Eventually, she became the second oldest ship in the Royal Navy after HMS Victory, Lord Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar.

When the Royal Navy finally scuttled Implacable in 1949, she flew both the French and British flags side-by-side as she sank.

[5] On 22 November 1802, under Captain Claude Touffet, she departed Toulon as part of a squadron commanded by Commodore Quérangal, also comprising the frigate Guerrière and the flagship Duquesne, a sister Téméraire-class vessel armed en flûte.

On 3 November 1805, British Captain Sir Richard Strachan, with Caesar, Hero, Courageux, Namur and four frigates, defeated and captured what remained of the Franco-Spanish fleet.

In early 1808 Russia initiated the Finnish War in response to Sweden's refusal to bow to Russian pressure to join the anti-British alliance.

The British decided to take counter-measures and in May sent a fleet, including Centaur, under Vice-Admiral Sir James Saumarez to the Baltic.

The Swedes massed a fleet under Swedish Admiral Cederstrom, consisting of 11 line-of-battle ships and 5 frigates at Örö and Jungfrusund to oppose them.

On 22 August, the Russian fleet, which consisted of nine ships of the line, five large frigates and six smaller ones, moved from Hanko and appeared off the Örö roads the next day.

The Swedish ships from Jungfrusund had joined Rear-Admiral Nauckhoff and by the evening of 24 August the combined Anglo-Swedish force had made its preparations.

At 5am on 26 August Implacable caught up with a Russian straggler, the 74-gun Vsevolod (also Sewolod), under Captain Rudnew (or Roodneff).

Vsevolod dropped her anchor and with both ships stuck in place, both sides attempted to board the other vessel.

Their prize was so firmly aground that after taking out the prisoners and wounded men, Sir Samuel Hood, in Centaur, ordered Vsevolod to be burnt.

Vsevolod lost another 124 men killed and wounded in the battle with Centaur;[7] 56 Russians escaped by swimming ashore.

[8] By the summer of 1809 Martin and Implacable were back in the Baltic, and Admiral Saumarez sent her and Melpomene to sail east of Nargen Island.

[9] Implacable, Melpomene and Prometheus deployed their boats to search all the creeks and inlets along the coast but found nothing more.

In Martin's word, the intent was "to impress these Strangers with that Sense of Respect and Fear, which His Majesty's other Enemies are accustomed to show to the British Flag".

She then sailed to Quiberon Bay with a small squadron that also included Disdainful, a brig, and the schooner Nonpareil, all escorting the Baron de Kolli.

[a] His mission was to arrange the escape of Ferdinand VII of Spain, whom the French had imprisoned at the Chateau of Valençay.

On 17 July Rear Admiral Sir Richard Keats arrived on Implacable to take charge of the British support of the Spanish in the Siege of Cádiz.

Marshal Victor's French army had completely blockaded the Isla de León by land and were further fortifying the coast with works that supplemented the existing defences.

Eleven or twelve British and Spanish line-of-battle ships anchored as close to shore as they could without grounding.

General Lacey's Spanish troops and horses landed from the transports on 23 August about 22 miles south of the town.

From August to November 1840 Implacable participated in the bombardment and capture of Acre, and operations on the coast of Syria.

H. V. Morton saw her at Devonport Dockyard during one of the restorations and was told she had been "lying for years in Falmouth, and we are giving her a wash and brush up before sending her back as a training ship".

A fireboat towed her to a spot east of the Isle of Wight and she sank into Saint Catherine's Deep, about five miles from Ventnor.

Public reaction to the "criminal action against the maritime history of Britain" forced the government to support the preservation of Cutty Sark.

[19] In the 1999 Patrick O'Brian novel Blue at the Mizzen, set soon after the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, newly-promoted Adm. John "Lucky Jack" Aubrey is ordered by the Admiralty to take command of HMS Implacable and the Royal Navy's South African Squadron.