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POR and in 1819 commanded in the West Indies. Returning on leave to England in 1820, he died at Cheltenham, on the 11th of September, aged 57. He wrote a vindication of his conduct in relation to the opening up of the Red Sea, and was the author of A Description of the Prince of Wales' Island, and Rules to be observed in the Royal Navy — all apparently published in 1805. His construction of a line of telegraph stations from Bridport to the Land's End in 1815 procured him admission to the Royal Society. His improvements in the system of naval signals constitute his best claim to remembrance.

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Porter, Francis, a Franciscan friar, was born in the County of Meath in the 17th century. He was Professor and Lecturer, and ultimately President, in the Irish College of St. Isidore's at Rome, where he died 7th April 1702. Harris's Ware gives a list of his Latin works, the principal of which are: Securis Evangelica ad Hoeresis Radices Posita (Rome, 1674), Compendium Annalium Ecclesiasticorum Regni Hibernice (Rome, 1690), and Systema Decretorum Dogmaticorum (Avignon, 1693).

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Porter, James, Rev,, a distinguished United Irishman, was born about 1760, at Ballindrait, in the County of Donegal. After completing his theological studies at Glasgow, he was appointed Presbyterian minister of Grey Abbey, near Belfast, in 1784 or 1785. Five years afterwards he married. He was a good classical scholar. His library was extensive, and his scientific instruments and museum for the illustration of natural philosophy were superior to anything else of the kind then in the north of Ireland. Of an enthusiastic and liberal mind, he entered the Society of the United Irishmen. At first moderate in his views, seeking only Catholic Emancipation and Parliamentary Reform, he advanced with the progress of events, and being a good public speaker, and having a ready pen, soon took a foremost place in the movement. His writings in the Northern Star and Press were forcible and trenchant. He took the field with the insurgents in June 1798, was arrested for participation in the attack on Saint-field, tried by court-martial, and executed at Grey Abbey, in sight of his church and home. He suffered with fortitude. He was buried in Grey Abbey churchyard, where a marble slab marks his resting-place.

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Porter, Alexander J., American jurist and senator, son of preceding, was born in Armagh in 1786. He went to the United States in 1801, and was admitted to the Bar in 1807. Settling in Louisiana in 1810, he took an active part in framing the State constitution in the following year. In 1821 he became a judge of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, and from 1834 to 1837 was United States Senator from that State. In Congress he favoured Calhoun's motion to reject petitions for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, and voted for the recognition of the independence of Texas; and throughout his career was a slave-holder and an upholder of the institution of slavery. He died on his plantation at Attakapas, Louisiana, 13th January 1844. To his labours is in a measure due the system of jurisprudence at present existing in Louisiana.

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Pottinger, Sir Henry, Bart., was born in the County of Down in 1789. [In 1613, an ancestor, Thomas Pottinger, was "sovereign" of Belfast, and another relative, a captain in the royal navy, conveyed William III. to Ireland in his ship, the Dartmouth, in 1690.] Henry was educated at the Belfast Academy. When very young he entered the navy, and in 1804, through Lord Castlereagh's influence, was granted a military appointment in India. He assiduously studied the native languages, and in 18 10 volunteered, with Captain Christie, for the difficult task of exploring the countries between the Indus and Persia. They travelled disguised as Mohammedan merchants — an incognito that it required all their tact and linguistic abilities to maintain. After treading districts which had not been visited by Europeans since the time of Alexander the Great, they returned to Bombay in February 1811. A few years afterwards he gave their experiences to the world in an interesting work entitled Travels in Beloochistan and Sinde. He next received the appointment of assistant to the resident at the court of the Peishwa, at Poonah. During the Mahratta war he had a narrow escape at the battle of Khirkee. After the termination of hostilities he was appointed collector at Ahmednuggur, a position which he exchanged in 1825 for a similar one at Cutch. In 1831 Pottinger, then a colonel, undertook a mission to Scinde, which resulted in opening up the traffic of the Indus. In 1839 he was made a baronet. Next year he returned to England for the benefit of his health; but was almost immediately (June 1841) sent as plenipotentiary to China, to reap the benefits expected from the war entered upon with the Celestial Empire. After the expenditure of much 443