commanders.
133
THOMAS SYKES, Esq.
[Commander.]
Obtained a lieutenant’s commission on the 14th Mar. 1799; and was first of the Tartar 32, commanded by Captain George Edmund Byron Bettesworth, when that gallant officer lost his life in action with a Danish flotilla, on the coast of Norway, May 15th, 1808. The particulars of the said engagement are given in the following extract of a letter from an officer on board the Tartar, dated May 20th, 1808:–
“We sailed from Leith on the 10th inst. to cruise off North Bergen and intercept a frigate, said to be in that harbour. We got on the coast on the i2th, but, from the very thick fogs, could not stand in till the 15th, when we made the islands to the westward of Bergen. On our hoisting Dutch colours, there came off twelve Norwegians in two boats, from whom we learnt that the frigate had sailed eight days before, for the East Indies, with three or four ships under her convoy. They took us through a most intricate rocky passage, till within five or six miles of Bergen, when they refused to pilot us any further. It being the captain’s intention to reach the town with the frigate and bring off the shipping, among which were three privateers, we anchored in the straits, with springs on our cables, and in the evening, the boats, with the captain, first and third lieutenants, and master, went up to the town, and would probably have cut out an East Indiaman lying under the battery, had not the guard-boat, which was without her, fell in with and fired on the launch, who returned the fire, wounding all their people severely, and took her: this alarmed the enemy on shore, who sounded their bugles, and manned the batteries; and we finding the ships lie within a chain, without which it would be difficult to get them, returned to the frigate, leaving the launch, commanded by Lieutenant Sykes, to watch the enemy. We immediately got the ship under weigh, but from the lightness of the wind, and intricacy of the passage, could not get near Bergen; and when about half way from our anchorage, in a narrow rocky strait, without a breath of wind, and a strong current; in this situation, we were attacked by a schooner and five gunboats, within half gun shot, lying under a rocky point, each mounting two 24-pounders, except the schooner, and manned with troops. They kept up a well-directed fire, hulling us in ten or eleven places, and cutting much our rigging and sails. One of their first shot killed our gallant captain, in the act of pointing a gun. The service has thus lost a most valuable commander, who had attached the whole of his officers and men to him, by the most kind and exemplary conduct. Although the force with which we were engaged was comparatively small, yet when it is known that we were at this time drifting towards the enemy, nearly end on, no wind, a
