pointed to the Boyne. On 14 Oct. he was landed in command of a party of seamen to strengthen the garrison of Fort Mathilde of Guadaloupe, and continued on that duty till 19 Nov., when he rejoined the Boyne, and in her returned to England. Jervis struck his flag shortly after arriving at Spithead, but the ship was ordered to refit for service. On 1 May 1795, while the marines were firing from the poop, the ship caught fire on the Spit and blew up. With a few exceptions all the men were saved.
After the court-martial on 18 May he was appointed to the Commerce de Marseille, and in September to the Victory, then in the Mediterranean, as part of the following of Sir John Jervis, going out as commander-in-chief. He went out with Sir John in the Lively frigate, and on 8 June 1796 was promoted to the rank of commander. For six weeks he was acting captain of the Mignonne on the coast of Corsica; he was then appointed to the Petrel, in which in August he took the merchants of the British factory at Leghorn to Naples, where on 12 Aug., the Prince of Wales's birthday, he entertained Prince Augustus (afterwards Duke of Sussex), Sir William Hamilton, and ‘his beautiful lady’ at dinner.
The Petrel after this went up the Adriatic, and back to Elba, where James was superseded, and appointed by Commodore Nelson to the Dromedary store-ship, in which he took Commissioner Coffin and the officers of the yard at Elba down the Mediterranean, with orders to carry them to Lisbon, in company with the Southampton frigate. On 11 Feb. 1797, in passing through the Gut, they were chased by the Spanish fleet, which they counted as numbering twenty-seven sail of the line, and were thus, on joining the admiral on the 13th, able to give him exact information. The Dromedary was ordered to proceed at once to the Tagus, where James was moved into the Corso brig of 24 guns, with a nominal complement of 121 men, but having actually only thirty-nine besides officers. On 23 March he sailed from Lisbon, with orders to cruise off Teneriffe as long as his water and provisions lasted. Within a few days after getting on his station he was chased by an enemy's squadron, from which he escaped only by throwing overboard most of his guns, his provisions, his ballast, and starting his water; but he managed to remain out for three months, and on rejoining the admiral off Cadiz was sent back under similar orders, with a few guns supplied from the fleet, and some men, naturally of the worst character—foreigners or mutineers from the Channel fleet. After a singularly adventurous cruise, he returned to Gibraltar in the end of October. In November the Corso was sent to England with despatches, and on rejoining the fleet in January 1798 was employed in cruising and the protection of trade on the coasts of Spain and Africa as far as Tunis. On 24 Oct. James was posted to the Canopus, one of the prizes from the Nile, and, refitting her at Lisbon, took her home towards the end of 1799. This was the end of his sea service. On the renewal of the war in 1803 he had command for some time of the sea fencibles on the coast of Cornwall; but for the rest of his life he resided in simple retirement near Falmouth, and died in 1827, preserving to the last his high spirits and genial temper. He married Henrietta Pender of Falmouth, and left issue two daughters, of whom the younger, Henrietta, married in 1808 Admiral Thomas Ball Sulivan [q. v.]
James's journal deals with minor incidents illustrating life in the navy through the latter half of last century. It was lent by the family to W. H. G. Kingston [q. v.], who made it the groundwork of his carelessly constructed story of sea-adventure entitled ‘Hurricane Hurry.’
[James's Journal 1752–1828, edited by J. K. Laughton with J. Y. F. Sulivan (Navy Records Soc.), 1896.]
JAMES, CHARLES (d. 1821), major and miscellaneous writer, was at Lisle at the outbreak of the French revolution, and made a solitary journey through France during its progress, which he described in his ‘Audi alteram Partem.’ He served as captain in the western regiment of Middlesex militia (since the 2nd royal Middlesex or Edmonton militia) in 1793–4, and as captain in the North York militia from 1795 to 1797. On 1 March 1806 he was appointed major of the corps of artillery drivers attached to the royal artillery. He was placed on half-pay when that rank was abolished in 1812. He died in London on 14 April 1821.
James, a very industrious writer, was author of: 1. ‘Petrarch to Laura: a Poetical Epistle,’ London, 1787, 4to. 2. ‘Tarere,’ an opera from the French of Beaumarchais, London, 1787, 8vo. 3. ‘Poems,’ 2 vols., 1789, dedicated to the Prince of Wales, including pieces written at school in 1775, at Liège in 1776, and elsewhere. 4. ‘Hints founded on Facts, or a View of our several Military Establishments,’ London, 1791, 8vo. 5. ‘Suicide rejected: a Poem,’ 1791, 4to. A reprint dedicated to Lady James was issued in 1797, for the benefit of the daughter and grandchildren of Colonel Frederick [q. v.] (cf. British
