A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Clarke, William Nehemiah
CLARKE. (Commander, 1826. f-p., 23; h-p., 28.)
William Nehemiah Clarke was born in July, 1783 or 4.
This officer entered the Navy, early in 1796, on board the Révolutionnaire 38, Capts. Fras. Cole and Thos. Twysden; and, among other captures, assisted in taking, on 13 April in that year, after a running fight, the French 36-gun frigate L’Unité. He afterwards, in the same ship, attacked a convoy protected by a strong line of batteries within the Penmacks, accompanied the expedition to Quiberon, and contributed to the capture of a national brig of 16 guns, and of 3 privateers, carrying, in the whole, 60 guns and 543 men. On subsequently proceeding to Sierra Leone, towards the close of 1801, in the Wasp 18, Capt. Chas. Bullen, he was for several weeks most arduously employed on shore in protecting the colony against a powerful combination of the native chiefs; after which he proceeded to the West Indies, and, on his return home, joined, in succession, the Expedition tender, Lieut.-Commander Felix Richardson, Dragon 74, Capt. Edw. Griffith, part of Sir Robt. Calder’s fleet in his action of 22 July, 1805, and, as Sub-Lieutenant, the Turbulent gun-brig, Lieut.-Commander Thos. Spearing Osmer. Being appointed, 19 Sept. 1806, full Lieutenant of the Sabrina 18, Capt. Edw. Kittoe, he commanded the boats of that vessel, with those of a squadron, in an attack on a Spanish flotilla; and, in conjunction with the boats of La Chiffonne, cut out, on a subsequent occasion, a brig and a schooner from under a battery of 4 guns on the south coast of Spain. While next serving, from May, 1809, to Aug. 1814, on board the Redwing 18, Capts. Edw. Augustus Down and Sir John Gordon Sinclair, Mr. Clarke was twice employed, on 30 March and 2 May, 1813, in demolishing the heavy batteries at Morjean, between Toulon and Marseilles; and, in Aug. following, he participated in a very gallant attack on the batteries of Cassis, and capture of a large convoy in the mole of that place. He was afterwards appointed, as First-Lieutenant – for a few months in 1815, to the Larne 20, Capts. Sir J. G. Sinclair and Abraham Lowe, on the Home station – 21 Feb. 1823, to the Egeria 24, Capt. Sam. Roberts, which vessel took out Commissioner Ward to Mexico, and thence brought home Commissioner Morier – and, in 1824, to the command of the Sir Francis Drake. He acquired his present rank 28 Dec. 1826, but has not since been afloat.
Commander Clarke married, 18 Aug. 1818, Lydia, eldest daughter of the late Thos. Delandre, Esq., Clerk of the Peace for co. Waterford. Agent – Frederick Dufaur.