# A Naval Biographical Dictionary/Coghill, Josiah

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​COGHILL, Bart., formerly Cramer. (Rear-Admiral of the White, 1841. f-p., 15; h-p., 50.)
Sir Josiah Coghill Coghill, born in 1773, is youngest son of the late Sir John Coghill, Bart., by Mary, daughter of Dr. Josiah Hort, Archbishop of Tuam. He succeeded his brother, as third Baronet, 21 May, 1817, and assumed, in the following June, the surname of “Coghill,” in place of his patronymic “Cramer.”
This officer entered the Navy, in April, 1782, as Captain’s Servant, on board the Bristol 50, Capts. Hugh Campbell and Jas. Burney, with whom he served in the East Indies until discharged in April, 1786. In April, 1798, he re-embarked on board the Haerlem 64, armée en flûte, Capt. Geo. Burlton, in which ship, having been created an Acting-Lieutenant in Sept. 1798, he was officially promoted 24 March, 1800. After attending the subsequent expedition to Egypt, and cutting out, in command of the Haerlem’s boats, the Prima galley, from the mole of Genoa, he removed, 25 April, 1801, to the Africaine, Capt. Jas. Stevenson; and, on 7 May, 1802, was promoted, from the Dédaigneuse frigate, Capt. Thos. Geo. Shortland, to the command of the Rattlesnake sloop, in the East Indies; where, with ​two boats under his immediate orders, we find him, after a sanguinary contest, destroying a pirate-vessel on the coast of Malacca. Having obtained, 25 April, 1805, the acting-command of La Concorde 36, Capt. Coghill, on 1 Feb. 1806, received an Admiralty commission confirming his appointment to that frigate, in which he continued until Sept. 1807. On next joining, 2 Oct. 1809, the Diana 38, he forthwith proceeded to join the armament then off Walcheren, and arrived in time to perform service marked by the approbation of the Commander-in-Chief. Capt. Coghill left the Diana in Feb. 1810, and remained on half-pay until 7 Oct. 1813, when he was appointed to the Ister 36, in which he served on the Leeward Island station until July, 1815. He has not been since afloat. His promotion to Flag-rank took place 23 Nov. 1841.
Sir Josiah Coghill, who is Deputy-Lieutenant for co. Dublin, married, first, in March, 1803, Sophia, daughter of Jas. Dodson, Esq., by whom (who died in 1817) he had three daughters; and, secondly, 27 Jan. 1819, Anna Maria, eldest daughter of the late Right Hon. Chas. Kendal Bushe, Lord Chief Justice of the Court of King’s Bench in Ireland, by whom he has living two sons and seven daughters. Agents–Messrs. Halford and Co.
​COGHILL. (Rear-Admiral of the Red.)
Sir Josiah Coghill Coghill assisted, as we have stated, at the cutting out of the Prima galley. The particulars of that exploit will be found alluded to more fully in our memoir of Capt. Geo. Scott. Sir Josiah was in the Haerlem at the evacuation of Genoa by the French and at the surrender of Malta to the British: in command of the same ship’s tender he carried from Smyrna despatches (received overland from Sir Wm. Sidney Smith, who was at St. Jean d’Acre) to Lord Keith, at Malta. The Africaine, which ship he fitted out as Senior Lieutenant at Minorca immediately after her capture from the French, was commanded at first by Capt. Geo. Burlton. He joined the Rattlesnake at the Cape ot Good Hope and took despatches in her to the East Indies. The Malay vessel which he attacked mounted 8 guns with a complement of about 125 men: she exploded while the British were on board. The latter, out of 22, had 16 killed and wounded; the enemy were all destroyed. Serving with Capt. Coghill on this occasion were the present Retired Commanders Arthur Davies and Robt John Fayrer. When in company, in the same sloop, with the Terpsichore frigate, Capt. Walter Bathurst, he annihilated a fleet of 92 proas, carrying ​each 2 guns in the bow, off the island of Rhio, in the strait of Singapore. In the Diana, before proceeding to the Walcheren, he had charge of the French coast from Dunkerque to Fécamp.