The keel of H.M.S. Curlew was laid in Good's yard, Bridport, in October 1811 and the finished vessel was launched on 27 May the next year. A "Cruizer" class brig-sloop mounting 18 guns, she measured 100 feet in length with a 30½ foot beam, and carried a crew of 121 men. For her first commission, Curlew was sent to the North America Station - where the war with the United States was at its height - although her only recorded contact with the enemy was that depicted in the above watercolour. On 1 May 1813, just a month before H.M.S. Shannon's historic capture of the Chesapeake, two U.S. frigates, President and Congress, left Boston on their third patrol. The following day the squadron sighed and chased the Curlew commanded by Captain Michael Head, but thanks to his considerable sailing skills and not a little luck, Curlew outran her pursuers and survived an encounter which would surely have either captured or sunk her. Serving with the Indian Marine at the destruction of the Joasmi pirate stronghold at Ras al Khaimah (Persian Gulf) in December 1819, Curlew was last recorded at Bombay in December 1822 when she was renamed Jenica after being sold out of the navy.