to the British Commander, offering to give up all the prisoners taken on this occasion, as well as those captured with General Beresford in the preceding year, if he would desist from any farther attack on the town, and withdraw the British forces from the Rio de la Plata; intimating likewise that such was the exasperation of the populace, that he could not answer for the safety of the prisoners, should offensive operations be persisted in. Lieutenant-General Whitelocke agreed to the proposal, and both Buenos Ayres and Monte Video were evacuated. This termination of an enterprise, from which much had been anticipated, occasioned great dissatisfaction; and the Lieutenant-General, on his return to England, was tried by a court-martial, which sentenced him “to be cashiered, and declared totally unfit and unworthy to serve his Majesty in any military capacity whatever:” a decision confirmed by the King, and approved by the public.
During the above disastrous campaign, Rear-Admiral Stirling was ordered by the Commander-in-Chief to remain at anchor with the line-of-battle ships off Monte Video. He subsequently proceeded to the Cape of Good Hope, to the command on which station he had been previously appointed.
Our officer was advanced to the rank of Vice-Admiral, July 31st, 1810; and on the 10th of the following month received the freedom of the Goldsmith’s Company, unanimously voted to him for his important public services. Toward the latter end of the year 1811, he was appointed Commander-in-Chief at Jamaica; but, in consequence of certain representations made to the Admiralty, an order was sent for his return from that station long before the usual period; and, in the month of May, 1814, he was tried by a court-martial at Portsmouth, on a charge of which the following is the substance;
“That it appeared from the affidavits of James Greenfield, clerk and cashier to Messrs. Atkinson, Bayles, and Co. and Mordecai Pallache, co-partner in the firm of Messrs. Moravia and Co. sworn before the Mayor of Kingston, on the 18th Jan. preceding, and by other documents, that the sum of 2000 dollars was paid by the said Moravia and Co. to the agents of Vice-Admiral Stirling, for the convoy of a schooner that was to sail under the protection of the Sappho sloop of war,
