Royal Naval Biography/Buck, Richard
RICHARD BUCK, Esq.
[Post-Captain of 1811.]
Nephew to Admiral Sir Richard Goodwin Keats, G.C.B. &c. &c.
We first find this officer, in Feb. 1806, serving as a lieutenant on board the Culloden 74, bearing the flag of Sir Edward Pellew, now Viscount Exmouth. His commission as a commander was confirmed by the Admiralty, Dec. 28, 1807; previous to which he had been successively appointed to the command of the Rattlesnake and Samarang: in the latter sloop, formerly the Dutch corvette Scipio[1], he assisted at the “entire destruction of the naval force of Holland,” in the eastern hemisphere[2].
Sir Richard J. Strachan, in his despatches from the Scheldt, dated Aug. 13, 1809, acquaints the Admiralty that Captain Buck had been employed with a light flotilla, in sounding and buoying the channels of that river, to enable the fleet to advance, for the purpose of putting into execution the ulterior objects of the Walcheren expedition; and that this service was executed, under the directions of Sir Home Popham, with judgment and correctness.
Captain Buck’s next appointment was, about Dec. 1809, to the Crocus brig; in which vessel he continued until his promotion to post rank, April 3, 1811: he subsequently commanded the Termagant ship-sloop, and Franchise frigate, on the Mediterranean station. In Feb. 1812, he drove on shore and burnt, near Cagliari, l’Aventurier French privateer, pierced for 16 guns, but only three mounted, with a complement of 60 men; and on the 27th September following, he assisted at the capture of a few small vessels in Tarragona mole. A long official letter, descriptive of this latter unimportant service, was published in the London Gazette; and a copy thereof will be found at p. 430, et seq. of Nav. Chron. vol. 28.
Captain Buck married, previous to the peace, a daughter of Mr. Macdonald, the British Consul at Algiers, whose other daughter has since been united to the Danish consul resident at that regency.