Captain Henry Lambert RN (died 4 January 1813) was an officer of the British Royal Navy during the

French Revolutionary The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are consider ...

and

Napoleonic Wars The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of major global conflicts pitting the French Empire and its allies, led by Napoleon I, against a fluctuating array of European states formed into various coalitions. It produced a period of Fren ...

and the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States of America and its indigenous allies against the United Kingdom and its allies in British North America, with limited participation by Spain in Florida. It bega ...

. During his career, Lambert served in numerous ships and several military actions with success, participating in the capture of Île Bonaparte in the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by th ...

as second in command under

Josias Rowley Admiral Sir Josias Rowley, 1st Baronet, (1765 – 10 January 1842), known as "The Sweeper of the Seas", was an Anglo-Irish naval officer who commanded the campaign that captured the French Indian Ocean islands of Réunion and Mauritius in 1810 ...

. Lambert is best known however for being captain of the

frigate A frigate () is a type of warship. In different eras, the roles and capabilities of ships classified as frigates have varied somewhat. The name frigate in the 17th to early 18th centuries was given to any full-rigged ship built for speed and ...

HMS ''Java'' on 29 December 1812 when she was captured in the Mid-Atlantic by USS ''Constitution'' during the

. Lambert was mortally wounded in the battle and died seven days later in

Salvador Salvador, meaning "salvation" (or "saviour") in Catalan, Spanish, and Portuguese may refer to: * Salvador (name) Arts, entertainment, and media Music *Salvador (band), a Christian band that plays both English and Spanish music ** ''Salvador'' ( ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

Career

Lambert was the son of naval Captain Robert Lambert and entered the navy at an early age aboard HMS ''Cumberland'' in 1795. Serving in the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the e ...

, ''Cumberland'' was heavily engaged at the

Battle of Hyères A battle is an occurrence of combat in warfare between opposing military units of any number or size. A war usually consists of multiple battles. In general, a battle is a military engagement that is well defined in duration, area, and force ...

where the French

ship of the line A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which depended on the two colu ...

''Alcide'' was blown up. For the next six years, Lambert served in the Mediterranean on board the frigate HMS ''Virginie'' and the ship of the line HMS ''Suffolk'' before obtaining promotion to lieutenant in 1801. He later joined HMS ''Victorious'' and the following year HMS ''Centurion'' during the

Peace of Amiens The Treaty of Amiens (french: la paix d'Amiens, ) temporarily ended hostilities between France and the United Kingdom at the end of the War of the Second Coalition. It marked the end of the French Revolutionary Wars; after a short peace it se ...

.Lambert, Henry
''

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography The ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (''DNB'') is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published since 1885. The updated ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (''ODNB'') was published on 23 September ...

'',

J. K. Laughton Sir John Knox Laughton (23 April 1830 – 14 September 1915) was a British naval historian and arguably the first to delineate the importance of the subject of Naval history as an independent field of study. Beginning his working life as a mathe ...

, (subscription required), Retrieved 15 November 2008 At the outbreak of the

in 1803, Lambert was promoted to be commander of the 20-gun . In April 1804 he fought off the 36-gun French privateer ''Psyché'' on the East India Station. The following year he became a

post captain Post-captain is an obsolete alternative form of the rank of Captain (Royal Navy), captain in the Royal Navy. The term served to distinguish those who were captains by rank from: * Officers in command of a naval vessel, who were (and still are) ...

in command of the 44-gun frigate HMS ''San Fiorenzo''. As captain of ''San Fiorenzo'', in February 1805 he encountered the ''Psyché'' again, now a frigate of the French Navy. This time Lambert captured her. He then sailed ''San Fiorenzo'' back to Britain in June. In 1808 Lambert took command of the frigate HMS ''Iphigenia'', initially based at

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

, but later transferring back to the Indian Ocean where he had previously been successful. Attached to the squadron then besieging Île Bonaparte and Île de France under

, in July 1810 Lambert participated in the successful invasion of Île Bonaparte. The following month, Lambert was part of a frigate squadron led by

Samuel Pym Admiral Sir Samuel Pym KCB (1778–1855) was a British admiral, brother of Sir William Pym. In June 1788, Pym joined the Royal Navy as captain's servant of the frigate ''Eurydice''. He was promoted to lieutenant of the sloop ''Martin'', under ...

which attempted to raid the anchorage of

Grand Port Grand Port () is a district of Mauritius, situated in the east of the island. The name means "large port" in French. The district has an area of 260.3 km2 and the population estimate was at 112,997 as of 31 December 2015. History Grand Po ...

on Île de France. Due to poor charts of the numerous reefs within the harbour, the attack was a disaster, with two frigates destroyed and two more, including ''Iphigenia'' severely damaged and captured. Lambert and his crew were released from captivity following the successful invasion of Île de France and honourably acquitted in the court martial inquiring into the loss of their ship, which had also been recaptured. In 1812, Lambert was given command of HMS ''Java'', originally a French frigate captured during the Mauritius campaign. On 29 December, ''Java'' engaged the larger American frigate USS ''Constitution'' which captured ''Java'' in a bitter battle, Lambert opting to engage the American ship rather than flee in the hope of inflicting such damage that ''Constitution'' would be forced to retire to the US for repairs. In the event, ''Java'' was captured and destroyed and Lambert mortally wounded by a

musket A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually d ...

ball in the chest. Despite the efforts of the American surgeon aboard ''Constitution'', Lambert died on 4 January 1813 in

from the effects of his wounds and was buried the following day.

Literature

Henry Lambert is a character in the '' Fortune of War'', which is the sixth novel in Patrick O'Brian's

Aubrey–Maturin series The Aubrey–Maturin series is a sequence of nautical historical novels—20 completed and one unfinished—by English author Patrick O'Brian, set during the Napoleonic Wars and centring on the friendship between Captain Jack Aubrey of the Roy ...

. In the book, he is mortally wounded in combat aboard HMS ''Java'', just as in real life. He was also named in the fourth novel, ''

The Mauritius Command ''The Mauritius Command'' is the fourth naval historical novel in the Aubrey-Maturin series by Patrick O'Brian, first published in 1977. Aubrey is married and the father of twin girls, owner of a cottage with a fine observatory he built. He ...

'', as captain of the ''Iphigenia'', as in real life. Oddly, when Aubrey meets him in the '' Fortune of War'' there is no reference to their service together two years earlier.

Family

He was the son of Captain Robert Lambert RN, younger brother of Rear Admiral Robert Lambert RN, General Sir

John Lambert John Lambert may refer to: *John Lambert (martyr) (died 1538), English Protestant martyred during the reign of Henry VIII *John Lambert (general) (1619–1684), Parliamentary general in the English Civil War *John Lambert of Creg Clare (''fl.'' c. ...

, Major General Samuel Lambert and older brother of Admiral Sir George Lambert RN.

Notes

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lambert, Henry 1813 deaths Royal Navy officers British military personnel killed in the War of 1812 Royal Navy personnel of the French Revolutionary Wars Royal Navy personnel of the Napoleonic Wars Year of birth unknown