page_title: Hugh Palliser
section_title: Early life
hierarchical_section_title: Hugh Palliser / Early life
caption_attribution_description: English: Photo of a model of the hull of en:HMS_Captain (1678) after her 1708 rebuild. the model was made by a Mr William hammond probably shortly after 1714
context_page_description: Admiral Sir Hugh Palliser, 1st Baronet was a Royal Navy officer. As captain of the 60-gun HMS Eagle he engaged and defeated the French 50-gun Duc d'Aquitain off Ushant in May 1757 during the Seven Years' War. He went on to serve as Commodore Governor of Newfoundland, then Controller of the Navy and then First Naval Lord. During the American Revolutionary War he came into a famous dispute with Augustus Keppel over his conduct as third-in-command of the Channel Fleet at the inconclusive Battle of Ushant in July 1778; the dispute led to Palliser being court-martialled, although he was subsequently acquitted. In retirement Palliser became Governor of Greenwich Hospital.
context_section_description: Palliser was the only son of Hugh Palliser and Mary Robinson and was born at Kirk Deighton, in the West Riding of Yorkshire (now in North Yorkshire). The family had estates in Yorkshire and Ireland. His parents died when he was still young, so he and his sisters were (probably) raised by relatives on his mother's side. He entered the navy in 1735 as a midshipman on HMS Aldborough commanded by his uncle Nicholas Robinson. He followed his uncle to HMS Kennington in 1737, and then to HMS Tiger and HMS Essex.
  Palliser passed his lieutenant's examination on 12 May 1741 and was promoted to the rank on 18 September 1741. He continued to serve aboard Essex, at first under Robinson, and after he was superseded, under Captain Richard Norris, the son of Sir John Norris. In February 1746 he was placed in command of HMS Weazel. On 25 November 1746 he was appointed post-captain in HMS Captain, sailing for the West Indies with the broad pennant of Commodore Edward Legge. Legge died on 19 September 1747, and Palliser transferred to HMS Sutherland. Six months later an accidental fire in that ship's arms chest wounded Palliser; a ball entered his back and exited his groin; another ball struck his right hip; a third ball struck his left shoulder. Two other men were killed in the explosion. Palliser returned to England to recover, but remained lame in his left leg, and suffered perpetual and sometimes excruciating pain to which his death was eventually attributed.
  He returned to active service in December 1748 and was appointed to command the frigate HMS Sheerness, sailing her to the East Indies to bring news of the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle which concluded Britain's role in the War of the Austrian Succession. Palliser was then part of Edward Boscawen's squadron on the Coromandel coast from July 1749, returning to Britain to pay off Sheerness in April 1750. As an alternative to half-pay he took up  appointment as captain of HMS Yarmouth, the guardship at Chatham. Shortly afterwards he was moved to the much smaller 20-gun HMS Seahorse, A difficulty arose when Scottish authorities accused a sailor from Seahorse of circulating a forged letter of indenture, in order to receive greater pay. The sailor took refuge aboard the ship, and Palliser refused to hand him over. Palliser was thereupon arrested in the sailor's place and held for several days in the Tolbooth Jail in Edinburgh. He was eventually released by order of the Scottish Lords of Session, who invoked their authority to supersede that of the judge of the vice-admiralty court in Edinburgh who had sought to commit Palliser for trial.
  In early 1753 he was appointed captain of the 50-gun HMS Bristol, but soon afterwards returned to command a convoy comprising Seahorse and Nightingale, with orders to protect transports being used to move two British Army regiments to the Colonies immediately prior to what would become the Seven Years' War against France. Palliser sailed in January 1755, directing the convoy in a long southern arc across the Atlantic, as far as the Tropic of Cancer. This represented a substantial deviation from the traditional and more direct easterly route, but enabled the convoy to travel in calmer weather and avoid the risk of losing transports to storms. The unorthodox navigation won Palliser some praise from British authorities.
caption: A model of the hull of HMS Captain after her 1708 rebuild
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