| History | |
|---|---|
 Great Britain | |
| Name | Loudoun (1774-1786) |
| Owner | Austrian East India Company (Imperial Eagle) |
| Builder | Liverpool |
| Launched | 1774 |
| Renamed | Imperial Eagle (1786-88) |
| Fate | Confiscated, 1788. |
| General characteristics | |
| Tons burthen | 400 (bm)[1] |
| Propulsion | Sail |
| Sail plan | Full-rigged ship |
| Armament | Loudon: 18 × 9-pounder + 3 × 6-pounder guns[1] 20 guns[2] |
Imperial Eagle, originally named Loudoun (also spelled Louden, Loudin, and Lowden), was a 400-ton (bm) British merchant ship, launched in 1774 at Liverpool. By 1780 her master was S. Rains, her owner Robertson, and her trade a transport out of London.[1] In 1786 she underwent refitting at Shadwell Dock, Thames, London. She then sailed on maritime fur trading ventures in the late 1780s. She was under the command of Captain Charles William Barkley until confiscated in India.
Although some sources, such as Miller,[3] state that Loudon was a former East Indiaman, Hardy and Hardy do not list her under any of the alternative spellings of her name, among the vessels that performed voyages for the British East India Company (EIC).[4] The National Archives's guide to East India Company records in the "British Library: Asian and African Studies (previously Oriental and India Office Library)" also has no record of any vessel bearing her name, in any of its alternative spellings.[5]
As Imperial Eagle, she was among the first ships used in the trading system that developed in the 1780s, in which traders collected sea otter pelts on the Pacific Northwest coast of North America, through trade with the indigenous peoples, and then sold them in Guangzhou (Canton) or Macau, China. The Hawaiian Islands, only recently discovered, were a key way station, with many trading vessels spending the winter there. This maritime fur trading system had originated from the voyages of James Cook, which unexpectedly had revealed the value of sea otter pelts in China.
- ^ a b c Lloyd's Register (1780).
- ^ Hill and Converse (2011), ed Chap. 1.
- ^ Capt. Barkley in IMPERIAL EAGLE in Barkley Sound, The Maritime Paintings of Gordon Miller
- ^ Hardy & Hardy (1811).
- ^ National Archives: Lord Melville (1) to Maitland[1] - accessed 24 November 2014.