A Naval Biographical Dictionary/White, John Chambers

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WHITE, K.C.B. (Vice-Admiral of the White, 1837. f-p., 29; h-p., 35.)

Sir John Chambers White died Commander-in-Chief at Sheerness, 4 April, 1845.

This officer entered the Navy, 7 June, 1781, as Captain’s Servant, on board the Quebec 32, Capt. Christopher Mason, stationed on the coast of North America, where he removed, in Aug. 1783, as Midshipman (a rating he had already attained), to the Diomede 50, Capt. Thos. Lennox Frederick. From 1784 until 1786 he served at Portsmouth in the Goliath 74, Capt. Sir Hyde Parker; and on 22 Nov. 1790, at which period he had been for a short time employed at Spithead and in the Channel in the Royal William and Swan, Capts. Geo. Gayton and Henry Warre, he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant. His next appointments were, 13 Sept. and 21 Dec. 1793 and 5 June, 1795, to the Arethusa, Nymphe, and Pomone frigates, the two former commanded by Capts. Hon. Seymour Finch and Geo. Murray, the latter bearing the broad pendant of Sir John Borlase Warren, and all employed on the Home station, where he was made Commander, 28 Aug. 1795, into the Sylph sloop. In her his activity enabled him to make prize, in May and Sept. 1796, of the Mercury Dutch brig-of-war of 16 guns, and Phoenix French privateer of 4 guns and 32 men. In July, 1797, he stood in with great promptitude and, by a well-directed fire, maintained for some hours, prevented the crew of the French 36-gun frigate Calliope, on shore, near the Penmarcks, from using any means to save their ship or stores;^[1] and in the following month he joined in an attack made upon a French convoy at the entrance of Sable d’Olonne, besides assisting at the capture of five coasting vessels and the destruction of Le Petit Diable cutter of 18 guns and 100 men. In the affair with the Calliope the Sylph had 6 of her people wounded, and with the convoy at Sable d’Olonne 2 killed and 4 wounded. In Feb. 1798 she was present at the capture of La Légere, French ship-privateer of 18 guns and 130 men: she intercepted subsequently the Eliza, an American ship, with a valuable cargo from Batavia, viâ Boston, bound to Amsterdam; La Fouine, a French national lugger of 8 guns and 26 men;^[2] two Spanish letters-of-marque richly laden; Le Début, a French brig of 8 guns (pierced for 16), bound to Cayenne with merchandize; and El Golondina,^[3] a Spanish packet, pierced for 20 guns, but with only 4 mounted. Capt. White was promoted to Post-rank, 2 Aug. 1799, in the Windsor Castle 98; and was subsequently appointed – 31 Oct. 1800 (after five months of half-pay) to the Renown 74, flag-ship during the first 12 months of Sir J. B. Warren – 8 July, 1804, to the Kent 74 – 9 Dec. 1805 (he had left the Kent in Dec. of the preceding year), to the Foudroyant 80, as Flag-Captain to Sir J. B. Warren, with whom he served until Nov. 1806 – 24 Sept. and 20 Nov. 1810, to the Hibernia 120 and Centaur 74, in the latter of which ships he remained until Nov. 1814 – and 27 May, 1825, and 26 June, 1827, to the Royal Charlotte and William and Mary yachts. In the Renown, under Sir J. B. Warren (who had with him, besides, the Dragon, Gibraltar, Hector, and Alexander 74’s, the Haerlem armée en flûte, and Mercury frigate), Capt. White went to the Mediterranean in the early part of 1801 in chase of a French armament under M. Ganteaume; whom he there pursued to the coast of Egypt and in other directions. While so employed the Renown encountered a gale of wind accompanied with much thunder and lightning, which killed 3 men and wounded 2 others. She united subsequently in the defence of Porto Ferrajo, in the island of Elba; where we find Capt. White superintending, 14 Sept. 1801, the landing and re-embarking of 689 seamen and marines, sent from the squadron to assist the garrison in a sortie made for the purpose of destroying the enemy’s batteries; a service which he performed in a very creditable manner, under a heavy fire from the French, and for which Sir John Warren acknowledged him to be “entitled to his wannest thanks.”^[4] After commanding the Renown for two years and nine months as a private ship, part of the time at the blockade of Toulon, Capt. White returned to England in 1804, in the Kent, with 1,060,000 dollars, received on board at Cadiz. On 13 March, 1806, being then in the Foudroyant, he witnessed the capture, during a cruize to the westward, of the Marengo 80, bearing the flag of Rear-Admiral Linois, and 40-gun frigate Belle Poule. The Hibernia was taken by him to the Mediterranean for the flag of Sir Sam. Hood. He co-operated in the Centaur in the defence of Tarragona until the fall of that city, 28 June, 1811;^[5] and he was present in the same ship, in April, 1814, at the destruction, in the Gironde, of the Regulus 74, three brigs-of-war, several smaller vessels, and all the forts and batteries on the north side of the river. He was superseded from the William and Mary on the occasion of his promotion to Flag-rank, 22 July, 1830. He attained the rank of Vice-Admiral 10 Jan. 1837; was nominated a K.C.B. 29 June, 1841; and from 15 Jan. 1844 until the period of his death, as above, was Commander-in-Chief at the Nore.

Sir John Chambers White married, first, in 1800, Cordelia, daughter of Capt. Robt. Fanshawe, R.N.,^[6] Resident Commissioner of Plymouth Dockyard, sister of the present Capt. Arthur Fanshawe, R.N., C.B., and sister-in-law of Admirals Wm. Bedford, Sir Thos. Byam Martin, G.C.B,, and Hon. Sir Robt. Stopford, G.C.B.; and secondly, 25 April, 1816, Charlotte Elizabeth, eldest daughter of General Sir Hew Whiteford Dalrymple, Bart., Colonel of the 57th Foot, and sister-in-law of the present Vice-Admiral Jas. Rich. Dacres. Sir John, who became a widower again 11 April, 1828, has left issue.

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1. Vide Gaz. 1797, p. 697. Eight vessels which had been under the protection of the Calliope, were on this occasion taken, and two others destroyed, by the Sylph and the squadron she was attached to.
2. Vide Gaz. 1798, p. 1108.
3. Taken by the Sylph, in company with the Mermaid 32.
4. “I beg leave,” says Lieut.-Col. Geo. Airey, the military officer in command, in his official report to General Hon. H. E. Fox , “to express my gratitude to Capt. White, of H.M.S. Renown, for his great attention in the arrangement for landing, and his activity in re-embarking the troops when a good deal pressed by the enemy.” – Vide Gaz. 1801. p. 1356.
5. Vide Gaz. 1811, p. 1588.
6. Vide Note, p. 347.