Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 44.djvu/278

 Montagu [q. v.], a doctor of medicine of Cambridge, is congratulated on having become a fellow. The works of Linacre, Glisson, Wharton, and Harvey are well described, and the whole oration is both graceful and lively. Pellett edited Sir Isaac Newton's ‘Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms’ with Martin Folkes [q. v.] in 1728. He felt the difficulties of private practice keenly, and inclined to give his time chiefly to medical study and to general learning. He died in London on 4 July 1744, and was buried in St. Bride's Church, Fleet Street, where he is commemorated by an inscription on a brass plate. His portrait, painted by Dahl, hangs on the staircase of the College of Physicians, and was engraved by J. Faber.

[Munk's Coll. of Phys. vol. ii.; manuscript notes in a copy of his oration; works.] 

PELLEW, EDWARD, (1757–1833), admiral, born at Dover 19 April 1757, was second son of Samuel Pellew (1712–1764), commander of a Dover packet. The family was Cornish. Edward's grandfather, Humphrey Pellew, a merchant, resided from 1702 at Flushing manor-house in the parish of Mylor, and was buried there in 1722. On the death of Edward's father in 1764 the family removed to Penzance, and Pellew was for some years at the grammar school at Truro. In 1770 he entered the navy on board the Juno, with Captain John Stott, and made a voyage to the Falkland Islands. In 1772 he followed Stott to the Alarm, and in her was in the Mediterranean for three years. Consequent on a high-spirited quarrel with his captain, he was put on shore at Marseilles, where, finding an old friend of his father's in command of a merchant ship, he was able to get a passage to Lisbon and so home. He afterwards was in the Blonde, which, under the command of Captain Philemon Pownoll, took General Burgoyne to America in the spring of 1776. In October Pellew, together with another midshipman, Brown, was detached, under Lieutenant Dacres, for service in the Carleton tender on Lake Champlain. In a severe action on the 11th Dacres and Brown were both severely wounded, and the command devolved on Pellew, who, by his personal gallantry, extricated the vessel from a position of great danger. As a reward for his service he was immediately appointed to command the Carleton. In December Lord Howe wrote, promising him a commission as lieutenant when he could reach New York, and in the following January Lord Sandwich wrote promising to promote him when he came to England. In the summer of 1777 Pellew, with a small party of seamen, was attached to the army under Burgoyne, was present in the fighting at Saratoga, where his youngest brother, John, was killed, and he himself, with the whole force, taken prisoner.

On returning to England he was promoted, on 9 Jan. 1778, to be lieutenant of the Princess Amelia guardship at Portsmouth. He was very desirous of being appointed to a sea-going ship, but Lord Sandwich considered that he was bound by the terms of the surrender at Saratoga not to undertake any active service. Towards the end of the year he was appointed to the Licorne, which, in the spring of 1779, went out to Newfoundland, returning in the winter, when Pellew was moved into the Apollo, with his old captain, Pownoll. On 15 June 1780 the Apollo engaged a large French privateer, the Stanislaus, off Ostend. Pownoll was killed by a musket-shot, but Pellew, continuing the action, dismasted the Stanislaus and drove her on shore, where she was protected by the neutrality of the coast. On the 18th Lord Sandwich wrote to him: ‘I will not delay informing you that I mean to give you immediate promotion as a reward for your gallant and officer-like conduct;’ and on 1 July he was accordingly promoted to the command of the Hazard sloop, which was employed for the next six months on the east coast of Scotland. She was then paid off. In March 1782 Pellew was appointed to the Pelican, a small French prize, and so low that he used to say ‘his servant could dress his hair from the deck while he sat in the cabin.’ On 28 April, while cruising on the coast of Brittany, he engaged and drove on shore three privateers. In special reward for this service he was promoted to post rank on 25 May, and ten days later was appointed to the temporary command of the Artois, in which, on 1 July, he captured a large frigate-built privateer.

From 1786 to 1789 he commanded the Winchelsea frigate on the Newfoundland station, returning home each winter by Cadiz and Lisbon. Afterwards he commanded the Salisbury on the same station, as flag-captain to Vice-admiral Milbanke. In 1791 he was placed on half-pay, and tried his hand at farming, with indifferent success. He was offered a command in the Russian navy, but declined it, and he was still struggling with the difficulties of his farm when the war with France was declared. He immediately applied for a ship, and was appointed to the Nymphe, a 36-gun frigate, which he fitted out in a remarkably short time. Having expected a good deal of difficulty in manning her,