Royal Naval Biography/Norton, John
JOHN NORTON, Esq.
[Commander.]
Was born at Yarmouth, co. Norfolk, April 15th, 1771; and appears to have entered the navy in 1789. We first find him serving under Sir Richard J. Strachan, in the Phoenix frigate, on the East India station[1]; and next in the Alexander 74, commanded by the late Sir Richard Rodney Bligh, with whom he was taken prisoner and carried into Brest, in Nov. 1794[2]. On his return from captivity he joined the Topaze frigate, Captain Stephen George Church; and on the 28th Aug. 1796, assisted at the capture of la Elizabet, French frigate, near Cape Henry, on the coast of America. His promotion to the rank of lieutenant took place in 1799; and he was afterwards successively appointed to the Resolution 74, Captain the Hon. Alan Hyde Gardner, with whom he sailed for the West Indies, Feb. 7th, 1802; – to the Trent 36, bearing the flag of Admiral Lord Gardner, at Cork, in 1804; – to the command of the Frisk cutter, in 1805; – and to the Fame 74, Captain Richard H. A. Bennet, fitting out for the Mediterranean station, in May, 1807. Whilst in the Frisk, he assisted at the capture and destruction of a three-gun battery, situated on Pointe d’Equillon, in the Pertuis Breton, and was highly commended, by Lord Cochrane, for his conduct on that occasion. He obtained the rank of commander in Oct. 1810, since which he has not been employed.
This officer married in 1803, and has issue one daughter.