Willoughby Thomas Lake
Encyclopedia
Admiral
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...

 Sir Willoughby Thomas Lake KCB
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...

 (8 January 1773 – 18 February 1847) 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 went on to be Commander-in-Chief, North American Station.

Naval career

Born the son of Sir James Winter Lake and Joyce Crowther, Lake joined 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...

 around 1790. By 1795 he was in command of the sloop
Sloop
A sloop is a sail boat with a fore-and-aft rig and a single mast farther forward than the mast of a cutter....

 HMS Rattler. Promoted to Post Captain in 1796, he was given command of HMS Gibraltar
Spanish ship Fenix (1749)
Fenix was an 80-gun ship of the line of the Spanish Navy, launched in 1749. She fought at the Battle of Cape St Vincent on 16 January 1780, as the flagship of Admiral Juan de Lángara....

, the ship in which, in 1807, he chased Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon I
Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...

's brother along the French coast. He also commanded HMS Magnificent
HMS Magnificent (1806)
HMS Magnificent was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 30 August 1806 at Blackwall Yard.She was hulked in 1825, and eventually sold out of the service in 1843....

 during an attack on Santander
Santander, Cantabria
The port city of Santander is the capital of the autonomous community and historical region of Cantabria situated on the north coast of Spain. Located east of Gijón and west of Bilbao, the city has a population of 183,446 .-History:...

 in 1812. He went on to be Commander-in-Chief, North American Station in 1824 and was promoted to Admiral of the White in 1842.

Family

In 1795 he married Charlotte MacBride, daughter of John MacBride
John MacBride (Royal Navy officer)
John MacBride was an officer of the Royal Navy and a politician who saw service during the Seven Years' War, the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary Wars, eventually rising to the rank of Admiral of the Blue.MacBride entered the navy after serving on merchant vessels and...

; they had one daughter.
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