Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Domett, William
DOMETT, Sir WILLIAM (1754–1828), admiral, entered the navy in 1769 under the patronage of Captain Alexander Hood (afterwards Lord Bridport), and after serving under Lord Ducie, Captain Elphinstone (afterwards Lord Keith), Captain Samuel Hood (afterwards Lord Hood), and others, was in 1777 promoted to be lieutenant, and shortly afterwards appointed to the Robust with Captain Alexander Hood, in which ship he was present in the action off Ushant on 27 July 1778. He was still in the Robust when, under Captain Cosby, she led Arbuthnot's line in the action off Cape Henry on 16 March 1781; was afterwards removed into the Invincible, in which he was present in the action of the Chesapeake on 5 Sept. 1781; was then taken by Sir Samuel Hood as his signal officer on board the Barfleur, and served in that capacity in the operations at St. Kitts in January 1782 and in the action off Dominica on 12 April 1782. A few days afterwards, Hood, having been detached from the fleet, captured four of the enemy's ships in the Mona passage, to the command of one of which, the Ceres sloop, Domett was promoted by Sir George Rodney, and sent to England with despatches. On 9 Sept. he was advanced to post rank and appointed as flag captain to Rear-admiral Sir Alexander Hood on board the Queen of 98 guns, one of the fleet which under Lord Howe relieved Gibraltar and repelled the attack of the enemy off Cape Spartel on 20 Oct.
During the peace he was actively employed on the coast of Scotland, in the West Indies, and Newfoundland. In the Spanish armament of 1790 he was again Sir Alexander Hood's flag captain on board the London; afterwards he commanded the Pegasus frigate on the coast of Newfoundland, and the Romney in the Mediterranean, as flag captain to Rear-admiral Goodall. When the war with France broke out in 1793 he was reappointed flag captain to Sir Alexander Hood in the Royal George, in which office he remained during seven years and a half, till Hood, created Viscount Bridport after the battle of 1 June 1794, struck his flag in 1800 [see Hood, Alexander, Viscount Bridport], a period including not only the battle of 1 June, but also that off L'Orient on 23 June 1795, when Lord Bridport was commander-in-chief, and the mutiny at Spithead in April 1797. In November 1800 Domett was moved into the Belle Isle, from which early in 1801 he was appointed captain of the fleet ordered for service in the Baltic, under Sir Hyde Parker, and, after Parker's return home, under Lord Nelson. On coming back from the Baltic he resumed the command of the Belle Isle, but was shortly afterwards appointed captain of the fleet off Brest, under Admiral Cornwallis, in which capacity he served till the peace of Amiens, and again, on the resumption of hostilities, till 23 April 1804, when he was promoted to be rear-admiral. Towards the end of the year he was appointed on the commission for revising the civil affairs of the navy [see Briggs, Sir John Thomas], and in the spring of 1808 to a seat at the board of admiralty, which he retained till the summer of 1813, when he was appointed commander-in-chief at Plymouth. He was advanced to be vice-admiral on 25 Oct. 1809, and admiral on 12 Aug. 1819. In Jan. 1815 he was nominated K.C.B., and G.C.B. on 16 May 1820. He died 19 May 1828. His nephew, Lieutenant Domett, was lost in the Vigilant schooner in February 1804: ‘a promising young officer,’ wrote Commodore Hood in reporting the event, ‘who was succeeding fast to the skill of his gallant uncle, the captain of the Channel fleet.’
[Marshall's Royal Naval Biography, i. 243.]