made strenuous endeavours to procure an alteration in the tonnage laws, with a view to the improvement of ship-building; and a few years afterwards, to draw public attention to the very dangerous rapidity with which steam-vessels navigated narrow channels and crowded rivers, in order that the same might be regulated; also, in 1839 and 1830, to procure an alteration in the machinery used on board those vessels, in order to facilitate their movements in turning and winding, which has since been done.
Commander Canning’s eldest brother, Jacob, held a commission in the Hertfordshire militia, and died on the 18th June, 1827.
ABEL WANTNER THOMAS, Esq.
[Commander.]
Was made a lieutenant in Oct. 1802. He lost the Grappler gun-brig, on the Isles de Chosey, Dec. 31st, 1803; obtained a pension for wounds, in June, 1813; and was promoted to the rank of commander on the 15th June, 1814. He appears, during the late war, to have received an honorable testimonial from the Committee of the Patriotic Fund.
JOHN POTENGER GREENLAW, Esq.
[Commander.]
We first find this officer acting as second lieutenant of la Creole frigate, Captain Austin Bissell, which ship, when accompanying a fleet of merchantmen from the West Indies to England, was necessarily abandoned by her officers and crew, Jan. 2d, 1804[1], He subsequently served as senior lieutenant of the Naiad, and obtained great credit for the “zealous support” he afforded Captain Carteret (afterwards Sir Philip C. Silvester) in two actions with the Boulogne flotilla, under the immediate inspection of Napoleon Buonaparte[2]. His first commission bears date May 4th, 1804; and his promotion to
