A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Scott, Edward Hinton
SCOTT. (Captain, 1838. f-p., 28; h-p., 21.)
Edward Hinton Scott was born about 1789.
This officer entered the Navy, 1 May, 1798, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board the Anson of 46 guns and 327 men, Capt. Philip Chas. Durham; became Midshipman, in May, 1800, of the Princess Royal 98, Capts. Thos. Macnamara Russell and David Atkins, flag-ship in the Channel of Sir Erasmus Gower; served from March, 1801, until Sept. 1804, on the West India and Home stations, in the Orion 74, Capts. Robt. Carthew Reynolds and Robt. Cuthbert, and Clyde 38, Capt. John Larmour; and from the latter date until March, 1807, was employed, more than two years of the time as Sub-Lieutenant, in the Blazer gun-brig, Lieut.-Commander John Hinton. In Sept. 1798 the Anson, the ship first mentioned, encountered, and for 17 days dogged, in company with the Ethalion 38, a French squadron under Commodore Bompart, consisting of La Hoche of 78 guns, eight frigates, a brig, and a schooner, destined for the invasion of Ireland. With five of the frigates, after the three others together with the line-of-battle ship had fallen into the hands of Sir John Borlase Warren, she came, 12 Oct., singly into collision, and sustained a loss, with injury to her masts and yards, of 2 men killed and 13 wounded. On 18 of the same month we find her, in company with the Kangaroo 18, enduring a similar loss in a gallant action of an hour and a quarter, which terminated in the capture of La Loire of 46 guns and 664 men (including troops), of whom 46 were killed and 71 wounded. While attached to the (Anson Mr. Scott contributed, also, to the capture of several fine privateers. In the Blazer he was often in action with the French flotilla in the neighbourhood of Ostend, Dunkerque, Calais, and Boulogne, and assisted, in July, 1805, in rescuing the crew of the Orestes 14, Capt. Thos. Brown, when wrecked on the Splinter Sand and exposed to the fire of the enemy. In the course of the same year he commanded a rocket-vessel in Sir Sidney Smith’s attack upon the Boulogne flotilla. On leaving the Blazer he became Acting-Lieutenant of the Skylark 16; and while in that brig (to which he was confirmed 12 June, 1807) he had charge of her boats in a running fight with a French cutter privateer of 8 guns and 48 men, whom, after having cut away her sweeps and chased her for three hours, he drove under the guns of the Skylark. On one occasion he landed at Flushing, spiked the 8 guns of a battery, and brought the guard off prisoners. His succeeding appointments were – 14 Nov. 1808, to the Termagant sloop, Capt. H. E. P. Sturt, on the Halifax station – 14 Feb. 1810, to the Saturn 74, Capt. Wm. Cumberland, attached to the force in the Baltic – in the course of 1811, to the Royal George 100, Laurestinus 24, and, as Senior, to the Orlando 36, commanded, on the Home, Mediterranean, North American, and East India stations, by Capt. John Clavell, uith whom, in 1819, he returned to England in the Malabar 74-and, 23 Aug. 1820, in the capacity last mentioned, to the Cambrian 48, Capt. Gawen Wm. Hamilton. He was frequently, in the Saturn and her boats, engaged with the enemy’s forts and armed vessels (several of which he captured) while affording protection to the trade passing through the Great Belt. During his servitude in the Orlando he took part in many boat-affairs in the Adriatic and Chesapeake. He commanded her boats too in several skirmishes with the Malay proas in the straits of Sunda and Malacca, and once succeeded in repelling an attack made by them at night on a wrecked Indiaman, of which he had been placed in charge. In the boats of the Cambrian we find him cutting out, in the Gulf of Athens, with much spirit and judgment, a piratical schooner, carrying 2 long guns and 50 men, together with three of her prizes; besides taking three small pirate-vessels from the island of Skopelo and effecting the re-capture of an English sloop. He also assisted at the reduction of Napoli di Romania, and, at the head of a hundred seamen, landed there at the request of the Provisional Government, had the good fortune, when the troops entered the town, to save the lives of 2000 Turks, men, women, and children, who were afterwards placed on shore at Smyrna. For these services he twice received the thanks of Sir Graham Moore, the Commander-in-Chief, was presented with a sword by the Greek Provisional Government, and was advanced, 18 July, 1823, to the rank of Commander in the Dispatch sloop of 18 guns.[1] In that vessel, stationed likewise in the Mediterranean, he remained until the close of 1824. He was lastly, from 23 Nov. 1835, until April, 1838, employed, again on the station last named, as Second-Captain, in the Rodney 92, Capt. Hyde Parker. His promotion to the rank he now holds took place 15 Jan. 1838.
For his conduct in jumping overboard from the Orlando and saving the lives of four persons, Capt. Scott (who is Senior of 1838) received the thanks of the Royal Humane Society. Agents – Goode and Lawrence.
- ↑ Before he left the Cambrian he appears, in command of a Tender, to have rendered material assistance to the Martin sloop, Capt. Hen. Eden, when driven on shore in a gale of wind.