[@Red Mage]

While women didn't hold commissions or rank there were women aboard Royal Naval Vessels

 Women and the British Navy

A large number of women started following their sailor-husbands to sea, and in the British navy during the eighteenth century, a few women even joined their husbands on battleships. The British Admiralty officially did not allow women on board, but records show that captains often let the wives of officers join the ship and share their husbands' cabins or hammocks and food rations.

Why would a woman leave home to travel on a ship of war? Many had no home or money while their husbands were at sea. The ship provided a home and a chance to share life, however harsh, with their husbands. The wives worked on the ship, mending or cleaning clothes or serving as captains' maids. In battle, they attended the wounded or carried gunpowder; a few were wounded themselves.