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Originally Posted by CutlassCollector
I thought someone may have identified it as a cavalry lance but if, by any chance, it is a French boarding pike, it is hard to see how a French weapon could have British government marks because even if captured it would not have gone through the initial inspection process.
However, perhaps there was a mechanism, that as ships were refitted and overhauled, captured weapons were given acceptance marks during an inspection before the vessel returned to duty. A theory only - hard to prove.
Ships were regularly captured and taken into the service of the captor and it is likely that ships tools and equipment and even pikes and axes would have stayed with the ship.
Some ships changed sides more than once and I always liked the story of the Ambuscade.
She was a British Naval frigate which was captured (much to the delight of Napoleon who decreed a massive painting be made of the event) by the smaller French corvette Bayonnaise in 1798. The resulting court martial exonerated Captain Henry Jenkins of Ambuscade, though a good case could be made that he messed up by losing a much more powerful ship. The French took her into service as Embuscade.
She was recaptured in 1803 by HMS Victory and returned to Royal navy service as Ambuscade after 5 years in the French fleet.
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What an interesting story , and I agree , its very likely that captured weapons would be pressed into service.
11th July 2019, 11:05 PM
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