On the re-commencement of hostilities, in 1803, Lord Keith was appointed Commander-in-Chief of all his Majesty’s ships employed in the North Sea, and in the English Channel, as far to the westward as Selsea-Bill. The nature of this extensive and complicated command, required that his Lordship should be established on shore, at some convenient station for maintaining his correspondence with the Admiralty Board, and with the commanding officers respectively employed under his orders, in the Downs, at Dungeneas, Sheeruess, Yarmouth, Leith, and upon the different stations within the limits of his flag; as well us for the purpose of regulating the distribution and stations of the blockships, which it had been judged necessary to employ for the defence of the entrance to the River Thames; in consequence of which he took up his residence at East Cliff, near Ramsgate, occasionally going on board his flag ship for the purpose of reconnoitring the enemy’s coast, and directing the attacks which it was, thought proper to make on the flotilla destined for the invasion of England.
Lord Keith continued to hold this important office until the month of May, 1807, when the Admiralty having determined to divide his command into three separate ones, he struck his flag. In 1812, his Lordship succeeded the late Sir Charles Cotton, as Commander-in-Chief of the Channel Fleet. Qa the 14th May, 1814, he was created a Viscount of the united kingdom. During the period of the second invasion of France by the allied powers, the noble Admiral commanded in the Channel, and by the judicious arrangement of his cruisers, secured the person of Napoleon Buonaparte, who acknowledged that an escape by sea was rendered impossible an event which secured the peace and tranquillity of Europe.
Grand Signor established an order of knighthood, which he named the Order of the Crescent.
In the first class were Lord Hutchinson, Lord Keith, Admiral Bickerton, Major General Coote, Major General Baird, and Lord Elgin. In the second the general officers and naval officers of equal rank.
The field officers had large gold medals given them; to the captains smaller gold medals were distributed; and to the subalterns still less. And finally, as a further proof of the sense he entertained of the services rendered him in that campaign, and the loyalty and good faith of the English nation, the Grand Signor ordered a palace to be built in Constantinople for the future residence of British ambassadors.
