down fresh buoys, the Danes having either removed or misplaced the former ones. His good conduct on this occasion was officially reported by Lord Nelson, who in a private letter to Earl St. Vincent, mentioned him as highly deserving of promotion[1]. During the absence of Captain Robert Waller Otway, who had been charged with the commander-in-chief s despatches, relative to the great victory obtained over the Danes, Captain Brisbane commanded the London, bearing Sir Hyde Parker’s flag[2]. He afterwards acted successively in the Ganges 74, and Alcmene frigate; and Lord Nelson’s recommendation being at length attended to, he was finally confirmed as a Post-Captain to the Saturn 74, the flag-ship of Rear-Admiral Totty, by commission dated back to the day of the battle.
In Dec. 1801, Rear-Admiral Totty obtained the chief command at the Leeward Islands, where he fell a victim to the yellow fever, a few months after his arrival. In consequence of this melancholy event, the Saturn returned to England and was paid off in the summer of 1802.
At the renewal of the war in 1803, Captain Brisbane was appointed to the command of the Sea Fencibles on the coast of Kent, where he continued till the autumn of 1805, when he joined the Alcmene on the Irish station; where he captured le Courier French privateer, formerly a British hired cutter of 7 guns, pierced for 14, with a complement of 70 men, Jan. 4, 1807.
On Lord Gardner’s removal from Ireland to command the Channel fleet, the Alcmene was transferred with that nobleman, and continued under his orders till the spring of 1808; when Captain Brisbane was appointed to la Belle Poule, a 38-gun frigate, in which he shortly after convoyed a large fleet of merchantmen to the Mediterranean. On his arrival there, he received directions from Lord Collingwood to assume the command of the squadron employed blockading Corfu, and watching the entrance of the Adriatic Sea.
- ↑ The Cruiser was attached to Lord Nelson’s division in the battle off Copenhagen, an account of which will be found under the head of Vice-Admiral Sir Thomas Foley.
- ↑ The same ship in which he had served as a Midshipman at the commencement of the war.
