Thomas Fremantle ( Royal Navy officer ) Vice - Admiral Sir Thomas Francis Fremantle GCB GCH RN ( 20 November 1765 – 19 December 1819 ) was a British naval officer in the Royal Navy whose list of accolades includes action in three separate fleet actions , a close personal friendship with Lord Nelson and a barony in Austria . Biography . Fremantle was born in 1765 , and joined the navy in 1777 aged just eleven aboard the frigate HMS " Hussar " . Profiting from family influence , active commissions in the American War of Independence and a keen sense of seamanship and aggressive tactical awareness , promotion came easily , making lieutenant on 13 March 1782 while on duty in Jamaica and being promoted to commander on 13 November 1790 in command of the sloop HMS " Spitfire " . Although he did not achieve fame with his service in this period , he was in a good position to profit from the mass promotions which accompanied the outbreak of the French Revolutionary War in 1793 , being made a Post Captain on 16 May 1793 in the small frigate HMS " Tartar " . It was in this ship that he first came to Nelson ' s eye , when they both served at the Siege of Bastia , where Nelson lost an eye and Fremantle gained a reputation for daring action , taking his ship under the fortress ' s walls despite heavy fire from overhead , which had already sunk one frigate in the bay . The following year Fremantle was commanding the frigate HMS " Inconstant " when he was engaged in Lord Hotham ' s indecisive and cautious fleet action in the Gulf of Genoa on the 14 March 1795 . The French fleet had departed Toulon and were making for the Italian coast , being chased by Hotham ' s fleet and an approaching storm . Fremantle , despite unspoken rules of engagement which did not require him to engage ships larger than his own , used his superior speed to overtake the 80 - gun " Ça Ira " , which had been damaged in a collision . By taking his ship under the massive bow of his opponent , he managed to slow her enough that the oncoming British fleet was able to capture " Ça Ira " and another French ship which had turned back in a rescue attempt . The first British ship to the scene was Nelson ' s HMS " Agamemnon " , and the respect between the two officers continued to grow . Nelson requested and received Fremantle as a companion and junior officer when he was detached to Italy in 1796 , and the two wreaked havoc along the Italian coastline , evacuating British and royalist civilians to Corsica when the French army invaded , capturing coastal positions and raiding shore installations , capturing the island of Elba . One of the British refugees whom Fremantle rescued from Livorno was the 18 - year old Catholic Betsey Wynne , daughter of Richard Wynne ( from the famous Anglo - Venetian Wynne family , acquainted with Casanova ) and Camille de Royer . Fremantle was so charmed by Betsey that he married her that year , with Prince Augustus as his best man . The same year he was embroiled in an engagement with Spanish gunboats off Cadiz , again under Nelson , and the next year he was with his mentor at the disastrous Battle of Tenerife , where both officers were grievously wounded in the arm . Nelson ' s was amputated ; Fremantle ' s survived , but he never regained full use of it again . Returning home on convalescence , Fremantle used the time to hone his own theories of successful command at sea , shown by several proposals he sent to the Admiralty concerning the judgment of petty disciplinary actions on board ship . Although these were rejected out of hand , they would later be used as models when the disciplinary system was revised in the 1850s . A very popular officer , loved by his men , his contemporaries and the public alike , Fremantle did not remain at home long , and when Nelson was given command of the Channel Fleet Fremantle joined him in August 1800 as commander of the ship of the line HMS " Ganges " . It was in this ship that he received further accolades for his service at the Battle of Copenhagen in 1801 when he was in the thick of the action . He also dabbled in politics , standing unsuccessfully for the constituency of Sandwich in 1802 before taking it in 1806 . Sent to Ireland and then Ferrol in 1803 and 1804 , Fremantle was given the massive 98 - gun HMS " Neptune " in May 1805 and was attached to the Cadiz blockade , ready for Nelson ' s assumption of command later that year . At the Battle of Trafalgar that October , " Neptune " was third in Nelson ' s division , cutting the Combined Fleet shortly after HMS " Victory " did , and ploughing past the wrecked " Bucentaure " he engaged the massive " Santissima Trinidad " with which he endured a savage slogging match which left " Neptune " with 44 casualties and the outnumbered Spanish ship with over 300 . Relatively undamaged , " Neptune " was able to tow the shattered " Victory " back to Gibraltar and Fremantle profited by taking the chapel silver from the big Spanish ship which he used to adorn his home . Fremantle spent the next five years in England , serving as a Member of Parliament for Sandwich 1806 – 1807 and as a Lord of the Admiralty ( 1806 – 1807 ) , before being posted rear - admiral and taking command in the Adriatic Sea , where he employed the frigate squadrons under him to great effect against French - held Italy and Dalmatia . When the French empire surrendered in 1814 , the entire Balkan coast surrendered to him with over 800 ships , netting Fremantle a vast fortune . For his services he was made a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath on 12 April 1815 , as well as a baron of the Austrian Empire and later a vice - admiral and , from 1818 , the Commander - in - Chief , Mediterranean Fleet . He also received several Austrian and Italian knighthoods as well as initiation into the Royal Guelphic Order of Hanover . Fremantle died in December 1819 from a sudden illness and was buried at Naples where his grave can still be seen in the Garden of Don Carlo Califano outside the gate of San Gennaro , Naples . Sons of Thomas Fremantle . His eldest son of the same name was a famous politician , originally given a baronetcy at his father ' s death before later being made Baron Cottesloe for his own services to the country . Another son , Charles Howe Fremantle , became the captain of the 26 - gun frigate , the first ship to arrive in a fleet of 3 ships sent out from Britain to establish a colony at the Swan River in Western Australia . The Australian City of Fremantle is named after him . Another son , William Robert Fremantle ( c . 1808 - 1895 ) was the Dean of Ripon . His fifth son , Stephen Grenville Fremantle ( 1810 – 1860 ) , was captain of from 1853 to 1858 .