HDMS Elephanten (1741)

HDMS Elephanten ^{[3][Note 1]} was an 18th-century ship-of-the-line in the Dano-Norwegian navy that was built at Nyholmen in Copenhagen by Laurent Barbé^[4] and ornamentation by J.Wiedewelt.^[5]

History
Denmark
Name	Elephanten[1][2]
Namesake	The Order of the Elephant
Builder	Laurent Barbé
Laid down	1740
Launched	6 May 1741
In service	1741
Out of service	1760
Homeport	Copenhagen
General characteristics
Type	Ship of the line[1]
Tons burthen	1177 Lst
Length	169 ft (52 m)
Beam	45 ft (14 m)
Draught	21 ft (6.4 m) (aft)
Sail plan	Full-rigged ship
Complement	668[2]
Armament	70 × 24-pdr guns

A model of this ship's figurehead can be seen at the Royal Danish Naval Museum and also a model of the stern galleries in full colour.^[1]

Design and construction

The design of the ship-of-the-line which would become Elephanten was produced by Barbé as part of a competition between him and another French shipbuilder, du Chemin, before the appointment of the new master shipbuilder to the Danish fleet. Barbé's employment dated from 6 May 1740,^[4] by which time construction of the new ship had already started!^[1] Even during construction, Elephanten gave cause for concern about the structure of the keel - which was put down to faulty construction rather than faulty design. In the end, Elephanten proved to be an excellent ship and the technical drawings set the standard for future work.^[4] Elephanten's sistership, Nellebladet (1746), was built to the same design plan.^[6]

Fate

Elephanten was decommissioned in 1760 and broken up the same year.^[2]

Notes

1. A number of technical drawings can be seen on-line at by clicking "vis"