A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Thomas, Richard

by William Richard O'Byrne

Layout 4

THOMAS. (Vice-Admiral of the Blue, 1848. f-p., 31; h-p., 26.)

Richard Thomas was born at Saltash, co. Cornwall. He is brother of the late Chas. Thomas, Esq., M.D., Physician to the Dispensary at Devonport.

This officer entered the Navy, 26 May, 1790, as Captain’s Servant, on board the Cumberland 74, Capt. John M‘Bride, and sailed in the course of the same year with a squadron under Rear-Admiral Cornish for the West Indies; where he removed, as A.B., on his arrival, to the Blanche 32, Capt. Robt. Murray. That frigate being paid off in June, 1792, he was received as Midshipman, in the following Dec, on board the Nautilus sloop, Capts. Lord Henry Paulet, Jas. Carpenter, Henry Wm. Bayntun, and Wm. Gordon Rutherford; and in her he assisted at the reduction of Tobago, Martinique, and Ste. Lucie. At Martinique he commanded a flat-bottomed boat in the brilliant attack upon Fort Royal, where he landed and escaladed the walls simultaneously with Capt. Robt. Faulknor of the Zebra sloop. He returned to England soon afterwards as Master’s Mate in the Boyne 98, bearing the flag of his patron Sir John Jervis; and on 1 May, 1795, he was on board that ship when she took fire at Spithead and was destroyed. By dint of swimming he contrived on the occasion to reach a boat, and was thereby saved. He then joined in succession the Glory 98, Commerce de Marseilles 120, Capt. John Child, and Barfleur 98 and Victory 100, flag-ships of Hon. Wm. Waldegrave and Sir John Jervis, the former of whom he accompanied to the Mediterranean. He was subsequently sent on shore with a party of seamen, ordered to act as gunners, at the Fort of St. Fiorenza, in Corsica, where he remained until the island was evacuated in Oct. 1796. Being made Lieutenant, 15 Jan, 1797, into the Excellent 74, commanded by the late Lord Collingwood, he bore a warm part, on 14 of the ensuing month, in the action off Cape St. Vincent, and continued employed in the same ship off Cadiz until transferred, in June, 1798, to the Thalia 36, Capt. Lord Henry Paulet. After three months of half-pay he rejoined the latter officer, in Feb. 1799, on board the Defence 74; he officiated next as Flag-Lieutenant to his friend Collingwood in the Triumph 74 and Barfleur 98, on the Channel station, from- the following Dec. until the peace of Amiens; and in June, 1803, at which period he had been for 12 months employed at Halifax in the Cambrian 40 and Leander 50, flag-ships of Sir Andrew Mitchell, he found that he had been promoted at home to the rank of Commander in the Chichester 44, by a commission bearing date 18 Jan. preceding. He took a passage, therefore, to England in the Lady Hobart packet, Capt. Wm. Dorset Fellowes; in which vessel, however, he had the misfortune, during the voyage, to be wrecked on an island of ice. After being for seven days exposed in an open boat to the most frightful hardships he arrived at length, in a state of utter exhaustion, at Cove Island, to the northward of St. John’s, Newfoundland, a distance of 350 miles. On his return to England he was appointed, in Dec. 1803, to the.Aetna bomb, fitting for the Mediterranean; where we find him, until posted, 22 Oct. 1805, into the Bellerophon 74, employed in covering Sardinia and in various other services.^[1] In the course of the month last mentioned he removed from the Belleeopbon to the Queen 98 as Flag-Captain to Lord Collingwood, with whom he continued to serve in the same capacity in the Ocean 98 and Ville de Paris 110, until the death of that distinguished nobleman in March, 1810. His occupations during this period were arduous in no ordinary degree : he was almost incessantly engaged at the blockade of Toulon, the Commander-in-Chief keeping the sea at one time for 19 months without casting an anchor, and there being no Captain of the Fleet, most of the duties attached to that office devolved upon him. The ill health too, which latterly paralysed to a certain extent the exertions of Lord Collingwood, added not a little to the anxiety and fatigue of his position. He remained in the Ville de Paris as a private ship until Dec. 1810; and in the following Feb. he obtained command of the Undaunted 38. In her he was at first employed in co-operating with the patriots on the coast of Catalonia, where his services ashore and afloat were such as to obtain the thanks of the Admiralty. He was afterwards intrusted with the blockade of Marseilles, and was for some time, during the absence of Sir Edw. Pellew, employed, with four frigates and two brigs under his command, in watching the port of Toulon. In April, 1812, the boats of his own ship and of the Volontaire 38 and Blossom sloop, under the orders of the present Commander John Eagar, effected the capture and destruction, at the mouth of the Rhone, of the greater part of a convoy of 26 sail (including a national schooner of 4 guns and 74 men), laden with provisions and stores for the relief of Barcelona.^[2] For directing the attack to be made Capt. Thomas received the approbation of the Commander- in-Chief. In Feb. 1813 he invalided home. He afterwards, from April, 1822, until April, 1825, and from 19 May, 1834, until advanced to the rank of Rear-Admiral lO Jan. 1837, superintended (the last five months as Captain of the San Josef 104) the ships in Ordinary at Portsmonth and Plymouth; and from 5 May, 1841, until relieved in Dec. 1844 by Sir Geo. Fras. Seymour, he commanded-in-chief in the Pacific with his flag in the Dublin 50. Among the principal events which took place during the Rear-Admiral’s sojourn on the latter station, we may notice the settlement of the long-pending claims of the owners of the British brig Anna (seized in 1822), and of the British merchants who had been plundered at Callao; the obtaining of compensation from the states of St. Salvador and Costa Rica for injuries and losses sustained by the British residents at those places; the occupation of Tahiti by the French Rear-Admiral Du Petit Thouars; the restoration, to their lawful sovereign, of the Sandwich Islands, which had been temporarily ceded to Lord Geo. Paulet, of the Carysfort; and the detention of a Peruvian squadron until redress had been made for certain injuries inflicted on British subjects. For his conduct on all the above occasions he had the satisfaction of receiving the approval of the Foreign Office and of the Admiralty. “Her Majesty’s Government,” we learn, in a letter from the Earl of Aberdeen, “viewed with the highest approbation the whole of his proceedings at the Sandwich Islands, as marked by great propriety and admirable judgment throughout, and as calculated to raise the character of British authorities for justice, moderation, and courtesy of demeanour in the estimation of the natives of those remote countries, and of the world.” The King too, Kamehameha III., moved by gratitude, intimated a wish that the Rear-Admiral would sit for his portrait in full uniform, that his Majesty “might have and preserve in his palace the likeness of a British officer, who, in restoring to him his kingdom, dared to act on his own sense of right, counting upon the approval of his magnanimous Queen, in which he was not disappointed.” We may add, that the Rear-Admiral received the thanks of the government of the United States for his conduct relative to the American residents in the Sandwich Islands; and that he was elected an honorary memher of the American “Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.” Prior to his return home he was presented with an address from the British merchants at Valparaiso, expressive of their acknowledgments for the “ability and zeal he had displayed, and the firm, prudent, and conciliatory manner in which he had conducted many difficult questions, upholding the honour of the British flag, and maintaining peace and good understanding with the Chilian and foreign powers.”^[3] He attained his present rank 8 Jan. 1848.

While serving in the Ordinary at Portsmouth the Vice-Admiral distinguished himself by his fearless exertions in subduing a fire which broke out, 18 Nov. 1823, at Drayton Farm, in the neighbourhood. He married, 2 Oct. 1827, Gratina, third daughter of the late Lieut.-General Robt. Williams, some time Colonel-Commandant of the Royal Marines at Stonehouse, and has issue a son and daughter.

---

1. In Oct. 1805 the Aetna was in company with the Eurydice, Capt. Wm. Hoste, when that ship took the ground in endeavouring to cover the boats in an attack upon some vessels near Cape Umbria. She was, however, by the great exertions of Capt. Thomas, soon got off. – Vide Gaz. 1805, p. 1376.
2. Vide Gaz. 1812, p. 1278.
3. He elicited also the thanks of the government of Chili for the spontaneous assistance he afforded with the officers and crew of the Dublin and Basilisk ketch, on the occasion ot an alannmg conflagration at Valparaiso in July, 1844.