The French ship Cassard was a 74-gun Téméraire-class ship of the line, constructed during the 1790s for the French Navy. Laid down in August 1793 at the Arsenal de Lorient and launched on 2 May 1795, she was completed by July of the same year. The vessel measured approximately 55.87 meters (183 feet 4 inches) in length, with a beam of 14.46 meters (47 feet 5 inches), and a depth of hold of 7.15 meters (23 feet 5 inches). She displaced around 3,069 tonneaux, with a tonnage of 1,537 port tonneaux, and had a mean draught of 7.15 meters. The ship was rigged with three masts and equipped for ship rigging. Her armament consisted of a traditional French 74-gun complement, including twenty-eight 36-pounder long guns on the lower gun deck, thirty 18-pounder long guns on the upper deck, and sixteen 8-pounder long guns on the quarterdeck and forecastle. Some ships of her class after 1787 also added four 36-pounder obusiers on the poop deck, though specific modifications for Cassard are not detailed. Throughout her active service, Cassard was renamed twice: first to Dix-Août in 1798 in honor of the 10 August 1792 insurrection, and later to Brave in 1803. She participated in notable operations such as the French expedition to Ireland in 1798. In 1801, she captured the 16-gun cutter HMS Sprightly, which she subsequently scuttled. The same year, she collided with the ship Formidable while sailing with the Mediterranean Fleet, forcing her to return to port. On 26 September 1805, as part of the Battle of Cape Santa Maria, she and Indivisible succeeded in disabling the British ship Swiftsure by shooting away her yards and masts, leading to her capture. Cassard’s combat record culminated at the Battle of San Domingo in 1806, where she was captured by HMS Donegal. Shortly after her capture, she foundered on 12 April 1806 while en route to Britain, with no loss of life. Her service history reflects her role in the naval conflicts of the Napoleonic Wars and her participation in significant fleet actions of the period.

This description has been generated using GPT-4.1-NANO based on the Vessel's wikidata information and then modified by ShipIndex.org staff.