A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Bowker, John
BOWKER. (Captain, 1811. f-p., 31; h-p., 31.)
John Bowker, born 1 Dec. 1770, and descended from an old Norman family distinguished during the Crusades, is second son of the late Robt. Bowker, Esq., of Queen’s County, Ireland, by a daughter of Thos. Cosby, Esq., of Vicarstown. He is a near relative of the late Phillips Cosby, Esq., Admiral of the White; and cousin of the present Thos. Phillips Cosby, Esq., of Stradbally Hall, Queen’s County, a magistrate and deputy-lieutenant.
This officer entered the Navy, 3 Aug. 1785, as A.B., on board the Trusty 50, bearing the broad pendant in the Mediterranean of Commodore P. Costly, and shortly afterwards attained the rating of Midshipman, He removed, in 1788, to the Ferret sloop-of-war, commanded on the latter station by Capts. Davidge Gould, Wm. Swaffield, and Hon. Robt. Stopford; served subsequently in 1790-1, as Master’s Mate, in the Gibraltar 80, Capt. Sam. Cranston Goodall, and London 98, bearing the flag of the same officer in the Channel; then proceeded to the West Indies in the Proserpine frigate, Capt. James Alms; in 1792 rejoined his relative. Rear-Admiral Cosby, in the St. George 98, at Plymouth; and on ultimately accompanying him to the Mediterranean in the Windsor Castle 98, served in command of a party of seamen at the occupation of Toulon, and was promoted, 10 July, 1794, into the St. Fiorenzo frigate, Capts. Sir Chas. Hamilton and Henry Inman. His next appointment was, 8 Dec. 1794, to the Mars, of 82 guns and 634 men, Capts, Sir Chas. Cotton, Alex. Hood, and John Manley, in which ship we find him employed, latterly as First-Lieutenant, until March, 1799. He was in consequence present in Cornwallis’s celebrated retreat of 16 and 17 June, 1795, when the Mars, being the sternmost ship, bore the brunt of the enemy’s attack; and he assisted, under Capt. Hood, at the capture, 21 April, 1798, L’Hercule, of 78 guns and 680 men. At the close of the desperate and sanguinary conflict which led to the latter event, wherein, for the space of an hour, the yards of the two ships were locked together, and muzzle touched muzzle, Mr. Bowker, then Second-Lieutenant, was the officer who, of his own accord, the Captain being mortally wounded and the First-Lieutenant absent from the quarter-deck, gallantly headed a party of boarders, and, springing into the main-chains of L’Hercule, succeeded in taking possession of that ship, although unexpectedly opposed by the First and Second French Captains and about 60 men, who had treacherously rallied and resumed their arms. In effecting this service, however, he unfortunately, while in the act of making a thrust at the latter officer, slipped and fell from the quarter to the orlop deck, a misadventure which occasioned him a loss of three teeth and a contusion in the right knee.[1] His ensuing appointments were – 28 March, 1799, 27 Nov. 1800, and 8 June, 1803 – to the Prince and Prince George 98’s, and, as First-Lieutenant, to the San Josef 110, all bearing the flag in the Channel of his friend Sir C. Cotton, by whom, in the autumn of 1806, he was placed in command of the Atalante brig. In that vessel, after taking or destroying eight of a French coasting convoy of 12 sail, and singly preventing by a ruse-de-guerre several of the enemy’s men-of-war from leaving Basque Roads, Lieut. Bowker, owing to the ignorance of the pilots, unhappily got aground, in Feb. 1807, and remained exposed to a heavy fire of great guns and musketry, until luckily rescued from off the wreck, with his ship’s company, by the arrival of two British frigates. His advancement to the rank of Commander being confirmed on 23 of the following month, he was successively appointed – on the same date, to the Epervier brig, on the West India station, whence his health obliged him to invalid in Jan. 1808 – 8 Aug. 1809, to the Aetna bomb, part of the naval force employed in the expedition to the Scheldt under Sir Rich. John Strachan, whose thanks he received in public orders, conjointly with the other participating officers, for silencing the batteries of Doel and covering the retreat of the advanced squadron of frigates – 3 Sept. 1810, after assisting in the defence of Cadiz, to the Wizard 16, attached to the fleet in the Mediterranean – and, 24 Feb. 1811, as Acting-Captain, to the San Josef, flag-ship of his patron Sir Chas. Cotton, in which he returned home. From the date of his Post-commission, 16 Aug. 1811, Capt. Bowker remained on half-pay, until nominated, 12 Feb. 1817, Flag-Captain, in the Sir Francis Drake of 46 guns, to Vice-Admiral Fras. Pickmore, Governor and Commander-in-Chief at Newfoundland, where, on the death of that officer, 24 Feb. following, he hoisted his broad pendant as Commodore, and acted as Governor, pro tem, with great credit, until the arrival of Sir Chas. Hamilton, about the end of the ensuing July. He continued to serve in the Sir Francis Drake, in his former capacity, until his return home in Nov. 1819; after which he commanded the Ordinary at Plymouth from 1825 until 1828. He was appointed a Captain of Greenwich Hospital 13 July, 1844.
Capt. Bowker married, in 1801, Mary Beckford, eldest daughter of Thos. Ligale Yates, Esq., who had been Purser of the Mars in her capture of L’Hercule, and died, 17 Jan. 1832, Senior Purser in the Navy, having attained that rank in 1777. He has issue a son and daughter.
- ↑ Vide Gaz. 1798, p. 842.