In the summer of 1807, Captain Douglas was entrusted with the command of a squadron stationed in the Chesapeake river. Whilst so employed, he had occasion to enter into a spirited correspondence with the Mayor of the town of Norfolk, in consequence of one of the ships under his orders having searched an American frigate for British seamen who had deserted to her. The particulars of this event will be given under the head of Captain S. P. Humphreys, in our next volume.
On the Bellona’s return to Europe, she was attached to the Channel fleet, and formed part of the force under Lord Gambier at the destruction of the enemy’s ships in Aix Roads, in the month of April, 1809. She was afterwards employed in the North Sea; and, on the 18th Dec. 1810, captured the French privateer, le Heros du Nord, of 14 guns and 44 men. Captain Douglas’s next appointment was in the spring of 1812, to the Prince of Wales, a second rate, in which he served on the Mediterranean station during the remainder of the war. His advancement to the rank of Rear-Admiral took place June 4, 1814; and at the latter end of 1815, he was nominated Commander-in-Chief at Jamaica, where he continued during the usual period of three years.
RIGHT HONORABLE GEORGE VISCOUNT TORRINGTON,
Rear-Admiral of the Red; Doctor of the Civil Law; Fellow of the Royal Society; Patron of the Maidstone Masonry Society; a Vice-President of the Literary, and Covent Garden Theatrical Funds, and of the Merchant Seamen’s Auxiliary Bible Society, the Seamen’s and London Hospitals, the Mile End Philanthropic Society, the Eastern Dispensary, and the British and Foreign Philanthropic Society.
This nobleman is descended from the Byngs, of Wrotham, co. Kent, who flourished in the reign of Hen. VII. In that of Elizabeth, Thomas Byng was Master of Clare Hall, Regius Professor of Civil Law, and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge. Robert, his elder brother, and ancestor of the subject of this memoir, served for the borough of Abingdon in the first parliament of that Queen, and also in the 34th
