Promoted to lieutenant on 26 March 1849, while serving in the fifth-rate HMS "Castor" on the Cape of Good Hope Station, he took part in the Cape Frontier War of 1851. After being given command of the gunboat HMS "Beaver" in 1856, he was promoted to commander on 26 February 1858 and commanded the gunboat HMS "Slaney" on the China Station seeing action at the Battle of Canton in December 1857 and the Battle of Taku Forts in May 1858 during Second Opium War.