User:Pickersgill-Cunliffe/sandbox3

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=Robert Hughes (Royal Navy officer, died 1774)=

Rear-Admiral Robert Hughes (died 19 January 1774) was a Royal Navy officer.

Design and construction
Medusa was a 50-gun, 12-pounder Experiment-class fourth rate. In the mid-eighteenth century the fourth rate as a class of ship had been slowly replaced by more capable but smaller frigates. The expectation of the American Revolution, however, meant that the type was brought back to the forefront of naval architecture. This was because the shallow waters off the coast of North America would not allow larger warships such as third rate ships of the line to operate safely. The Royal Navy's frigates, while shallow enough to work close to shore, were too small to be as effective as ships of the line could be. Fourth rates were both large enough and shallow enough to make an impact in warfare off the American coasts. As such shipbuilders began to submit designs for new classes of fourth rates, one of which was the Experiment class by Surveyor of the Navy, John Williams.

The Experiment class of fifty guns was planned by Williams to be a serious alternative to the use of frigates in wider naval warfare, and as such looked to create a "best of both worlds" situation between ships of the line and frigates. Williams designed the class to carry a battery of 24-pounder long guns on the ship's lower deck but based the hull on dimensions from the 1741 Establishment of Royal Navy ship construction, thus making the ships smaller than other modern designs. The Admiralty approved the design on 9 November 1772, but decreed that the 24-pounders would be too destructive on the lightly built timbers of the ships, replacing the battery with 12-pounders.

Medusa was ordered on 1 August 1775, the second ship of the class after the prototype HMS Experiment. She was named on 20 October, after the gorgon Medusa. The contract for Medusa was given to the shipwright John Henslow at Plymouth Dockyard. The ship was laid down in March the following year, but a long period of time ensued before she was launched, during which in November 1784 Henslow was replaced by Thomas Pollard. Medusa was finally launched on 23 July 1785 with the following dimensions: 140 ft along the upper deck, 115 ft at the keel, with a beam of 38 ft and a depth in the hold of 16 ft. The ship had a draught of 10 ft forward and 14 ft aft, and measured 920$16/94$ tons burthen.

Medusa was completed on 10 August, having cost £26,417. With a crew complement of 300, she was armed with twenty 12-pounders on the lower deck and twenty-two 12-pounders on the upper deck. This main armament was complemented by six 6-pounders on the quarterdeck. Initially the forecastle was planned to carry two more 6-pounders, but on 10 October 1790 an Admiralty Order changed this to two 32-pounder carronades. Medusa was fitted out for the first time between August and 15 October to operate in the English Channel. This cost a further £3,296.

Service
Medusa was commissioned in August 1790 by Captain John Nicholson Inglefield. Despite her having been fitted for the English Channel, on 22 October the ship sailed for the African coast. Having at some point returned to Britain, Medusa was recommissioned under Captain James Norman in January 1793. In the following month the ship was converted into a receiving ship at Chatham Dockyard at a cost of £3,446. She served in such a role at Cork from April, and towards the end of the year was described as being a 38-gun fifth rate with a crew of 274 men.

Medusa was sent to Jamaica on 15 February 1795 and returned as an escort to a convoy in December, being paid off at the same time. Early the following year she may have briefly served as a troop ship before in February she was instead fitted as a hospital ship at Plymouth at a cost of £8,961. Recommissioned under the command of Commander John Eaton in March, Medusa continued as a hospital ship until January 1797. Subsequently in July Medusa returned to her role as a troop ship, under the command of Commander Alexander Becher. In this role she sailed to the Mediterranean Sea in October 1798. While off Rosia Bay, Gibraltar, on 26 November Medusa was wrecked.

Service
Matthew Latham was born in 1785/6 and joined the British Army as an ensign in the 3rd Regiment of Foot on 15 November 1805. He was subsequently promoted to lieutenant on 8 April 1807. From November 1809 Latham served with his regiment in the Iberian Peninsula, fighting the Peninsular War. As such he fought at the Battle of Busaco on 27 September 1810 and was then present at the Battle of Albuera on 16 May the following year.

Early life
Booty Harvey was born at Wordwell, Suffolk, on 4 May 1764. He was the son of Thomas Harvey, a farmer; his mother's maiden name was Pawsey. His father's landlord was Rear-Admiral Augustus Hervey, 3rd Earl of Bristol. Under Hervey's patronage, Harvey joined the Royal Navy as a midshipman in 1775.

Early career
With the American Revolutionary War ongoing, Harvey was sent to serve on the 32-gun frigate HMS Arethusa, in which ship he sailed to St Helena. Subsequent to this Harvey transferred to join the 32-gun frigate HMS Montreal, visiting Quebec in her. Montreal afterwards joined the Mediterranean Fleet, where in 1779 the frigate was captured by two French ships of the line. Hervey died on 23 December 1779, but the patronage of the Hervey family continued for Harvey under Hervey's nephew, Captain John Hervey, Lord Hervey, another Royal Navy officer. Harvey served under Hervey in various ships until the end of the American Revolutionary War in 1783.