RIGHT HONOURABLE
JOHN EARL OF ST. VINCENT,
Viscount St. Vincent, and Baron Jervis; an Admiral of the Fleet; General of the Royal Marines; a Privy Counsellor in Great Britain; one of the Council of State for the Duchy of Cornwall; Knight Grand Cross of the most honourable Military Order of the Bath; and of the Portuguese Order of the Tower and Sword; a Fellow of the Royal Society; and one of the Elder Brethren of the Trinity House.
It is well known, that the naval services of this venerable officer have raised him to his present elevated station. He is descended from James Jervis, of Chathill, in the county of Stafford, who lived temp. Henry VIII, and whose second son William, having settled at Ollerton, in Shropshire, was the ancestor of Swynfen Jervis, Esq. of Meaford, co. Stafford, Barrister at Law, sometime Counsel to the Board of Admiralty, and Auditor of Greenwich Hospital, who married Elizabeth daughter of George Parker, of Park-Hall, in the same county, Esq., and sister of the Right Hon. Sir Thomas Parker, Knt., Chief Baron of the Exchequer, by whom he had two sons; viz. William, a gentleman usher of the Privy Chamber to his late Majesty, died in 1813; and John, the subject of this memoir, who was born at Meaford, Jan. 9, 1734, and originally intended for the law; but evincing a decided predilection for the sea service, his father determined to educate him accordingly.
In 1748-9, we find Mr. Jervis serving as a Midshipman on board the Gloucester of 50 guns, bearing the broad pendant of the Hon. George Townshend, on the Jamaica station. On the 19th Feb. 1755, he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant; and not long afterwards, selected by that admirable officer the late Sir Charles Saunders[1], to serve on board his flag-ship, the Neptune, a second rate.
- ↑ Sir Charles Saunders died Dec. 7, 1775. He was first Lieutenant of Commodore Anson’s ship, in his celebrated expedition to the South Sea.
