruel, Philadelphia
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| Ship acquired = Circa May 1805 by purchase of a prize
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| Ship captured = 17 November 1805
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{{Infobox ship career
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| Ship country=United Kingdom
| Ship flag={{shipboxflag|UKGBI|civil}}
| Ship name = ''Ranger''
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| Ship acquired = By purchase of a prize
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| Ship fate = Last listed 1814
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| Ship tons burthen= *1791: 105,<ref name=LR1791/> or 107<ref name=LoM>{{cite web|url=http://www.1812privateers.org/Great%20Britain/marque1793-1815.pdf|title=Letter of Marque, p.83 – Retrieved 25 July 2017.|access-date=27 October 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161020052005/http://www.1812privateers.org/Great%20Britain/marque1793-1815.pdf|archive-date=20 October 2016|url-status=dead }}</ref> ([[Builder's Old Measurement|bm]])
*1796: 151, or 154,<ref name=LoM/> or 160 (bm)
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| Ship sail plan = *1791: [[Brig]]
*1796: [[Full-rigged ship|Ship]]
| Ship complement = *1793: 4<ref name=LoM/>
*1803: 23<ref name=LoM/> or 24
| Ship armament =  
*1793: 10 × 4-pounder guns<ref name=LoM/>
*1794: 2 × 6-pounder guns
*1803: 14 × 4-pounder guns<ref name=LoM/>
| Ship notes = Built of live oak and [[Juniperus bermudiana|cedar]]
}}
|}

'''''Ranger''''' was launched in 1791 in New Providence and immediately came to Britain. She generally traded between Liverpool and New Providence. She underwent grounding in 1795 and in 1796 her owners had her repaired, lengthened, and converted from a brig to a ship. A French privateer captured her in August 1797 after a [[single-ship action]]. In a process that is currently obscure, ''Ranger'' returned to British ownership circa 1799. She then became a [[West Indiaman]]. From 1803 on she became a [[Liverpool slave trade|Liverpool-based]] [[slave ship]] in the [[triangular trade]] in enslaved people. She made one complete voyage transporting enslaved people. Then French privateers captured her after she had embarked captives in West Africa but before she could deliver them to the West Indies. A United States citizen purchased her at Guadeloupe and renamed her ''Delaware''. In 1805 the [[Royal Navy]] recaptured her. She was returned to her British owners who sailed her between Ireland and Newfoundland. She was last listed in 1814.

==Career==
''Ranger'' first appeared in ''[[Lloyd's Register]]'' (''LR'') in 1791.<ref name=LR1791>[https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015050578056?urlappend=%3Bseq=289 ''LR'' (1791), Seq.No.R246.]</ref>

{| class=" wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Master
! Owner
! Trade
! Source & notes
|-
| 1791
| J.Walker
| Thomas Moss
| Liverpool–New Providence
| ''LR''
|-
|}

After the [[French Revolutionary Wars|outbreak of war with France]], Captain John Walker acquired a [[letter of marque]] on 16 May 1793.<ref name=LoM/> This was short lived. In 1794 ''Ranger'' had a new master who did not acquire a letter of marque, and a much reduced armament.

{| class=" wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Master
! Owner
! Trade
! Source & notes
|-
| 1794
| J.Walker<br/>J.Turnbull
| Moss & Co.
| Liverpool–New Providence
| ''LR''
|-
| 1795
| Turnbull<br/>H.Jump
| Moss & Co.
| Liverpool–Bahamas
| ''LR''
|-
|}

In November 1795 ''[[Lloyd's List]]'' reported that ''Ranger'', Jump, master, had gone on shore at the Isle of Man. She was on her way from Liverpool to Lisbon.<ref>{{cite news |title=The Marine List |work=Lloyd's List |issue=2769 |date=17 November 1795 |hdl=2027/uc1.c3049068?urlappend=%3Bseq=193 }}</ref>

{| class=" wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Master
! Owner
! Trade
! Source & notes
|-
| 1796
| H.Jump<br/>J.Bell
| Moss & Co.
| Liverpool–Lisbon<br/>London–San Domingo
| ''LR''
|-
| 1797
| J.Bell
| Moss & Co.
| London–Caicos
| ''LR''; lengthened & large repair 1796
|-
|}

==Capture==
''Lloyd's List'' reported in December 1797 that on 25 August 1797 a French privateer had captured ''Ranger'', from Liverpool and New Providence to the Caicos, and taken her into [[Cap-Haïtien|Cape Francois]]. Captain Bell was killed in the two-hour engagement before ''Ranger'' [[striking the colours|struck]].<ref>{{cite news
 |title=The Marine List |work=Lloyd's List |issue=2972 |date=1 December 1797 |hdl=2027/uc1.c3049069?urlappend=%3Bseq=199 }}</ref>{{sfnp|Williams|1897|p=360}}

In a process that is currently obscure, ''Ranger'' returned to British ownership circa 1799. She reappeared in the 1799 volume of ''Lloyd's Register''.<ref name=LR>[https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015004281260?urlappend=%3Bseq=295 ''LR'' (1799), Seq.No.R256.]</ref>

{| class=" wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Master
! Owner
! Trade
! Source
|-
| 1799
| J.M'Gee
| Tierney & Co.
| London–Martinique
| ''LR''
|-
| 1800
| J.M'Gee<br/>E.Redman
| Tierney & Co.
| London–Martinique
| ''LR''
|-
| 1801
| E.Redman
| Phynn & Co.
| London–St Lucia
| ''LR''
|-
| 1802
| E.Redman<br/>J.Bruce
| Phynn & Co.
| London–St Lucia
| ''LR''
|-
| 1803
| J.Bruce<br/>T.Phillips
| Phynn & Co.
| London–St Lucia<br/>Liverpool–Africa
| ''LR''
|-
|}

New owners in Liverpool put ''Ranger'' into the slave trade.

'''1st voyage transporting enslaved people (1803–1804):''' Captain Thomas Phillips acquired a [[letter of marque]] on 2 August 1803.<ref name=LoM/> He sailed from Liverpool on 28 April 1803.<ref name=TAST83285/> In 1803, 99 vessels sailed from English ports, bound for Africa to acquire and transport enslaved people; 83 of these vessels sailed from Liverpool.{{sfnp|Williams|1897|p=680}}

''Ranger'' acquired captives at [[Calabar]]. On 13 October she arrived at Trinidad with 189 captives. Phillips died on the voyage,{{sfnp|Behrendt|1990|p=105|loc=Table 6}} probably before ''Ranger'' arrived at Trinidad. She left Trinidad for Liverpool on 1 December and arrived back there on 27 January 1804 with Elliot Arthy, master. She had left Liverpool with 24 crew members and had suffered no crew deaths on her voyage.<ref name=TAST83285>[https://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/83285/variables Trans Atlantic Slave Trade Database – ''Ranger'' voyage #83285.]</ref>

'''2nd voyage transporting enslaved people (1804–loss):''' Captain Archibald Holmes sailed from Liverpool on 29 April 1804.<ref>[https://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/83287/variables Trans Atlantic Slave Trade Database – ''Ranger'' voyage #83287.]</ref> In 1804, 147 British ships, 128 from Liverpool, sailed on voyages to acquire and transport enslaved people.{{sfnp|Williams|1897|p=680}}

===Capture===
In June 1805 ''[[Lloyd's List]]'' reported that two privateers had captured ''Ranger'', Holmes, master, to the windward of Barbados. The privateers sent ''Ranger'' into Guadeloupe.<ref>{{cite news|title=The Marine List |work=Lloyd's List |issue=4227 |date=21 June 1805 |url=https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.c2735022?urlappend=%3Bseq=107 }}</ref>

In 1805, 30 British enslaving ships were lost, 11 of them on their way from Africa to the West Indies.{{sfnp|Inikori|1996|p=62}} During the period 1793 to 1807, war, rather than maritime hazards or resistance by the captives, was the greatest cause of vessel losses among British enslaving vessels.{{sfnp|Inikori|1996|p=58}}

==''Delaware''==
Francis Bruel, a United States citizen purchased ''Ranger'' in Guadeloupe and renamed her ''Delaware''. On 17 November 1805 {{HMS|Unique|1804|6}} captured ''Delaware'', George Pickle, master, some 10 miles from Guadeloupe as ''Delaware'' was sailing from Philadelphia to Guadeloupe. Pickle protested the capture, arguing that ''Delaware'' was a neutral vessel. The [[Vice admiralty court]] at Antigua on 16 December rejected the appeal. Documents submitted during the court case revealed that ''Delaware'' had been ''Ranger''. ''Ranger'' was returned to her British owners.<ref>[https://portal.prizepapers.de/fullscreen/prizepapers_document_c30df60f-1b10-4866-90fd-5986d878b1c3/1/ Printed prize appeal from the Vice-Admiralty Court of Antigua. Captured ship: Delaware...; Reference: HCA 45/52/9 from the Vice-Admiralty Court of Antigua.]</ref>

==''Ranger''==

{| class=" wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Master
! Owner
! Trade
! Source & notes
|-
| 1808
| T.Phillips<br/>Pugh
| Weston & Co.
| Liverpool–Africa<br/>Waterford–Newfoundland
| ''LR''; lengthened 1796
|-
|}

==Fate==
''Ranger'' was last listed in ''Lloyd's Register'' in the volume for 1814, but with data unchanged since 1808.

==Citations==
{{reflist|30em}}

==References==
* {{cite journal| last = Behrendt | first = Stephen D. | author-link = Stephen D. Behrendt | url = https://www.hslc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/140-5-Behrendt.pdf |date = 1990 | title = The Captains in the British slave trade from 1785 to 1807 | journal = Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire | volume = 140}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Inikori |first1=Joseph|year= 1996 |title= Measuring the unmeasured hazards of the Atlantic slave trade: Documents relating to the British trade |journal= Revue française d'histoire d'outre-mer |volume=83 |issue=312|pages=53–92}}
* {{cite book |last=Williams |first=Gomer |year=1897 |title=History of the Liverpool Privateers and Letters of Marque: With an Account of the Liverpool Slave Trade |publisher=W. Heinemann}}

{{1795 shipwrecks}}

[[Category:1791 ships]]
[[Category:Ships built in the Bahamas]]
[[Category:Maritime incidents in 1795]]
[[Category:Captured ships]]
[[Category:Age of Sail merchant ships of England]]
[[Category:Liverpool slave ships]]
[[Category:Age of Sail merchant ships of the United States]]