RODNEY, George Brydges, Lord Rodney, was born on the 19th of February 1718. He was the descendant of an ancient family, and was related to the duke of Chandos. His father Henry Rodney obtained, at the age of fourteen, a commission as cornet of horse; but having quitted the army after a short period of service, he settled at Walton-upon-Thames, and married Mary, eldest daughter and coheiress of Sir Henry Newton, envoy extraordinary to the grand duke of Tuscany, and afterwards judge of the court of admiralty. Through the interest of the duke, who usually attended the king on his journeys to and from Hanover, Mr Rodney obtained the command of the royal yacht; and having on one of these occasions been asked what mark of favour he would wish the king to confer upon him, he requested that his majesty would stand sponsor for his son. Such a request was easily granted; and accordingly his second son was named after his royal and noble godfathers.

At a very early age he was sent to Harrow school; and having quitted it at the age of twelve, he received from the king a letter of service, the last ever granted, and went to sea On the Newfoundland station he served for six years with Admiral Medley. On the 15th of February 1739 he was made lieutenant in the Dolphin, by Admiral Haddock, in the Mediterranean, and served successively in the Essex, Royal Sovereign, and Namur. Admiral Mathews having in 1742 appointed him to the Plymouth of sixty-four guns, he convoyed three hundred sail of the Lisbon trade through the midst of the French fleet, then cruising in the channel; and for his conduct on this occasion he received the warmest thanks of the merchants. In the rank of captain he was confirmed by the admiralty, and was appointed to the command of the Sheerness, in which he continued for eighteen months. He was then removed to the Ludlow Castle, of forty guns. In this ship he fought and took the great St Maloes privateer, of forty guns, and one hundred men above his own complement. From this period till December 1745, he was employed in various pieces of service, which afforded him no particular opportunities of obtaining distinction. Having been appointed to the Centurion, he for two years cruised in the North Sea; and on that station he commanded while the pretender was in Edinburgh, and until the arrival of Admiral Byng. He was now promoted to the command of the Eagle, of sixty-four guns; and in 1747 he was despatched in a small squadron for the purpose of intercepting the French fleet, llomeward-bound from St Domingo. On the 20th of June they fell in with this fleet off Cape Ortegal. The French men-of-war deserted their convoy during the night, and no fewer than forty-eight merchantmen were captured. Rodney afterwards joined the squadron of Admiral Hawke, and bore a distinguished part in the action off Finisterre on the 14th of October in the same year. Near the close of this war, a small squadron, of which the Eagle was one, fell in with a Spanish fleet from the West Indies, consisting of twelve sail of the line with a rich convoy, and, notwithstanding their own inferiority, they took from them six sail of merchantmen.

Captain Rodney was appointed to the Rainbow in March 1748, and was soon afterwards sent as governor and commander-in-chief on the Newfoundland station. This was his first appearance with the rank of commodore. He had received particular instructions to discover, if possible, an island in the Western Ocean, said to be in lat. 49. N., about three hundred leagues from Britain. After cruising fourteen days to no purpose, he sailed for St John’s, the seat of his government. In this station he continued till the month of October 1752, when he returned home to take his seat in parliament, having been elected for the borough of Saltash.

In May 1757 he sailed in the Dublin, of seventy-four guns, with Hawke’s expedition for the bombardment of [7:19:310]Rochefort; and in February 1758, with Boscawen in the expedition against Louisbourg. On the 19th of May 1759 he was promoted to the rank of rear-admiral, and was immediately appointed to the command of a small squadron destined to bombard Havre de Grace. This service he performed in a very effectual manner; and having continued to keep the sea till the close of the ensuing year, he returned to Britain. In 1761 he was elected member of parliament for Penryn. On the 6th of October he hoisted his flag on board the Marlborough, having been appointed commander-in-chief at Barbadoes and the Leeward Islands, and to conduct the naval operations of the armament destined for the attack of Martinique. This island, together with St Lucia, was speedily reduced.

The admiral returned home on the 12th of August 1763. On the 21st of the preceding October he had been made vice-admiral of the blue. In 1764 he was created a baronet, and during the following year was appointed governor of Greenwich Hospital. In 1768 he was returned to parliament for Northampton. On the 18th of October 1770 he became vice-admiral of the white, and on the 24th of October 1771 vice-admiral of the red. During the latter year, on the 23d of January, he had been appointed commander-in-chief at Jamaica, and with this command was not permitted to retain the office of governor. Having returned to Britain, he struck his flag at Portsmouth on the 4th of September 1774.

Being inattentive, as many seamen are, to the rules of economy, his circumstances became so embarrassed that he was obliged to fly from his country, with very slight hopes of ever being able to return. He was in France when the ill-advised policy of that court prompted them to take a decided part with America against Great Britain; and it is said that some men in power, no strangers to the desperate state of Sir George’s affairs, offered him a high command in the French navy, if he would carry arms against his own country. This offer he rejected with becoming indignation. Soon after this gallant behaviour, the duke de Chartres, afterwards the infamous Orleans, told Sir George that he was himself to have a command in the fleet to be opposed to that under the command of his countryman Keppel; and with an insulting air asked him what he thought would be the consequence of their meeting. “That my countryman will carry your highness with him to learn English,” was the high-spirited reply. These statements do not perhaps rest on sufficient authority; but we learn from his own correspondence, that Maréchal Biron expressed his willingness to advance whatever sum he might require, even to the amount of two thousand pounds. Having accepted a loan of a thousand louis, he was in 1778 enabled to pay his bills in Paris, and to revisit his own country. He was speedily enabled to discharge this debt, and to make a satisfactory arrangement with his creditors.

On the 1st of October 1779, Rodney was appointed commander-in-chief of Barbadoes and the Leeward Islands.

His first exploit after this appointment was on the 8th of

January ensuing, when he took sixteen Spanish transports, together with seven ships and vessels of war, which had left St Sebastian’s a week before. On the 16th of the same month he fell in with the Spanish fleet, consisting of eleven sail of the line, under the command of Don Juan de Langara; of which one was blown up during the engagement, five were taken and carried into Gibraltar, among which was the admiral’s ship, and the rest were much shattered. In April the same year, he fell in with the French fleet under the command of Admiral Guichen, at Martinique, whom he compelled to fight, and whom he com pletely beat; though, from the shattered state of his own fleet, and the unwillingness of the enemy to risk another action, he took none of their ships. The successful efforts of the gallant admiral during the year 1780 were generally applauded through the nation. He received the thanks of both houses of parliament, and addresses of thanks from various parts of Great Britain, and the islands to which his victories were more particularly serviceable. In December the same year, he made an unsuccessful attempt, together with General Vaughan, on St Vincent’s. In 1781, he continued his exertions, with much success, in defending the West India Islands; and, along with the above-named general, he conquered St Eustatius, on which occasion his conduct to the inhabitants has been much, though perhaps unjustly, censured. The island was certainly a nest of contraband traders. On the 12th of April 1782, he came to a close action with the French fleet under Count de Grasse; during which he sunk one ship and took five, of which the admiral’s ship, the Ville de Paris, was one. On the 22d of May, the thanks of both houses of parliament were voted to the admiral, his officers, and seamen, for this brilliant and decisive victory. He was appointed vice-admiral of Great Britain, and was raised to the peerage by the title of Baron Rodney of Stoke in Somersetshire. The House of Commons voted him an annual pension of L.2000. In the year 1793 this pension was permanently settled on the title; and in 1806 a pension of L.1000 Irish was granted to his grandson for life. Having been superseded, very ungraciously, in his command, Lord Rodney once more steered a homeward course. He landed at Bristol on the 15th of September 1782, and next day proceeded to join his family at Purbrook near Portsmouth. He survived for ten years, having died on the 24th of May 1792, after he had completed the seventy-fourth year of his age. ^[1. The Life and Correspondence of the late Admiral Lord Rodney. By Major-General Mundy. Lond. 1830, 2 vols. 8vo. The author married Lord Rodney’s youngest daughter. ]

Lord Rodney had been twice married; first to the sister of the earl of Northampton, and next to the daughter of John dies, Esq. With her he did not reside for several years before his death. He was succeeded in his title and estates by his son George, who married, in 1781, Martha, daughter of the Right Hon. Alderman Harley, by whom he had issue.