James Young (1762–1833)
Encyclopedia
James Young was an officer of the Royal Navy
who saw service during the French Revolutionary
and Napoleonic Wars
, rising to the rank of vice-admiral of the white
.
Young was born in 1762, the son of a naval officer. He followed his father, and an older half-brother, into the navy and was promoted to commander early in the French Revolutionary Wars while serving in the West Indies with Sir John Jervis
. His first command was a fireship, though he was also temporary commander of a 74-gun warship, before being promoted to post captain and given a frigate
. He was successful in cruising against privateer
s, and was given another ship, in which in late 1799, he was involved in the chase of two Spanish frigates, capturing one of them. They were found to be transporting valuable cargoes from the Spanish colonies, and their capture made the captains involved extremely wealthy men, with their crews also receiving huge sums of money comparative to their usual wages.
Young commanded a frigate in the Mediterranean for the rest of the French Revolutionary Wars, paying her off at the peace
. He did not immediately return to service with the outbreak of the Napoleonic Wars, and it was not until 1807 that he commissioned a 74-gun ship and joined the expedition to Copenhagen
. Promoted to flag rank towards the end of the Napoleonic Wars, Young was further advanced to vice-admiral in 1830, and died three years later with the rank of vice-admiral of the white
.
, and his second wife Sophia. William
, his half-brother by his father's first marriage to Elizabeth Bolton, also embarked on a naval career and rose to be Vice-Admiral of the United Kingdom
, with the rank of admiral of the red
. James Young followed his father and brother into the navy, and after several years of service, was promoted to commander
in 1794, shortly after the start of the French Revolutionary Wars
, by Sir John Jervis
. He had been serving with Jervis in the West Indies prior to this, and on returning to Britain aboard Reprisal, was given command of the fireship . Young briefly served as acting-commander of the 74-gun from June 1795, after her previous captain, Christopher Mason, had been promoted to rear-admiral. Young went out to the Mediterranean, before returning to resume command of Comet. He was promoted to post captain on 5 October 1795.
Young was given command of the 32-gun in 1796 and cruised in the North Sea, and then in the English Channel, where he was particularly successfully against privateer
s, capturing the 16-gun Aventure off Cape Barfleur
at 4.am on 19 December 1796 and Tartane off Beachy Head
at 7.am on 18 February 1797. Aventure was a privateer brig
carrying sixteen 4-pounder guns and a crew of 62 men, under the command of Citizen Peltier. She was two days out of Calais
on her first cruise and had not captured any prizes. Tartane was also a brig, mounting sixteen 4-pounder guns and carrying 60 men, on a cruise from Dieppe
. She had not taken any prizes, and in his report on the capture, Young paid tribute to Captain Cheshire of the 18-gun sloop
, who having seen the chase, manoeuvred to cut off Tartanes escape. Young commanded Greyhound until March 1797, when he took command of the 32-gun .
, while a fourth frigate, , under Captain John Gore
, was also sighted, joining from astern. Pierrepoint signalled his intention to engage the foremost ship, leaving the sternmost for Young in Ethalion, and at 7am the ships, now discerned to be Spanish frigates, separated. Ethalion pursued the sternmost frigate, exchanging fire from their stern and bow chasers, and after closing and firing two broadsides, the Spanish ship surrendered. She was discovered to be the 36-gun Thetis, carrying 12- and 6-pdr guns and with a crew of 250, under the command of Don Juan de Mendoza. She was bound from Veracruz
to a Spanish port, carrying a cargo of 1,411,526 dollars and cocoa. Ethalion suffered no casualties during the chase, while there was one man killed and nine wounded aboard Thetis. Meanwhile Naiad, in company with Alcmene and Triton, chased down and captured the other Spanish frigate, which was discovered to be the Santa Brigada, also carrying a valuable cargo. Each captain received £40,730.18s. in prize money, approximately £ at today's prices.
The sum paid out was so large that it was said that the crew of the ships involved roamed around Portsmouth
with 'bank notes stuck in their hats, buying watches for the fun of frying them, and issuing laws that any of their crew who appeared without a gold-laced hat should be cobbed, so that the unlucky man who appeared in silver could only escape by representing that the costlier articles were all bought up, but he had compelled the shopkeeper to take money for gold lace.' Each seaman involved received £182 4s 9¾d, the equivalent of ten years pay.
, sailing to land troops in Egypt. The fleet pursued Pique for a time, but could not catch her. Young escaped, and then made his way to report the French movements to Admiral Lord Keith. Young sailed back to Britain to pay Pique off after the end of the wars, and arrived in port on 2 July 1802. He does not appear to have returned to service after the outbreak of the Napoleonic Wars
until April 1807, when he commissioned the new 74-gun . Young went out with Rear-Admiral William Essington's force to Copenhagen in mid-1807
, arriving off the city on 7 July.
, Gloucestershire
with the rank of Vice-Admiral of the White
on 8 March 1833 at the age of 67. He had married the daughter of Colonel (later Lieutenant-General) Fyers of the Royal Engineers
while at Gibraltar
in 1802. She was renowned as the 'beauty of the rock', and together the two had a large family.
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
who saw service during the French Revolutionary
French Revolutionary Wars
The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of major conflicts, from 1792 until 1802, fought between the French Revolutionary government and several European states...
and Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
, rising to the rank of vice-admiral of the white
Vice Admiral (Royal Navy)
Vice admiral is a flag officer rank of the British Royal Navy. It equates to the NATO rank code OF-8 and is immediately superior to rear admiral and is subordinate to the full admiral rank.The Royal Navy has had vice admirals since at least the 16th century...
.
Young was born in 1762, the son of a naval officer. He followed his father, and an older half-brother, into the navy and was promoted to commander early in the French Revolutionary Wars while serving in the West Indies with Sir John Jervis
John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent
Admiral of the Fleet John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent GCB, PC was an admiral in the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom...
. His first command was a fireship, though he was also temporary commander of a 74-gun warship, before being promoted to post captain and given a frigate
Frigate
A frigate is any of several types of warship, the term having been used for ships of various sizes and roles over the last few centuries.In the 17th century, the term was used for any warship built for speed and maneuverability, the description often used being "frigate-built"...
. He was successful in cruising against privateer
Privateer
A privateer is a private person or ship authorized by a government by letters of marque to attack foreign shipping during wartime. Privateering was a way of mobilizing armed ships and sailors without having to spend public money or commit naval officers...
s, and was given another ship, in which in late 1799, he was involved in the chase of two Spanish frigates, capturing one of them. They were found to be transporting valuable cargoes from the Spanish colonies, and their capture made the captains involved extremely wealthy men, with their crews also receiving huge sums of money comparative to their usual wages.
Young commanded a frigate in the Mediterranean for the rest of the French Revolutionary Wars, paying her off at the peace
Treaty of Amiens
The Treaty of Amiens temporarily ended hostilities between the French Republic and the United Kingdom during the French Revolutionary Wars. It was signed in the city of Amiens on 25 March 1802 , by Joseph Bonaparte and the Marquess Cornwallis as a "Definitive Treaty of Peace"...
. He did not immediately return to service with the outbreak of the Napoleonic Wars, and it was not until 1807 that he commissioned a 74-gun ship and joined the expedition to Copenhagen
Battle of Copenhagen (1807)
The Second Battle of Copenhagen was a British preemptive attack on Copenhagen, targeting the civilian population in order to seize the Dano-Norwegian fleet and in turn originate the term to Copenhagenize.-Background:Despite the defeat and loss of many ships in the first Battle of Copenhagen in...
. Promoted to flag rank towards the end of the Napoleonic Wars, Young was further advanced to vice-admiral in 1830, and died three years later with the rank of vice-admiral of the white
Vice Admiral (Royal Navy)
Vice admiral is a flag officer rank of the British Royal Navy. It equates to the NATO rank code OF-8 and is immediately superior to rear admiral and is subordinate to the full admiral rank.The Royal Navy has had vice admirals since at least the 16th century...
.
Family and first commands
James Young was born into a naval family in 1762, the son of the naval officer James Young, who would become a vice-admiralVice Admiral (Royal Navy)
Vice admiral is a flag officer rank of the British Royal Navy. It equates to the NATO rank code OF-8 and is immediately superior to rear admiral and is subordinate to the full admiral rank.The Royal Navy has had vice admirals since at least the 16th century...
, and his second wife Sophia. William
William Young (1751–1821)
Sir William Young GCB was an officer of the Royal Navy who saw service during the American War of Independence, and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars....
, his half-brother by his father's first marriage to Elizabeth Bolton, also embarked on a naval career and rose to be Vice-Admiral of the United Kingdom
Vice-Admiral of the United Kingdom
The Vice-Admiral of the United Kingdom is an honorary office generally held by a senior Royal Navy admiral. Despite the title, the Vice-Admiral of the United Kingdom is usually a full admiral. He is the official deputy to the Lord High Admiral, an honorary office vested in the Sovereign from...
, with the rank of admiral of the red
Admiral (United Kingdom)
Admiral is a senior rank of the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom, which equates to the NATO rank code OF-9, outranked only by the rank Admiral of the Fleet...
. James Young followed his father and brother into the navy, and after several years of service, was promoted to commander
Commander
Commander is a naval rank which is also sometimes used as a military title depending on the individual customs of a given military service. Commander is also used as a rank or title in some organizations outside of the armed forces, particularly in police and law enforcement.-Commander as a naval...
in 1794, shortly after the start of the French Revolutionary Wars
French Revolutionary Wars
The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of major conflicts, from 1792 until 1802, fought between the French Revolutionary government and several European states...
, by Sir John Jervis
John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent
Admiral of the Fleet John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent GCB, PC was an admiral in the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom...
. He had been serving with Jervis in the West Indies prior to this, and on returning to Britain aboard Reprisal, was given command of the fireship . Young briefly served as acting-commander of the 74-gun from June 1795, after her previous captain, Christopher Mason, had been promoted to rear-admiral. Young went out to the Mediterranean, before returning to resume command of Comet. He was promoted to post captain on 5 October 1795.
Young was given command of the 32-gun in 1796 and cruised in the North Sea, and then in the English Channel, where he was particularly successfully against privateer
Privateer
A privateer is a private person or ship authorized by a government by letters of marque to attack foreign shipping during wartime. Privateering was a way of mobilizing armed ships and sailors without having to spend public money or commit naval officers...
s, capturing the 16-gun Aventure off Cape Barfleur
Barfleur
Barfleur is a commune in the Manche department in the Basse-Normandie region in north-western France.-Middle Ages:In the Middle Ages Barfleur was one of the chief ports of embarkation for England....
at 4.am on 19 December 1796 and Tartane off Beachy Head
Beachy Head
Beachy Head is a chalk headland on the south coast of England, close to the town of Eastbourne in the county of East Sussex, immediately east of the Seven Sisters. The cliff there is the highest chalk sea cliff in Britain, rising to 162 m above sea level. The peak allows views of the south...
at 7.am on 18 February 1797. Aventure was a privateer brig
Brig
A brig is a sailing vessel with two square-rigged masts. During the Age of Sail, brigs were seen as fast and manoeuvrable and were used as both naval warships and merchant vessels. They were especially popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries...
carrying sixteen 4-pounder guns and a crew of 62 men, under the command of Citizen Peltier. She was two days out of Calais
Calais
Calais is a town in Northern France in the department of Pas-de-Calais, of which it is a sub-prefecture. Although Calais is by far the largest city in Pas-de-Calais, the department's capital is its third-largest city of Arras....
on her first cruise and had not captured any prizes. Tartane was also a brig, mounting sixteen 4-pounder guns and carrying 60 men, on a cruise from Dieppe
Dieppe, Seine-Maritime
Dieppe is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in France. In 1999, the population of the whole Dieppe urban area was 81,419.A port on the English Channel, famous for its scallops, and with a regular ferry service from the Gare Maritime to Newhaven in England, Dieppe also has a popular pebbled...
. She had not taken any prizes, and in his report on the capture, Young paid tribute to Captain Cheshire of the 18-gun sloop
Sloop-of-war
In the 18th and most of the 19th centuries, a sloop-of-war was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. As the rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above, this meant that the term sloop-of-war actually encompassed all the unrated combat vessels including the...
, who having seen the chase, manoeuvred to cut off Tartanes escape. Young commanded Greyhound until March 1797, when he took command of the 32-gun .
Ethalion and Thetis
Young's next ship was the 38-gun , which he took over in February 1799. At 3pm on 16 October 1799 Ethalion sighted three sails, and bearing up, discovered that they were two enemy frigates, being pursued by the 38-gun , under Captain William Pierrepoint. Young joined the chase, and the following morning the British were joined by another frigate, , under Captain Henry DigbyHenry Digby (Royal Navy officer)
Admiral of the Blue Sir Henry Digby GCB was a senior British naval officer, who served in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars in the Royal Navy...
, while a fourth frigate, , under Captain John Gore
John Gore (Royal Navy officer)
Admiral Sir John Gore, KCB was a British naval commander of the 18th and 19th centuries...
, was also sighted, joining from astern. Pierrepoint signalled his intention to engage the foremost ship, leaving the sternmost for Young in Ethalion, and at 7am the ships, now discerned to be Spanish frigates, separated. Ethalion pursued the sternmost frigate, exchanging fire from their stern and bow chasers, and after closing and firing two broadsides, the Spanish ship surrendered. She was discovered to be the 36-gun Thetis, carrying 12- and 6-pdr guns and with a crew of 250, under the command of Don Juan de Mendoza. She was bound from Veracruz
Veracruz
Veracruz, formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave , is one of the 31 states that, along with the Federal District, comprise the 32 federative entities of Mexico. It is divided in 212 municipalities and its capital city is...
to a Spanish port, carrying a cargo of 1,411,526 dollars and cocoa. Ethalion suffered no casualties during the chase, while there was one man killed and nine wounded aboard Thetis. Meanwhile Naiad, in company with Alcmene and Triton, chased down and captured the other Spanish frigate, which was discovered to be the Santa Brigada, also carrying a valuable cargo. Each captain received £40,730.18s. in prize money, approximately £ at today's prices.
The sum paid out was so large that it was said that the crew of the ships involved roamed around Portsmouth
Portsmouth
Portsmouth is the second largest city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire on the south coast of England. Portsmouth is notable for being the United Kingdom's only island city; it is located mainly on Portsea Island...
with 'bank notes stuck in their hats, buying watches for the fun of frying them, and issuing laws that any of their crew who appeared without a gold-laced hat should be cobbed, so that the unlucky man who appeared in silver could only escape by representing that the costlier articles were all bought up, but he had compelled the shopkeeper to take money for gold lace.' Each seaman involved received £182 4s 9¾d, the equivalent of ten years pay.
Pique and Valiant
Young took command of the 36-gun in June 1800 and commanded her in the Mediterranean for the remainder of the French Revolutionary Wars. On 5 June 1801 he came came across a large French squadron under Honoré Joseph Antoine GanteaumeHonoré Joseph Antoine Ganteaume
Count Honoré Joseph Antoine Ganteaume was a French admiral.Ganteaume was born to a family of merchant sailors, and sailed on a dozen commercial cruises in his youth...
, sailing to land troops in Egypt. The fleet pursued Pique for a time, but could not catch her. Young escaped, and then made his way to report the French movements to Admiral Lord Keith. Young sailed back to Britain to pay Pique off after the end of the wars, and arrived in port on 2 July 1802. He does not appear to have returned to service after the outbreak of the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
until April 1807, when he commissioned the new 74-gun . Young went out with Rear-Admiral William Essington's force to Copenhagen in mid-1807
Battle of Copenhagen (1807)
The Second Battle of Copenhagen was a British preemptive attack on Copenhagen, targeting the civilian population in order to seize the Dano-Norwegian fleet and in turn originate the term to Copenhagenize.-Background:Despite the defeat and loss of many ships in the first Battle of Copenhagen in...
, arriving off the city on 7 July.
Flag rank and later life
Young was promoted to rear-admiral in 1814, and to vice-admiral in 1830. He died at Barton End HouseBarton End
Barton End is a village just south of Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, England....
, Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
with the rank of Vice-Admiral of the White
Vice Admiral (Royal Navy)
Vice admiral is a flag officer rank of the British Royal Navy. It equates to the NATO rank code OF-8 and is immediately superior to rear admiral and is subordinate to the full admiral rank.The Royal Navy has had vice admirals since at least the 16th century...
on 8 March 1833 at the age of 67. He had married the daughter of Colonel (later Lieutenant-General) Fyers of the Royal Engineers
Royal Engineers
The Corps of Royal Engineers, usually just called the Royal Engineers , and commonly known as the Sappers, is one of the corps of the British Army....
while at Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...
in 1802. She was renowned as the 'beauty of the rock', and together the two had a large family.