This first French _Téméraire_ was a ship that the British Navy of her time saw something of. She formed one of the men-of-war present with the allied French squadron which played so very peculiar a part when attached to the Duke of York’s fleet in the battle of Solebay in 1672, and in the same way also she was present at Prince Rupert’s three drawn battles with De Ruyter in the following year. As an enemy a few years later, the first French _Téméraire_ fought against us both at Beachy Head and in the battle off Cape Barfleur, after which the _Téméraire_ escaped and found refuge under the harbour batteries of St. Malo.
“_The Rash_” is what an official return on the French Navy, presented to Parliament on the 9th of February, 1698, calls the _Téméraire_, in accordance with the custom then in vogue of translating foreign men-of-war names appearing in British official documents. It seems a curious disguise for the name _Téméraire_ perhaps, although even then it is hardly so grotesque as the names under which some of the _Téméraire’s_ consorts figure in various House of Commons returns: “_The Without Danger_,” for instance, for _Le Sans Pareil_; “_The Undertaker_” or “_The Understanding_” (as two different official lists give it) for _L’Entreprenante_, another ship; “_The Jolly_” for _Le Joli_; “_The Fire_” for _Le Fier_; “_The Fiddle_” for _La Fidelle_, a frigate; the “_Turkish Lady_” for another frigate, _La Turquoise_, and so on.
Two years after Barfleur—on the 28th of November, 1694—a crippled French man-of-war was met with, a few miles to the south of the Lizard, by the British man-of-war _Montagu_. She had been dismasted in a storm out in the Atlantic and was nearly waterlogged and sinking; and after a few shots in reply to the _Montagu’s_ challenging gun hauled her colours down. The enemy’s ship was the “_Timmeraire_, of fifty-six guns,” in the words of the _Montagu’s_ log. They found it impossible to save the prize, either to rig jury masts or to take her in tow, as the weather came on thick and stormy, and in the end cleared the crew out, and on the 3rd of December abandoned the ship and set her on fire. That was the end of the first French _Téméraire_.
Two other _Téméraires_ followed in the French Navy, and then we come to the ship that became our own first _Téméraire_. This was the _Téméraire_, of seventy-four guns, built in 1748, which, after fighting against us in the battle which cost Admiral Byng his life, became prize of war three years later to the man whose hand signed the order for Byng’s firing party, Admiral Boscawen, on the day of Boscawen’s defeat of the French Toulon fleet in Lagos Bay, on Monday, the 19th of August, 1759.