Page:Royal Naval Biography Marshall sp1.djvu/309

  by Captain Harris, after putting several parties of the enemy to flight; and on the 22nd, articles of capitulation were agreed upon between him and the commandant of Sourabaya: but when these terms were on the point of being signed, intelligence was received from Lieutenant-General Sir Samuel Auchmuty, of the capitulation for the surrender of Java and its dependencies having been concluded four days previous, in consequence of which Sourabaya was taken possession of under the conditions at that time agreed to.

We now lose sight of Captain Harris until April 3, 1813, on which day, in the Belle Poule, he captured the Grand Napoleon, American schooner, of 4 guns and 32 men, with a valuable cargo, from New York, bound to Bourdeaux; this vessel was copper-fastened, pierced for 22 guns, and measured no less than 305 tons. On the 11th of the following month. Captain Harris also took the Revenge letter of marque, from Charlestown bound to the same French port, pierced for 16 guns, having on board 4 long nine-pounders and 32 men. His share of the proceedings in the Gironde river will be noticed under the head of Captain John Coode, C.B.

Captain Harris’s last appointment was, Mar. 22, 1823, to the Hussar of 46 guns, the proceedings of a court-martial by which he was tried on a charge of delaying the public service, whilst under orders to convey his Majesty’s Ambassador to Lisbon, are detailed in the “Hampshire Telegraph,” Dec. 1,and 8, 1823, from which journal we make the following extracts:–

“The charges have not been proved against Captain George Harris, and are without any foundation; the communications from the Foreign Office to the Admiralty, originating in the letters of Sir Edward Thornton, to the Under Secretary of State, mentioning therein that the Hussar was not ready for sea, are totally without foundation, as that ship appears to have been in perfect readiness to have put in execution the orders from the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, from the moment of her anchoring in Plymouth Sound, on ihe 9th August, and to have been solely and entirely delayed by the non-embarkation of Sir E. Thornton; and that no blame whatever, in the slightest degree, is imputable to Captain George Harris, who, on the contrary, appears to have acted throughout with his accustomed zeal and promptitude: nor has the conduct of Captain Harris been in any way