A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Leslie, Walter
LESLIE. (Lieut., 1814. f-p., 17; h-p., 27.)
Walter Leslie entered the Navy, 1 Oct. 1803, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board the Hazard sloop, Capt. R.J. Neve, stationed in the Channel; and, in Nov. 1804, removed to the Niobe 40, Capts. Matthew Henry Scott and John Wentworth Loring, under the latter of whom, on 28 March, 1806, he witnessed the capture of the French corvette Le Néarque of 16 guns and 97 men. Rejoining Capt. Scott, in the following July, as Midshipman, in the Dragon 74, he sailed in that ship for the West Indies; on his return whence, in Dec. 1808, he was received on borad the Achille 74, Capt. Sir Rich. King. After co-operating in the defence (during the siege of Cadiz) of Fort Matagorda, where he was wounded, Mr. Leslie, in July, 1810, became Acting-Lieutenant of the Téméraire 98, bearing the flag on that station of Rear-Admiral Fras. Pickmore. He went back, however, in the following Oct., to a Midshipman’s berth in the Achille; and he was next, from Feb. 1811 until March, 1813, employed in the North Sea as Master’s Mate of the Marlborough 74, Capt. M. H. Scott, and Christian VII. 80, and Impregnable 9&, flag-ships of Admiral Wm. Young, by whom, for a few weeks in the former year, he was lent, as Acting-Lieutenant, to the Britomart sloop, Capt. Wm. Buckley Hunt. He then repaired to the Canadian lakes, where he joined in an attack on the enemy’s army and flotilla, and continued to serve as Lieutenant (commission dated 24 Aug. 1814) of the Prince Regent and St. Lawrence, bearing the broad pendants of Commodore Sir Jas. Lucas Yeo and Edw. W. C. K. Owen, until Sept. 1815. His last appointment was to the Penguin, a Falmouth packet, the command of which he retained from 5 Nov. 1841 until Nov. 1846.