1813	Boats of Swiftsure Board Charlemagne	183

in boarding and cutting the cables of 16 vessels under a most galling fire. Two of the vessels sank at the entrance of the harbour, but the remaining 14, deeply laden, were brought out. The loss to the British in performing this service, which was over in three hours, amounted to two men killed and 10 wounded.

On the 8th of November, at 8 h. 30 m. p.m., the boats of the 74-gun ship Revenge, Captain Sir John Gore, under the orders of Lieutenant William Richards, assisted by Lieutenant Thomas Blak1ston, Captain of marines John Spurin, and master's mates and midshipmen Thomas Quelch, William Rolfe, Henry Fisher, Benjamin Mainwaring, John Harwood, Valentine Munbee, George Fraser, Robert Maxwell, Charles M. D. Buchanan, and John P. Davey, were sent into the harbour of Palamos, to endeavour to cut out a French felucca privateer. At 11 p.m. Lieutenant Richards and his party boarded and carried the privateer, without having a man hurt, and by 1 a.m. on the 9th had brought her alongside the Revenge.

On the 9th Captain Ussher sent the boats of the Undaunted, under the orders of Lieutenant Joseph Robert Hownam, assisted by Lieutenant Thomas Hastings and Lieutenant of marines Harry Hunt, also the boats of the Guadeloupe brig, under Lieutenant George Hurst and Mr. Alexander Lewis the master, into Port-Nouvelle. The batteries were stormed and carried in the most gallant manner, and two vessels captured and five destroyed, without a casualty.

On the 26th. of November, off Cape Rousse, island of Corsica, the boats of the British 74-gun ship Swiftsure, Captain Edward Stirling Dickson, under the orders of Lieutenant William Smith, the 4th, were detached in pursuit of the French privateer schooner Charlemagne, of eight guns and 93 men, who was using every exertion by sweeping to effect her escape. On the approach of the boats, the privateer made every preparation for resistance, and reserved her fire till the boats had opened theirs ; when the schooner returned it in the most determined manner for some minutes, until the boats got close alongside. The British then boarded the Charlemagne on the bow and quarter and instantly carried her ; but not without a serious loss, having had one midshipman (Joseph Douglas) and four seamen killed, and two lieutenants (Rose Henry Fuller and John Harvey, the latter mortally), one lieutenant of marines (James Robert Thompson), one midshipman (----- Field), and 11 seamen wounded.

On the 25th of November, 1812, the two new French 40-gun frigates Aréthuse, Commodore Pierre-Francois-Henry-Etienne Bouvet, and Rubis, Captain Louis-Francois Ollivier, sailed from Nantes on a cruise. In January these two frigates, accompanied by a Portuguese prize-ship, the Serra, steered for the coast of Africa, and on the 27th, when off Tamara, one of the Isles de Los, the Rubis, who was ahead, discovered and chased a brig,

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