Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 27.djvu/270

 as able seaman with Captain  [q. v.], whom in April 1743 he followed to the Garland. In November of the same year he was discharged to the Sheerness, in which he was rated a midshipman, with [q. v.], and in September 1744 went with him, again as midshipman, to the Ludlow Castle. He left her on 23 Jan. 1745–6; served for a few months in the Exeter, again under Smith, at this time commodore, commanding in chief on the coast of Scotland, and was appointed by him acting-lieutenant of the Winchelsea of 20 guns, commanded by Captain Henry Dyve, on whose recommendation the commission was confirmed on 17 June 1746. His appointments, thus traced from the respective pay-books, dispose of the story that he entered the navy as a clerk and served with Rodney in that capacity (, i. 243). That story probably sprang out of the circumstance that his first cousin, Samuel Hood, the father of Captain Alexander Hood (1758–1797) and of Vice-admiral Sir (1762–1814) [q. v.], was a purser and of about the same age. Hood's junior service is, indeed, only noticeable from having been passed under officers of exceptional merit, which may be explained by the fact that his family was known to the Lytteltons and the Grenvilles.

The Winchelsea continued to be actively employed on the coast of Scotland, in the North Sea, and in the Channel. On 19 Nov. 1746, while cruising off Scilly in company with the Portland, they fell in with the French frigate Subtile of 26 guns. In the chase the Portland was lost sight of, and a severe action between the two frigates ensued, in the course of which Hood was wounded in the hand. On the Portland's coming up the Subtile surrendered, and was added to the English navy as the Amazon (Winchelsea's Log;, i. 308). In March 1748 Hood was appointed to the Greenwich, then commissioned by Captain John Montagu, but left her in a few months to join the Lyon, going out to North America with the flag of Rear-admiral Watson. She returned to England in November, and was paid off. Hood was placed on half-pay, and the following year married Susannah, daughter of Edward Linzee, for several years mayor of Portsmouth. In January 1753 he was appointed to the Invincible, guardship at Portsmouth, from which in May he was turned over to the Terrible. In the following year he was promoted to the command of the Jamaica sloop, which he took out to the coast of North America. There, on 22 July 1756, he was posted to the Lively, but was appointed by Commodore [q. v.] to be his own captain in the Grafton, and in her he returned to England towards the end of the year.

In the following January Hood offered his services to take temporary command of any ship whose captain was absent on the court-martial on Admiral Byng, being, he wrote to Lord Temple, ‘no ways inclined to be idle ashore while anything can be got to employ me.’ He was accordingly appointed to the Torbay in lieu of Captain Keppel. On 1 April he was similarly appointed to the Tartar, and again, on 30 April, to the Antelope of 50 guns, then ordered on a cruise. A fortnight afterwards, 14 May, he fell in with the 50-gun ship Aquilon, which he drove ashore over a reef in Audierne Bay, where he left her a total wreck. A week later he captured a couple of privateers, the crews of which he brought in as prisoners. In acknowledging his letter giving an account of what he had done, the secretary of the admiralty conveyed to him their lordships' formal approval of his conduct, and an intimation that he might expect to be appointed to the command of a ship (Clevland to Hood, 3 June 1757). Accordingly on 14 July 1757 he was appointed to the Bideford frigate attached to the fleet under Sir Edward Hawke during its autumn cruise in the Bay of Biscay. On 7 Feb. 1758 he was commissioned to the Vestal frigate of 32 guns, and joined her on 7 March, on the return of the Bideford from a cruise, in time to take part in Hawke's second visit to Basque roads and destruction of the fortifications on the Isle of Aix. The year was passed in almost continuous cruising, for the most part between Ushant and Cape Clear, and on 12 Feb. 1759 the Vestal sailed for North America in the squadron under Commodore Holmes. On the 21st, however, off Cape Finisterre a strange sail was chased by the Vestal and brought to action, only the Trent frigate being in sight, and she several miles astern. After a running fight of more than three hours, the French frigate Bellona of 32 guns, being completely dismasted, struck her colours. The Vestal had only her lower masts standing, and these badly wounded. In this state it was necessary for her to return with her prize to Spithead, and after refitting she joined the squadron under Rodney, which in July bombarded Havre and destroyed the flat-bottomed boats there. Hood continued employed on the blockade of the French coast till the following spring, when, at his own special request, he was sent to the Mediterranean. ‘For ten years past,’ he wrote on 30 April 1760, ‘I have been afflicted more or less with a bilious disorder, which has been so very severe within these nine months as to confine me to my