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made a lieutenant on the 10th of May, 1799; and commander Aug. 12th, 1812. 



born at West Buckland, near Barnstaple (of which place his father, the Rev. William Hole, was surrogate), Feb. 27th, 1781.

This officer entered the royal navy, as midshipman on board the Atlas 98, Captain Edmund Dodd, June 6th, 1795; and was scarcely fifteen years of age when he had the temerity to walk from the main-top-sail-yard-arm to the rigging, without holding by any rope; an exploit rendered the more remarkable by the circumstance, of the studding-sail-booms not being then aloft: he continued in the same ship, under the command of Captain Matthew Squire, until Oct. 1799; when we find him rated master’s-mate of the Stag frigate, Captain Joseph Yorke. On the 29th of Aug. 1800, he commanded a boat at the capture of la Guêpe, French ship privateer, of 18 guns and 161 men. The enemy’s loss on this occasion consisted of no less than sixty-five men killed and wounded; that of the British, four killed, one drowned, and twenty wounded.

On the 6th of the ensuing month, the Stag, then under the command of Captain Robert Winthrop, was wrecked in Vigo bay; after which disaster, Mr. Hole appears to have served as master’s-mate of the Renown 74, flagship of Sir John Borlase Warren, on the coast of Spain, and in the Mediterranean; whore he was removed to le Généreux 74, Captain Manley Dixon, in July, 1801; appointed acting master of the Delight sloop, Captain Richard William Cribb, in Sept. following; and from that vessel discharged into the Foudroyant 80, bearing the flag of Admiral Lord Keith, with whom he returned to England during the peace of Amiens,