Rates of Ships

Rates of Ships

This item describes the rating system used by the British to classifiy the various ships of their fleets.

Blacso, M. (n.d.). 3decks - Naval Sailing Warfare History / Rates. Retrieved 30 April 2015, from http://3decks.pbworks.com/w/page/915789/Rates

British English

Type	Rate	Guns	Gun decks	Men
Ship of the line or great frigate*	1st rate	100+	3	850 to 875
	2nd rate	90 to 98	3	700 to 750
	3rd rate	64 to 80	2	500 to 650
	4th rate	50 to 60	2	320 to 420
Great frigate* or frigate	5th rate	32 to 44	1 to 2	200 to 300
	6th rate	28	1	200
Frigate* or post ship		20 to 24	1	140 to 160
Sloop-of-war	Unrated	16 to 18	1	90 to 125
Gun-brig, brig, cutter, or schooner		4 to 14	1	20 to 90

 

The rating system of the Royal Navy was used by the British Royal Navy between the beginning of the 17th century and the middle of the 19th century to categorise sailing warships, initially classing them according to their assigned quantity of men, and later according to the number of their carriage-mounted guns

The Stuart era

The formal system of dividing up the Navy's fighter battleships into a number or groups or "rates" began in approximately 1604. At this time the combatant ships of the "Navy Royal" were divided up according to the number of men required to man them at sea (i.e. crew size) into four groups:

• Royal ships (the largest ships in the previous "great ships" grouping) mounting 42–55 guns
• Great ships (the rest of the ships in the previous "great ships" grouping) mounting 38–40 guns
• Middling ships mounting 30–32 guns
• Small ships mounting less than 30 guns

At the dawn of King Charles I's reign, these four groups were renamed to a numerical sequence. The royal ships were now graded as first rank, the great ships as second rank, the middling ships as third rank, and the small ships as fourth rank. Shortly afterwards, the structure was modified, with the term rank now being replaced by rate, and the prior small ships now being sub-divided into fourth, fifth and sixth rates. (Blacso, 2006)

The earliest rating was based not on the number of guns, but on the established complement (number of men). This first classification took place in 1626, and was substantially altered in late 1653 as the complements of individual ships were raised. From approximately 1660 the classification moved from one based on the number of men to one based on the number of carriage guns a ship carried.

Samuel Pepys, then Secretary to the Admiralty, revised the structure in 1677 and laid it down as a "solemn, universal and unalterable" classification. The rating of a ship was of administrative and military use. The number and weight of guns determined the size of crew needed, and hence the amount of pay and rations needed. It also indicated whether a ship was powerful enough to stand in the line of battle. Pepys's original classification was updated by further definitions in 1714, 1721, 1760, 1782, 1801 and 1817 (the last being the most severe, as it provided for including in the count of guns the carronades that had previously been excluded). (Blacso, 2006)

First, second and third rates (ships of the line)

A first, second or third-rate ship was regarded as a "ship-of-the-line". The first and second rates were three-deckers; that is, they had three continuous decks of guns (on the lower deck, middle deck and upper deck), as well as smaller weapons on the quarterdeck, forecastle and poop. The largest third rates, those of 80 guns, were likewise three-deckers from the 1690s until the early 1750s, but both before this period and subsequent to it, 80-gun ships were built as two-deckers. All the other third rates, with 74 guns or less, were likewise two-deckers, with just two continuous decks of guns (on the lower deck and upper deck), as well as smaller weapons on the quarterdeck, forecastle and poop.

Fourth, fifth and sixth rates

According to Blasco (2006), "The smaller fourth rates, of about 50 or 60 guns on two decks, were ships-of-the-line until 1756, when it was felt that such 50-gun ships were now too small for pitched battles. The larger fourth rates of 60 guns continued to be counted as ships-of-the-line, but few new ships of this rate were added, the 60-gun fourth rate being superseded over the next few decades by the 64-gun third rate. The Navy did retain some fourth rates for convoy escort, or as flagships on far-flung stations; it also converted some East Indiamen to that role."

The smaller two-deckers originally blurred the distinction between a fourth rate and a fifth rate. At the low end of the fourth rate one might find the two-decker 50-gun ships from about 1756. The high end of the fifth rate would include two-deckers of 40- or 44-guns (from 1690) or even the demi-batterie 32-gun and 36-gun ships of the 1690–1730 period. The fifth rates at the start of the 18th century were generally "demi-batterie" ships, carrying a few heavy guns on their lower deck (which often used the rest of the lower deck for row ports) and a full battery of lesser guns on the upper deck. However, these were gradually phased out, as the low freeboard (i.e., the height of the lower deck gun port sills above the waterline) meant that in rough weather it was often impossible to open the lower deck gun ports. (Blacso, 2006)

Fifth and sixth rates were never included among ships-of-the-line. The middle of the 18th century saw the introduction of a new fifth-rate type—the classic frigate, with no ports on the lower deck, and the main battery disposed solely on the upper deck, where it could be fought in all weathers.

Sixth-rate ships were generally useful as convoy escorts, for blockade duties and the carrying of dispatches; their small size made them less suited for the general cruising tasks the fifth-rate frigates did so well. There were two groups of sixth rates; the larger category comprised the sixth-rate frigates of 28 guns, carrying a main battery of twenty-four 9-pounder guns, as well as four smaller guns on their superstructures. The second comprised the "post ships" of between 20 and 24 guns. These were too small to be formally counted as frigates (although colloquially often grouped with them), but still required a post-captain (i.e. an officer holding the substantive rank of captain) as their commander.  (Blacso, 2006)

Unrated vessels

The rating system did not classify vessels smaller than the sixth rate. The remainder were simply "unrated". The larger of the unrated vessels were generally all called sloops. The category of "sloop-of-war" included any unrated combatant vessel.