HMS Sans Pareil (1794) and Reeves Instrument Corporation

HMS Sans Pareil ("Without Equal") was an 80-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She was formerly the French ship Sans Pareil, but was captured in 1794 and spent the rest of her career in service with the British.

Contents 1 French service 2 British service 3 Fate 4 References 5 External links

French service

Sans Pareil was built at Brest as a Tonnant-class ship of the line, to a design by Groignard. She was launched on 8 June 1793, but spent less than a year in service with the French navy. She sailed into the Atlantic in May 1794, under the command of Captain Courand, as part of a squadron under Rear-Admiral Joseph-Marie Nielly. She was Nielly's flagship for the operation, which aimed to meet a corn convoy inbound from North America, under Pierre Jean Van Stabel. Neilly initially failed to make contact with the French convoy, but on 9 May 1794 the squadron came across a British one, escorted by HMS Castor, under the command of Captain Thomas Troubridge. The squadron attacked and captured the Castor, and a number of the convoy's ships. The Castor was only briefly in French hands, being retaken by HMS Carysfort on 29 May. The French fleet on 1 June 1794. Sans Pareil is second to last in the French rear

Having made contact with the approaching convoy, the squadron began the return voyage. During this, a French fleet under Admiral Louis Thomas Villaret de Joyeuse was intercepted by a British fleet under Lord Howe, and a series of sporadic actions were fought on 28 and 29 May. Neilly brought some of his larger ships, including the Sans Pareil to join Villaret, sending the convoy on ahead escorted by frigates. The fleets eventually clashed in force at the Glorious First of June, where Sans Pareil formed part of the French rear. During the battle HMS Royal George, flagship of Vice-Admiral Alexander Hood, broke the French line ahead of Sans Pareil, bringing down her fore and mizzen masts with a broadside. HMS Glory then passed across her stern, shooting away her main mast. Disabled and unmanageable, Sans Pareil drifted out of the line and was taken by HMS Majestic. Aboard her were found Troubridge and 50 men and officers of the Castor. They were released and helped to bring the damaged Sans Pareil into Spithead. Sans Pareil had possibly lost as many as 260 of her crew, with another 120 wounded. British service

The Sans Pareil was commissioned into the Royal Navy, and was initially commanded from March 1795 by Captain Lord Hugh Seymour, who was promoted to Rear-Admiral on 1 June 1795, the first anniversary of the Glorious First. He was succeeded in the command by Captain W. Browell in August 1795, but she continued to serve as Seymour's flagship, with the Channel Fleet. She was then present as part of a fleet under Admiral Hood at another engagement with Villaret, the Battle of Groix on 22 June, where she engaged the French ships Formidable and Peuple, losing ten killed, and having another two wounded. The Formidable was subsequently taken, joining the Royal Navy as HMS Belleisle. Seymour left the ship after this, being appointed to the Board of Admiralty in autumn 1795.

Sans Pareil continued to sail off the French coast, using her French build to her advantage by flying the French ensign and luring privateers to come within range. Seymour returned on a number of occasions, retaining her as his flagship for several cruises. By January 1799 Captain Atkins had taken command of Sans Pareil, but by August Captain Charles Penrose had replaced him. She then sailed to the West Indies, again as Seymour's flagship.

At some point in 1800 or 1801, Sans Pareil captured the Guachapin, which the British took into service under that name. Interestingly, the London Gazette reports that on 9 April 1800, Sans Pareil captured the Spanish trader Guakerpin, of 165 tons burthen (bm), ten guns and 38 men. She belonged to Saint Andero, and was sailing from there to Vera Cruz with a cargo of iron, porter, and linens.

On 27 March, Sans Pareil captured two small French privateer schooners. One was the Pensee, of four guns and 65 men. She was from Guadeloupe and had set out on cruise from Pointe-à-Pitre when she was captured. The second was the Sapajon, of six guns and 48 men. Both were from Guadeloupe and had set out on cruise from Pointe-à-Pitre when they was captured.

Seymour contracted a fever and died on 11 September 1801. Penrose too became ill and had to return to Britain. Sans Pareil then came under the command of Captain William Essington, and served as the flagship of Admiral Richard Montague. She returned to Plymouth on 4 September 1802. Fate

After her return to Plymouth the Lords of the Admiralty wished immediately to recommission her as a guardship, but then she was put into ordinary instead because she was so in need of repair. In 1805 she was ordered repaired. The subsequent major refit lasted for 18 months and cost £35,000. This turned her into a prison hulk, and by 1807 she was used to hold French prisoners-of-war. She was reduced to a sheer hulk at Plymouth in October 1810, and spent another 32 years in service. Sans Pareil was finally broken up in October 1842.

Reeves Instrument Corporation and HMS Sans Pareil (1794)

Reeves Instrument Corporation (RICO) was a Cold War manufacturer of computer and radar systems for the United States. The corporation was the Project Cyclone laboratory operator for simulation of guided missiles, and RICO developed several Strategic Air Command combination (radar/computer/communications) systems ("Q" systems). History

Reeves was originally "Hudson American…just a little bit before the end of D-Day" and in 1946 Reeves Sound Laboratory, a division of Reeves-Ely Laboratories (R.E.L.), was researching "advance gunfire control systems and computers; radar and tracking systems; guided missile controls; aircraft control instruments… (Research initiated 1942.)" RICO was awarded the Department of the Navy contract No. N60ori-128 on June 10, 1946, for "development of a guided missile simulator and the operation of a simulation laboratory research and development on guided missile simulation" and "development and construction of a rapid and precise automatic analog computer suitable for detailed simulation of guided missiles". The contract's Task Order III on June 12, 1947, required Reeves provide "a simulation laboratory, the Project Cyclone Laboratory, which was to be operated by the Reeves Analysis and Computer Group." Reeves built the lab's original Reeves Electronic Analog Computers in 1947, and a new computing lab of REACs was contracted under Task Order III in 1949. "The guided missile simulator of Task Order II was completed in early 1949 satisfactory demonstration in February 1949 of the guided missile simulator solving a three-dimensional guided missile problem".

Early in the Cold War, Reeves developed & tested the AN/USQ-24 Bomb Scoring Central, a variant of the MSQ-2 Close Support Control Set developed by Rome Air Development Center. Bomb Scoring Centrals by RICO were used for Radar Bomb Scoring (RBS), as well as Korean War ground-directed bombing (GDB) controlled by TADPOLE sites. "Reeves Instrument Corporation a wholly owned subsidiary of … Claude Neon, Inc." on April 15, 1955, when the former merged into Dynamics Corporation of America; and on January 20, 1956, the other Reeves division of Neon—Reeves-Ely Laboratories, Inc.--also merged into Dynamics.

In 1958, RICO moved production to its Roosevelt Field plant on East Gate Blvd in Garden City, New York.

In the early 1960s, the Reeves AN/MSQ-35 Bomb Scoring Central was produced for Strategic Air Command RBS and in 1965, the Reeves AN/MSQ-77 Bomb Directing Central was built for Vietnam War GDB. Reeves also produced a 1967 transportable variant of the vacuum tube AN/MSQ-77, and one of the AN/TSQ-81 variants was destroyed after the Battle of Lima Site 85 in Laos. By the end of the war the vacuum-tube Reeves AN/TSQ-96 Bomb Directing Central with a solid state Univac 1219B ballistic computer was being used for GDB.
171+255 170 172 173