Royal Naval Biography/Hopkins, Harry
HARRY HOPKINS, Esq.
[Post-Captain of 1814.]
Entered the navy under the auspices of Captain William Henry Ricketts, nephew to Earl St. Vincent, with whom he served in the Bonetta sloop, on the West India station, from 1787 till 1790. During the Spanish armament, we find him in the Canada 74, commanded by the late Lord Hugh Seymour; and, subsequently, in the Inconstant and Niger frigates. Captains George Wilson and Richard Goodwin Keats. At the commencement of the French revolutionary war, he again joined his friend Lord Hugh, then commanding the Leviathan 74, in which ship he was present at the occupation of Toulon, by Lord Hood, Aug. 28, 1793[1].
In May, 1704, Mr. Hopkins was received on board the Queen Charlotte, bearing the flag of Earl Howe, under whom he had the honor of assisting at the defeat of the republican fleet, on the glorious first of June. His promotion to the rank of lieutenant took place in the month of December following, on which occasion he was appointed to the Comet fire-vessel. Captain Edward Codrington.
We now lose sight of Mr. Hopkins until Feb. 14, 1797, when, as a lieutenant of the Lively frigate. Captain Lord Garlies, he witnessed the discomfiture of the Spanish fleet, near Cape St. Vincent[2]. On the 28th May, in the same year, he commanded a boat belonging to that ship, and “gallantly supported” Lieutenant Thomas Masterman Hardy, in “a most resolute attack” upon la Mutine French national brig, of 14 guns and 113 men, the capture of which vessel has been recorded at p. 154 of Vol. II. Part I.
“The gallantry of this action,” says Earl St. Vincent, “has prompted me to take la Mutine into his Majesty’s service, and to appoint Lieutenant Hardy to the command of her; a measure, so necessary to encourage a continuance of daring enterprise, I am confident will merit the approbation of their lordships.”
The Lively was then commanded by Captain Benjamin Hallowell, but afterwards by the present Sir James Nicoll Morris, under whom Lieutenant Hopkins continued to serve until she was wrecked, near Cadiz, in 1798. His subsequent appointments were to the Magnificent 74, and Prince of Wales 98, the former ship commanded by Captain Edward Bowater, the latter bearing the flag of Sir Robert Calder, and in which he assisted at the capture of the San Rafael and El Firme, Spanish 2-deckers, July 22, 1805[3]. His commission as commander bears date Jan. 22, 1806; and, about the same period, he was appointed to the Satellite brig, of 16 guns, actively employed on the Boulogne station, under Commodore (now Sir Edward) Owen.
In June 1810, Captain Hopkins received an appointment to the Helicon of 10 guns, on the Plymouth station, where he remained under the orders of his friend Sir Robert Calder until advanced to post rank, June 7, 1814. Among other prizes taken by him, during that period, were la Zulma and la Revenant, French privateers; the latter a schooner mounting 14 guns, with a complement of 77 men. He also drove on shore a privateer, name unknown, near St. Maloes, and assisted at the capture of la Venus schooner, of 14 guns and 67 men.
Agents.– Messrs. Cooke, Halford, and Son.