# A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Mudge, Zachary

Layout 4
​MUDGE. (Vice-Admiral of the Red, 1841. f-p., 28; h-p., 39.)
Zachary Mudge is son of the late John Mudge, Esq., of Plymouth, an eminent Physician.
This officer entered the Navy, 1 Nov. 1780, as Captain’s Servant, on board the Foudroyant 84, Capt. John Jervis; and, on 21 April, 1782, assisted at the capture, after a gallant action of nearly an hour, attended, however, with no casualty to the British, of the French 74-gun ship Pégase, whose loss, besides being seriously damaged, amounted, out of a crew of 700 men, to 80 killed and wounded. During the next seven years we find him serving on the Home and American stations, chiefly in the capacity of Midshipman, on board the Pégase and another ship, both commanded by Capt. Hon. Geo, Cranfield Berkeley, Sampson 64, Capt. Chas. Hope, Perseus 22, Capt. Geo. Palmer, Leander 50, flagship of Rear-Admiral Herbert Sawyer, and Bombay Castle 74, Capt. Robt. Fanshawe. He was then, 24 May, 1789, promoted to a Lieutenancy in the Centurion 50, bearing the flag at Jamaica of Rear-Admiral Peter Affleck; and he was next appointed – 26 Nov. in the same year, to the Carnatic 74, Capt. Ford, lying at Plymouth – 20. Jan. 1790, again to the Perseus, Capt. John Gibson, employed on the Irish and Channel stations – and, 15 Dec. 1790 and 8 Feb. 1794, as Senior, to the Discovery and Providence, in which ships he was for six years employed on voyages of discovery under Capts. Vancouver and Broughton. When at Nootka Sound in the Discovery Mr. Mudge was despatched in an open vessel to India, with a crew of only 14 men. Being awarded a second promotal commission 24 Nov. 1797, he obtained command, 8 Nov. 1798, of the Fly 16; and while in that sloop, in which he continued until posted, 15 Nov. 1800, he effected the capture of the French privateers Le Glaneur, of 6 guns and 32 men, and Le Trompeur, and was all but lost on an immense island of ice during his passage home from Halifax with despatches from H.R.H. the Duke of Kent. His subsequent appointments were – 1 April, 1801, to La Constance 24 – 23 Sept. 1802, to the Blanche of 44 guns – 18 Nov. 1805, to the Phoenix 36 – and, 4 July, 1814 (having left the Phoenix in May, 1810), to the Valiant 74. In La Constance Capt. Mudge, in the spring of 1801, received the thanks of the British merchants and consuls at Lisbon and Oporto for the service he had rendered them in safely convoying a fleet from Falmouth to Portugal, and also for the activity he had exhibited in collecting some vessels at Viana, laden with brandy, which could not have otherwise been got ready to go home under his protection. About the same period he captured the Spanish national cutter El Duides, of 8 guns and 69 men, and lugger privateer Venture, of 2 guns and 27 men. In July, 1801, with the assistance of the Stork 18, and of the boats of the two ships, we find him making prize, near Cape Ortegal, of El Cantara, Spanish privateer of 22 guns and 110 men, and of her consort, a vessel mounting 10 guns. La Constance was subsequently engaged in conveying a number of disbanded foreign soldiers from Lymington to the Elbe. At the close of 1803, Capt. Mudge, then in the Blanche, was employed at the blockade of St. Domingo; where, in less than a month, he captured and destroyed 24 of the enemy’s vessels. In the course of 1804-5 he had the increased good fortune to take, ​independently of a large number of merchantmen, the Gracieuse and Amitié, French national vessels of 14 guns each, the Dutch schooner Nimrod, of 4 guns, and the French privateer Le Hasard, of 3 guns and 58 men. On 19 July in the latter year, however, the Blanche was herself captured (after an action of 45 minutes, and a loss, out of 215 men, of 8 killed and 15 wounded, and when on the verge of sinking) by a powerful French squadron, consisting of La Topaze frigate, of 44 guns and 410 men, one sloop of 22 guns and 236 men, a corvette of 18 guns and 213 men, a,nd a brig of 16 guns and 123 men. Under such circumstances Capt. Mudge was of course honourably acquitted by court-martial of all blame in the loss of his ship; and not only acquitted but eulogised for his very able and gallant conduct. He afterwards served, as above, in the Phoenix and Valiant, on the Bay of Biscay, Lisbon, and Brazilian stations. The latter ship he left in Aug. 1815. He became a Rear-Admiral 22 July, 1830; and a Vice-Admiral 23 Nov. 1841.
* ↑ Vide Gaz. 1804, p. 162.
* ↑ Vide Gaz. 1805, pp. 52, 954.
* ↑ Vide Gaz. 1804, p. 1266.
* ↑ Vide Gaz. 1805, p. 1063.