HMS Hawke was a former Dutch hoy, one of 19, that the British Admiralty purchased in 1794 for service with the Royal Navy.

[1] Lieutenant Henry Hicks took command in 1795 and she joined Admiral Sir Sidney Smith's squadron.

The gunvessels and the shore batteries and redoubts the British erected on the islands were initially under Hicks and then under Lieutenant Charles Papps Price in Badger.

[1] On 7 September the French mounted an attack with 17 large boats filled with men.

They retreated in confusion after coming under fire from the redoubts the British had erected on East Island and from the gunvessels,[3] among them the hoys Hawke, Badger, Serpent, and Shark, and the Musquito-class floating battery Sandfly.