A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Gordon, Adam
KENMURE, Viscount. (Lieutenant, 1815. f-p., 12; h-p., 31.)
The Right Honourable Adam Gordon Viscount Kenmure, born 9 Jan. 1792, at Drungan Lodge, near Dumfries, N.B., is son of the late Hon. Adam Gordon, by his first wife. Miss Harriet Davies. His eldest brother, John, died a Lieutenant in the R.N. 31 Dec. 1813; and his youngest, Edward Maxwell, a Lieutenant in the 22nd Infantry, lost his life at Jamaica 14 Dec. 1827. The Viscount succeeded his uncle in the Peerage 21 Sept. 1840.
This officer entered the Navy, 12 July, 1804, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board the Ajax 74, Capts. Lord Garlies, Christopher Laroche, Wm. Brown, and John Pilfold, in which ship we find him sharing, in the course of 1805, in Sir Robt. Calder’s action, also in Hon. Wm. Cornwallis’ pursuit of the French fleet into Brest, and in the battle of Trafalgar. Removing, in April, 1806, to the Seahorse of 42 guns, he was present, on the night of 5 July, 1808, when that ship, with only 251 men on board, put to flight the Turkish frigate Alis-Fezan of 26 guns and 230 men, and captured, after a memorably furious engagement, and a loss to the British of 5 men killed and 10 wounded, her consort, the Badere-Zaffer, mounting 52 guns, with a complement of 543 men, of whom 170 were killed and 200 wounded. During his continuance in the Seahorse Mr. Gordon was often engaged with the enemy’s batteries and gun-boats at Cadiz; he assisted, too, in reducing the islands of Gianuti and Pianosa;[1] and in one of several boat affairs on- the coast of Italy he received a slight contusion. Being unfortunately, on 21 Oct. 1809, taken prisoner in a prize, oif Sardinia, by the Lettéros letter-of-marque, he was carried to Genoa, and subsequently to Verdun, where it was his lot to be detained en parole until 1814. He then sailed for Quebec in the Psyche, Capt. Peter Fisher, for the purpose of joining the Canadian Lake service, to which he continued attached, as Acting-Lieutenant and Lieutenant (order and commission respectively dated 9 April and 1 July, 1815), until he invalided in Aug. 1816. He has since been on half-pay.
Viscount Kenmure is Deputy-Lieutenant for Kirkcudbrightshire. He married, 2 Nov. 1843, Mary Anne, daughter of the late Jas. Wildey, Esq., of the Oxford Militia.
- ↑ Vide Capt. Thos. Bennett.