of a Falmouth packet. One of his brothers, Stephen Bell, Esq. died in command of the Francis Freeling, a vessel of similar description, on the same station. Another brother was blown up in the Amphion frigate, Sept. 22, 1796[1].
Agent.– J. Copland, Esq.
WILLIAM GOATE, Esq.
[Post-Captain of 1809.]
Son of the late Lieutenant-Colonel Goate, of the West Suffolk militia.
This officer received his first commission in Nov. 1790; and at the commencement of the French revolutionary war, we find him serving as junior Lieutenant of the Orpheus a 32 gun frigate. Captain Henry Newcome, on the African station, where he assisted at the capture of several merchant vessels, in April, 1793[2].
Proceeding to Sierra Leone, in charge of four prize-brigs, with Mr. Willoughby and two other midshipmen under his orders. Lieutenant Goate struck on a shoal off Rio Grande, to the southward of the river Gambia, and in less than a quarter of an hour his vessel went to pieces, as did likewise Mr. Willoughby’s very soon afterwards. The perilous situation of the whole, owing to their ignorance of the coast, and having neither charts nor pilots on board, is thus described by one of the prizemasters:
- ↑ See Vol. I, Part II, p. 455 et seq.
- ↑ On the 22d April, 1793, the barge and cutter of the Orpheus captured two French brigs in Senegal roads. One of these vessels was boarded by Lieutenant Richard St. Lo Nicholson and Mr. Nisbet J. Willoughby, midshipman, who found a party of officers from the shore assembled at supper in her cabin, totally unconscious of an enemy being so near.
On the 21th of the same month, the launch, barge, and cutter, commanded by Lieutenants Nicholson, John Broughton, and Goate, cut out two brigs and a schooner, under a heavy but ill-directed fire from the fort on Goree island.
