Royal Naval Biography/Gambier, George Cornish
GEORGE CORNISH GAMBIER, Esq.
[Post-Captain of 1821.]
A son of the late Commissioner Samuel Gambier, R.N. by Jane, youngest daughter of Daniel Mathew, of Felix Hall, co. Essex, Esq., and nephew to Admiral Lord Gambier, G.C.B.
This officer entered the navy June 18th, 1808; and served us midshipman on board the Unicorn and Acasta, frigates, commanded by Captain Alexander Robert Kerr, and employed as cruisers in the bay of Biscay, from Oct. 1800, until Nov. 1811; when he joined the Malta 80, bearing the flag of Rear-Admiral Hallowell; in which ship he continued, on the Mediterranean station, during the remainder of the war. He was made lieutenant, March 6th, 1815; appointed to the Orlando 42, Captain John Clavell, Aug. 17th following; removed to the Minden 74, flagship of Sir Richard King, in the East Indies, March 12th, 1817; re appointed to the Orlando, July 4th in the same year, and to the Minden, Feb. 12th, 1818; appointed to the Topaze 40, Captain John Richard Lumley, Sept. 20, 1819; promoted to the command of the Curlew sloop, on the same station, Dec. 7th, 1819; and posted into the Dauntless 24, June 4th, 1821.
Captain Gambier subsequently visited China, New South Wales, New Zealand, the western coast of South America, the Marquesas islands, and Otaheite. In March, 1822, when on his return to India, from the Pacific Ocean, he made an excursion to the south head of Botany Bay, in company with the members of the Philosophical Society of Australia, and assisted at the ceremony of affixing a brazen tablet, with a suitable inscription, against the rock on which Captain Cook and Sir Joseph Banks, “the Columbus and Miecenas of their time,” first landed. He then proceeded through Torres Straits to join his commander-in-chief. The Dauntless was paid off, at Portsmouth, towards the end of 1823.
Captain Gambier has since employed himself in making “noble and generous efforts to improve the morals and condition of our seamen, and to protect their persons and property us soon us they come ashore, from those harpies in London and other ports, that are always on the look-out to rob and ruin them.” It has, indeed, been stated, that, during the last two years, he contributed more than 1000l. towards the feeding, clothing, and sheltering of numerous poor fellows, who, either from their own improvidence, their inability to obtain employment, or the villainy of land-sharks, had been reduced to the very extreme of destitution. “A better omen than this, of patriotic feeling, and attachment to the ‘wooden walls,’ is not often to be met with.”[1]
Agent.– T. Collier, Esq.
- ↑ United Service Journal. No. VI. p. 756 et seq.