HMS Active (1799)

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Career (United Kingdom)

Name:	HMS Active
Builder:	Chatham Dockyard
Launched:	14 December 1799
Renamed:	HMS Argo on 15 November 1833
Reclassified:	On harbour service from February 1826
Fate:	Broken up in October 1860
General characteristics as built
Class and type:	38-gun fifth rate frigate
Tons burthen:	1,058 long tons (1,075.0 t)
Length:	150 ft (45.7 m) (gundeck)
Beam:	41 ft (12.5 m)
Propulsion:	Sails
Sail plan:	Full rigged ship
Armament:	38 guns

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Active and HMS Argo.

HMS Active was a fifth rate frigate of the Royal Navy, launched on 14 December 1799 at Chatham Dockyard.

Active entered service in 1800, operating in the English Channel as part of the Channel Fleet during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1801 the privateer Quinola was captured in the Channel and in 1802 Active sailed to Egypt and back with specie. In 1805, Active was in the Mediterranean, later sailing to the West Indies and then the the waters off Ireland. In 1807, Active returned to the Mediterranean to participate in Thomas Louis's squadron in the Dardanelles Operation. The following year Active captured the Italian brig Friedland and in 1809 returned to Britain and was paid off.

Recommissioned later in 1809, Active sailed for the Adriatic and in 1810 she participated in a raid of Grao near Trieste, seizing a coastal convoy under Captain James Alexander Gordon. In 1811 active raided Pescona and Ortona and in later in the year participated in the Battle of Lissa. Later in the year Active attacked Ragosniza and in November the ship was engaged at the Action of 29 November 1811 when a French convoy was destroyed.

In 1812 Active returned to Britain and served briefly in the West Indies in 1815. Active remained in service in the Mediterranean and elsewhere until 1824, when she entered reserve in Portsmouth. She was renamed HMS Argo on 15 November 1833 and was broken up in October 1860 at Plymouth.