HMS Grasshopper (1813)

HMS Grasshopper was a Royal Navy 18-gun Cruizer-class brig-sloop launched in 1813. She was the second ship of the class to bear the name; the first HMS Grasshopper (1806) had been stranded at Texel and surrendered to the Batavian Republic on Christmas Day 1811.

Service
On 6 October 1813, Grasshopper recaptured the Dryades, Humphries, Master.

From 1814 Grasshopper served in the Mediterranean. On 29 April and 18 May 1815, she captured the Maruccia, Madonna del Montalleggro, and the Immaculata Concezione. Unfortunately, Grasshoper's prize agents, Messers Lark and Woodhead, went bankrupt in 1816. As a result, the last of the prize money from these captures did not arrive until 1850, and then was minor.

More importantly, on 13 May was part of the squadron that was present at the surrender of Naples during the Neapolitan War, though she herself was not actually there. A British squadron, consisting of Grasshopper, the 74-gun HMS Tremendous (1784), the frigate Alcmene, and the sloop HMS Partridge (1809) blockaded the port and destroyed all the gunboats there. Parliament voted a grant of £150,000 to the officers and men of the squadron for the property captured at the time, the grant being paid in 1816. Initially, Grasshopper was excluded from the payment as she was not actually present, having been sent on an errand. However, Sir Charles Barrard sued and eventually the court agreed that there had been a blockade and that Grasshopper had been part of the blockade and so was entitled to share in the grant. The money was paid in May 1819, with the other officers and crew of the other three vessels being required to repay part of their grant.

Grasshopper then spent 1816 and 1817 in Portsmouth. From 1818 she was assigned to the North America Station, being based at Halifax and Newfoundland. During this time her captain was Commander David Buchan, and in her he carried out an assignment from the Governor, Sir Charles Hamilton, to return the native woman Demasduwit to her people, the Beothuks. Although she died of tuberculosis before the mission could be accomplished, he transported her body to a Beothuk camp by ascending the Exploits River in January 1820. Seeing signs of the Beothuk, but meeting none, they left her body and possessions in a tent by Red Indian Lake and returned to Grasshopper by the end of February. In 1822 she returned to Portsmouth and was converted to a ship-sloop before returning in 1823 to Halifax. In 1827 she was in Woolwich Dockyard, presumably for another refit.

From 1827 to 1830 Grasshopper served on the West Indies Station, based in Jamaica. There she was involved in suppressing the slave trade. Commander Abraham Crawford was appointed to the command of Grasshopper on 8 December 1827.

On 27 June 1828 she captured the Xerxes. Admiral Fleeming had ordered Crawford to patrol Cuba's northwest coast and it was there that Grasshoper encountered the Xerxes. The Xerxes was armed with one 18-pounder gun, four smaller guns, and her 44-man crew was well supplied with small arms. She had sailed with 426 slaves, of whom 406 were still alive. Grasshopper chased Xerxes for 26 hours before capturing her in the Gulf of Mexico; Grasshopper then took her into Havana where British and Spanish Mixed Court condemned (confiscated) the vessel and nominally freed the now 401 surviving slaves on 12 July. On 22 November she captured the Firme, which was carrying 487 slaves when Grasshopper. captured her, having started out from the Gold Coast with 492. She had a crew of 43 men, four passengers, and was armed with six guns, four 18-pounders, one 12-pounder, and one 24-pounder. She too went into Havana and was condemned on 18 December. Crawford received promotion to post-captain in the hospital ship HMS Magnificent (1806), which was at Port Royal, Jamaica, on 5 January 1829; he invalided back to Britain on 3 April in the yacht Herald later that year.

In 1832 Grasshopper returned to Portsmouth.

Fate
The Admiralty offered Grasshopper for sale at Portsmouth on 30 May 1832. She was sold on that day to Thomas Ward.