drop shed in that action I was engaged in.” His king,
Charles, had suffered the same death by beheading on
30 January 1649.
References: Beatty, John Louis, Warwick and Holland:
Being the Lives of Robert and Henry Rich (Denver: Alan
Swallow, 1965); Doyle, James William Edmund, “Hol-
land,” in The Official Baronage of England, Showing the
Succession, Dignities, and Offices of Every Peer from 1066 to
1885, with Sixteen Hundred Illustrations, 3 vols. (London:
Longmans, Green, 1886), II:207; Dalton, Charles, Life
and Times of General Sir Edward Cecil, Viscount Wimble-
don, Colonel of an English Regiment in the Dutch Service,
1605–1631, and one of His Majesty’s Most Honourable
Privy Council, 1628–1638 (London: Sampson Low, Mar-
ston, Searle, & Rivington, 1885), I:179; MacCormick,
Charles, ed., The Secret History of the Court and Reign of
Charles the Second, by a Member of his Privy Council... ,
2 vols. (London: J. Bew, 1792), I:276.
Hood, Samuel, first viscount Hood (1724–
1816) British admiral
Samuel Hood was born in Butleigh, Somersetshire, En-
gland, on 12 December 1724, the son of Samuel Hood,
the village vicar. Hood entered the Royal Navy in 1741
at the age of 16, serving with George Brydges rod-
ney, later first baron Rodney of Stoke-Rodney, aboard
the Ludlow Castle, and he was promoted to the rank of
lieutenant. He was named as commander of the sloop
Jamaica in 1754 and, after several additional postings,
took temporary command of the 50-gun Antelope in
- During the Seven Years’ War (1756–63), while
still only in temporary command, Hood captured a
French frigate (1759) and took two privateers (pirate
ships carrying contraband). For this service, he was
given command of the frigate Bideford. He served in the
English Channel and in the Mediterranean during the
remainder of the war.
Hood was then posted to the North American Sta-
tion from 1767 to 1770, serving as “commander-in-chief
of all the men-of-war of these parts.” After returning to
England, he was named as commissioner of the dock-
yard at Portsmouth and as governor of the Naval Acad-
emy. In 1780, created a baronet, he was recalled to active
duty, promoted to rear admiral, and dispatched to the
West Indies to help the English navy against the French
in what became the American Revolution.
In early 1781, he took up his post as second in
command under his old shipmate, George Rodney.
Later that year, he fought an indecisive battle against
the French admiral the comte de Grasse in Chesa-
peake Bay (5 September 1781). In the Battle of the
Saints (9–12 April 1782) near the island of Dominica,
Rodney and Hood, commanding a fleet of 36 ships,
defeated the French under de Grasse with 33 ships.
However, due to Rodney’s negligence (attributed to
his age—he was approximately 64 years old), de Grasse
had been able to dock at Fort Royal, Dominica. Rod-
ney returned to England, and for his service, Hood was
created Baron Hood of Catherington (an Irish peer-
age) and given command of the English fleet for the
remainder of the war.
In 1784, Hood was elected to a seat in Parliament,
but he was forced to relinquish the seat when he was
appointed a lord of the Admiralty. Nevertheless, he was
elected to this seat again in 1790. In 1793, the outbreak
of hostilities after the French Revolution (1789) caused
the British government to dispatch Hood to the Medi-
terranean to serve as commander in chief of English
naval forces in that area. From May 1793 until October
1794, he provided important leadership, occupying the
city of Toulon when French royalists on the side of King
Louis XVI requested his assistance. When the French
under naPoleon forced him to leave, Hood took his
forces to Corsica, occupied it, and transferred his com-
mand there.
In October 1794, Hood was recalled to England
and thereafter did not serve at sea, being removed from
command altogether in 1795. Named as the governor of
Greenwich Hospital in 1796, he was styled as Viscount
Hood of Whitley that same year. He held this post until
his death on 27 January 1816. His brother, Alexander
Hood, first viscount of Bridport (1727–1814), was also
a noted British naval officer.
Historian Michael Duffy sums up Hood’s career
and influence:How did Hood acquire his immense and influen-
tial stature with the able officers who commanded
the Royal Navy to victory in the Revolutionary
and Napoleonic Wars? Unlike his almost equally
long-lived brother, Alexander, who rose to the
command of the Channel Fleet and to a peer-
age as Lord Bridport, he did not have chief com-
mand in a naval victory. He missed his chance inhooD, SAmuel, FiRSt viScount hooD