Royal Naval Biography/Senhouse, Humphrey Fleming
HUMPHREY FLEMING SENHOUSE, Esq.
[Post-Captain of 1814.]
We first find this officer mentioned as the bearer of despatches from Lord Hugh Seymour to the Admiralty, announcing the capture of Surinam, in 1799; and, secondly, as an able assistant to Captain Philip Beaver, at the debarkation of the British army in Bay Robert, Martinique, Jan. 30 and 31, 1809[1]. His promotion to the rank of commander took place June 2 in the latter year. The following is Mr. James’s account of the occurrence to which we alluded at p. 644 of Vol. II. Part II.
“In the month of July, 1813, Captain (James) Sanders, with his frigate the Junon, and the ship-sloop Martin, Captain Humphrey Fleming Senhouse, of 16 carronades, 24-pounders, and 2 long nines, was stationed in Delaware bay. On the 29th, about 8 a.m., the Martin grounded on the outer ridge of Crow’s Shoal, within 2½ miles from the beach; and, it being a falling tide, could not be floated again before the return of flood. The water ran so shallow, that it became necessary to shore the ship up; and the same cause prevented the Junon from afterwards anchoring nearer to the Martin, than a mile and three quarters. This afforded to the flotilla of American gun-boats and block-vessels then in the Delaware, a fine opportunity to destroy the British sloop. They accordingly, ten in number, advanced, and deliberately took up an anchorage about a mile and three quarters distant, directly on the Martin’s beam, on the opposite side to the Junon, and so as to bring the latter in a line with the sloop. Thus, by anchoring at the distance of three miles from the frigate, which, it was well known, could not approach nearer on account of the shoals, the American gun-boats had no force but the Martin’s to contend with.
“All this while, crowds of citizens, on foot, on horseback, and in carriages, were hastening to the beach, in the hope to see verified in the speedy destruction of the Martin, the wonderful accounts they had heard of American prowess on the ocean. The Martin got her top-gallant-masts struck, and her sails furled; and, although he despaired of saving his ship from so formidable a force. Captain Senhouse resolved to defend her to the last extremity. The gun-boats commenced the fire, and the Martin returned it, at first with her carronades; but finding they could not reach. Captain Senhouse had the two 9-pounders transported from their ports, one to the top-gallant forecastle, the other to the poop. Between these two guns, and all the guns of the American flotilla, was the fire maintained for nearly two hours, without the slightest injury to the Martin. At about 2 p.m. the sternmost gun-boat in the line having separated a little from the rest, Captain Sanders made the signal for the boats manned and armed. Accordingly, three boats were despatched from the Martin, containing 40 officers and men, and four from the Junon, containing 100 officers and men, the whole under the orders of the Junon’s first lieutenant, Philip Westphal. On the approach of the boats, the gun-vessels turned their fire from the Martin against them, but at too great a distance to be effective. The single gun-boat, which was the principal object of attack, kept up a spirited fire, but Was quickly boarded and overpowered. The British boats, in this affair, lost 3 killed and mortally wounded, and 4 slightly wounded; the gun-boats, 7 wounded. The last discharge from the gun, mounted on board the gun-boat, broke its carriage. That prevented the British from returning the fire of the remaining gun-boats, which had dropped down in line, hoping to retake the prize; but which the captors towed off" in triumph. As, in their attempt to save their companion, the gun-boats passed the bow of the Martin, the sloop fired upon them with effect; and the Junon opened her fire, but her shot scarcely fell beyond the Martin.
“Some of the gun-boats having grounded, the remainder anchored for their mutual protection. The tide had drifted the ship’s boats, as well as the captured vessel, to a considerable distance. The gun-boats that had grounded got off, and the whole, as if to renew the attack upon the change of tide, anchored within two miles and a half of the Martin, now weakened by the absence of 40 of her best hands. However, at 5 p.m., to the surprise of the Martin’s officers and crew, and, as it afterwards appeared, to the extreme mortification of the spectators on shore, this formidable flotilla weighed and beat up, between the Martin and the shore, without further molesting her, arid arrived in safety, soon afterwards, at their station near the mouth of the river.
“The force that attacked the Martin, consisted of eight gun-boats and two block-vessels. The latter were sloops of 100 tons each, which had been coasters. Their sides had been raised, heavy beams laid across, and the whole planked in, on the top, on each bide, and at the ends; leaving only loopholes for musketry (through which pikes might be used in repelling boarders), and three ports of a side: in these were mounted long 18-pounders. The covering extended the whole length of the vessel, and was large enough to contain 60 men, the number stated as the complement of each. The gun-boats were sloop-rigged vessels, averaging about 95 tons, and mounted each a long 32 and a 4-pounder, on traversing carriages, with a complement of 35 men, the exact number found on board the prize.”
On the 30th June, 1814, Captain Senhouse captured the American privateer Snap-dragon, of 6 guns and 80 men; and on the 11th of the following month, he assisted in taking possession of Moose island, in Passamaquoddy bay, which was surrendered without opposition to the naval and military forces under Sir Thomas Masterman Hardy and Lieutenant-Colonel Pilkington. He returned home with despatches from Sir Alexander Cochrane, announcing the successful result of an expedition against Castine, in the province of Maine[2].
Captain Senhouse’s post commission bears date Oct. 12, 1814.
Agent.– J. Hinxman, Esq.
- ↑ A very interesting memoir “the Life and Services of Captain Philip Beaver,” has recently been published by Captain W. H. Smyth, R.N. K.S.F. &c.
- ↑ See Vol. II. Part II. p. 729 et seq.