Royal Naval Biography/Frankland, Edward Augustus

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2382675Royal Naval Biography — Frankland, Edward AugustusJohn Marshall


EDWARD AUGUSTUS FRANKLAND, Esq.
[Commander.]

Second son of the late Rev. Roger Frankland, rector of Yarlington, and vicar of Dulverton, both in Somersetshire; a canon-residentiary of the cathedral church of St. Andrew, Wells, by Catherine, sister to Vice-Admiral Lord Colville.[1]

Mr. Edward A. Frankland was born at Yarlington, May 23d, 1 794; and entered the royal navy as midshipman on board the Repulse 74, Captain the Hon. (now Sir Arthur K.) Legge, which ship he joined off the Dardanelles, in the summer of 1807. He subsequently served under Captain Edwin H. Chamberlayne, in l’Unité 38, stationed in the Adriatic; and was removed from that frigate into the Caledonia 120, bearing the flag of Sir Edward Pellew (afterwards Viscount Exmouth), commander-in-chief of the Mediterranean fleet; by whom he was successively appointed acting lieutenant of the Edinburgh 74, Captain the Hon. George H. L. Dundas; and Curaçoa 36, Captain John Tower; in which latter ship he continued (his appointment to her having been confirmed by the Admiralty, Mar. 16, 1814) until paid off in the summer of 1815. He subsequently made a tour in France and Switzerland; after which we find him serving as private secretary to his cousin, Commodore Bowles, on the South American station.

This officer has two brothers in the army and one in the navy, viz. – Frederick William, now possessing the paternal estate, Muntham, co. Sussex; – Charles Colville, a commander; – and George, surveyor-general in Van Diemen’s Land; – his youngest brother, Arthur, is colonial aid-de-camp at the Mauritius. His uncle, Lieut.-Col. William Frankland, was secretary to the Duke of Portland, during his Grace’s administration, and afterwards a Lord Commissioner of the Admiralty.



  1. The Rev. Roger Frankland was the youngest son of Admiral Sir Thomas Frankland, Bart., M.P., proprietor of the borough of Thirsk, co. York, in which county his paternal relatives have been established ever since the Conquest. One of his ancestors, the second Baronet, became possessed of considerable property at Chiswick, co. Middlesex, and in other counties, by the gift of his maternal uncle, the Earl of Fauconberg, on his marriage to that nobleman’s niece, a grand-daughter of Oliver Cromwell. Another stood high in the estimation of Queen Elizabeth, in whose reign he greatly distinguished himself at the capture of Berwick-upon-Tweed.