A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Phillips, Edward
PHILLIPS. (Lieut., 1812. f-p., 15; h-p., 31.)
Edward Phillips was born 22 Aug. 1790. His grandfather, Lieut. Rich. Lang, was nearly 50 years a commissioned officer in the service.
This officer entered the Navy, 15 July, 1801, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board the Goliath 74, Capts. Wm. Essington, Chas. Brisbane, and Robt. Barton, employed in the Channel and West Indies – for some time under the flag of Sir John Thos. Duckworth. In Feb. 1806 he removed as Midshipman (a rating he had attained in June, 1802) to the St. George 98, flag-ship in the Baltic and Channel of Rear- Admirals Elias Harvey and Fras. Pickmore; he next, from Nov. 1809 until Oct. 1812, served, in the North Sea and Baltic, on board the Hearty 14, Lieut.-Commander Wm. Wickham, Cressy 74, Capt. Chas. Dudley Pater, and Victory 100, flag-ship of Sir Jas. Saumarez; and on 20 Nov. in the latter year he was confirmed a Lieutenant in the Rose sloop, Capt. Thos. Mansell. In the Goliath, Mr. Phillips witnessed the capture, 28 June, 1803, and 11 and 18 Aug. 1805, of La Mignonne of 16 guns and 80 men, La Faune of 16, and La Torche of 18 guns. While attached to the Hearty he retook a galliot, and cut out a Danish privateer. The Quick Huntsman; and when in the Cressy, besides making prize of another privateer, he came into contact, in 1811, with a flotilla of 40 gun-boats. Although the latter had been the aggressors, several of them were taken by the Cressy. When afterwards in charge of a Russian brig, Mr. Phillips was cast away and taken prisoner on the coast of Lapland. During the winter of 1812, at which time he was serving on board the Rose, he assisted at the capture by that sloop of every vessel that came out from Norway or Jutland. Lieut. Phillips’ last appointment was to the Calliope 10, Capts. John M‘Kerlie, John Codd, and Alex. Maconochie, with whom he continued from 25 May, 1813, until paid off in Sept. 1815. On 8 July, 1813, he was for two hours in action with the enemy’s naval force at Cuxhaven; and on 31 of the following Oct., having been sent up the river Weser in charge of the boats of the Calliope and Wrangler, he passed the strong batteries of Bremerlehe and Blexen (at the surrender of which he was shortly afterwards present), and succeeded in capturing two row-boats, one carrying 16 the other 12 men, together with four sail of merchantmen, lying off Braak, where he also aided in taking possession of two 20-gun corvettes that were building. During the expedition against New Orleans Lieut. Phillips, with the Calliope’s cutter in charge, co-operated with the small-arm men under Capt. Rowland Money, and the troops under Colonel Thornton, at the storming of a battery on the Mississippi, 8 Jan. 1815.
He married, 28 Nov. 1825, Miss Mary Clapshaw.