attentions from Captain Richard Thomas, whose sufferings after the loss of the Lady Hobart packet, in 1803, made him regard the distressing scene of devastation with feeling sympathy.
On the 12th of April, the Hound sailed for Gibraltar, having had her large mortar damaged, and main top-mast shot through. On the 15th, a detachment of Spanish troops, under Generals Blake and Zayas, left Cadiz, to join General Ballasteros, then near Ayamonte with about 4000 men, for the purpose of cooperating with Marshal Beresford, at the approaching siege of Badajos. A constant communication with those officers was kept up by the small vessels of the British squadron; and in the course of this service. Lieutenant Vallack, commanding the Basilisk gun-brig, perished with the whole of his boat’s crew, in attempting to cross the bar of the Guadiana. The above detachment bore a part at the battle of Albuera, May 16th, 1811.
Owing to the successes of Lord Wellington, the siege of Cadiz now dwindled to a mere land blockade; the British flotilla, however, never relaxed in its endeavours to annoy the enemy, and was consequently often engaged with Fort Santa-Catalina and other works. On the 27th of May, Captain George Price, commanding the Sabine sloop, reported the capture and destruction of four of the Chipiona privateers.
From the 14th to the 28th of June, the Milford and three other line-of-battle ships cruised at the entrance of the Straits, where they fell in with Sir Edward Pellew, proceeding to assume the chief command in the Mediterranean. After communicating with that officer, Sir Richard Keats returned to Cadiz, accompanied by Rear-Admiral Legge; who had been appointed his successor, and who continued to conduct the naval operations on that station until, amongst the consequences of the glorious battle of Salamanca, every French soldier was withdrawn from the vicinity of La-Isla-de-Leon.
The Milford proceeded from Cadiz to Gibraltar, Carthagena, and the coast of Catalonia; after which she joined the fleet off Toulon, where Sir Richard G. Keats shifted his flag
