turned and our boats made no progress, when we put about, the enemy following at a distance.”
Lieutenant Dobson’s whole European force in this little expedition was only thirty-six men. On his return to Pagoda Point he received directions to join the expedition destined against Tavoy and Mergui. On the 19th, these orders were countermanded, and the troops embarked on board the Satellite sent to other vessels. On the 11th Sept., Captain Marryat quitted Rangoon for Penang, leaving Lieutenant Dobson, with sixteen of the Larne’s crew and nine supernumerary seamen, in charge of the Satellite, off Pagoda Point; and on the 15th of the same month, Captain H. D. Chads, of the Arachne sloop, recently from England, assumed the chief command of the combined naval force attached to Sir Archibald Campbell’s army. On the 21st, a movement was made upon Panlang, where the enemy had established a post, and were busily employed in constructing combustible rafts, and boats for the destruction of our shipping. The military force employed consisted of about five hundred troops, under the command of Brigadier-General Hugh Frazer; the naval operations were personally directed by Captain Chads, who had embarked on board the Satellite for that purpose. In the evening, heavy guns were heard, not far distant, and next morning five stockades were seen, three on the right side and two on the left; the Satellite manned with forty-five British sailors and twenty soldiers, and towed by the Diana steam-vessel, was far a-head of the flotilla, and soon ran up with the enemy’s works, receiving, as she advanced, a heavy raking fire of great guns, musketry, &c., but which was not returned till she was placed directly in the centre, when both broadsides were opened on them, and the enemy soon fled in all directions. Some troops under Major Sale were immediately landed with trifling opposition, and the whole of the stockades destroyed. Fifteen guns of various calibre were taken, and the same number of one-pounder swivels. On the 24th, three other stockades, situated about twenty miles higher up the river, were bombarded for a short time previous to the landing of the troops, when they were all found evacuated.
