Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 15.djvu/411

 sixty so-called frigates, in reality row-boats, carrying in all 134 guns, and manned by 2,600 Europeans and six thousand natives. In addition to the four ships just arrived with Downton, two of which were but small as compared with the Portuguese galleons, the English had only three or four country vessels known as galivats, and their men numbered at the outside under six hundred. It was the middle of January 1614–15 before the Portuguese, having mustered their forces, arrived before Surat. The nawab was terrified and sued for peace. The viceroy of Goa, who commanded in person, haughtily refused the submission, and on 20 Jan. the fight began. The English were lying in the Swally, now known as Sutherland Channel, inside a sheltering shoal, which kept the enemy's larger ships at a distance. The Portuguese did not venture to force the northern entrance to the channel, which they must have approached singly, and the attack was thus limited to the smaller vessels and the frigates, which crossed the shoal and swarmed round the Hope, the smallest of Downton's four ships, stationed for her better security at the southern end of the line. Several of them grappled with the Hope and boarded her. After a severe fight their men were beaten back, and, unable to withstand the storm of shot now rained on them, they set fire to their ships and jumped overboard. Numbers had been killed; numbers were drowned; many were burned. The Hope was for a time in great danger; the fire caught her mainsail and spread to her mainmast, which was destroyed; but she succeeded in extinguishing it and in casting off the blazing vessels, when they drifted on to the sands, and burnt harmlessly to the water's edge. During the next three weeks the viceroy made repeated attempts to burn the English ships in the roadstead, sending fireships night after night across the shoal. The English, however, always succeeded in fending them off, and on 13 Feb. the Portuguese withdrew. They had fought with the utmost gallantry, but the position held by the English was too strong for them to force. Their loss in killed, burnt, and drowned was said to amount to nearly five hundred men; that of the English was returned as four slain (Edwardes to East India Company, 26 Feb.; Downton to East India Company, 7 March).

The victory enormously increased the English influence, and on 25 Feb. the nawab came down to the shore in state, was visited by Downton attended by a guard of honour of 140 men under arms, and accompanied him to the ship. There he presented him with his own sword, ‘the hilt,’ says Downton, ‘of massie gold, and in lieu thereof I returned him my sute, being sword, dagger, girdle, and hangers, by me much esteemed of, and which made a great deal better show, though of less value.’ Downton's position at Surat was, however, still one of anxiety and difficulty. A succession commission had been given to Edwardes, the second in command, who appears to have been intriguing to procure Downton's dismissal, and who, at any rate, wrote many complaints. Within little more than a month of his arrival Downton had written home (20 Nov. 1614), complaining of others being joined in authority with him. On 3 March Downton with his four ships left Surat, intending to go to Bantam. They were scarcely outside before they saw the Portuguese fleet coming in from the westward, and for the next three days the two fleets were in presence of each other, Downton being all the time in doubt whether the viceroy was going to attack him, or to slip past him and make an attack on Surat, which he would have equally felt bound to defend. The viceroy, however, did not think it prudent to persevere in face of Downton's bold attitude, and ‘on the 6th he bore up with the shore, and’—to quote Downton's journal—‘gave over the hope of their fortunes by further following of us.’ The Portuguese having now gone clear away, the English were free to pursue their route. On 19 March they doubled Cape Comorin, and on 2 June the New Year's Gift and Solomon anchored in Bantam Roads. The return to the ‘stinking stew’ proved fatal to Downton, and he died on 6 Aug. Elkington, the captain of the Solomon, noted in his journal under date 5 Aug.: ‘I was aboard with the general, then very ill, and the next day had word of his departure.’ Of Downton's family nothing seems to be known, except that he had one only son, George, who accompanied him in both voyages, and died at Surat on 3 Feb. 1614–15, while they were hourly expecting the renewal of the Portuguese attack, and when, as the general touchingly noted in his journal, ‘I had least leisure to mourn.’ Early the next morning he was buried ashore, and the volley appointed to try the temper of the viceroy served also to honour his burial.

[Purchas his Pilgrimes, pt. i. pp. 247, 274, 500, 514, where are the Journals of Middleton, of Downton for both voyages, and of Elkington; Calendar of State Papers (East Indies), 1513–1616 freq. (see Index).] 

DOWRICHE, ANNE (fl. 1589), poetess, must have been granddaughter of Sir Richard Edgcumbe, and daughter of Peter Edgcumbe, who died in 1607, aged 70. She married, first, the Rev. Hugh Dowriche, probably