Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 09.djvu/441

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racked the Java through and through, while the Java's return was wild and produced little effect, her men stuck manfully to their guns to the last. It was only when the ship lay an unmanageable hulk, and the Constitution took up a raking position athwart her bows, that Chads gave the order to haul down the colours.

English writers have endeavoured to show that the loss of the Java is to be attributed to the size of the Constitution, the power of her armament, and the number of her crew; but notwithstanding these disadvantages the true cause was that the Constitution's men were trained to the use of their arms and the Java's men were not. The Constitution lost in killed and wounded thirty-four, while the Java lost a hundred and fifty; the Constitution was scarcely damaged in hull or rigging, while the Java was entirely dismasted and sinking.

On his return home, Chads, with the officers and men of the Java, was, on 23 April 1813, tried by court-martial for the loss of the ship, when he was honourably acquitted and specially complimented by the president. On 28 May he was promoted to be commander, and appointed to the Columbia sloop, which he commanded in the West Indies till the final peace, and paid off on 24 Nov. 1815. He was then unemployed till November 1823, when he commissioned the Arachne of 18 guns for the East Indies, and in her was present during the operations in the Irawaddy. On 25 July 1825 he was advanced to post rank and appointed to the Alligator frigate, which he commanded till the end of the Burmese war, when he signed the treaty as senior naval officer, after which he returned to England and paid off his ship on 3 Jan. 1827. He was nominated a C.B. a few days before, 26 Dec. 1826. He afterwards, from 1834 to 1837, commanded the Andromache of 28 guns on the East India station, and from 1841 to 1845 the Cambrian of 36 guns, also in the East Indies. On his return he was appointed, 28 Aug. 1845, to the command of the Excellent, the school of naval gunnery, at Portsmouth. In this command he remained for upwards of eight years, and won for himself a distinct reputation for the improvements which he introduced into the detail of gunnery exercise and gunnery instruction. He was frequently employed on committees and in the conduct of experiments; and, though repeatedly offered other employment, he always begged to be allowed rather to stay in the Excellent. In 1848 he was selected to report on the Blenheim, the first screw line-of-battle ship, and at the same time to command a small squadron on the coast of Ireland during Smith O'Brien's ‘cabbage-garden’ rebellion.

In September 1850 he was sent to witness a naval demonstration at Cherbourg, after which he made a confidential report on the strategical importance of Cherbourg, which he thought overrated, and on the French system of manning their ships, recommending the introduction into our own navy of continuous service. He also pointed out the danger of Portsmouth, then without any defence, and urged the construction of heavy forts.

On 12 Jan. 1854 he attained the rank of rear-admiral, and served during that year as fourth in command in the Baltic, with his flag in the Edinburgh. He was present at the reduction of Bomarsund, and was made K.C.B. on 5 July 1856. He was commander-in-chief at Cork from 1855 to 1858, after which he did not serve afloat, though in 1859 he was chairman of a committee on coast defence. He became vice-admiral on 24 Nov. 1858, admiral on 3 Dec. 1863, and was made G.C.B. on 28 March 1865. The latter years of his life were passed at Southsea, where he was known as a county magistrate and a warm supporter of the local charities, especially of the Seamen and Marines' Orphan School. He died in April 1868.

He married, on 26 Nov. 1815, Elizabeth, daughter of Mr. John Pook of Fareham, by whom he had a family of two daughters and two sons, the eldest of whom is the present Admiral Henry Chads.

[O'Byrne's Nav. Biog. Dict.; Marshall's Royal Nav. Biog. ix. (vol. iii. pt. i.) 237; Memoirs of Admiral Sir Henry Ducie Chads, by an Old Follower (Montagu Burrows), 1869, with a good portrait; James's Naval History, 1860, v. 409–423, is the account of the capture of the Java, told with all the bitterness and one-sidedness which disfigures that author's account of the transactions of the American war; Roosevelt's Naval War of 1812, p. 119, is a much fairer and more candid account of the same event, though naturally with an American colouring.]

J. K. L.

CHADWICK, JAMES, D.D. (1813–1882), catholic prelate, was descended from an ancient Lancashire family. His father, John Chadwick, who belonged to the family of the Chadwicks of Brough Hall, near Chorley, emigrated to Ireland at the beginning of the present century and settled at Drogheda, where the future bishop was born on 24 April 1813. He was educated at St. Cuthbert's College, Ushaw, near Durham, and at different times he filled the chairs of humanities, mental philosophy, and pastoral