This page is on the Surveyor of the Navy. For the 16th century MP, see William Symonds (MP), for the clergyman and headmaster see William Symonds (1556-1616), and for the geologist see William Samuel Symonds

William Samuel Symonds

William Samuel Symonds , English geologist, was born in Hereford.He was educated at Cheltenham College and Christ's College, Cambridge, where he graduated BA in 1842. Having taken holy orders he was appointed curate of Offenham, near Evesham in 1843, and two years later he was presented to the...

.

Sir William Symonds FRS (24 September 1782, Bury St Edmunds – 30 March 1856, aboard the French steamship Nil, Strait of Bonifacio

Strait of Bonifacio

The Strait of Bonifacio is the strait between Corsica and Sardinia, named after the Corsican town Bonifacio. It is wide and divides the Tyrrhenian Sea from the western Mediterranean Sea...

, Sardinia

Sardinia

Sardinia is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea . It is an autonomous region of Italy, and the nearest land masses are the French island of Corsica, the Italian Peninsula, Sicily, Tunisia and the Spanish Balearic Islands.The name Sardinia is from the pre-Roman noun *sard[],...

) was "Surveyor of the Navy

Surveyor of the Navy

The Surveyor to the Navy was a civilian officer in the Royal Navy. He was a member of the Navy Board from the inauguration of that body in 1546, and held overall responsibility for the design of British warships, although until 1745 the actual design work for warships built at each Royal Dockyard...

" in the 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...

 from 9 June 1832 to October 1847, and took part in the naval reforms instituted by the Whig First Lord of the Admiralty Sir James Robert George Graham in 1832.

Early life

He was the second son of a naval captain, Thomas Symonds

Thomas Symonds

Captain Thomas Symonds, R.N. was a British naval captain of the American Revolutionary War.In 1780, in England, he replaced John Luttrell as captain of , and sailed for America with a naval force...

 (?-1793) and his second wife, and first went to sea on, , in September 1794. Serving in Lord Bridport's fleet at the Battle of Groix

Battle of Groix

The Second Battle of Groix was a naval engagement that took place on 23 June 1795 during the French Revolutionary War off the west coast of France....

 on 23 June 1795 and during the 1797 Spithead

Spithead and Nore mutinies

The Spithead and Nore mutinies were two major mutinies by sailors of the Royal Navy in 1797. There were also discontent and minor incidents on ships in other locations in the same year. They were not violent insurrections, being more in the nature of strikes, demanding better pay and conditions...

 mutiny, he was promoted to lieutenant on 14 October 1801. However, despite service at sea for the whole duration 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...

 (in which experiences of being outsailed by French ships left him with an obsession for speed, wide beams and sharp design in his later designs for sailing ships) and showing fine seamanship, he was promoted no further (though between 1819 and 1825 he was captain of the port at Malta

Malta

Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...

).

Experiments in naval architecture

Using a minor legacy from Admiral Sir William Cornwallis

William Cornwallis

Admiral the Honourable Sir William Cornwallis GCB was a Royal Navy officer who fought in the Napoleonic Wars. He was the brother of Charles Cornwallis, the 1st Marquess Cornwallis, governor-general of India...

 (who left his estate to his best friend's widow, Symonds' sister), in 1821 Symonds built an experimental yacht, which was copied by the rich yachtsman George Vernon, who aided his publication of a pamphlet on naval architecture. Vernon also convinced the Admiralty to employ Symonds as a corvette

Corvette

A corvette is a small, maneuverable, lightly armed warship, originally smaller than a frigate and larger than a coastal patrol craft or fast attack craft , although many recent designs resemble frigates in size and role...

 designer, with promotion to Commander

Commander (Royal Navy)

Commander is a senior officer rank of the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom. It is immediately junior to captain and immediately senior to the rank of lieutenant commander...

, by standing his surety with a bond of £20,000 should Symonds fail in his designs, and by then introducing him to the Duke of Portland

William Bentinck, 4th Duke of Portland

William Henry Cavendish Cavendish-Scott-Bentinck, 4th Duke of Portland PC, FRS, FSA , styled Marquess of Titchfield until 1809, was a British politician who served in various positions in the governments of George Canning and Lord Goderich.-Background and education:Portland was the eldest son of...

 in December 1826. Of his two yacht designs for the Duke, one (Pantaloon

HMS Pantaloon

Two ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Pantaloon: was a 10-gun brig purchased in 1831 and broken up in 1852. was a unique 11-gun wooden screw sloop launched in 1860 and sold in 1867.-References:...

, 1832) was later bought by the Admiralty for adaptation as a 10 gun 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...

. When Portland entered George Canning

George Canning

George Canning PC, FRS was a British statesman and politician who served as Foreign Secretary and briefly Prime Minister.-Early life: 1770–1793:...

's Cabinet in April 1827, he then promoted Symonds as a designer to the Lord High Admiral, the Duke of Clarence, who appointed Symonds to the royal yacht and granted him his captaincy on 5 December the same year. Sailing trials in 1827 and 1831 were won by Symonds' entries, and (with Clarence's accession as William IV, the Whig abolition of the Navy Board

Navy Board

The Navy Board is today the body responsible for the day-to-day running of the British Royal Navy. Its composition is identical to that of the Admiralty Board of the Defence Council of the United Kingdom, except that it does not include any of Her Majesty's Ministers.From 1546 to 1831, the Navy...

 and Earl Grey

Earl Grey

Earl Grey is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1806 for General Charles Grey, 1st Baron Grey. He had already been created Baron Grey, of Howick in the County of Northumberland, in 1801, and was made Viscount Howick, in the County of Northumberland, at the same time as...

's ministry) he was taken on to design a 50 gun frigate, which he named after his patron.

Naval surveyor

Symonds was appointed the Surveyor of the Navy on 9 June 1832 by Sir James Graham, the Whig First Lord of the Admiralty. He was intended to control the Navy's dockyards and shipbuilding programme, but (thanks to his title of surveyor and the vague wording of the instructions given him) he also began to meddle in ship design, forcing the Navy to adopt his designs despite much opposition to this, to his appointment being a political one rather than one based on aptitude, and to his position as a favourite of the king (who, for example, omitted to inform the Admiralty of his intention to make him a Knight Bachelor

Knight Bachelor

The rank of Knight Bachelor is a part of the British honours system. It is the most basic rank of a man who has been knighted by the monarch but not as a member of one of the organised Orders of Chivalry...

 but still went ahead with it, on 15 June 1836 at St James's Palace). He also became a Fellow of the Royal Society in June 1835.

Ship-design was no longer the important part of Surveyor's role that it had been, and so Symonds was its first holder to have been an amateur ship-designer rather than a professional shipwright. Nevertheless, the observations and experience gained in such design allowed him to introduce radical changes to ship design, such as widening Navy ships' beams and making their bottoms more wedge-shaped (to decrease the amount of ballast needed and to increase stability, speed, stowage and the weight of guns that could be carried). (However, with the decline in the sailing navy, most of Symonds' huge wooden sailing designs - larger, heavier-rigged, wider-beamed, more spacious for working their guns and heavier armament than ever before - became obsolete with the decline of sail and were later converted to steam-screw.)

During his time in office, he also took on George Rennie

George Rennie (engineer)

George Rennie was an engineer born in London, England. He was the son of the Scottish engineer John Rennie and the brother of Sir John Rennie.-Early life:...

's suggestion of creating watertight compartments in ships (something first suggested for the Royal Navy by Samuel Bentham

Samuel Bentham

Sir Samuel Bentham was a noted English mechanical engineer and naval architect credited with numerous innovations, particularly related to naval architecture, including weapons...

). In 1840 he privately published a book of sketches of men-of-war and yachts, under the title "Naval Costume". He also travelled much overseas, accurately observing the timber resources and navies of foreign powers such as the Russian Baltic

Baltic Fleet

The Twice Red Banner Baltic Fleet - is the Russian Navy's presence in the Baltic Sea. In previous historical periods, it has been part of the navy of Imperial Russia and later the Soviet Union. The Fleet gained the 'Twice Red Banner' appellation during the Soviet period, indicating two awards of...

 and Black Sea

Black Sea Fleet

The Black Sea Fleet is a large operational-strategic sub-unit of the Russian Navy, operating in the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea since the late 18th century. It is based in various harbors of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov....

 Fleets (whose inefficiency at a time of increased Anglo-Russian tension proved a useful observation). This informed his reporting of British oak supplies from the forest of Dean

Forest of Dean

The Forest of Dean is a geographical, historical and cultural region in the western part of the county of Gloucestershire, England. The forest is a roughly triangular plateau bounded by the River Wye to the west and north, the River Severn to the south, and the City of Gloucester to the east.The...

 and the New Forest

New Forest

The New Forest is an area of southern England which includes the largest remaining tracts of unenclosed pasture land, heathland and forest in the heavily-populated south east of England. It covers south-west Hampshire and extends into south-east Wiltshire....

, improved timber supplies and (along with a new means of construction invented by the talented Chief Clerk in the Surveyor's Office, John Edye, who also provided the detail for Symonds' over 200 designs for the Navy) allowed Symonds to create larger and larger wooden warships. These were able not only to defeat an enemy by weight of fire (as the Navy had long been able to do) but also to pursue them and force battle. Despite his feeling that steam was only an adjunct to a sailing navy rather than the future of naval propulsion (based on his correct assertion that the a wooden warship's stern would be weakened by adding a steam screw), Symonds did also produce some steam paddle-wheel designs.

However, Symonds' "empirical" school of shipbuilding came into conflict both with the "scientific" school led by the new class of professional naval architects and the first School of Naval Architecture (closed in 1832), and the "traditional" school led by Master Shipwrights from the Royal Dockyards. Autocratic in office, demanding obedience and support from subordinates and superiors alike and taking any criticism or suggested alteration to his designs as a personal slight, he turned on his opponents in the pamphlet Facts versus Fiction (1844). Determined to prove Symonds' designs to be failures, the new Tory Board of Admiralty sent out successive "Experimental Squadron

Experimental Squadron (Royal Navy)

The Experimental Squadrons of the Royal Navy were groups of ships sent out in the 1830s and 1840s to test new techniques of ship design, armament, building and propulsion against old ones...

s" in 1844, 1845 and 1846. Outside factors such as individual captains' political bias or stowage's influence on how well a ship sailed were underappreciated in these trials - the success of Symonds' designs depended on the skill of their captains (they handled badly under clumsy ones, or ones opposed to him, but very well under skilled commanders) - whilst his larger ships were fast but unsuited to use as gun platforms due to rolling too rapidly. They did, however, handle well in all but the worst weather. Nevertheless, in the face of the Tory First Sea Lord

First Sea Lord

The First Sea Lord is the professional head of the Royal Navy and the whole Naval Service; it was formerly known as First Naval Lord. He also holds the title of Chief of Naval Staff, and is known by the abbreviations 1SL/CNS...

 Lord Ellenborough

Edward Law, 1st Earl of Ellenborough

Edward Law, 1st Earl of Ellenborough GCB, PC was a British Tory politician. He was four times President of the Board of Control and also served as Governor-General of India between 1842 and 1844.-Background and education:...

's institution of a "Committee of Reference" in 1846 to oversee Symonds and modify his designs according to the Board's wishes, a command to make a radical alteration to his design for a new 90 gun ship, and loss of most of his Whig support even on their return to power in July 1846, Symonds resigned his role in October 1847 (despite retaining the Duke of Portland's continued support), and was succeeded by Sir Baldwin Walker.

Retirement

Despite his fall from grace, he was granted a Order of the Bath

Order of the Bath

The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...

 (civil) on 1 May 1848, and in June 1853 James Graham, having again become First Sea Lord

First Sea Lord

The First Sea Lord is the professional head of the Royal Navy and the whole Naval Service; it was formerly known as First Naval Lord. He also holds the title of Chief of Naval Staff, and is known by the abbreviations 1SL/CNS...

, was convinced by the Duke of Portland to take Symonds back on, as the Queen's naval Aide-de-Camp. Becoming a retired Rear admiral

Rear Admiral

Rear admiral is a naval commissioned officer rank above that of a commodore and captain, and below that of a vice admiral. It is generally regarded as the lowest of the "admiral" ranks, which are also sometimes referred to as "flag officers" or "flag ranks"...

 the following year, he and his third wife from then on lived abroad, principally in Malta and Italy, for reasons of his health. He died at sea in 1856, en route from Malta to Marseilles, and was buried at the Protestant Cemetery at the latter. His will required the publication of a biography in his favour - this repeated the arguments over his sailing-ship designs despite the Navy's having long abandoned sail by this date.

Family

On 21 April 1808 William married Elizabeth Saunders Luscombe, daughter of Matthew Luscombe of Plymouth, and they had:

• One daughter
• William Cornwallis Symonds
  William Cornwallis Symonds
  Captain William Cornwallis Symonds was a British Army officer who was prominent in the early colonisation of New Zealand. He was the eldest son of William Symonds, Surveyor of the Navy....
  
  , eldest son, who became an army captain, a member of the Royal Geographic Society and Deputy Surveyor-General of New Zealand
  New Zealand
  New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
  
  , but was killed in November 1841 when a boat carrying him across the Bay of Avito capsized.
• Thomas Matthew Charles Symonds, second son
• Two other sons

After Elizabeth's death, William remarried on 10 March 1818 to Elizabeth Mary, daughter of Rear-Admiral Philip Carteret

Philip Carteret

Philip Carteret, Seigneur of Trinity was a British naval officer and explorer who participated in two of the Royal Navy's circumnavigation expeditions in 1764-66 and 1766-69.-Biography:...

, of Trinity Manor, Jersey

Jersey

Jersey, officially the Bailiwick of Jersey is a British Crown Dependency off the coast of Normandy, France. As well as the island of Jersey itself, the bailiwick includes two groups of small islands that are no longer permanently inhabited, the Minquiers and Écréhous, and the Pierres de Lecq and...

. After her death, he married a third and final time, in 1851, to Susan Mary, daughter of the Revd John Briggs.

Sources

• Biography by Andrew Lambert
  Andrew Lambert
  Andrew Lambert BA , MA, PhD, FRHistS is a British naval historian, who is currently Laughton Professor of Naval History in the Department of War Studies at King's College London.-Early life and education:...
  
   on the Dictionary of National Biography
  Dictionary of National Biography
  The Dictionary of National Biography is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published from 1885...
  
  
• http://www.pdavis.nl/Experimental.htm
• Falmouth Packet archive
• Book Review: Shipping, Technology, and Imperialism: Papers Presented to the Third British-Dutch Maritime History Conference
• Portrait of him