HMS Medway

Eight ships and a shore establishment of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Medway, after the River Medway.

HMS Medway (1693)

HMS Medway was a 60-gun fourth rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched at Sheerness Dockyard on 20 September 1693.

Medway, together with Chatham and Triton, captured the French Auguste on 19 August 1705.

She was rebuilt according to the 1706 Establishment at Deptford Dockyard, and relaunched on 1 August 1718. Medway was hulked in 1740.

She was eventually broken up in 1749.

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HMS Medway (1812)

HMS Medway was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 19 November 1812 at Northfleet.

Commander Augustus Brine, whilst in command of the Medway captured the United States, 18 gun, Brig of War Syren with a complement of 137 men in July 1814.

Medway was converted to serve as a prison ship at the Royal Naval Dockyard on Ireland Island in Bermuda in 1847. The colony had been selected for development as the primary British naval and military base in the North American and West Indian region following the loss of all British ports between Nova Scotia and the West Indies with American Independence. Bermuda's manpower was entirely devoted to shipbuilding and seafaring, and the shortage of cheap manual labour led the Admiralty to import convicts from British and Irish prisons, who were housed in hulks like the Medway. Conditions for the convicts were harsh, and discipline was draconian.

In 1849, convict James Cronin, on the Medway, was placed in solitary confinement from the 25th to the 29th for fighting. On release, and being returned to work, he refused to be cross-ironed. He ran onto the breakwater, brandishing a poker threateningly. For this, he was ordered to receive punishment (presumably flogging) on Tuesday, the 3rd of July, 1849, with the other convicts aboard the hulk assembled behind a rail to witness. When ordered to strip, he hesitated. Thomas Cronin, his older brother, addressed him and, while brandishing a knife, rushed forward to the separating rail. He called out to the other prisoners in Gaelic and many joined him in attempting to free the prisoner and attack the officers. The officers opened fire. Two men were killed and twelve wounded. Punishment of James Cronin was then carried out. Three-hundred men of the 42nd Regiment of Foot, in barracks on Ireland Island, responded to the scene under arms.