ROYAL SOVEREIGN HMS 1702

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The stamp is designed after a painting made by the Dutch artist not well known L de MAN and shows us a detail from a painting made around 1725 of HMS ROYAL SOVEREIGN “saluting at the Nore”.
She was a design by Fisher Harding and built as a wooden hulled first-rate, ship-of-the-line at the Woolwich Dockyard for the Royal Navy.

October 1697 ordered.
25 July 1701 launched as the HMS ROYAL SOVEREIGN.
Tons burthen 1882+71⁄94 bm. Dim. 53.2 x 15.3 x 5.8m, length of keel 43.2m.
Full-rigged sailing ship.
General characteristics as built.
Class and type 100-gun first rate ship of the line
Armament: 100 guns (1702): Gundeck: 28 x British 32-Pounder. Middle gundeck: 28 x British 18-Pounder. Upper gundeck: 28 x British 9-Pounder. Quarterdeck: 12 x British 6-Pounder. Forecastle: 4 x British 6-Pounder.
Crew: 580 peace, in war 780.
January 1702 commissioned, under command of Captain Thomas Ley as the flagship of Admiral Sir George Rooke.
1703 100 guns: Gundeck: 28 x British Demi-Cannon. Middle gundeck: 28 x British Culverin. Upper gundeck: 28 x British Demi-Culverin.Quarterdeck: 12 x British 6-Pounder. Forecastle: 4 x British 6-Pounder.
General characteristics after the 1728 rebuild.
Class and type 1719 Establishment 100-gun first-rate ship of the line
Tons burthen 1883+46⁄94 bm. Length 174 ft (53.0 m) (gundeck). Beam 50 ft (15.2 m). Depth of hold 20 ft (6.1 m).
Propulsion Sails. Sail plan: Full-rigged ship.
Armament: 100 guns: Gundeck: 28 × 42 or 32 pdrs. Middle gundeck: 28 × 24 pdrs. Upper gundeck: 28 × 12 pdrs. Quarterdeck: 12 × 6 pdrs. Forecastle: 4 × 6 pdrs.

HMS ROYAL SOVEREIGN was a 100-gun first rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built at Woolwich Dockyard and launched in July 1701. She had been built using some of the salvageable timbers from the previous ROYAL SOVEREIGN, which had been destroyed by fire in 1697.

Service
She was Admiral George Rooke's flagship in the War of the Spanish Succession. She was later the flagship of Admiral Clowdisley Shovell. In the Seven Years' War, she was the flagship of the Portsmouth fleet. Admiral Boscawen received the death warrant for Admiral John Byng in the captain's cabin in March 1757, and here authorized the firing squad on the nearby HMS MONARCH .
ROYAL SOVEREIGN formed the basis for the dimensions for 100-gun ships in the 1719 Establishment, being a generally well-regarded vessel. In practice, only ROYAL SOVEREIGN herself was affected by this Establishment, being the only first-rate ship either built or rebuilt to the Establishment in its original form, but the ROYAL WILLIAM and BRITANNIA had been rebuilt to the same dimensions (approximately) when both were re-launched in 1719. She underwent her rebuild to the 1719 Establishment at Chatham after an order of 18 February 1724, being relaunched on 28 September 1728.
The rebuilt ROYAL SOVEREIGN remained in service until she was broken up in 1768, ending her career with a total of 67 years of service in the Royal Navy.

popular culture
In the 2013 video game Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, HMS ROYAL SOVEREIGN, partnered with HMS FEARLESS, appears as one of the legendary ships that the protagonist Edward Kenway could encounter and sink in the Caribbean sea. As the two ships sail and fight together, either ROYAL SOVEREIGN and FEARLESS are both sunk in battle with the JACKDAW, or neither of them is.
A giant in Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift is depicted with a staff “near as tall as the mainmast of the ROYAL SOVEREIGN.”. HMS ROYAL SOVEREIGN was a 100-gun first-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built at Woolwich Dockyard and launched in July 1701. She had been built using some of the salvageable timbers from the previous ROYAL SOVEREIGN, which had been destroyed by fire in 1697.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Royal ... ign_(1701) British Warships in the Age of Sail 1714-1792 by Rif Winfield.
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