active part in the action of July 13, 1795[1], on which occasion she carried the flag of Rear-Admiral Mann, and, with a few other ships of the van-division, bore the brunt of the enemy’s fire, the centre and rear not being able to get up, owing to vexatious calms and baffling winds.
Towards the latter end of the same year Sir John Jervis hoisted his flag on board the Victory; and in January following, Lieutenant Hamilton was promoted to the rank of Commander, in the Comet fire-ship. In that vessel he was sent to the West Indies, where he served upwards of twelve months, without any opportunity to signalize himself. Having returned to Lisbon with despatches, he was there posted, June 3, 1797, into the San Josef, of 110 guns, from which ship he exchanged into the Surprise, a small frigate, mounting twenty-four 32-pounders, and eight 18-pounders (carronades) with a complement of 197 men[2] . From this period till the conclusion of the year, he was employed in escorting the trade to and from Newfoundland.
In July 1798, Captain Hamilton was ordered to convoy a fleet to Jamaica, where he arrived with his charge on the 3d Oct. He continued on that station till Jan. 20, 1800, and during that time was constantly engaged in the most active and hazardous services. The annoyance he gave to the enemy will readily be conceived when we state that he captured, burnt, or otherwise destroyed, upwards of eighty armed vessels and merchantmen; and that those which he preserved were sold for no less a sum than 200,000 pounds currency. At one time he chased a privateer and her prize into Laguna, on the north side of Cuba; and after having effected their destruction, was two days and nights in constant action with the batteries, the baffling winds and light airs preventing his clearing the port.
His achievement in boarding and cutting out the Hermione, of 44 guns, and manned with nearly 400 Spaniards, from the harbour of Porto Cabello, though surrounded by
- ↑ See p 159.
- ↑ The Surprise had been the French corvette Unite, taken in 1796. She was unique, in having a 36-gun ship’s main-mast, with the fore and mizen-masts of a 28. This was a plan of Captain Hamilton’s, and she appears not to have been complained of as a sailer.
