HMS Tamar (1863)

HMS Tamar was a Royal Navy troopship built by the Samuda Brothers at Cubitt Town, London, and launched in Britain in 1863. She served as a supply ship from 1897 to 1941, and gave her name to the shore station HMS Tamar in Hong Kong (1897 to 1997).

History

The 1863 incarnation of HMS Tamar was the fourth to bear that name, which is derived from the River Tamar, in Cornwall, and the ship's crest is based on its coat of arms. Built in Cubitt Town in East London, she was launched in June 1863, and began her maiden voyage on 12 January 1864 as a troopship to the Cape and China.

Tamar was dual-powered with masts and a steam engine, giving a speed of 12 knots. She originally had two funnels, but she was re-equipped with a more advanced boiler and reduced to one funnel.

In 1874, she formed part of the Naval Brigade that helped to defeat the Ashanti in West Africa, during the Ashanti War.Tamar took part in the bombardment of Alexandria in 1882.

In 1879, The British Medical Journal reported a group of sailors aboard the Tamar were poisoned by a bad pigeon pie which spawned an Admiralty investigation.

HMS Tamar

Five ships and a naval station of the Royal Navy have been called HMS Tamar, after the River Tamar in South West England:

HMS Tamar (shore station)

HMS Tamar (Chinese: 添馬艦) was the name for the British Royal Navy's base in Hong Kong from 1897 to 1997. It took its name from HMS Tamar, a ship that was used as the base until replaced by buildings ashore.

History

19th Century

The British Navy arrived during the First Opium War to protect the opium traders. Sir Edward Belcher, aboard HMS Sulphur landed in Hong Kong on 25 January 1841.Possession Street still exists to mark the event, although its Chinese name is 水坑口街 ("Mouth of the ditch Street").

Commodore Sir Gordon Bremer raised the Union Jack and claimed Hong Kong as a colony on 26 January 1841. Naval store sheds were erected there in April 1841. The site had been referred to as the "HM Victualling Yard" in the Navy's own register. The first naval storekeeper and agent victualler, Thomas McKnight, appointed on 21 March 1842, served until October 1849. Early maps show that major construction was also carried out at another, slightly more westward site, between 1845 and 1855. In fact, the naval authorities demolished the West Point store sheds and surrendered the land to the colonial government in 1854 in exchange for a plot of land where the Admiralty station of the Mass Transit Railway stands.

HMS Tamar (1758)

HMS Tamar or Tamer was a 16-gun Favourite-class sloop-of-war of the Royal Navy.

The ship was launched in Saltash in 1758 and stationed in Newfoundland from 1763 to 1777.

She was renamed HMS Pluto when she was converted into a fire ship in 1777. The French privateer Duc de Chartres captured her on 30 November 1780; her subsequent fate is unknown.

References

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