On 20 May the British squadron, under the command of Captain Charles Marsh Schomberg, discovered the French off Tamatave and attacked, both sides hampered by light winds which impeded movement for much of the day.

[3] The French had also been preparing reinforcements for the region, but their nearest naval bases were in France itself, several thousand miles away across oceans almost totally controlled by the Royal Navy.

Each ship carried over 200 soldiers for the Isle de France garrison and significant food and military supplies with which to refit Hamelin's squadron and resupply the island.

Beaver then began eliminating French harbours in the western Indian Ocean, sending the brig HMS Eclipse to attack Tamatave on Madagascar, which was captured on 12 February.

[4] After the end of the hurricane season in March, Beaver personally sailed in HMS Nisus to invade the Seychelles, before collecting specie from Madras to refloat the Mauritian economy.

Hillyar, aware that his squadron was weaker than Roquebert's, held back in anticipation of the arrival of Schomberg in Astraea from Port Louis, to whom he had sent an urgent message the night before.

[7] Although Losack, supported by many crew members on board both Phoebe and Galatea, remonstrated with Hillyar for not pursuing the French, the British commander could not be persuaded and Roquebert slipped away.

Although the British garrison in the eastern part of the island was weak, the plan was thwarted by heavy surf on the landing beaches and Roquebert continued eastwards on half rations, reaching Tamatave in Madagascar on 19 May.

The British garrison at Tamatave, 100 men of the 22nd Regiment of Foot, were afflicted with malaria and surrendered without contesting the town, where the French squadron gathered water and food supplies.

The British returned fire, Phoebe and Galatea joining the attack as they advanced, but the long distances and slow speeds involved meant that little damage was caused by either side.

The rearmost ship, Néréide, was unable to manoeuvre successfully in the light winds and remained beyond the effective range of Astraea and Racehorse, despite an ineffectual cannonade in her direction.

As the breeze strengthened at 19:00, Renommée and Clorinde advanced on Phoebe, Losack firing on the French as they pulled away before steering his battered ship westwards and informing Schomberg that the damage was such that he could not continue in action.

Although Galatea was still within sight at dawn, Losack was unsure of the identity of the approaching squadron and decided to sail directly to Port Louis rather than risk combat with a superior enemy force.

Aware that no one in the British squadron had intimate knowledge of the coral reefs that surrounded the entrance to the bay and thus that he was poorly positioned to attack the French if they chose to resist him, Schomberg sent Racehorse into the harbour under a flag of truce.

[14] Ponée refused, instead proposing that the ship's crew and the garrison of Tamatave be repatriated to France without conditions if the frigate, town and a 12-gun battery were surrendered to Schomberg's squadron.

On 26 June, Clorinde landed at Diego Garcia and collected fresh water and coconuts before beginning the return journey to France in defiance of the orders to continue on to Batavia issued before the convoy left Brest.

On 24 September, Clorinde encountered the British blockade squadron off Brest and was chased by the 80-gun ship of the line HMS Tonnant under Captain Sir John Gore.

Although Tonnant came close enough to Clorinde to discharge her broadside at the frigate, Gore was unable to catch the elusive French ship and was eventually forced to retire to open waters after coming under fire from batteries at Pointe Trépassée.

In March 1812, he was brought to a court martial to examine his behaviour and found to have been negligent in his duty, for which he was dismissed from the service, expelled from the legion of Honour and sentenced to three years' imprisonment.

Captain Losack was particularly offended as Schomberg had implied that Galatea's distress signal was an overreaction in the face of the enemy, despite her casualties being greater than the rest of the squadron combined.

[20] The action marked the end of the final French attempt to operate in the Indian Ocean during the Napoleonic Wars: with their bases now in British hands, any deployment to the region would require a significant quantity of ships and supplies at a time when France was unable to even protect the entrances to her principal harbours, as Clorinde's brush with Tonnant had demonstrated.

[21] The action also ended the threat to British merchant ships, especially the large East Indiamen, from attack in the Indian Ocean and the requirement for a significant Royal Navy presence in the region.