The Bedford formed part of the squadron sent, by Sir W. Sidney Smith, to escort the royal family of Portugal from Lisbon to South America, where she was commanded for several months by the late Captain Adam Mackenzie, but latterly by Captain Walker. On her return to Europe, she was attached to the North Sea fleet; and principally employed in the blockade of Flushing, until the peace with France in 1814. She then assisted in escorting the allied sovereigns from Boulogne to England; and afterwards proceeded with the expedition against New Orleans. On the 14th Dec. in the same year. Lieutenant Franklin was slightly wounded, while leading the Bedford’s boats to the attack of five large American gun-vessels, stationed in Lac Borgne, the capture of which force has been described at p. 4, et seq. of Suppl. Part IV.
The laborious exertions and great privations of the officers and seamen employed with the army during the subsequent operations against New Orleans, very few of whom ever slept one night on board their ships for a period of about seven weeks, have seldom been equalled: an outline of the services they performed is given at p. 637, et seq. of our first volume; but it is here necessary to add, that a party under Lieutenant Franklin assisted in cutting a canal across the entire neck of land between the Bayou Catalan and the Mississippi, of sufficient width and depth to admit of boats being brought up from Lac Borgne, for the purpose of transporting a military detachment, with 300 sailors and marines, to the right bank of the river, as a diversion in favor of the main attack upon the enemy’s entrenched position. The fatigue undergone, in the prosecution of this work, no words can sufficiently describe; yet it was pursued without repining, and so far effected as to enable boats enough for the conveyance of 600 men to reach their destination: the soil through which the canal was dug being soft, parts of the bank gave way, and, choking up the channel, prevented the heaviest of the boats from getting forward: otherwise it was intended to have pushed over 1400 men. The brilliant result of the dash across the Mississippi, on the morning of
