duce, two neutral vessels with cargoes, and an armed schooner, in the bays near St. Louis. On the 25th Nov. l’Inconstante frigate, struck her tri-coloured flag to the Penelope and Iphigenia, after exchanging a few broadsides, and sustaining a loss of 6 men killed and 21, including her captain, wounded. In this affair, the former British ship had 1 man slain and 7 wounded.
At the commencement of 1794, the Penelope was employed in the blockade of Port-au-Prince; and soon afterwards in covering the debarkation of the troops under Lieutenant-Colonel Whitelocke, near Cape Tiberoon. She subsequently engaged the batteries of Aux Cayes, and brought out from thence several loaded merchantmen.
Mr. Maples next joined the Europa 50, bearing the broad pendant of Commodore Ford, at Cape Nichola Mole, where he appears to have been employed for several weeks, in a fort named after that officer, by whom he was appointed lieutenant of la Magicienne 32, a few days subsequent to the reduction of Port-au-Prince, which took place June 4, 1794[1]. La Magicienne’s loss by yellow fever, while co-operating with the army under Brigadier-General Whyte, in the vain attempt to complete the subjugation of the French posts in St. Domingo, amounted to about 70 officers and men.
In the spring of 1796, la Magicienne, then commanded by Captain William Henry Ricketts, was employed off Havre, under the orders of Sir W. Sidney Smith; and in the ensuing autumn, we find her returning to the Jamaica station, where she soon made many captures. Among them were le Cerf Volant corvette, having on board despatches for the French Directory, and delegates from the southern department of St. Domingo to the National Assembly; la Fortune privateer, of 8 guns and 74 men; le Poisson Volant, of 12 guns and 80 men; and two Spanish brigs, laden with cocoa. In Jan. and Feb. 1797, her boats, under the command of Lieutenant Maples, cut out two French privateers and a Spanish armed brig from different anchorages at the west end of Porto Rico;
