HMS Leopard 36"

• 36" long x 12" Wide x 29" High (1:106 scale)
• Requires hundreds of hours to build from scratch (not from a model kit) by our master artisans.
• Plank on frame 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 cherry, teak, yellow siris, birch and rosewood.
• The model rests perfectly on a large wood base between four arched dolphins (marble base pictured).
• No plastic fittings (machine turned brass cannons and metal anchors)
• Note the significant detail including the planked hull where you can see the nail holes.
• To build this ship, extensive research was done using various sources such as museums, drawings, copies of original plans and photos of the actual ship.
• Visit our Frequently Asked Questions or call with questions.

   

HMS Leopard was a British 50-gun 4th rate warship involved in the Chesapeake-Leopard Affair. Her keel was laid down in 1775 at Portsmouth Dockyard and she was finally launched in 1790 from Sheerness. In early 1807, a number of British and American sailors deserted their respective ships, then blockading French ships in Chesapeake Bay, and joined the crew of the USS Chesapeake.

In an attempt to recover deserted British sailors (or possibly to press American sailors into the service of the Royal Navy), Captain Salisbury Pryce Humphreys hailed the USS Chesapeake and requested permission to search it. Commodore of the Chesapeake, James Barron, refused, and the Leopard opened fire. The former surrendered, and Humphreys boarded to search for deserters. The boarding party captured four deserters from the Royal Navy — two African-born Americans, one U.S.-born American and one British-born sailor — and took them to Halifax, where the British-born sailor, Jenkin Ratford, was later hanged. Though many subsequently believed the affair to be a prelude to the War of 1812, at the time it did little more than strain diplomatic relations between the United States and Britain.

In 1812, the Leopard was converted to a troopship. On June 28, 1814, she was en route from England to Quebec when she grounded on Anticosti Island in heavy fog. The ship was destroyed but none of those on board were lost.

The Leopard in fiction

In Patrick O'Brian's novel Desolation Island, the fifth book of the Aubrey–Maturin series, Jack Aubrey commands the Leopard on a cruise through the Atlantic and Indian oceans after the Chesapeake-Leopard Affair and before the beginning of the War of 1812.