Page:A Naval Biographical Dictionary.djvu/1246

1232 was actively employed from Sept. 1810 until Oct. 1815, in the Mediterranean, on board the 40, Capt. Geo. Digby, 74, Capt. Graham Eden Hamond,  120, bearing the flag of the late Lord Exmouth,  80, Capt. Wm. Chas. Fahie, and, again under Lord Exmouth, in the 98. He was then presented with a commission dated 28 Feb. 1815. He has been afflicted, for upwards of 20 years, with paralysis of the right side, accompanied occasionally with deafness and now with the loss of speech.

 WAGHORN. 

entered the Navy 10 Nov. 1812; was advanced to his present rank 23 March, 1842; and has since been on half-pay. This officer has rendered himself famous as being the originator of the overland mail to India via Trieste. His zeal and activity in the cause of the public have been acknowledged by a pension from the Hon.E.I.Company.

 WAINWRIGHT. 

entered the Navy 10 Oct. 1832 J passed his examination 17 Jan. 1840; and (after having studied at the Royal Naval College) was presented with a commission 22 Dec. 1841. He was appointed, 7 March, 1842, to the 50. fitting for the flag of Hon. Josceline Percy, Commander-in-Chief at the Cape of Good Hope; and has been serving, since 20 May, 1846, in the 50, Capts. Sir Baldwin Wake Walker and Geo. Wm. Courtenay, now in the Pacific.

 WAINWRIGHT. 

is eldest son of the late Capt. John Wainwright, R.N., C.B., who conducted, in the 36, a successful expedition against the pirates of the Persian Gulf in 1809, had charge in 1814, when Captain of the  80, of the boats employed at the destruction of Commodore Barney’s flotilla up the Patuxent, and became afterwards Lieut.-Governor of the Royal Naval College.

This officer entered the Navy, in June, 1808, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board the 36, commanded by his father, under whom in the following year he witnessed the attack made on the  pirates. In Jan. 1813, after an interval of three years, he joined, as Midshipman, the 74, Capt. Benj. Wm. Page, lying at Spithead: in the following Aug. he entered the Royal Naval College; and between May, 1815, in the course of which month he left that institution, and the date of his promotion to the rank of Lieutenant, 4 Nov. 1819, he was employed on the Home and St. Helena stations in the and  frigates, both commanded by Capt. Fras. Stanfell, sloop, Capts. Jas. Wallis and Geo. Brine, 74, Capt. F. Stanfell,  42, Capt. John Brett Purvis, and  74, Capt. Aiskew Paffard Hollis. His last appointments were – in June, 1820, to the 44, Capt. Sir Thos. John Cochrane, stationed, until Oct. 1824, in the West Indies and on the coast of North America – 18 April, 1825, to the 24, Capt. Fred. Wm. Beechey, under whom he was for three years employed on Surveying-service – and 7 Sept. 1829, to the 74, Capts. Alex. Wilmot Schomberg and Christopher John Williams Nesham, in the Mediterranean. He has been on half-pay since the commencement of 1831.

Lieut. Wainwright married, 27 Jan. 1821, Elizabeth, second daughter of Sam. Powell, Esq., of Upper Harley Street, London, and of Brandlesome Hall, co. Lancaster, by whom he has issue. – Goode and Lawrence.

 WAKE. 

, born 4 Jan. 1813, in Blake Street, York, is son of Baldwin Wake, Esq., M.D. (son of Drury Wake, Esq., formerly of the 17th Lancers, and nephew of Sir Wm. Wake, Bart., of Courteen Hall, co. Northampton), by Sarah, sister of the present Jas. Spedding, Esq., of Summergrove, co. Cumberland, late a Captain in the 1st Regiment of Foot Guards (and now Major of the Royal Westmoreland Militia, and a Deputy-Lieutenant and Magistrate for co. Cumberland), who was severely wounded in the engagement of 2 Oct. 1799, near Egmont-op-Zee, in North Holland. Another of Lieut. Wake’s uncles, Lieut.-Colonel Carlisle Spedding, served as a Captain in the 4th Regiment of Dragoons under the Duke of Wellington in Spain and Portugal during nearly the whole of the Peninsular War, was present at most of the actions and sieges, and was taken prisoner at the battle of Albuera in 1811.

This officer entered the Navy, 24 July, 1827, as Fst.-cl. Vol., on board the 10, Capt. Henry Fras. Greville, under whom he was for three years employed at the Cape of Good Hope. In Sept. 1830 he removed as Midshipman to the 10, Capts. Henry Griffith Colpoys, Thos. Metcalfe Currie, and John Garrett, on the West India station. On a subsequent occasion, when that vessel was going at the rate of 4 knots an hour, he jumped overboard and, with the assistance of a main-top man, named John Hogan, was the means of saving the life of a seaman, who had fallen from the fore-chains and was unable to swim. On a dark night in Dec. 1831, the being then at Sheerness, he again, with a rope, leaped overboard, to the rescue of a man intoxicated, although the boats were hoisted up and a strong tide was at the time running. As a reward for this act of intrepidity, Mr. Wake was introduced by Capt. Garrett to the Commander-in-Chief, Sir John Poo Beresford, who received him, in Feb. 1832, on board his flag-ship, the 80, and ever afterwards extended to him his patronage. On the night of 13 Feb. 1833, about three months after he had been transferred to the 3, Lieut.-Commander Wm. Henry Quin, that vessel, during a violent gale off Scilly, parted from her anchors and was driven on the Crow bar. On the cutter being hoisted out Mr. Wake volunteered with a seaman to clear it from the tackles; the boat was, however, swamped, and the seaman drowned; Mr. Wake himself being only saved by grasping a rope at the very moment that the was driven off the bar. The latter having again struck upon the rocks, several efforts were made to send a line to the shore; but this was not accomplished until Mr. Wake, seizing it in his mouth, succeeded in getting through the surf; when a hawser was hauled on shore, and the thereby prevented from being carried round a point and inevitably lost. After serving for nearly a year at Plymouth in the 110, flag-ship of Sir Wm. Hargood, Mr. Wake was appointed in March, 1834 (he had passed his examination in the preceding Nov.), Mate of the 18, Capt. Sir Jas. Everard Home, fitting for the West Indies; where, on the occasion of his promotion to the rank of Lieutenant, which took place 19 April, 1837, he was nominated Additional of the 74, bearing the flag of Sir Peter Halkett, the Commander-in-Chief on the North America and West India station. While the was equipping at Plymouth, a seaman fell from the main-rigging and was fast sinking, when Mr. Wake, perceiving what had occurred, plunged through a port and brought him to the surface. Being off Para in 1835, when that city lay at the mercy of a troop of Indians, our truly gallant officer found means, at the risk of his life, of performing another valuable service. On his own responsibility, accompanied by a Mate of the, the present Commander Byron Drury, he approached during the night a building from which, although in the midst of the insurgents, his exertions enabled him to bring away 220 Brazilian troops, who were thus saved from a massacre which took place on the following day. His last appointments were – in 1837-8, to the 72, flag-ship of Hon. Sir Chas. Paget, 16, Capt. Rich. Laird Warren, and