USS Ranger was a 18-gun sloop of the Continental Navy, serving from 1777 to 1780 and the first to bear her name. Built at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard on Badger's Island in Kittery, Maine, she is famed for the solo raiding campaign carried out by her first captain, John Paul Jones, during naval operations of the American Revolutionary War. In six months spent primarily in British waters, she captured five prizes (mostly merchantmen), staged a single failed attack on the English mainland at Whitehaven, and caused Royal Navy ships to be dispatched against her in the Irish Sea.
Jones was detached in Brest, France to take charge of the , turning over responsibility for Ranger to his first officer, Lieutenant Thomas Simpson. Under Simpson, the Ranger went on to capture an additional twenty-four prizes across the Atlantic and along the U.S. coast throughout 1778 and 1779.
Receiving new orders in late 1779 to aid the American garrison at Charleston, South Carolina, during the British siege, she continued her raiding career until ultimately forced to anchor on the Cooper River, resulting in her capture on 11 May 1780, with the fall of the city. Renamed Halifax, she finished her active service as a Royal Navy ship and was decommissioned in 1781. Later that year, she was sold in Portsmouth, England to private buyers for use as a merchantman.
History
Ranger (initially called Hampshire) was launched on 10 May 1777 by James Hackett, master shipbuilder, at the shipyard of John Langdon on what is now called Badger's Island in Kittery, Maine. Captain John Paul Jones was named her first commander.
Ranger sailed from Brest 10 April 1778, for the Irish Sea and four days later captured the brigantine "Dolphin" between the Scilly Isles and Cape Clear and scuttled it. On 16 April, she took the ship "Lord Chatham" 5 leagues from Cape Clear and sent her to Brest.