John Billingham Swann

John Billingham Swann (1828-1904) was a Passed Clerk in Vesuvius from the 29th of June, 1853, until appointed Assistant Paymaster in Diamond on the 9th of February, 1855, so would have messed with Richard Ramsay Armstrong and they would have known one another well.

Swann had two careers: after retiring from the Navy as a Paymaster on the 17th of June, 1870, he embarked on probably his true vocation as a clergyman. This was unusual, but by no means unheard of for ex-army and naval officers during the nineteenth century. I can name a couple with whom I am very familiar and there were undoubtedly others: the first an old cousin of mine, the Reverend Arthur Ralph Green Thomas, vicar of St. Paul Camden Square for many years, who started out as Lieutenant in the 32nd (Cornwall) Regiment of Foot, with seniority 13 March 1827, and top-class exam results from Sandhurst. The other was a certain rather unsavoury gentleman by the name of Granville Hamilton Wood, a Commander RN, about whom Richard Ramsay Armstrong heard dire reports when he served on the Slave Coast around 1850. Wood left the Navy under something of a cloud and reappeared having taken Holy Orders and become a Jesuit priest, dying in Malta under slightly suspicious circumstances. (For the full story, see my piece "The Secret History of HM Brig Hound" in the appendices of RRA's Book of his Adventures.)



Swann was born on the 9th of May, 1828, one of at least two sons and at least two daughters, to an interesting character called Edward Swann and his wife Elizabeth, formerly Chambers. The parents had married by licence in Warwickshire on the 4th of November, 1823. The bridegroom was 46. He had been born in Leicester in 1777 and was the eldest surviving son of ten children of a wealthy currier of Belgrave Gate in Leicester, also called Edward. (Above: Belgrave Gate, Leicester, in the 1920s) Edward junior appears to have become an Assistant Surgeon in the Royal Navy sometime around the turn of the century, extrapolating from his brief obituary in the Medical Times & Gazette Vol 2, July 13, 1861:

"July 3rd 1861 death - Swann July 3, at Weedon, Northamptonshire, Edward Swann, late Staff Surgeon to the Military District prison, at Weedon, formerly Asstant Surgeon in the Royal Navy, and afterwards Ordnance Surgeon, aged 83. The deceased gentleman served in the Walcheren Expedition, and the siege of Flushing."

There doesn't seem to be much concrete evidence for his naval career. There is, however, a relevant record at the National Archives (ADM 45/29 Series 8, No. 95) which is an 1852 application to the Admiralty as follows:

"Elizabeth Swann formerly Elizabeth Chambers, Widow of Surgeon, who died: 18 March 1852. Notes on executor's application for money owed by the Royal Navy."

This means Elizabeth had a previous husband who had been a surgeon in the Navy. A quick search identifies one Robert Chambers, Surgeon RN, seniority 17 Nov 1807, who married Elizabeth Billington (Note) on the 10th of May, 1810, at Brownsover, Warwickshire, just outside Rugby. Another search of the National Archives online catalogue confirms all this with the following record in ADM 6/355:

"Elizabeth Chambers, widow of Robert Chambers, surgeon Royal Navy who died 03 Apr 1817. Includes: Extract from Parish Register, married 10 May 1810. Papers submitted to the Charity for the relief of Officers' Widows. Covering dates 1817."

So John Billingham Swann's father Edward married the widow Chambers in 1823, six years after the death of her first husband, a Royal Naval surgeon. Edward claimed he had been an assistant surgeon in the Navy too, but I can't find a service record for him, or any other naval record of any kind for an Edward Swann, although it is possible - probable even - he served under an alias. There were two 'Swann' surgeons in the Navy at approximately the right time, both of whose service records are extant: there was a George Swann, but he appears to be too young and not connected. However a John Henry Swann, seniority 26 Jan 1809, whose service appears to finish in 1814 but continues to appear in the Navy Lists well into the 1840s, is a much more plausible candidate. But on closer examination of his service record it turns out he was in the West Indies for the whole of 1809 and 1810 while the Walcheren Expedition and the siege of Flushing were in progress. (Edward Swann's brief obituary in the Medical Times & Gazette of 1861 - see above - claims he served at Walcheren and Flushing.) Incidently, it is not at all clear from the reference to Walcheren and Flushing whether Swann was still in the Navy at the time, or had already joined the Ordnance Medical Department.

Edward Swann's marriage to the Widow Chambers was actually his second too. He had married an Elizabeth Bishop at St. Margaret, Leicester, on the 9th of June, 1802. They had had at least eight children by 1818, and she probably died in 1819/20. The clue that revealed this first marriage comes from the Monthly Magazine & British Register of the 1st of May, 1821:

"In August last, at sea, off the coast of China, Mr, J. Swann, second son of Mr. S. Royal Ordnance Surgeon, at Weedon Depot."

This was John Edward Swann, born Leicester, 1805, and it will be noted that this death notice was published two years before Edward Swann married the Widow Chambers.

At some point - probably around 1812/13 because his youngest two recorded children by his first marriage were born at Weedon - Surgeon (if that is what he was) Edward Swann apparently left the Navy and started working for the Ordnance Medical Department at Weedon Depot. However, the first mention I can actually find for him in the Army Lists is in 1846. He is listed as "Surgeon: Dr. E. Swann, late of R.N." for the Military Prison at Weedon, Northamptonshire. His earlier career as surgeon for the depot, before the prison was created on the same site, is not recorded in any Army List as far as I am aware. It turns out that a part of Weedon was only converted into the prison in 1844/45 [see this PDF from English Heritage] and "was opened for the reception of prisoners on the 7th August, 1845 [Parliamentary return dated 26th May 1846], so Edward Swann was clearly the first prison medical officer and moved seemlessly from one job to the other.



Very little can be discovered about the children of his first marriage, and infuriatingly, Edward and Elizabeth Swann (Mk.2) and their children can't be found in the 1841 census for England & Wales. I have been informed by Alan J. Clarke who runs a very useful look-up service for the 1841 Northamptonshire census that the Weedon Bec - including the barracks - census returns for that year have not survived.

Nevertheless, John Billington Swann's naval career is well documented in his service record held by the National Archives. Click on the image for a larger version:



It will be seen that he retired from the Navy on the 17th of June, 1870. He had been married for ten years. Not to be outdone by his father, he had also married an Elizabeth - Elizabeth Smith Farmer. This from the Gentleman's Magazine of 1860:

"At the parish church, Cheadle, Cheshire, JB Swann esq RN son of Edward Swann esq of Weedon, Northamptonshire, to Elizabeth, dau. of John Farmer of Cheadle."

The National Archives has a record of the marriage too - it was recorded "for potential Royal Navy widow's pension." [ ADM 13/70 Marriage Certificates. Folio: 680 ] This could well have been done on the advice of his father whose second wife Elizabeth Chambers had apparently had trouble getting her widow's pension from The Admiralty (see above)!

In the 1861 census Paymaster Swann and his new bride were living in Melcombe Regis, Dorset. His father Edward, then 83 years old, a widower for the second time since 1852, was in lodgings in Weedon Bec. Just weeks after the census, he too was dead.

Meanwhile, Swann's elder brother Frederick Billington Swann had studied medicine at St George's Hospital, London, and went on to become a GP in the home village of Weedon, eventually taking on his father's old job as Medical Officer at the prison.

Paymaster Swann and Elizabeth probably had four children during the course of the 1860s: Harrington, Sidney Bellingham, Lilian and Grace. By the 1871 census the family was based in Richmond, Surrey, presumably so Swann could study at King's College, London. [ Crockford's Clerical Directory, 1874 ] The same sources reveals that he was ordained deacon in 1873 by the Bishop of Lichfield and became Curate of St. John, Derby, in the diocese of Lichfield the same year. The family was now living at 9, Vernon Street, Derby. Both boys attended the old Derby School (crest, right) and Harrington went on to Rugby and Sidney to Marlborough.



In the middle of the 1870s Swann became the Rector of Harlaston in Staffordshire (St. Matthew's Church, above), where he remained for twenty years until about 1895. The rectory is pictured at right, looking very much as it would have done in Swann's day. He then returned to his roots - becoming Rector of the tiny village of Catthorpe near Rugby in the very heart of the Midlands and right in the modern 'armpit' of the M1 and M6 motorways. And, as the crow flies, about 12½ miles north of his birthplace of Weedon.

Both Swann's daughters got married in the 1890s. Neither were in the first flush of youth: Lilian, the elder, was the first to go. She married a David Pegrum in Deptford in 1896. She was 32. Grace, who was three years Lilian's junior, married at Catthorpe on the 13th of December, 1898. The bridegroom was Theodore Edward Naish, a thirty year old Captain in the Royal Engineers and son of a Bristol cotton manufacturer. The union was a disaster. Grace bore one child, Sidney, in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1900. In July 1909 Grace filed a petition for seperation on the grounds of cruelty, which she won. In 1912 they were divorced after Grace employed private detectives to provide evidence of Naish's adultery. Page 4 of The Times of Wednesday the 30th of October 1912 carries a report of the court case. Reading through it, one could easily form the impression that Naish was a proper cad and a bounder. However, that was the necessity to win in court, and it may well have been much more a case of 'six and two threes'. Naish remarried in 1917 to a Ruth Harrison - not the woman named in the adultery case. Unfortunately I can find no more recent reference to Grace or her son Sidney.


Of Swann's sons, Harrington opted for a career in the regular army after a spell in the Derby Militia. He married Miss Fanny Stevens of Long Island in 1893. There is just a hint of sniffiness in the New York Times' report - Fanny was well connected in New York society and the wedding breakfast was at the Waldorf - the groom was only described as coming "from a good English family and stands in high favor in the English Army." [Marriages NYT 22 March 1893] After his sister Grace's seperation he became one of the guardians of his nephew Sidney. However, like his sisters, Harrington then disappears into obscurity.

Sidney Bellingham Swann (the spelling of his grandmother's maiden name changed over the years), on the other hand (left), had such a well-documented and extraordinary life than I can do little more than list some achievements and show a facsimile of his obituary from The Times of Tuesday the 4th of August 1942. He was athlete, cyclist, rower (Cambridge Blue), pioneer motorist, canoeist, amateur flying enthusiast, wartime ambulance driver, clergyman and missionary to Japan. Cleary one of the great English eccentrics - some would say madmen - he died of a heart attack in 1942 following a fracture of the thigh caused by falling off his bicycle. For good measure I have added a facsimile of The Times obituary for his second wife, the amazing Lady Bagot, which was published on the 26th of February 1940. His Son, Sidney Ernest Swann followed in his wake and was also a Cambridge rowing Blue, then won gold and silver rowing medals in the 1912 and 1920 Summer Olympics respectively.



The Reverend John Billingham Swann, once a young naval clerk who had likely occupied the next hammock to Richard Ramsay Armstrong in the bowels of Vesuvius fifty years before, died at the rectory, Catthorpe, on Tuesday the 16th of August, 1904. His brief obituary appeared in The Times two days later.

New information about 'Pike' 29 Mar 09

New information has come to light about Bayley Pike and John Brewer Pike. Those who have read RRA will remember that he told the story of a young man called Pike, with whom he had been at school in Jersey, who was 'dismissed the Service' in Sierra Leone and put ashore from the notorious HMS Hound.

RRA remembered that Pike instantly got the job of Mate on an 'Indiaman' which was at Sierra Leone on her way home. Her captain had died, and Pike took her home in something like record time to be thoroughly congratulated and awarded plate by the owners. RRA then says that Pike continued with a very successful career in the Merchant Service.

In the 1841 census for Jersey there is indeed a Pike, born in 1833, the same year as RRA. So far so good. His name was Bayley Pike. And a Bayley Pike turns up in the service records of naval officers in the National Archives - and yes he was dismissed the Service at Sierra Leone in early 1851 from being Master's Assistant in HMS Hound. So clearly, that much of the story is true.

Next I looked for Pikes in the 1851 census, conveniently taken sometime after Pike would have got home in the 'Indiaman'. Lo and behold, there is a Pike, the right age, in Plymouth, at his father's house (a storekeeper at the Devonport dockyard), and describing himself as "Mate of the Talavera".

(All this is covered in much greater detail in the Appendix of RRA)

But (Oh dear) This Pike is called John Brewer Pike, and is recorded as being born in Plymouth, not Jersey like Bayley Pike in the census ten years before.

And the Talavera? Well, coincidence upon coincidence, she was an 'Indiaman', owned by Duncan Dunbar of Blackwall, and yes, she was on her way home from India at exactly the right time in early 1851!

There is no more trace of 'our' Bayley Pike in the England & Wales or Channel Islands censuses after that solitary appearance in 1841. John Brewer Pike, however, went on to have a successful career in the Merchant Marine as a Master Mariner, and appears in several more E&W censuses.

That's the story in a nutshell. When I wrote the appendix to RRA I became convinced, though there was no positive proof, that Bayley Pike had skippered the Talavera home, and for whatever reason, had 'become' John Brewer Pike, son of Anthony Pike of Plymouth. I had not been able to find the Plymouth Pikes in the 1841 census - but now I have.

There is, of course, the same Anthony Pike, naval storekeeper, and among his children is a boy, the right age, simply registered as 'John Pike'. So surely this must be the John Brewer Pike of ten years later? Mustn't it...? That effectively kicks my theory into touch.

And further mystery is provided by the discovery of a perfectly plausible Bayley Pike as a sheep station manager in the South Island of New Zealand in the late 1850s and early 1860s, and then as a 'sheep inspector' in Queensland in the late 1860s.

But wait a minute - the late 1850s and early 60s was exactly when RRA was first in the South Island of New Zealand! Did he bump into his old school friend from Jersey, the friend he hadn't seen for nearly ten years? Did he and the friend yarn about old times on the Slave Coast? Did Bayley Pike tell him about being dismissed the Service? And the other young officer dismissed from HMS Hound at exactly the same time? (There was one according to RRA's story - but so far untraced and unnamed.) Did RRA do his usual trick of muddling stories? Was the other young man John Brewer Pike? A cousin perhaps of Bayley Pike? Sounds fantastic, but fits the facts better than the suggestion that Bayley Pike changed his name to John Brewer... now that we know that the Bayley Pike from Jersey is almost certainly the very same as the sheep run manager in Canterbury.

One problem: there is no John Brewer Pike in RN Service Records. The quest goes on!

John Beecroft, British Consul

On page 107, RRA mentions the British Consul for the Bights of Biafra and Benin, one John Beecroft.

Beecroft was a man of some mystery. He was born at Sleights near Whitby on the east coast of Yorkshire in 1790, and his baptismal record is dated 2 May that year. He was the son of John Beecroft of Sleights and his wife Jane, née Carpenter.

There is very little information about his early life, though he seems to have gone to sea as a teenager in a coastal vessel and was captured by the French in either 1804 or 1805 and imprisoned by them until 1814. This ten year episode in his life is widely quoted, but no sources are ever given and it has so far proved impossible to verify. Sometime after his return from captivity he "later travelled to Greenland as part of William Perry's expedition." That from Wikipedia, among others. Presumably they mean Rear-Admiral Sir William Edward Parry, 1790-1855. Parry commanded three expeditions in search of the North-West Passage; 1819-20, 1821-23 and 1824-25. Beecroft could have been on one or all of these, however, apparently not in a senior enough position to rate an entry in the Navy Lists, nor in Parry's own memoirs. However, one source suggests that he was in command of one of the transport vessels on one of the expeditions.

Beecroft’s career on the Coast of Africa began in 1829 when it seems he went to Fernando Po in some sort of business capacity and British Superintendent of Works, when the island was temporarily a British anti-slavery base. He remained there after Britain abandoned the place in 1834 and when Spain took control again in 1843 he was appointed official Spanish governor of the island. He also acted as an unofficial British consul in the mid-1840s, helping the Royal Navy's anti-slavery squadron make treaties and settle disputes. He gained a high reputation and was much respected by chiefs up and down the coast. During the 1830s and 1840s he made a number of exploratory expeditions on the coast and up the rivers:

1835 - River Niger 300 miles in steamer Quorra.
1836 - Cross River 120 miles from Old Calabar.
1840 - Benin River.
1841 - Cross River.
1842 - Cross River.

In 1841 he had assisted with the withdrawal of the Niger expedition in his steamer the Ethiope.

In 1849 came the official British appointment as Consul for the Bights of Biafra and Benin. (Gazette, November 1849: "John Beecroft Esq. to be HM Consul in the territories on the coast of Africa between Cape St. Paul and Cape St.John..." )

The following passage is taken from "Nigeria Under British Rule" By William Nevill Montgomerie Geary:

On the 30th of June 1849 John Beecroft of Fernando Po was appointed British Consul for the Bights of Biafra and Benin without prejudice to his retaining the Spanish Governorship of Fernando Po. So Mr. Beecroft was both Governor and Consul. He was much trusted by the British Foreign Office and rightly. He was an honourable, kindly gentleman, who would fitly represent the interest of England, brave and full of common sense. It is a pleasure to read his terse, shrewd, business-like, right-minded despatches. He knew the Native mind, and he knew the merchant. In his consular duties, he had to travel from Fernando to the Oil Rivers and Lagos and elsewhere in men-of-war, and one can imagine the pleasant dinners on deck in tropical moonlight when the Consul and the Captain were wise and witty. It was Beecroft who was the political officer at the Lagos bombardment, who dealt with the savage king of Dahomey. Mr. Beecroft also made voyages up the Niger on the Ethiope, but alas ! he left no journal and wrote no book. He died at Fernando Po on the 10th of June 1854.

The following account of the work of the good Beecroft, one of those sturdy honest men who do England’s business as it should be done, was written forty years later by Sir Claude Macdonald, the British Commissioner and Consul-General for the Oil Rivers. His despatch of 10 January 1893 says:

"John Beecroft was H.M.’s first consul for Bights of Benin and Biafra. In this capacity he did very good work and was instrumental in making many of the treaties for the suppression of the export slave trade. The naval expedition of 1841 up the Niger under Captain Bird Allen would have suftered even more terribly than it did had it not been for the prompt action taken by Governor Beecroft in going to their rescue. Governor Beecroft was the first to discover and survey the Cross river as far as the rapids. To this day Governor Beecroft’s name is a byword for uprightness and honour in Fernando Po and in the territories known as the Oil Rivers Protectorate. On his death, which took place in 1854, the negroes of Fernando Po, chiefly descendants of liberated slaves erected a monument to his memory, upon which they recorded their gratitude “for his many years fatherly attention to their comforts and interests and upon his unwearying exertions to promote the happiness and welfare of the African race”.

(Geary, William Nevill Montgomerie, NIGERIA UNDER BRITISH RULE, Methuen, 1927.)

John Beecroft died in 1854 while preparing for another expedition up the River Niger: "On June 10 [1854] at Clarence, after 25 years residence in Africa, John Beecroft esq., HBM's consul and Gov. of Fernando Po. (Deaths, The Times, Monday 14 August 1854, page 1.)

The painting of the Ethiope is on display in the International Slavery Museum, on the third floor of the Merseyside Maritime Museum building.

Back to the West Coast of Africa

On page 109 is the following passage:

While still on the Gold Coast, we called in at a village known on the Chart as Ambrezette, an anchorage a few miles from St. Paul de Loanda. We observed a peculiar round column on an embankment near the beach, evidently composed of marble or granite of about 150 feet in height, the base several feet in circumference and running up to a fine point. On examination we could not find joints or anything to give us an idea of how it was constructed, nor could we find anyone to give us its history. I have many times thought over this peculiar construction, and have come to the conclusion, it must have been cemented foot by foot with a conglomerate of crushed marble and some strong cement.

Well, "Ambrezette" appears to have normally been spelt Ambrizete, and is now N'zeto on the coast of Angola (see sat. pic). However, no mention of a "granite or marble column" can be found anywhere in other contemporary or recent accounts. There is nothing marked on any map that I can find - nor anything visible on Google Earth, though the patch for the N'zeto vicinity is quite high resolution. Was RRA mistaken? Was the 150 foot high column somewhere else on the coast? It's a mystery!

However, a clue to RRA's possible confusion maybe in the opening phrase of the passage, "While still on the Gold Coast..." Ambrizete/N'zeto was not, and still isn't on the Gold Coast: it is much further south, south of the Bight of Benin. Maybe the strange column was really on the Gold Coast, somewhere near Elmina, perhaps? I will keep looking...

The Wrong Kennedy...!

I have made a silly mistake with the identification of one of RRA's colleagues in the Naval Brigade ashore in the Crimean War.

On page 408, in the Appendix 2 piece about the death of Lieutenant Kidd at the Redan on 18 June 1855, I confused two men called Kennedy who were young officers in the Naval Brigade and were both part of the ladder parties that tried to storm the Redan. This doesn't affect the overall piece, but it is a sloppy mistake - especially as (modesty aside) I probably know more about the 150 officers who served ashore with the Naval Brigade than anyone else! So, for the sake of honour, I must set the record straight:

In fact there were three unrelated officers called Kennedy who served ashore with the Naval Brigade during the Crimean War. The most senior was John James Kennedy (1821-1885). He was a Commander by the time of the Redan assault and was effectively 'brigade major', not being part of the ladder parties. His life was a very intriguing one and I cover it in some detail in the investigation of 'Mrs. and Miss Dunn' starting on page 429.

The second was William Robert Kennedy (1838-1916), later a full Admiral; well known and much respected (photo, above). It was he that I carelessly assumed was the 'Kennedy, Mate' that appears in the list of officers attached to the ladder parties. I even went so far as to point out that the official list was wrong in calling him a Mate because I knew he was still a Midshipman at the time. If nothing else, this should have alerted me to my mistake. W.R. Kennedy was part of the ladder parties, but in one of those which never made the assault, watching the action from the forward trench. This explains the lack of detail concerning his own activity in his autobiography.

The real 'Kennedy, Mate' of the No.3 Ladder Party led by Lieutenants Cave and Kidd was of course Andrew James Kennedy (1834-1895). His life was very low profile compared to either of the other two. He is quite difficult to research: his Times obituary is very brief and lacking in detail and he does not appear to be included in anyone's detailed family research. However, the following is known about him and comes from my file for him:

Andrew James Kennedy, Admiral RN, b. 21 Jan, bapt. 16 Feb 1834 Princes Street Independent, Devonport, married 1QTR 1871 Stoke Damerel, Cordelia Mary Gill (daughter of Thomas H. Gill, solicitor, and his wife Elizabeth, of Devonport), and died 17 Feb 1895 at the Hotel International, Nice, France. Only known child: Ethel Annie Kennedy, b. c.1875 Devonport. 6 August 1855 Lieutenant; 11 April 1866 Commander; 13 October 1876 Captain.

His brief obituary in the Times of Thursday 21 Feb 1895, reads as follows:

Admiral Andrew James Kennedy, who died at Nice on the 17th inst., entered the Navy in 1847, and served in the Black Sea and Crimea 1854-5, receiving the 5th Class of the Medjidieh and a knighthood of the Legion of Honour. He was captain of the Briton during the naval and military operations in Eastern Sudan in 1884, and was placed on the retired list in 1889. He was promoted to be rear-admiral (retired) in 1891.

However, this does miss the fact that he was awarded the Sardinian Medaglia Al Valore Militare (photo, left) for his service in the Crimea. The citation reads:

Served with the Naval Brigade nearly nine months, and at every bombardment except the first. Was one of the scaling-ladder party at the attack on the Redan, on the 18th of June, and was mentioned in the despatches of the late Lord Raglan, for his conduct on that occasion with especial praise. Also especially recommended by Sir Stephen Lushington, for good service during the siege of Sebastopol.

[Dougla-Morris, Kenneth J., NAVAL MEDALS 1793-1856, Privately Printed, London, 1987.]

RRA's Second Commission

The lines of 'Star Class' brig/packets. Both Cygnet and the infamous and unhappy Hound were brigs of this class.

RRA's second commission (now as a fully-fledged Midshipman), was on the west Coast of Africa, 1850 to 1853, travelling out in Firefly as a supernumerary, and then serving in Cygnet, Commander Richard Dunning White, 1819-1899.

A brief summary of White's career is given here:


Date Rank
15 April 1826 Entered Navy
5 November 1840 Lieutenant
28 August 1847 Commander
10 May 1856 Captain
19 January 1874 Retired Rear Admiral
1 February 1879 Retired Vice Admiral

Date from Date to Service
December 1843 March 1847
Lieutenant in Sealark, commanded by Thomas Lewis Gooch, west coast of Africa

1 March 1847 September 1847
Commander in Skylark (until paying off at Chatham), west coast of Africa

1 July 1850 May 1853
Commander in Cygnet (until paying off at Portsmouth), coast of Africa

6 January 1855 10 May 1856
Commander in Desperate, the Baltic during the Russian War

15 September 1859 1863
Captain in Madagascar, storeship, Rio de Janeiro

26 May 1865 23 February 1867
Captain in Cossack (until paying off at Sheerness), Mediterranean

186? January 1869
Captain in Mersey, flagship, Queenstown.


His obituary appeared on page 9 of The Times on Monday 31 July 1899:

Vice-Admiral R.D. White, C.B., died on Saturday, at his residence, Heavitree, Exeter, in his 80th year. He was the youngest son of the late Admiral Thomas White, of Buckfast Abbey. In 1826 he entered the Royal Navy as a volunteer of the first class. After filling various minor appointments, he served in Syria, and was present at the capture of St. Jean d'Acre. From 1844 to 1847 and from 1850 to 1853 he was employed on the West Coast of Afica in suppressing the slave trade, and captured many slavers. As the senior officer of the Sierra Leone Division, Admiral White was also employed in settling a somewhat difficult diplomatic question that arose with the French, owing to a French vessel having been captured in error by a British ship. During the Russian war he commanded the Desperate in the Baltic, and captured the first prize of the season. Admiral White was present at the attack on the forts and batteries at the entrance to the river Dwina, near Riga, and at several operations on land in the gulf in command of sailors and marines. He afterwards commanded for four years the Madagascar at Rio de Janeiro, the Cossack in the Mediterranean from 1865 to 1867, and the Mersey at Queenstown from the latter year to 1869. At the conclusion of the Russian war he was officially gazetted and promoted in consequence of "special and distinguished individual services" performed during the war. Admiral White held the medals for Syria, Turkey, and the Baltic, and he was made a C.B. in 1881. He was a justice of the peace for Devon.