HMS Briton (1812)

HMS Briton off Rio de Janeiro
History
United Kingdom
Name	HMS Briton
Owner	Royal Navy
Ordered	28 September 1808
Builder	Chatham Dockyard
Laid down	February 1810
Launched	11 April 1812
Fate	Broken up 18 September 1860
General characteristics [1]
Class and type	Leda class Fifth-rate 44 gun frigate
Tons burthen	1,07981⁄94 (bm)
Length	Overall; 149 ft 11 in (45.7 m) Keel: 125 ft 3+3⁄4 in (38.2 m)
Beam	40 ft 3 in (12.3 m)
Depth of hold	12 ft 8+1⁄2 in (3.9 m)
Propulsion	Sail
Sail plan	Fully rigged
Complement	284
Armament	Upper deck: 28 x 18-pounder guns. QD: 8 x 9-pounder guns + 6 x 32-pounder carronades. Fc: 2 x 9-pounder guns + 2 x 32-pounder carronades.

HMS Briton was a 38-gun fifth-rate frigate of the British Royal Navy's Leda class. She was ordered on 28 September 1808 and her keel laid down at Chatham Dockyard in February 1810. Navy veteran Sir Thomas Staines was appointed her first captain on 7 May 1812 but did not join the ship until 17 June 1813 owing to his being at sea aboard HMS Hamadryad.^[2] After a period of cruising in the Bay of Biscay, the vessel set sail for South America where during the course of several missions she unexpectedly encountered the last member of the crew that had seized HMS Bounty from its captain Lieutenant William Bligh during the 1789 mutiny aboard the ship. With the coming of the Pax Britannica in 1815, Briton undertook various voyages before she was broken up in 1860.