“The committee having taken into consideration the very meritorious and highly laudable conduct of Lieutenant Richard Saumarez, of H.M.S. Bacchante, in voluntarily risking his own life under circumstances of the greatest peril, to save that of Robert Taylor, a seaman on board the same ship, who had fallen overboard when between Malta and Sicily, on the 10th day of May. 1814:
“Resolved, that this committee particularly recommend to the general court to award the honorary medallion of the society to Lieutenant Richard Saumarez, as a testimony of their unfeigned admiration of his noble and gallant conduct.
On the 10th of April, 1818, Lieutenant Saumarez, then at Vienna, received a letter from Prince Metternich, announcing that the Emperor of Austria, “in consideration of the signal services which he had rendered in the campaign of 1813,” and which had been borne testimony to by the Duke of Modena, had deigned to confer on him the Cross of a Knight of the Order of Leopold, In Dec. following, he was appointed to the Sybille 44, bearing the flag of Sir Home Popham, on the Jamaica station, where he received his commission as commander, appointing him to the Beaver sloop, May 19th, 1819.
On his return from the West Indies, Captain Saumarez submitted to the Admiralty some observations on the yellow fever, of which he had experienced three attacks in the course of one year, and was informed by the secretary, that “their Lordships were pleased with the attention he had given to this highly important subject. In April, 1821, he received the thanks of the Committee of West India Merchants, “for the interesting information conveyed in his letter of the 16th” of that month, as to the most eligible track to be pursued by their homeward bound shipping.
Captain Saumarez was advanced to post rank on the 17th of April, 1824. His brother, acting Commander Thomas Saumarez, died at the island of Ascension, May 19th, 1823, only seven days after his appointment to the Bann of 20 guns.
Agent.– J. Hinxman, Esq.
