captivity had been attended with most serious calamities as respected his private fortune; in fact, this treacherous act of the enemy may justly be considered as the principal feature in his professional life; and future historians will no doubt dwell upon it, in order to show the spirit of the government that Great Britain had then to oppose – our own limits will not admit of any further comments.
Early in 1808, Captain Dillon was appointed to the Childers brig, of which vessel the following just description is given by Mr. James, in the second edition of his Naval History, Vol. V. p. 39 et seq.
“Notwithstanding the fate of the ‘sloop of war’ Lily[1], vessels of that denomination, inferior in force to a gun-brig, were still suffered to remain in the British navy. One of the ‘cruisers’ of this class was the Childers, a brig of 202 tons, built as long ago as the year 1778; a vessel so unseaworthy as to have been obliged, on more than one occasion, to throw overboard her guns (long) 4-pounders, in order to save the lives of her crew. The brig at length became so crazy, that 18-pounder carronades were found too heavy for her, and she was fitted with fourteen 12-pounders. In this state, and manned with a crew, nominally, of 86, but really of 65 men and boys, including only one Lieutenant (there not being accommodation for more), the Childers, Captain William Henry Dillon, in the month of January (1808), lay in Leith roads, waiting to give her ‘protection’ to the trade proceeding to Gottenburgh. But the merchants, the instant they knew the force and qualifications of the Childers, objected to place their property under her care; supposing, very naturally, that so small and ill-armed a vessel was incapable of beating off the privateers that infested the northern waters. Ludicrous as the application would have appeared, the merchants, had they wished for a vessel of nearly double the force of the one they had rejected, might have requested the board of admiralty to appoint, instead of ‘the sloop of war’ Childers, the ‘gun-brig’ Insolent, then cruising on the Downs station. What vessel the merchants at last obtained we know not; but the Childers proceeded by herself to the Baltic (station), to effect as much, in the way of annoying the enemy, as her small powers would admit.”
Having thus made our readers acquainted with the force of the vessel placed under Captain Dillon’s command, we shall now present them with a copy of his official letter respecting
- ↑ Captured by a French privateer, July 15, 1804.
