A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Marsingall, Samuel
MARSINGALL. (Retired Commander, 1843. f-p., 13; h-p., 36.)
Samuel Marsingall entered the Navy, 20 Jan. 1798, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board La Lutine, Capt. John Monckton; whom he followed as Midshipman, in April, 1799, into the Mars 74, bearing the flag in the Channel of Hon. Geo. Cranfield Berkeley. In Jan. 1801 he removed to the St. Fiorenzo of 42 guns and 253 men, Capts. C. W. Paterson and Joseph Bingham; and in June, 18O3, on his arrival in the East Indies, he joined the Wilhelmina armée en flûte, Capt. Henry Lambert, carrying 21 guns and 134 men. In that ship it appears he took part, 11 April, 1804, in a very gallant conflict of an hour and a half, which terminated in her beating off, with a loss to herself of 10 men wounded, the French frigate-built privateer Psyché of 36 guns and 250 men, 11 of whom were killed and 33 wounded. Returning subsequently with Capt. Lambert to the St. Fiorenzo he assisted, 14 Feb. 1805, at the capture, after a desperate action of several hours, of the above named Psyché, which had been since added to the French navy, and whose loss on the present occasion amounted, out of 252 men, to 57 killed and 70 wounded, while that of the British did not exceed 12 killed and 36 (including himself) wounded. On 12 March, 1806, at which time he had been for nine months attached to the Culloden 74, bearing the flag, still on the East India station, of Rear-Admiral Sir Edw. Pellew, Mr. Marsingall was nominated Acting-Lieutenant of the Grampus 50, Capt. Jas. Haldane Tait, to which ship the Admiralty confirmed him 20 Aug. 1807. His last appointments were – 3 Nov. 1807, to the Camel store-ship, Capt. John Joyce, for passage to England – 14 May, 1808, to the Triumph 74, Capt. Sir Thos. Masterman Hardy, part of the Channel fleet – and 14 May and 4 Nov. 1809, to the Barfleur 98, flag-ship of Hon. Geo. Cranfield Berkeley, and Myrtle sloop, Capt. Thos. Innes, both on the Lisbon station. He invalided home in March, 1810; and accepted his present rank 1 Nov. 1843.
The wound received by Commander Marsingall at the capture of the Psyché was rewarded with a gratuity by the Patriotic Society. Agents – Messrs. Stilwell.