English ship Foresight (1570)

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Foresight.

History
English FlagEngland
NameForesight
BuilderDeptford Dockyard
Launched1570
FateBroken up, 1604
NotesCaptain Christopher Baker commanded the ship Foresight for the English Royal Fleet in the 1588 battle against the Spanish Armada.
General characteristics as built
Class and type41-gun galleon
Tons burthen294 tons
Length78 ft (24 m)(keel)
Beam27 ft (8.2 m)
Depth of hold14 ft (4.3 m)
Complement160
Armament28 guns of various weights of shot

Foresight[Note 1] was a 28-gun galleon of the English Tudor navy, built by Mathew Baker at Deptford Dockyard and launched in 1570. It was a radical innovation over contemporary ships. When John Hawkins became Treasurer of the Navy in 1577, he had sailed all over the world, and his ideas contributed to the production of a new race-built series of galleons - of which the Foresight was the first - without the high fore- and after-castles prevalent in earlier galleons; these "marvels of marine design" could reputedly "run circles around the clumsier Spanish competition."[1] As such, the Foresight was part of the English fleet which destroyed most of the Spanish Armada in 1588.

She was broken up in 1604.

Notes

  1. ^ The 'HMS' prefix was not used until the middle of the 18th century, but is sometimes applied retrospectively

Citations

  1. ^ Boot, Max (2006). War Made New. p. 37. ISBN 978-1-59240-315-8.

References

  • Lavery, Brian (2003) The Ship of the Line - Volume 1: The development of the battlefleet 1650-1850. Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-252-8.
  • Winfield, Rif (2009) British Warships in the Age of Sail 1603-1714: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84832-040-6.


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