abstract
| - HMS Princess was a 70-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She had briefly sailed as the Princesa for the Spanish Navy, until her capture off Cape Finisterre in 1740 during the War of the Austrian Succession. After being chased down and captured by three British ships, she was acquired for service by the Royal Navy. Her design and fighting qualities excited considerable interest, and sparked a series of increases in the dimensions of British warships. She went on to serve under a number of commanders in several theatres of the War of the Austrian Succession, including the Mediterranean, where she was at the Battle of Toulon, and in the Caribbean and off the North American coast. She was then laid up and being assessed, was not reactivated for service during the Seven Years' War. She was instead reduced to a hulk at Portsmouth, in which capacity she lasted out both the Seven Years' War and the American War of Independence, being sold for breaking up in 1784, shortly after the end of the latter conflict, after a career in British service lasting 44 years.
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