HMS Busy (1778)

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

Illustration of a Royal Navy cutter built to equivalent dimensions as Busy
History
Great Britain
NameHMS Busy
BuilderThomas Farley, Folkestone
Launched1778
Completed1 October 1778 at Deptford Dockyard
Commissioned
  • July 1778–May 1783
  • May 1786–August 1786
  • March 1787–June1792
Decommissioned
  • May 1783–May 1786
  • August 1786–March 1787
Out of service20 August 1771
FateSold out of service, Portsmouth Dockyard, June 1792
General characteristics
Class & type10-gun cutter
Tons burthen188 (bm)
Length
  • 73 ft 6+1⁄2 in (22.4 m) (overall)
  • 53 ft 6+1⁄4 in (16.3 m) (keel)
Beam25 ft 8 in (7.8 m)
Depth of hold9 ft 7 in (2.9 m)
Sail planfore-and-aft rig
Complement55
Armament
  • 10 × 4-pounder guns (prior to 1780)
  • 12 × 4-pounder guns, 2 x 12-pounder carronades (1780–1792)

HMS Busy was a 12-gun single-masted cutter of the Royal Navy, purchased during the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War for coastal patrols in the English Channel and North Sea. In 1780 she was instrumental in the Royal Navy's recapture of HMS Jackal which had been in French control after a crew mutiny in the previous year. Present but not significantly involved in the 1781 Battle of Dogger Bank against a substantial Dutch fleet, Busy saw out her remaining years of service in coastal patrols off northern and eastern Scotland and in the Shetland Islands. In 1792 she was sold into private ownership at Portsmouth Dockyard for a sum of £130 (equivalent to £20,000 in 2023).

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