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Client References- Soleil Royale Tribute Model.
Dear Rehaz,
On behalf of my father I would just like to say a
big thank you for the delivery of the four tribute model ships .
Thank you so much for your quick response - the
models your company makes are simply beautiful and a wonderful reminder of a
bygone era of tall sailing ships .
Best Regards (UK Client June 2008)
Details of Tribute model ships:
The innovative moulding process we specify to manufacture the hull of these display models enables us to include an incredible amount of intricate detail. We have put particular focus on improving the accuracy/scaling of the rigs and fittings such as anchors, cannons and longboats. They come supplied completely assembled ready for display, and accompanied by a history leaflet.
Named in honour of the Sun King, Louis XIV, Le Soleil Royal was one of the most powerful ships of her day. As flagship of the revitalised French Navy brought into being by the Minister of Marine Jean- Baptiste Colbert, she was sumptuously decorated with wooden carvings depicting a variety of motifs emblematic of the French monarch. As the sculptures recovered from the Swedish warship Wasa prove, such lavish ornament was not uncommon in seventeenth-century warships. Charles Le Brun’s drawings of the Statuary for le Soleil Royale are in the Louvre.
Details of the first decade of Le Soleil Royale’s service are obscure.
After her re-fit in 1889, she flew the flag of Vice Admiral Anne-Hilarion de Contentin, Comte de Tourville, Admiral of the French fleet.
In July 1690, Tourville led a fleet of seventy ships out of Brest and on July 10, he met a combined English and Dutch fleet of fifty-seven ships off Beachy Head.
The English and Dutch fleet lost eight ships, whilst the French lost none in a Victory called Beveziers.
Two years later, the position was reversed. Tourville with a fleet of only forty-four ships was ordered to set sail from Brest on May 12, 1692. His order was to clear the English Channel for Louis XIV’s invasion force of thirty thousand men assembled near Cherbourg.
On May 20, Tourville again met an Anglo-Dutch fleet of eighty-seven ships. By increasing the distance between his ships in line ahead, Tourville prevented his fleet from being encircled and outflanked.
But Le Soleil Royale was so badly damaged, that Tourville was forced to transfer his flag to Ambitieux the next day.
Le Soleil Royale, and two other French vessels, was forced into Cherbourg where they ran aground and were eventually destroyed.
Clowes, Royal Navy. Culver, Forty Famous Ships.
(CM 7646)
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