A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Clifford, Herbert John
CLIFFORD. (Lieut., 1811. f-p., 38; h-p., 7.)
Herbert John Clifford entered the Navy, 10 Oct. 1802, as Third-cl. Boy, on board the Leander 50, Capt. Jas. Oughton, bearing the flag on the North American station of Sir Andw. Mitchell; in which ship he attained the rating of Midshipman 21 July, 1804, and assisted, under Capt. John Talbot, at the capture, 23 Feb. 1805, of La Ville de Milan, French frigate, of 46 guns, and the simultaneous re-capture of her prize, the Cleopatra 32. After serving for a few weeks with Capt. John Wight on board the latter vessel, he rejoined the Leander, and, on subsequently removing with Vice Admiral Hon. Geo. Cranfield Berkeley to the Leopard 50, Capt. Salusbury Pryce Humphreys, witnessed the surrender to that ship, on 22 June [errata 1], 1807, of the United States frigate Chesapeake. The Leopard having been appointed, early in 1808, flag-ship at the Cape of Good Hope of Vice-Admiral Albemarle Bertie, Mr. Clifford proceeded in her to that station, and, on 21 Dec. following and 6 April, 1810, was successively appointed Acting-Lieutenant of the Caledon, Capt. Jas. Tomkinson, and Boadicea 38, Capt. Josias Rowley. In the course of the latter year he aided at the retaking of the Africaine 38, and at the capture, after a spirited action of 10 minutes, and a loss to the Boadicea of 2 men wounded, and to the enemy of 9 killed and 15 wounded, of La Vénus of 44 guns and 380 men, bearing the broad pendant of Commodore Hamelin, and of the Ceylon 32, her prize; and he further served on shore at the reduction of Isle Bourbon and of the Isle of France. On 5 Dec. 1810, Mr. Clifford become Acting Flag-Lieutenant, in the Africaine, to Vice-Admiral Bertie. Obtaining his official promotion 22 April, 1811, he was afterwards, between June, 1812, and Oct. 1817, appointed, on the East India station, to the acting-command for a brief period of the Samarang 18, and, next, to the Bucephalus 32, Capt. Barrington Reynolds, Illustrious and Minden 74’s, flagships of Sir Sam. Hood, Africaine 38, Capt. Hon. Edw. Rodney, and Victor 16, and Lyra 10, both commanded by Capt. Basil Hall. He has been an Inspecting-Commander in the Coast Guard since 11 Oct. 1823.
Lieut. Clifford, who, when on board the Lyra, accompanied Lord Amherst’s embassy to China in 1816-17, compiled on that occasion a vocabulary of the language of the Great Loo-choo Island, which may be found in Capt. Basil Hall’s ‘Voyage of Discovery to the Western Coast of Corea and the Great Loo-choo Island, in the Japan Sea,’ &c.