A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Townshend, John
TOWNSHEND. (Captain, 1834. f-p., 18; h-p., 15.)
John Townshend, born 28 March, 1798, is eldest son (by Georgiana Anne, youngest daughter of Wm. Poyntz, Esq., of Midgham, co. Berks,) of the late Lord John Townshend, a nobleman distinguished for his genius and his literary accomplishments, who accompanied Lord Howe, as a Volunteer, to the relief of Gibraltar in 1782, was afterwards a Lord of the Admiralty and-Paymaster of the Forces, and M.P. at different periods, for the University of Cambridge, the city of Westminster, and the borough of Knaresborough. Capt. Townshend is brother of the Rev. Geo. Osborne Townshend, who married a daughter of Admiral John M‘Kellar; brother-in-law of Rear-Admiral Sir Augustus Wm. Jas. Clifford, Bart., C.B.; and nephew of the late General Wm. Loftus, Lieutenant of the Tower of London and Colonel of the 2nd Dragoon Guards, also of Lord Jas. Townshend, Captain R.N. (1809), K.C.H., who died 28 June, 1842, and of George, sixth Duke of Leeds. His grandfather, George, first Marquess Townshend (a Field-Marshal, Colonel of the Second Dragoon Guards, and for some time Lord Lieutenant of Ireland), served under George II. at the battle of Dettingen, and was present at Fontenoy, Culloden, and Lafeldt, as well as at the siege of Quebec, which town surrendered to him as Commander-in-Chief after the death of General Wolfe.
This officer embarked (from the Royal Naval College) 24 April, 1814, as Midshipman, on board the Mulgrave 74, Capt. Thos. Jas. Maling, attached to the fleet in the Mediterranean. In the following Aug. he removed to the Tiber 38, Capt. Jas. Rich. Dacres, on the Irish station; he served next, from June, 1816, until June, 1819, on the coast of North America, in the Forth 40, Capt. Sir John Louis; and in Oct. 1820, at which period he had been for 12 months employed at Leith as Master’s Mate in the Dover 28, Capt. Arthur Batt Bingham, he joined the Cambrian 48, Capt. Gawen Wm. Hamilton, again in the Mediterranean; where he was made Lieutenant, 13 May, 1822, into the Rochfort 80, flag-ship of Sir Graham Moore. In the spring of 1824 he returned to England. He was next, 4 Jan. 1827, appointed to the Alligator 28, Capt. Wm. Pitt Canning, on the Haiifax station; and while there he was promoted, 26 Jan. 1828, to the command of the Columbine 18; which sloop he brought home and paid off in the early part of 1830. He attained his present rank 22 Oct. 1834; and was lastly, from 5 Sept. 1837 until the end of 1841, employed in the Tyne 26, in the Mediterranean.
Capt. Townshend married, 18 Aug. 1825, Elizabeth Jane, eldest daughter of the late Rear-Admiral Lord Geo. Stuart, C.B., uncle of the present Marquess of Bute. By that lady he has issue two sons and two daughters. Agents – Goode and Lawrence.