A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Allen, William Edward Hughes
ALLEN. (Commander, 1828. f-p., 23; h-p., 24.)
William Edward Hughes Allen, born 6 Feb. 1787, is son of William Allen, Esq., Admiral of the Red, who died in Oct. 1804; and grand-nephew of Sir Thos. Allen, also an officer in the Navy. An account of these gentlemen’s services will be found in the 1st and 6th volumes of Charnock’s Biographia Navalis.
This officer entered the Royal Naval College about the year 1800; and embarked, in Oct. 1802, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board the Dryad 36, Capt. Robt. Williams, bearing the broad pendant afterwards of Commodore Wm. Domett, on the Irish station. In June, 1804, he became Midshipman of the Téméraire 98, Capt. Elias Harvey, from which ship, after bearing a warm part in the battle of Trafalgar, he removed, in Dec. 1805, to the Audacious 74, Capt. John Larmour. Early in the following year he rejoined Captain, then Rear-Admiral, Harvey, on board the Tonnant 80, off the coast of Spain, where, during a subsequent attachment, as Acting-Lieutenant, to the Confiance 18, Capt. Jas. Lucas Yeo, he saw some good service. Being confirmed, 25 March, 1807, into the Hercule 74, Capt. Hon. John Colville, Lieut. Allen, in the course of the same and of the following years, accompanied the expedition to Copenhagen (where he commanded an armed boat in several rencounters with the enemy’s flotilla) and escorted home from Lisbon the surrendered Russian fleet. Proceeding to the East Indies towards the close of 1808, as Lieutenant of the Clorinde 38, Capt. Thos. Briggs, he there became Senior, 24 Aug. 1810, of the Cornwallis alias Akbar 44, Capts. Edw. Wallis Hoare, Thos. Gordon Caulfield, Wm. Fisher, and Henry Drury, and was present in that ship at the reduction both of the Mauritius and of the island of Java. He afterwards, when in command of the Akbar’s boats, captured a French schooner, carrying 12 brass six-pounders and 25 men, with two French Colonels on board, charged with despatches from Java. His next appointment, we find, was to the Cygnet 18, Capt. Robt. Russell, in which sloop he served, as First Lieutenant, from 13 Nov. 1812, until wrecked, off the mouth of the Courantine River, 8 March, 1815. He subsequently obtained command, in Oct. 1822, and Dec. 1824, of the Castle Coote and Badger, Revenue-vessels; and, acquiring his present rank 28 Aug. 1828, was employed from 31 March, 1831, until April, 1834, as an Inspecting-Commander in the Coast Guard. He has not since held any official appointment.
Commander Allen married, 5 Nov. 1815, Miss Ellen Bernie Kirk, and has issue two sons and three daughters.