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hms surprise model ship

32" long x 12" Wide x 28" High click here to: buy model now coming soon CLICK HERE TO: SEE MORE PICTURES --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hms surprise 32" long x 12" Wide x 28" High Requires over 350 hours to build from scratch (not from a model kit) by a master artisan Plank on bulkhead construction (a painstaking process where each individual plank is added to the hull one at a time). Built with rare, high quality woods such as light ebony, rosewood and blackwood. The model rests perfectly on a large, polished  base between four arched  dolphins. Masterfully stitched canvas sails. No plastic parts (metal anchors and machine turned brass cannons. Significant detail. To build this ship, extensive research was done using various sources such as museums, drawings, copies of original plans HISTORY made famous by the film master & commmander five ships of this class were built. Two were captured by the British, L'Unité and La Tourterelle. The records from this period of French history are sparse and provide no information on her actions before she was taken. the Surprise ex L'Unité, famous in her own life for the Hermione exploit, but famous today because of the writing of Patrick O'Brian. In his books on the adventures of Captain Aubrey and the surgeon Maturin, it is the fictional Surprise, based on this real ship, that comes to life as the Captain's favorite ship. Here is the history of the original: constructed in Le Havre as L'Unité in 1794 a 24 gun corvette, armed with 8lb long guns. She was captured in the Mediterranean April 1796 by the British frigate Inconstant and taken in as Surprise . Her lines were taken off and she was re-armed and classed as a 28 gun ship. The Surprise actually carried 24 32lb carronades on her main deck, 8 32lb carronades on her quarter deck and 4 6lb long guns on her foredeck. It was difficult to rate her and she was regarded as a fifth rate till 1798 and then re-classed as a sixth rate.   She sailed to Jamaica in July 1796 under the command of Captain Edward Hamilton. The big moment in her lifetime was the  cutting out of the frigate Hermione on the 24th of October 1799. The Hermione crew had mutinied, killing their commander, Captain Pigot, and their officers. The ship was then surrendered to the Spanish who were allied with the French. She was in the harbor at Puerto Cabello (in what is now Venezuela), defended by shore batteries mounting about 200 guns. The boats of the Surprise, led in person by Captain Hamilton, were detected and fired upon by the patrolling gunboats, but they proceeded, boarded the Hermione, whose crew were at quarters, cleared the deck and sailed her out. Their losses were 12 wounded; the Spanish suffered a loss of 119 killed and 97 wounded. Captain Hamilton was knighted for his conduct and the Hermione was restored to the navy. The Surprise sailed back to England where she was sold at Deptford in February of 1802.