by his former captain; and was present in that ship at the capture of three French privateers, on the Halifax station, in the summer of 1805[1]. Previous to his return home in May, 1807, he was placed in charge of a detained American schooner, which vessel, after an ineffectual attempt to reach Halifax, and narrowly escaping destruction on Sable Island, was obliged to bear up for Bermuda, with so small a stock of provisions, that every one on board must have perished, but for the timely assistance rendered by an English letter of marque.
In July, 1807, we find Mr. Harris following Captain Beresford into the Theseus 74, then employed in the blockade of Ferrol, and subsequently of Rochefort. He was in that ship when she, in company with three others, under the orders of her captain, prevented eight sail of the line from forming a junction with the l’Orient squadron, Feb. 21st, 1809; he commanded her pinnace, employed in covering the retreat of the officers and men belonging to fire-vessels, sent against the same squadron, anchored near l’Isle d’Aix, April 11th, 1809; and he subsequently bore a part in the operations of the Walcheren expedition. On the 26th Feb. 1810, in consequence of favorable representations personally made to the Board of Admiralty by Sir John Poo Beresford, he was advanced to the rank of lieutenant, and about the same lime appointed to serve under his constant patron, in the Poicters 74, then fitting out at Chatham.
After Lord Wellington’s famous retreat to the lines of Torres Vedras, the Poictiers being then in the river Tagus, her barge, commanded by Lieutenant Harris, assisted in supporting the right of the British army, resting for some months at Villa Franca, eighteen miles above Lisbon; and on Marshal Massena’s retreat from Santarem, she assisted in cutting off several hundreds of his rear-guard; and also in crossing Lord Hill’s division from Mugem to the south side of the river.
The Poictiers was afterwards stationed in Basque roads,
