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I had an interesting visit yesterday. I took the family to an antiques and home decoration centre (I can hear your eyes glazing over, but wait a bit...) called The Chesapeake Mill in Wickham, Hampshire.

I was wondering about the name, because I knew it was American.

The explanation is, that the frame of the mill is built of the timbers of the frigate USS Chesapeake, which fought and lost against HMS Shannon in 1813.

There is a little heritage museum inside, explaining the background to the war and events of the battle.

The Shannon was cruising outside Boston and running short on supplies, so Captain Broke sent a letter to Captain Lawrence of the Chesapeake, requesting the favour of a ship to ship duel.

Although the Americans never received the note, they sailed out to challenge anyway.

Both sides had balls of steel.

During the fight, the Chesapeake’s captain was mortally wounded. Almost his last act was to tell the crew, “Don’t give up the ship!”, which has become a celebrated phrase of the US Navy.

Captain Broke was also wounded but recovered.

The captured Chesapeake was brought back to Portsmouth, where its lines were studied by the Admiralty for the secrets of the design.

In 1820 it was sold for scrap. Much of the timber was bought by a builder and used for the frame of the Chesapeake Mill, which operated until the 1970s.

http://www.chesapeakemill.co.uk/

Haha, that is pretty cool

The US frigates at the time had an advanced hull design which made them bigger and faster...and balsier.

"They were all against me, all against me."
-Caine Mutiny

Yup, they were desinged by a guy name sHumphrey's so the style of the Frigate was a Humphries Frigate. That's all Iv'e got from memory but I seem to recall they were faster and coudl carry more guns than a British equivalent.

The US was actually fairly successful in Frigate vs. Frigate actions in the Psuedo-War and the War of 1812. Again, this is from memory so you might want to do your own research.

That's pretty cool.
Thanks for the brief history lesson!