Anglo-Danish war

The naval conflict between England and Denmark began with the Copenhagen battle as part of the Second Coalition's war in 1801 , when Horatio Nelson’s squadron of Admiral Parker ’s fleet attacked the Danish capital. The battle that was lost was the cause of the Danish policy of armed neutrality during the final stages of the French Revolutionary Wars , in which Denmark used its naval forces to defend internal and Danish-Norwegian trade. In 1807, Denmark decided to join the continental blockade . In an effort to prevent this, the UK decided to deliver a preemptive strike and sent its fleet to the Danish shores. On August 16, 1807, a landing force was landed near Copenhagen . The capital of Denmark was blocked by the actions of the British fleet and the landing force.

As a result of the British seizure and destruction of large parts of the Danish-Norwegian fleet during the attack on Copenhagen, the Danish-Norwegian government decided to build gunboats in large numbers to compensate for the losses. Danish commander (and later admiral) Steen Andersen Bille ( 1751 - 1833 ) was an active supporter of the strategy for using gunboats. The gunboat projects were originally developed by the Fredrik Henrik af-Chapman , a Swede, and the strategic advantage of the gunboats was that they could be built quickly and cost-effectively throughout the kingdom. The tactical advantage of the gunboats was that they were very maneuverable, especially in shallow waters, and it was hard to get into them from the guns. On the other hand, the boats were vulnerable and often sank from a single hit. They also could not be used in the stormy sea and against large ships. However, the Danish-Norwegian government produced more than 200 gunboats of two models: a sloop cannon (the crew of 76 people, an 18- or 24-pound cannon in the bow, and the other at the stern) and a small gunboat (the crew of 24 people, one 24-pound cannon on the nose) ^[4] .

During the first three years of the war, gunboats were able to seize cargo ships from convoys several times and defeat British naval brigs , although they were not strong enough to defeat large frigates and battleships. The British controlled the Danish waters throughout the war, and with the onset of the navigation season, large trading convoys were regularly conducted through Öresund and the Great Belt . The war included not only armed clashes, but also economic war: the British regularly captured merchant ships as trophies, carried out raids on small islands ^{[5] [6]} , well populated, but unprotected. British warships also conducted landings to replenish stocks of firewood and water, forcibly buying or simply stealing livestock.

The war went along with the Anglo-Russian war , and Russia and Denmark were allies in actions against British troops.

1807-1808

On August 12, 1807, before the war was officially declared, the British battleship HMS Comus captured the 32-gun Danish frigate Friderichsværn . Only one British sailor suffered in the battle, and the Danes lost 12 people, another 20 were injured, some fatally ^[7] . The Royal Navy put Frederiksværn into service and renamed Frederickscoarn ^[8] . On August 23, the British HMS Prometheus launched Congrive missiles in the Danish flotilla of gunboats, but the attack had little effect ^[9] .

After a fierce shelling on September 7, the garrison of Copenhagen laid down arms. The British captured the entire Danish navy, but the Danish government refused to capitulate and turned to France for help.

On September 11, Admiral Thomas McNamara Russell from HMS Carrier sent the dispatch to the British Admiralty, where he announced the surrender of the small island of Helgoland ^[10] . Helgoland from that time became the center of smuggling and espionage against Napoleon.

At the end of October 1807, the French-Danish military alliance was concluded, and Denmark officially joined the continental blockade.

Only on November 4, 1807, the British Empire officially declared war on Denmark. On November 7, the war of the British Empire was also declared by Russia , forced to this step by the conditions of the Peace of Tilsit .

In 1808, Sweden entered the war on the side of Great Britain, but the main events unfolded in the east, where during the Russian-Swedish war of 1808-1809 the Swedes were defeated by Russian troops.

In the East Indies, on February 13, 1808, HMS Russell landed the 14th Infantry Regiment on the Coromandel coast, which allowed the capture of the Danish colony of Tranquebar . On March 14, the 14-gun HMS Childers and the Danish 20-gun sloop HDMS Lougen engaged in a protracted battle ^[11] . The British lost two people killed and nine wounded before they could get out of the battle and return to Leith ^[12] . On March 22, British battleships HMS Nassau and HMS Stately destroyed the Danish battleship HDMS Prins Christian Frederik , commanded by Captain Carl Jessen, in a battle off the island of Zealand . HMS Nassau lost one soldier killed, 16 injured, and HMS Stately lost 4 killed and 27 wounded. The Danes lost 55 people killed and 88 wounded ^[12] .

On April 22, 1808, the sloops HMS Daphne and HMS Tartarus , with the support of brig HMS Forward , attacked a Danish-Norwegian convoy near Skagen . The convoy transported food to Norway, where hunger began due to the British blockade of Danish waters. The British sank five brigs, three haliots, schooners and a sloop under heavy fire from the shore. On May 15, the British frigate HMS Tartar approached Bergen under the Dutch flag to attack the Dutch frigate Guelderland , which was under repair there. Unfortunately for the British, Guelderland had already left the bay, and the British sent boats to the shore to attack merchant ships. When the boats came under heavy fire, HMS Tartar approached the city to cover them. During the battle, captain HMS Tartar and another sailor were killed, twelve injured, but the frigate was able to leave.

On May 24, a British armed cutter Swan joined the battle at Bornholm Island with a Danish 8-gun cutter ^[13] . The battle ended in an explosion aboard the Danish ship, while the Swan was lossless, despite the fire from the Danish ship and Bornholm batteries ^[13] . The island battery made the British cutter go ^[13] .

On 4 June, four Danish gunners attacked the sloop HMS Tickler and captured him after four hours of combat. HMS Tickler lost the captain and another 14 sailors, another 22 soldiers and officers were injured. The Danes lost only one person to the wounded. ^[12] The Danes made HMS Tickler training ship ^[14] .

On June 19, the British brig HMS Seagull pursued and caught up with the Danish brig HDMS Lougen , which was armed with 18 short 18-pound cannons and two long 6-pound cannons ^[15] . At the 20th minute of the battle, 6 Danish gunboats approached and opened fire on the British, while Lougen opened fire on the port side of the HMS Seagull's nose. Half an hour later, the fire badly damaged the Seagull rigging and disabled 5 guns. In the end, Seagull surrendered, losing 8 dead and 20 wounded, including the captain, R. B. Katkart. Seagull sank shortly thereafter ^[15] .

The Danes also captured the sloop HMS Tigress . Sixteen Danish gunboats seized it in the Great Belt on 2 August . In the battle, HMS Tigress lost two people killed and eight wounded ^{[16] [17]} .

On October 20, 1808, bound by the calm of HMS Africa , under the command of Captain John Barrett, barely survived the attack of 25 Danish gunboats and seven armed boats under the command of Commodore J.K. Krieger in the Öresund Strait ^{[18] [19]} . HMS Africa lost nine dead and 51 wounded. At night, the Danes captured the ship ^[20] . On December 5, the English were even less fortunate when HMS Proselyte was defeated on the Anholt island reefs due to the fact that the Danes destroyed the lighthouse. The crew was rescued ^[21] .

1809-1810

On May 18, 1809, the 64-gun battleship HMS Standard , commanded by Captain Pefford Hollis, and the 36-gun frigate HMS Owen Glendower captured Anholt Island. Part of the sailors under the command of Captain William Selby and Captain Edward Nicholls landed on the shore. The Danish garrison of 170 soldiers had fierce but ineffective resistance, which led to the death of one British sailor and the wounding of two more. Then the garrison surrendered, and the British took control of the island. The main objective of the mission was to restore the lighthouse on Anholt to facilitate the movement of British convoys ^[22] .

On 9 June, a Danish-Norwegian flotilla of 21 cannonies and 7 mortar boats attacked a British convoy of 70 merchant ships off the island of Salthholm near Copenhagen . The Danes managed to capture 12 or 13 merchant ships, as well as HMS Turbulent , one of the convoy ships. On 10 August, the Danes captured HMS Allart , a former ship of the Danish fleet ^[23] . On August 12, HMS Lynx commander John Willoughby Marshall discovered three Danish lugers near the Danish coast ^[24] . The water was too shallow for the Lynx , so Marshall sent the monkey sloop and the boat to the battle. The largest of the lugers, who had four cannons and four howitzers, opened fire on the Monkey , before all three luggers rushed to the shore, as soon as the Monkey responded with 18-pound carronades. The British drove the Danes aground and the next day captured them without a loss ^[25] . On 2 September, the Danish-Norwegian fleet seized another British ship when the Danish flotilla of gunboats under the command of Lieutenant Nikolai H. Tuxen captured the gun brig HMS Minx off the coast of northern Jutland. The battle cost the British two people dead and nine wounded. ^[26]

In early 1810, the Danes stopped sending ships with resources to Norway because of British naval activity in Öresund. At the same time, difficulties were noted in transporting grain from Vordingborg in the south of Denmark, past Moen to Copenhagen. To normalize deliveries, the Danes began to use the flotilla of merchant ships accompanied by gunboats, thus avoiding the famine in Denmark ^[27] .

On April 13, 1810, four Danish gunboats, under the command of Lieutenant Peter Nicholas Skibsted, captured the British cannoner Grinder near the Dyursland peninsula near Greno ^[14] . The British ship was armed with one 24-pound cannon and one 24-pound carronade. Grinder was under the command of Thomas Hester and wintered over Anholt. Of the crew of 34 people, two were killed in battle, two were injured. On May 23, seven Danish gunboats opened fire on the brig sloops HMS Raleigh and HMS Alban and the Princess of Wales cutter near Skagen . The Danes lost one gunboat. On July 23, opponents met in a battle near the Norwegian island of Silla . British frigates HMS Belvidera and HMS Nemesis attacked the harbor and burned three schooners - Odin , Tor and Balder , as well as the barge Cort Adeler , who were there. On September 12, six Danish gunboats captured Alban in calm after a four-hour battle, during which the British lost the captain and another soldier to the dead and three wounded. The Danes took the ship into their fleet, retaining its name.

1811-1814

Danish gunboats, staffed by almost 1,000 soldiers, including infantry, attempted to reclaim Anholt Island on February 27, 1811 . The battle at Anholt led to the retreat of the Danes with heavy losses. On April 23, Danes cutter Swan met three Danish gunboats near Senningsesund ^[28] . A volley with one of the gunboats led to water getting into the armored cellar, and Swan was forced to surrender ^[28] . The Danes tried to tow the cutter, but it sank not far from Uddevalla ^[28] . May 11, HMS Rifleman fought off Alban from the Danes. The seizure occurred after a 12-hour chase near the Shetland Islands. By the time the capture of Alban was armed with 12 guns and had a crew of 58 people ^[29] .

On July 31, 1811, HMS Brev Drageren and HMS Algerine followed in Laugesundfjord, Norway, when they faced three Danish brigs: 20-gun Langeland , 18-gun Lügum and 16-gun Kiel . The English ships who gave up on armament turned to flee. ^[30] The next day, HMS Brev Drageren unsuccessfully re-encountered the Danish brigs. August 17, HMS Manly sailed from Sheerness with a convoy. On September 2, at Rental on the Norwegian coast, he was joined by HMS Chanticleer . By the end of the day, the convoy came across three Danish 18-gun brigs ( Alsen , Lolland , Samsø ) ^[31] . Lolland attacked Manly , while the other two brigs pursued the Chanticleer , but he was able to escape. In the battle with Lolland, Manly lost spars and rigging, and after losing six guns on the port side was forced to surrender ^[32] .

The last major battle between the Danish and British warships took place on July 6, 1812, during the battle of Lingor , when a small squadron of British ships met a small squadron of Danish ships on the Norwegian coast. The British were able to destroy the Danish frigate Najaden ^[33] .

The end of the war came only in 1814 , when the Napoleonic empire collapsed and Denmark lost its mighty patron. As a result of the Swedish invasion of Holstein in December 1813 during the war of the Sixth Coalition, Denmark-Norway was forced to seek peace. Under the terms of the world of Kiel, Denmark recognized its defeat and ceded Norway to Sweden, and Great Britain, the island of Helgoland , captured by the British back in 1807 . In general, the Anglo-Danish war adversely affected the economic and political situation in Denmark.

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