Mars as a training ship on River Tay, circa 1902
History
Royal Navy EnsignUnited Kingdom
NameHMS Mars
BuilderChatham Dockyard
Laid downDecember 1839
Launched1 July 1848
FateSold, 1929
General characteristics [1]
Class and typeVanguard-class ship of the line
Tons burthen2576 bm
Length190 ft (58 m) (gundeck)
Beam56 ft 9 in (17.30 m)
Depth of hold22 ft 6 in (6.86 m)
PropulsionSails
Sail planFull-rigged ship
Armament
  • 78 guns:
  • Gundeck: 26 × 32 pdrs, 2 × 68 pdr carronades
  • Upper gundeck: 26 × 32 pdrs, 2 × 68 pdr carronades
  • Quarterdeck: 14 × 32 pdrs
  • Forecastle: 2 × 32 pdrs, 2 × 32 pdr carronades
  • Poop deck: 4 × 18 pdr carronades

HMS Mars was a two-deck 80-gun second rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 1 July 1848 at Chatham Dockyard.[1]

She served as a supply carrier in the Crimean War, and was fitted with screw propulsion in 1855. She then saw service in the Mediterranean.[2] In 1869 she was moored in the River Tay,[3] off Woodhaven. Here she served as a training ship for boys aged ten to sixteen from across Scotland, with up to 400 on board at any one time; these boys were usually homeless, orphans, or delinquents.[4][5] She was finally sold in 1929, when she was sold and towed to Thos. W. Ward's Inverkeithing yard to be broken up.[1][6]

Citations

  1. 1 2 3 Lavery, Ships of the Line vol.1, p191.
  2. ↑ "Mars, Dundee". Dundee City Council. Archived from the original on 1 March 2006. Retrieved 6 November 2008.
  3. ↑ "Mars Training Ship, Dundee". Dundee City Council. Archived from the original on 1 December 2008. Retrieved 6 November 2008.
  4. ↑ "From Mars to Dundee: The prison ship that shaped generations". The Herald. 27 October 2019. Retrieved 16 November 2023.
  5. ↑ Longair, Bill (March 2023). "A Mars boy: from the streets of Dundee to the battlefields of South Africa". Orders & Medals Research Society Journal. 62 (1): 26. ISSN 1474-3353.
  6. ↑ "Mars, Dundee". Dundee City Council. Archived from the original on 1 December 2008. Retrieved 6 November 2008.

References

  • Lavery, Brian (2003) The Ship of the Line – Volume 1: The development of the battlefleet 1650–1850. Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-252-8.


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