Chilean corvette Independencia (1818)

Career (United States of America)
Name:	Curatio
Owner:	Paul Delano
Launched:	July 1818
In service:	9. September 1818
Fate:	built for Chile
Career (Chile)
Name:	Independencia
Cost:	USD300.000
Commissioned:	September 1819
Out of service:	1. April 1826
Honours and awards:	Liberating Expedition to Perú, Expedition to California (capture of Spanish San Francisco Javier, definitive capture of Chiloé)
Fate:	sold to Argentina for $40.000
Career (Argentina)
Name:	Montevideo
Cost:	$ 40.000
Commissioned:	1. April1826
Fate:	sunk in Talcahuano, refloated and sold to Perú
Career (Peru)
Name:	Independencia
Cost:	$ 40.000
Fate:	sunk in Callao
General characteristics
Class and type:	Corvette
Displacement:	850 t
Length:	130-138 ft
Beam:	37,3 ft
Draft:	18 ft
Propulsion:	sail
Crew:	200-256
Armament:	26 guns

Independencia was a corvette of 851 tons and 26-gun built 1818 in the Forman Cheeseman Shipyard of New York under the name Curatio for the Chilean revolutionary government.

The ship was launched in July and tugged from Corlear's Hook in East River to the Hudson River to continue the work there. Because of US neutrality laws she was declared in the ship's register with the built number 203 on 30 July as merchant ship property of his captain, Paul Delano and, unarmed, set sails for Buenos Aires on 9 September, together with the Horatio (under Captain Joseph Skinner), built in the Adam and Noah Brown Shipyards under the same circumstances, and the Sachem with the respective materiel.

Chilean career

In Buenos Aires the Curatio set sails for Valparaíso, where she arrived on 23 June 1819 to be renamed Independencia and commissioned to the First Chilean Navy Squadron under the command of Captain Carlos F. Foster (also Robert Forster) and up 1821 Wilkinson.

She was flagship of Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald's expedition to California in 1821. On the way she, together with the Araucano, captured the Spanish brigantine corsario San Francisco Javier. She ran aground near El Realejo without heavy losses.

In summer 1822/23 she was refitted in Valparaíso and participated in the blockade of Chiloé. 1823 transported Jorge Beauchef and his regiment from Valdivia to Talcahuano in order to support the Putsch of Ramón Freire against Bernardo O'Higgins.

1826 she participated to the blockade and conquest of Chiloé under the command of Paul Delano again.

Argentine career

On 1 April 1826 she was sold for $40,000 to Argentina (in war against Brazil) and renamed Montevideo, but her bad condition impeded the rounding of Cape Horn, and she sank in Talcahuano. She was refloated and sold to Peru.

Peruvian career

She was sunk in Callao

See also

• First Chilean Navy Squadron

External links

• Gerardo Etcheverry, Principales naves de guerra a vela hispanoamericanas. (retrieved 22. January 2011) in Spanish languagee