# Royal Naval Biography/Shortland, Thomas George

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THOMAS GEORGE SHORTLAND, Esq [Post-Captain of 1802.]
This officer is the only surviving son of Captain John Shortland, R.N., who died at Lisle in 1803. He was born at Portsea, May 10, 1771; entered the naval service as a Midshipman, on board the Irresistible 74, bearing the broad pendant of Sir Andrew Snape Hamond, in Jan. 1785; and removed into the Alexander store-ship, commanded by his father, in Mar. 1787.
On the 13th May following, the Alexander sailed from the ​Motherbank, in company with eight other store-ships and transports, having on board the first party of convicts ever sent from Europe to New South Wales, where they arrived under convoy of the Sirius frigate, and Supply armed tender, Jan. 20, 1788 .
After remaining about five months at the new settlement, Mr. Shortland, senior, was ordered to England by way of Batavia, and charged with the Governor’s official despatches relative to the infant colony. It is due to departed merit to state, that his services in New South Wales were of a very active nature; and some of the charts, &c. given in “Philip’s Voyage” are from surveys which he made. In that work will be found a portrait and biographical notice of him; a ​table of the route of the Alexander, the variation of the compass, and meteorological observations during his voyage from Port Jackson to Batavia; and a detailed account, drawn up, we believe, from his own papers, of the dreadful sufferings of his crew. The following is an abstract of that account:
The Alexander, Friendship, Prince of Wales, and Borrowdale, were got ready in the beginning of July, 1783, to sail for England, under the care and conduct of Lieutenant Shortland, at which time Governor Philip took the opinions of the masters of those transports concerning their route. The season was thought to be too far advanced for them to attempt the southern course by Van Diemen’s Land; and the passage by Cape Horn was objected to by the Governor. It was therefore agreed unanimously that they should go to the northward, either through Endeavour’s Straits, or round New Guinea. Unfortunately the ships were ill prepared to encounter the difficulties which were to be expected in every mode of return. Their complement of men was small, only six to every 100 tons, officers included. They were without a surgeon, and unprovided with those articles which have been found essential to the preservation of health in long voyages. We cannot therefore wonder that their crews should have suffered dreadfully from the scurvy, in the length of time necessary for exploring a passage through an unknown sea crowded with islands, where they were destitute of assistance from charts, or observations of former navigators, and were not fortunate enough to obtain a supply of salutary refreshments. The Alexander left Port Jackson on the 14th July, intending to touch at Lord Howe’s Island, there to meet the other ships, and appoint a place of rendezvous in case of separation. The Friendship kept close to her 5 but the Prince of Wales and Borrowdale parted company on the 18th, and were not again met with. About the 10th Aug. the scurvy began to show itself; and for want of proper remedies, it increased so rapidly, that it was ultimately found necessary to sacrifice one of the ships, that both of them might not be lost. Towards the latter end of September some deaths had happened in the Alexander, and scarcely auy of her crew were capable of exertion; but in the Friendship, only 1 man was disabled. By the 20th Oct. both of the crews were in a pitiable condition. The Alexander had lost 8 men, and was reduced to 2 in a watch; only 4 seamen and 2 boys being at all fit for duty. The Friendship had only 5 men who were not disabled; both ships were short of provisions; and as the western monsoon was expected soon to set in, it was agreed to destroy the Friendship. She was accordingly cleared, bored through with augurs, and turned adrift in the neighbourhood of Borneo. The joint crews now amounted to only 30 persons, officers and boys included; the sickness continued to increase; and by the beginning of November, only one man, besides the officers, was able to go aloft. Had the Alexander been at this time a very few days sail more distant from Batavia, she must inevitably have been lost; not from any stress of ​weather, or danger of coasts or shoals, but merely from inability to conduct her into port. At 6 P.M. on the 17th, her anchor was let go between the islands of Leyden and Alkmaar; soon after a gun was fired, and a signal made for assistance. None, however, arrived till the following evening, when a boat was sent to her from the Dutch Commodore. Never, perhaps, did any ship arrive in port more helpless from the mere effects of a dreadful and invincible disorder. From two British East Indiamen, which lay in Batavia Roads when she arrived, and from three others which came in a few days after, with the assistance of a few Dutch sailors, a fresh crew was at length made up, in which only 4 of the original seamen remained, the rest having either died in the hospital, or not being sufficiently recovered to re-embark previous to her sailing again on the 7th Dec. Nothing remarkable happening during the remainder of the passage home, she arrived off the Isle of Wight on the 28th May 1789, after an absence of rather more than two years. Lieutenant Shortland, during this voyage, determined for the first time the actual position of Solomon’s Islands.
Mr. T. G. Shortland subsequently served as Midshipman and Master’s-Mate on board the Director, Discovery, and Sandwich, the latter ship bearing the flag of Vice-Admiral Dalrymple at the Nore. Towards the latter end of 1790 he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant, in the Speedy sloop of war, on the North Sea station; and from Jan. 1793 till Sept. 1794, we find him serving on board the Nemesis, a small frigate attached to the Mediterranean fleet. His gallant conduct in Hieres Bay, after the evacuation of Toulon, has already been briefly noticed at p. 313. On that occasion, although exposed to a heavy fire of musketry from the shore, he used every effort to get the hospital-ship alluded to afloat; but finding it impracticable to move her, in consequence of its blowing a gale of wind, was under the necessity of clearing and setting her on fire, having first succeeded in bringing off the whole of the wounded men, provisions, &c
From the Nemesis, Lieutenant Shortland removed into the Romney of 50 guns, commanded by Sir Charles Hamilton, whom he accompanied into the Melpomene frigate, about April 1795, and continued to serve with for a period of four years; during which l’Aventurier brig of war, la Revanche, ​of 18 guns and 167 men, le Zelé of 16 guns and 69 men, several smaller privateers, and a number of merchantmen, were taken from the enemy.
In April 1799, Lieutenant Shortland was made a Commander into the Voltigeur sloop of war, stationed at Newfoundland. His next appointment was, pro tempore, to the Donegal of 80 guns, at Plymouth, which ship he fitted out with only 170 men, and moored in Cawsand Bay, on the seventeenth day after she was taken out of dock. Earl St. Vincent, who then, (July 1801,) presided at the Admiralty, testified his approbation of the extraordinary exertions used on this occasion, by appointing him, in Oct. following, to act as Captain of the Dedaigneuse, and afterwards confirming him in the command of that frigate. His post commission bears date Mar. 1, 1802.
Captain Shortland proceeded in the Dedaigneuse to the East Indies; but soon after his arrival there was obliged to invalid through ill health, and return to England as a passenger on board the Intrepid 64. He arrived at Portsmouth in Feb. 1803, and subsequently commanded the Britannia a first rate, and Caesar 80; the latter bearing the flag of Rear-Admiral Sir Richard J. Strachan.
At the latter end of June, 1806, Captain Shortland was selected by the late Sir Thomas Louis to command his flagship, the Canopus of 84 guns; and on the 27th Sept. in the same year, he assisted at the capture of le Presidente, a remarkably fine French frigate, mounting 44 guns, with a complement of 330 men.
The Canopus led the van of Sir John T. Duckworth’s squadron when forcing the passage of the Dardanelles, Feb. 19 and Mar. 3, 1807. Notwithstanding the tremendous fire to which she was exposed on both those days, from the ​formidable Turkish batteries, her total loss during the whole of the operations in that quarter appears to have been only 6 men killed and 26 wounded; she however suffered greatly in her rigging, and received several immense shot, or rather blocks of granite, one of which was twenty-three inches in diameter, and weighed 546lbs.
After his retreat from the Sea of Marmora, Sir John T. Duckworth proceeded with the squadron to Egypt, and arrived there a few days subsequent to the capture of Alexandria by the military and naval forces under Major-General Fraser and Captain Benjamin Hallowell.
Captain Shortland left the Canopus in Sept. 1807; and for fourteen months from that period commanded the Queen of 98 guns, on the Mediterranean and Cadiz stations. In June, 1809, he joined the Valiant 74; and during the expedition up the Scheldt, we find him commanding the first division of the flotilla under Sir Richard G. Keats. From Dec. 1809 till May 1811 he served in the Iris frigate, at Cadiz, off the Western Islands, and on the Channel station. His next appointment was, in Jan. 1812, to the Royal Oak 74, bearing the flag of Lord Amelius Beauclerk, with whom he continued till the summer of 1813. In Nov. following, Captain Shortland was appointed Agent for prisoners of war at Dartmoor, where he remained about two years and a half. From April 1816, till April 1819 he superintended the ordinary in Hamoaze, and obtained the approbation of the Admiralty for his meritorious conduct during that period, as also for his zeal and ingenuity in forming a system to make telegraphic communications by shapes in lieu of buntin flags, or semaphore.
Captain Shortland’s three years of service as senior superintending Captain of the ordinary at Plymouth had no sooner expired, than he was nominated Comptroller-General of the Preventive Boat Service, under the direction of the Lords ​of the Treasury, who were pleased to express their approva of his services by a minute dated Jan. 15, 1822. He resigned that office in consequence of the department being transferred to the Board of Customs; and was succeeded by Captain William Bowles, R.N. in July of the same year. The subject of this memoir married Elizabeth, daughter of Peter Tonkin, Esq. of Plymouth, by whom he has nine children. One of his sons is a Student at Law in the Inner Temple; and another a Midshipman in the Royal Navy. His brother John commanded the Junon frigate, and was mortally wounded in defending her against a French squadron, Dec. 13, 1809. His heroic conduct and lamented death will be more fully spoken of in a subsequent part of this work.
Agents.– Messrs. Goode and Clarke.
* ↑ The principal officers employed on this interesting expedition were Commodore Arthur Philip; Captain John Hunter; Lieutenants Henry Lidgbird Ball, and John Shortland; the former commanding the Supply, the latter Agent to the transports; and Major Ross, of the marines. The 7th Feb. 1788, was the memorable day which established a regular form of government on the coast of New South Wales. For obvious reasons, all possible solemnity was given to the proceeding necessary on this occasion. On a space previously cleared, the whole colony was assembled; the military drawn up and under arms; the convicts stationed apart; and near the person of the Governor those who were to hold the principal offices under him. The royal commission was then read by Mr. D. Collins, the Judge-Advocate. By this instrument, Arthur Philip, Esq. was constituted and appointed Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief in and over the territory called New South Wales, extending from Cape York to the southern extremity of Van Diemen’s Land, and of all the country inland to the westward, as far as the 135th degree of East longitude, reckoning from the meridian of Greenwich, including all the islands adjacent in the Pacific Ocean, between the latitudes of 10° 37' and 43° 39' S. The act of Parliament establishing the courts of judicature were next read; and lastly, the patents under the great seal, empowering the proper persons to convene and hold those courts whenever the exigency should require. The office of Lieutenant-Governor was conferred on Major Ross. A triple discharge of musketry concluded this part of the ceremony; after which Governor Philip returned his thanks to the soldiers for their steady good conduct on every occasion; and then addressed the convicts in a speech which was received with universal acclamations. The assembly now dispersed, and the Governor proceeded to review the military on a piece of ground cleared away for the purpose of a parade. He then .gave his officers a dinner; and the first evening of his government was concluded propitiously, in good order and innocent festivity, amidst the repetition of wishes for its prosperity.
* ↑ At 10 P.M. on the 3d Aug. 1798, Sir Charles Hamilton despatched five boats from the Melpomene and Childers, under the orders of Lieutenant Shortland, to attack a French convoy lying in the Bay of Corigeon, near Isle Bas. The weather was at this time very squally, with heavy rain and vivid lightning. At 3 A.M. on the 4th the boats boarded, and after a short but spirited resistance, carried l’Aventurier of 12 guns and 79 men, 16 of whom were wounded, several mortally. The batteries in the neighbourhood being by this time alarmed, and the wind blowing dead on the land, Lieutenant Shortland was obliged to relinquish any attempt on the other vessels, and work his prize off shore; which he succeeded in doing, after being exposed to the fire of the batteries for about two hours. This gallant exploit was performed with the loss of 1 man killed, 1 missing, and 3 or 4 wounded.
* ↑ See Captain Edward Hawkins.
* ↑ See Vol. I. pp. 317, 799, and 808 et seq.
* ↑ See Vol. I. p. 482.
* ↑ Captain Shortland is the author of “A Report on Azimuths and Amplitudes, with a Method to obtain the True Variation of the Compass, having the true apparent Noon given by a good Watch;” also of “A Plan recommending and shewing the facility of forming a safe anchorage at the Island of St. Michael (Azores).”