# A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Curry, Richard

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​CURRY, C.B. (Vice-Admiral or the White, 1846. f-p., 30; h-p., 37.)
Richard Curry, born in 1772, is son of the late Thos. Curry, Esq., of Gosport, Hants, for more than years a zealous and active Magistrate for that county; and cousin of the late Capt. Jonathan Faulknor, R.N.
This officer entered the Navy, 22 March, 1780, as Captain’s Servant, on board the Amphitrite 24, Capt. Robt. Biggs, from which vessel he was discharged 2 April, 1782. Re-embarking, 12 Aug. 1786, on board the Goliath 74, Capt. Archibald Dickson, guard-ship at Portsmouth, he afterwards served on the Mediterranean, Halifax, West India, and Home stations, as Midshipman and Master’s Mate in the Phaeton 38, Capt. Geo. Dawson, Actaeon troop-ship, Lieut.-Commander Joseph Hanwell, Royal George 100, and Barfleur 98, flagships of Hon. Sam. Barrington and of Rear-Admiral Faulknor, Iphigenia 32, Capt. Patrick Sinclair, and Venus, of 38 guns and 192 men, commanded by his relative Capt Jonathan Faulknor. While in the Iphigenia, we find Mr. Curry, in Feb. 1793, conducting into port L’Elizabeth, the second privateer captured during the war; and on his removal to the Venus, taking part, 27 May following, in a very severe action of two hours and a half (the third fought with the republicans at sea) which terminated in the separation of the combatants, after a loss to the British frigate of 2 killed and 20 wounded, and to the Frenchman (the Semillante, of 40 guns and 300 men) of 12 killed and 20 wounded. Obtaining his first commission 14 March, 1794, he soon accompanied Capt. Faulknor into the Diana 38, and on 23 Aug. in the same year he witnessed the apparent destruction, near the Penmarcks, by a squadron under Sir Edw. Pellew, of the 36-gun frigate Volontaire, and corvettes Espoir and Alert. After serving for three years and a half, latterly as First-Lieutenant, on board the Sans Pareil 80, flag-ship in the Channel of Lord Hugh Seymour, he was ultimately promoted, 30 Nov. 1798, to the command of the Fury bomb. In that vessel he appears to have taken a very conspicuous share in the expedition to Holland in 1799, during which he bombarded a military post near the Holder Point – covered the landing of the army under Sir Ralph Abercromby – accompanied Vice-Admiral Mitchell’s flotilla to the Zuyder Zee – co-operated with Capt. Wm. Carthew in removing a large quantity of naval stores from Medenblik, the dockyard at which place and two frigates were burnt – and was the last but one to quit the Texel on its evacuation. On afterwards repairing to the Mediterranean, Capt. Curry, early in March, 1801, joined in the hostilities then commencing against the French in Egypt. After assisting at the debarkation of the troops, he bombarded and reduced the castle of Aboukir, on 8 of that month, by which event 12 guns and 190 of the enemy fell into the hands of the British. On 19 April, with a division of gunboats under his orders, he further contributed to the surrender, at the close of a siege of three days, of the castle of Jullien, although defended by 15 pieces of cannon and a garrison of nearly 400 men. Ascending the Nile, he subsequently, on 9 May, commanded a force of four flats and three launches in an action of six hours with the enemy’s forts at Rahmanieh, the eventual capture of which, after occasioning the British a loss of 4 men killed and 7 wounded, cut off all communication between the French armies at Grand Cairo and Alexandria, secured the command of the Nile, and contributed in a great degree to the final expulsion of the enemy from the country. For these services Capt. Curry was presented by the Capitan Pacha with several pieces of rich silk stuff, embroidered with gold in various patterns, and, as a mark of particular distinction, he received from the Grand Vizier a handsome pelisse of camel’s hair lined with rich fur. On the capitulation of Grand Cairo, towards the close of June, a few days previously to which he had constructed a bridge for the passage of the army across the Nile, Capt. Curry was sent in his cutter down that river with the intelligence to Lord Keith, then in Aboukir Bay. In consequence of the strong recommendations of which he was the bearer, he was immediately ordered home with the despatches; and on his arrival at the Admiralty he was awarded the sum of 500l., usually given on such occasions. Having rejoined the Fury in the Mediterranean, ​Capt. Curry was soon, by commission dated 7 Jan. 1802, promoted to Post-rank, and appointed to the Tigre, of 74 guns, which ship he brought home and paid off in Oct. following. We afterwards find him assuming the successive command – 13 April, 1803, of the Royal Sovereign 100, attached to the fleet in the Channel – 30 April, 1805, of the Tribune 32, stationed off Cherbourg – and, 23 Jan. 1806, and 24 Sept. 1811, of the Roebuck 44, and Solebay 32, flag-ships of Admiral Billy Douglas, Lord Gardner, and Robt. Murray, Commanders-in-Chief at North Yarmouth, where he remained until the peace of 1814. From May, 1830, to May, 1833, he next, in the Caledonia 120, Foudroyant 80, and San Josef 110, officiated as Flag-Captain to Sir Mauley Dixon, Commander-in-Chief at Plymouth. Since his original promotion to Flag-rank, 10 Jan. 1837, he has been on half-pay. His present commission bears date 9 Nov. 1846.
Vice-Admiral Curry, who has received a gold medal for his services in Egypt, was nominated a C.B. 26 Sept. 1831. He married, 18 Jan. 1804, Elizabeth, youngest daughter of Daniel Blachford, Esq., of Lower Tooting, co. Surrey, and has 11 children now living. One of his sons, Douglas, is a Captain, R.N. another, Robert Murray, First-Lieutenant, R.M., commanded, while attached to the Thunderer 84, a company at the storming of Sidon, and served at the siege of Acre in 1840.
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