Indien (1777)

Indien was a 40-gun frigate ordered by American diplomats in France Benjamin Franklin, Silas Deane, and Arthur Lee. Designed by shipwright Jacques Boux, she was laid down in early 1777 at a private shipyard in Amsterdam and launched in November 1777. Built with the scantlings and lines of a small 74-gun ship of the line, she was constructed as a frigate. In 1780, the Duke of Luxembourg chartered her to the South Carolina State Navy, which renamed her South Carolina.

Her armament consisted of 28 Swedish 36-pounder long guns on her main deck, and 12 12-pounder long guns on her forecastle and quarterdeck. In December 1782, she was captured by the Royal Navy in the Battle of the Delaware Capes. The British did not take her into service, and she disappears from historical records after 1783. Perhaps her greatest significance is that the marine architect Joshua Humphreys studied her sleek hull and used her lines in designing the United States Navy's first frigates, especially USS Constitution and USS Constellation.

In 1777, Continental Navy officer John Paul Jones sailed for the Kingdom of France, hoping to assume command of Indien; however, prior to his arrival, financial difficulties and opposition from the still-neutral Dutch Republic had forced the commissioners to sell the frigate to King Louis XVI under British diplomatic pressure.

For over three years the ship remained idle while several American and European agents schemed to obtain her. Finally, on 30 May 1780 the King granted her to the Duke of Luxembourg, who simultaneously chartered her to South Carolina, represented by Commodore Alexander Gillon of the South Carolina State Navy, for a quarter-share of her prizes. Gillon renamed the frigate South Carolina.

In 1781 South Carolina, manned by American officers and a group of European seamen and marines, sailed from Texel via Scotland and Ireland. On the way she captured a privateer. She then stopped at Corunna and Santa Cruz before sailing across the Atlantic toward Charleston. On the way to Tenerife she captured the brig Venus, loaded with a cargo of salt fish from Newfoundland for Lisbon. When she found that the British had already occupied Charleston she sailed for the West Indies. On the way she captured five Jamaican vessels in the Gulf of Mexico. She then took her prizes to Havana, Cuba.

South Carolina arrived at Havana on 12 January 1782. At Havana, after negotiations between Gillon and the Spanish, the South Carolina joined a force of 59 vessels sent to capture the British colony of New Providence in the Bahamas. On 22 April the expedition sailed and by 5 May the whole fleet had reached New Providence. On 8 May the colony surrendered. This was the third capture of New Providence during the American Revolutionary War.

South Carolina then sailed north, arriving at Philadelphia on 28 May. On the way, on 25 May a British privateer, the Virginia of New York, trailed her, firing the occasional cannon to try to draw the attention of any vessels of the Royal Navy that might be cruising in the area. South Carolina sustained no damage.

She remained in Philadelphia nearly six months. While she was there the Duke of Luxembourg dismissed Gillon and replaced him as captain with Captain John Joyner. She sailed in November but not very far. Most of her crew had never been out to sea and began to have regrets. Fortunately she had some 50 Hessian marines and eight British soldiers aboard who had been captured from General John Burgoyne's army at the Battle of Saratoga and who had been recruited from prison. Ironically, they remained loyal, thus forestalling the brewing mutiny.