Page:Royal Naval Biography Marshall sp4.djvu/246

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POST-CAPTAINS OF 1821.
231

line Howard, eldest daughter of Frederick, Earl of Carlisle, K.G.

This officer obtained the rank of lieutenant, Mar. 13, 1811; and was third of the Belvidera frigate, Captain Richard Byron, when that ship fell in with and effected her memorable escape from an American squadron, under Commodore Rodgers, in June, 1812[1]. He was made commander, May 16, 1814; appointed to the Racehorse, of 18 guns, fitting for the Mediterranean station, May 5, 1818; and posted, as an expression of the high sense entertained by the Board of Admiralty of the character and services of his deceased uncle, Admiral Sir George Campbell, Jan. 27, 1821.

Agent.– Messrs. Stilwell.



DONAT HENCHY O’BRIEN, Esq.
[Post-Captain of 1821.]

Is lineally descended from one of the ancient monarchs of Ireland, and was born in the county of Clare about the year 1785. He entered the navy, as midshipman on board the Overyssel 64, in Dec. 1796; and commanded a flat-bottomed boat at the landing of the British army, near the Helder, Aug, 27, 1799[2]. After the invasion of Holland, he was placed in charge of a merchant vessel laden with granite, one of a dozen or thirteen similarly filled, intended to be sunk at the entrance of Goree Harbour, to prevent the egress of three Dutch line-of-battle ships. The whole of these vessels, we believe, foundered in a heavy gale of wind, on their passage across the North Sea, and Mr. O’Brien appears to have owed his preservation to the humanity and intrepidity of Lieutenant Tatham and a boat’s crew belonging to the Lion hired armed cutter, by whom he was rescued, together with the few men under him, only three minutes before his stone-ship went to the bottom.

Mr. O’Brien next joined the Amphion 32,and served in that