Captain

Captain (Royal Navy)

Captain is a senior officer rank of the Royal Navy. It ranks above Commander and below Commodore and has a NATO ranking code of OF-5. The rank is equivalent to a Colonel in the British Army or Royal Marines and to a Group Captain in the Royal Air Force. The rank of Group Captain is based on the...

 Maurice Suckling (1726–1778) was a Royal Navy

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...

 officer who was instrumental in the training of his nephew, Horatio Nelson.

Seven Years War

Suckling was the commander of Dreadnought

HMS Dreadnought (1742)

HMS Dreadnought was a 60-gun fourth rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, built according to the 1733 proposals of the 1719 Establishment at Deptford, and launched on 23 June 1742....

 in action in the Battle of Cap-Français

Battle of Cap-Français

The Battle of Cap-Français was a naval engagement during the Seven Years' War fought between French and British forces outside the harbour of Cap-Français, Saint-Domingue on 21 October 1757....

 off Saint-Domingue

Saint-Domingue

The labour for these plantations was provided by an estimated 790,000 African slaves . Between 1764 and 1771, the average annual importation of slaves varied between 10,000-15,000; by 1786 it was about 28,000, and from 1787 onward, the colony received more than 40,000 slaves a year...

 on 21 October 1757.

It was Suckling who was responsible for Nelson's early training. Young Nelson was entered on the books of the newly-commissioned Raisonnable

HMS Raisonnable (1768)

HMS Raisonnable was a 64-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, named after the ship of the same name captured from the French in 1758. She was built at Chatham Dockyard, launched on 10 December 1768 and commissioned on 17 November 1770 under the command of Captain Maurice Suckling,...

, commanded by Suckling, and joined the crew several months later, in early 1771. Suckling was transferred to the Nore

Nore

The Nore is a sandbank at the mouth of the Thames Estuary, England. It marks the point where the River Thames meets the North Sea, roughly halfway between Havengore Creek in Essex and Warden Point in Kent....

 guardship and arranged for his nephew to sail to the West Indies in a merchantman, gaining experience of seamanship and life at sea. Suckling also used his influence to have Nelson appointed to the for a 1773 expedition in search of the Northwest Passage

Northwest Passage

The Northwest Passage is a sea route through the Arctic Ocean, along the northern coast of North America via waterways amidst the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans...

. Suckling became Comptroller of the Navy

Third Sea Lord

The Third Sea Lord and Controller of the Navy was formerly the Naval Lord and member of the Board of Admiralty responsible for procurement and matériel in the British Royal Navy...

 in 1775 and was able to speed Nelson's career. He continued to use his influence on Nelson's behalf until his death in 1778.

Family

Captain Maurice Suckling's sister was Catherine Suckling

Catherine Suckling

Catherine Suckling was the mother of Horatio Nelson. Catherine had 11 children of which Nelson was the third surviving son.-Family and marriage:...

 (1725–67), wife of Reverend Edmund Nelson. Maurice and Catherine were the grandnephew and grandniece of the first British Prime Minister Robert Walpole

Robert Walpole

Robert Walpole, 1st Earl of Orford, KG, KB, PC , known before 1742 as Sir Robert Walpole, was a British statesman who is generally regarded as having been the first Prime Minister of Great Britain....

.

Suckling's nephew, Lieutenant Maurice William Suckling (1761–1820), also served with his uncle.