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Robert Mends
Captain Sir Robert Mends (c. 1767 – 4 September 1823) was a prominent British Royal Navy officer of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, who lost an arm in the American War of Independence, caught in an explosion at the Battle of Groix in 1795 and wounded again at the action of 6 April 1809. In 1815 he was made a Spanish knight for his services in the Peninsular War and was awarded a pension of £300 a year from the British government. He remained in service at the end of the Napoleonic Wars and in 1821 was made commodore on the West African station, on which he died in 1823. Life Robert Mends was born into a prominent Pembrokeshire family in the late 1760s, probably 1767. He joined the Royal Navy in 1779, serving on HMS ''Culloden'' under Captain George Balfour during the American War of Independence. Mends was almost instantly in action, ''Culloden'' fighting at the Battle of Cape St Vincent and at the Great Siege of Gibraltar in 1780. The following year, Mends ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pembrokeshire
Pembrokeshire ( ; cy, Sir Benfro ) is a county in the south-west of Wales. It is bordered by Carmarthenshire to the east, Ceredigion to the northeast, and the rest by sea. The county is home to Pembrokeshire Coast National Park. The Park occupies more than a third of the area of the county and includes the Preseli Hills in the north as well as the Pembrokeshire Coast Path. Historically, mining and fishing were important activities, while industry nowadays is focused on agriculture (86 per cent of land use), oil and gas, and tourism; Pembrokeshire's beaches have won many awards. The county has a diverse geography with a wide range of geological features, habitats and wildlife. Its prehistory and modern history have been extensively studied, from tribal occupation, through Roman times, to Welsh, Irish, Norman, English, Scandinavian and Flemish influences. Pembrokeshire County Council's headquarters are in the county town of Haverfordwest. The council has a majority of Independ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peninsular War
The Peninsular War (1807–1814) was the military conflict fought in the Iberian Peninsula by Spain, Portugal, and the United Kingdom against the invading and occupying forces of the First French Empire during the Napoleonic Wars. In Spain, it is considered to overlap with the Spanish War of Independence. The war started when the French and Spanish armies invaded and occupied Portugal in 1807 by transiting through Spain, and it escalated in 1808 after Napoleonic France occupied Spain, which had been its ally. Napoleon Bonaparte forced the abdications of Ferdinand VII and his father Charles IV and then installed his brother Joseph Bonaparte on the Spanish throne and promulgated the Bayonne Constitution. Most Spaniards rejected French rule and fought a bloody war to oust them. The war on the peninsula lasted until the Sixth Coalition defeated Napoleon in 1814, and is regarded as one of the first wars of national liberation. It is also significant for the emergence of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brig
A brig is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: two masts which are both square-rigged. Brigs originated in the second half of the 18th century and were a common type of smaller merchant vessel or warship from then until the latter part of the 19th century. In commercial use, they were gradually replaced by fore-and-aft rigged vessels such as schooners, as owners sought to reduce crew costs by having rigs that could be handled by fewer men. In Royal Navy use, brigs were retained for training use when the battle fleets consisted almost entirely of iron-hulled steamships. Brigs were prominent in the coasting coal trade of British waters. 4,395 voyages to London with coal were recorded in 1795. With an average of eight or nine trips per year for one vessel, that is a fleet of over 500 colliers trading to London alone. Other ports and coastal communities were also be served by colliers trading to Britain's coal ports. In the first half of the 19th century, the vast majority ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Thompson (Royal Navy Officer)
Edward Thompson (c. 1738–1786) was an English Royal Navy officer who rose to the rank of commodore, known also as a literary figure with the nickname "Poet Thompson". Life The son of a merchant of Kingston upon Hull, he received his early education at Beverley, and later at Hampstead under Dr. Cox, formerly of Harrow School. He is said to have made a voyage to Greenland in 1750. In 1754 he was on board an East Indiaman and made a voyage to the East Indies. On his return to England he entered on board , a 64-gun-ship, as a midshipman. Two years later, on 16 November 1757, he passed his examination and was promoted to be lieutenant of , in the North Sea and the Channel; ten days later, in December 1758, he was moved into with Captain Peter Denis. During the Seven Years' War he was in the long blockade of Brest through the summer of 1759, and was present at the Battle of Quiberon Bay on 20 November in March 1760 he accompanied Denis to , in which he stayed till the end of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMS Grampus (1782)
Eleven vessels of the Royal Navy have been named HMS ''Grampus'' after two members of the dolphin family ( Delphinidae): ''Grampus griseus'', also known as Risso's dolphin, and ''Orcinus orca'', also known as the killer whale. * was a 14-gun sloop launched in 1731. She foundered in the English Channel in 1742. * was a 14-gun sloop launched in 1743 and was captured by the French in 1744. * was a 14-gun sloop launched in 1746. She was converted to a fire ship and renamed ''Strombolo'' in 1775. She was hulked in 1780. * HMS ''Grampus'' was a 70-gun third-rate ship of the line launched in 1751 as HMS ''Buckingham''. She was renamed HMS ''Grampus'' in 1777 and used as a storeship. * was a 50-gun fourth rate launched in 1782 and broken up in 1794. *HMS ''Grampus'' was a 54-gun fourth rate, originally the East Indiaman East Indiaman was a general name for any sailing ship operating under charter or licence to any of the East India trading companies of the major European trad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Invasion Of Dominica (1778)
The Invasion of Dominica (7 September 1778) was a successful French invasion of the island of Dominica in the British West Indies, during the American Revolutionary War. The action took place before British authorities in the Caribbean were aware that France had entered the war as an ally of the United States of America. The French governor in the West Indies, François Claude Amour, marquis de Bouillé, was notified on 17 August that France was at war, and organized the invasion, infiltrating spies to rally sympathetic French-speaking Dominican support. Early on 7 September 1778, French forces landed on the southeastern coast of the island. They rapidly took over some of the island's defenses, and eventually gained control of the high ground overlooking the island's capital, Roseau. Lieutenant Governor William Stuart then surrendered the remaining forces. Dominica remained in French hands until the end of the war, when it was returned to British control. Background Fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMS Conqueror (1773)
HMS ''Conqueror'' was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built by Israel Pownoll and launched on 10 October 1773 at Plymouth. May, 1778 under command of Capt. Thomas Graves. She was commanded by Captain George Balfour in the Battle of the Saintes The Battle of the Saintes (known to the French as the Bataille de la Dominique), also known as the Battle of Dominica, was an important naval battle in the Caribbean between the British and the French that took place 9–12 April 1782. The Brit ..., 1782. Here she was fifth in line in the attack on the French fleet.Famous Fighters of the Fleet, Edward Fraser, 1904, p.106 She was broken up in 1794. Citations and notes References *Lavery, Brian (2003) ''The Ship of the Line - Volume 1: The development of the battlefleet 1650-1850.'' Conway Maritime Press. . *Winfield, Rif (2007) ''British Warships of the Age of Sail 1714-1792: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates.'' Seaforth. . Ships of the line o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Knox Laughton
Sir John Knox Laughton (23 April 1830 – 14 September 1915) was a British naval historian and arguably the first to delineate the importance of the subject of Naval history as an independent field of study. Beginning his working life as a mathematically trained civilian instructor for the Royal Navy, he later became Professor of Modern History at King's College London and a co-founder of the Navy Records Society. A prolific writer of lives, he penned the biographies of more than 900 naval personalities for the ''Dictionary of National Biography''. Family Laughton was born in Liverpool on 23 April 1830, the second son and youngest child of a former Master Mariner, James Laughton of Liverpool (1777–1859). In 1866, Laughton married his first wife, Isabella, daughter of John Carr of Dunfermline. They had two sons, Leonard and Arthur, and three daughters – Elsbeth, Mary and Dorothy. In 1886, Laughton married his second wife, María Josefa, daughter of Eugenio di Alberti, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oxford Dictionary Of National Biography
The ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (''DNB'') is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published since 1885. The updated ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (''ODNB'') was published on 23 September 2004 in 60 volumes and online, with 50,113 biographical articles covering 54,922 lives. First series Hoping to emulate national biographical collections published elsewhere in Europe, such as the '' Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie'' (1875), in 1882 the publisher George Smith (1824–1901), of Smith, Elder & Co., planned a universal dictionary that would include biographical entries on individuals from world history. He approached Leslie Stephen, then editor of the '' Cornhill Magazine'', owned by Smith, to become the editor. Stephen persuaded Smith that the work should focus only on subjects from the United Kingdom and its present and former colonies. An early working title was the ''Biographia Britannica'', the name of an earlier eig ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMS Guadeloupe (1763)
HMS ''Guadeloupe'' (or ''Guadaloupe''), was a 28-gun sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. The ship was designed by Sir Thomas Slade, and was initially contracted to be built with the Pembrokeshire shipwright John Williams of Neyland; however he became bankrupt and the Admiralty transferred the order to the Plymouth Naval Dockyard. ''Guadeloupe'' served during the American War of Independence. In May 1778 she was under the command of Captain Hugh Robinson. At Yorktown her men, stores, and guns were landed to support the British Army during the siege. When she came under fire from shore batteries the British scuttled her in the York River, Virginia, on 10 October 1781 to prevent the French capturing her. The French Navy The French Navy (french: Marine nationale, lit=National Navy), informally , is the maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the five military service branches of France. It is among the largest and most powerful naval forces in th ... sub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frigate
A frigate () is a type of warship. In different eras, the roles and capabilities of ships classified as frigates have varied somewhat. The name frigate in the 17th to early 18th centuries was given to any full-rigged ship built for speed and maneuverability, intended to be used in scouting, escort and patrol roles. The term was applied loosely to ships varying greatly in design. In the second quarter of the 18th century, the 'true frigate' was developed in France. This type of vessel was characterised by possessing only one armed deck, with an unarmed deck below it used for berthing the crew. Late in the 19th century (British and French prototypes were constructed in 1858), armoured frigates were developed as powerful ironclad warships, the term frigate was used because of their single gun deck. Later developments in ironclad ships rendered the frigate designation obsolete and the term fell out of favour. During the Second World War the name 'frigate' was reintroduced to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Balfour (Royal Navy Officer) (1823–1903), Scottish physician
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George Balfour may refer to: * George Balfour (Conservative politician) (1872–1941), British Conservative Party politician and engineer * George Balfour (Liberal politician) (1809–1894), British Army officer and Liberal politician * George William Balfour George William Balfour FRSE (2 June 1823 – 9 August 1903) was a Scottish physician, known as a heart specialist. Early life and education Born at the manse of Sorn, Ayrshire, on 2 June 1823, he was the sixth son and eighth of the thirteen c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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