After this he had no command till 1778, when he was appointed to the newly built 74-gun , and served in the Channel Fleet through 1779 and 1780. He afterwards went to the West Indies as part of the squadron with Sir Samuel Hood, and was present in the action off Fort Royal in Martinique on 29 April 1781, and in the action off the Chesapeake on 5 September. Owing to the faulty system of tactics then in vogue and almost compulsory, the "Alfred" had no active share in either of these battles, the circumstances of which were afterwards much discussed.