duty as master’s-mate. A few days afterwards, he lost the sight of his right eye, occasioned by one of the marines firing a musket close to him, whilst he was in the act of preventing drunken man from falling over the gangway.
The Theseus, successively commanded by Captains John Bligh, Edward Hawker, Francis Temple, and B. Dacres, was paid off, at Chatham, Sept. 22d, 1805. A narrative of her proceedings, while bearing the flag of Rear-Admiral J. R. Dacres, during a hurricane, in which she was dismasted and obliged to throw many guns overboard, is given in the Naval Chronicle, vol. xii. p. 477 et seq. Shortly after her return in that state to Port Royal, she lost at least 100 men by yellow fever.
From the Theseus, Mr. Dougal was removed into the Powerful 74, Captain Robert Plampin, with whom, however, he did not go to sea. We afterwards find him serving as master’s-mate of the Sampson and Diadem 64’s, successively bearing the flag of Rear-Admiral Stirling, by whom he was appointed, April 22d, 1807, to the command of the Dolores schooner, recently captured at Monte Video, which vessel he gallantly and successfully defended against two others of the same description and force, sent from Buenos Ayres purposely to attack him. He was subsequently employed in battering the sea defences of that city; and after the failure of the attack thereon, by Lieutenant-General Whitelocke, ordered on board the Princessa, an old Manilla galleon, selected to convey 400 men of the 71st regiment, with their wives and children, to England. That ship sailed from the Rio de la Plata on the 13th Sept. 1807, and on the 24th was abandoned, in consequence of her being in a sinking condition.
During the next four months, Mr. Dougal was a supernumerary on board the Africa 64, Captain (now Sir Henry W.) Bayntun. On his arrival in England, he received intimation that he was at liberty to go where he pleased; nor could he recover one farthing of pay for the time he had served in the Princessa and Africa:– the Navy Board said they had nothing to do with the former ship, she being a transport; the
