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Sir William Symonds CB FRS (24 September 1782 – 30 March 1856, aboard the French steamship ''Nil'', Strait of Bonifacio, Sardinia)Complete List of Royal Society Fellows 1660-2007
page 345.
was Surveyor of the Navy in the Royal Navy from 9 June 1832 to October 1847, and took part in the naval reforms instituted by the Whig First Lord of the Admiralty Sir
James Robert George Graham Sir James Robert George Graham, 2nd Baronet (1 June 1792 – 25 October 1861) was a British statesman, who notably served as Home Secretary and First Lord of the Admiralty. He was the eldest son of Sir James Graham, 1st Baronet, by Lady Ca ...
in 1832.


Life


Early life

Symonds was the second son of naval captain Thomas Symonds (1731–1792) and his second wife, and first went to sea on, , in September 1794. Serving in
Lord Bridport Admiral Alexander Hood, 1st Viscount Bridport, KB (2 December 17262 May 1814), of Cricket St Thomas, Somerset, was an officer of the British Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary Wars and Napoleonic Wars. Origins He was a younger son of ...
's fleet at the Battle of Groix on 23 June 1795 and during the 1797 Spithead mutiny, he was promoted to lieutenant on 14 October 1801. However, despite service at sea for the whole duration of the Napoleonic Wars (in which experiences of being outsailed by French ships left him with an obsession for speed, wide beams and sharp design in his later designs for sailing ships) and showing fine seamanship, he was promoted no further (though between 1819 and 1825 he was captain of the port at Malta).


Experiments in naval architecture

Using a minor legacy from Admiral Sir William Cornwallis (who left his estate to his best friend's widow, Symonds' sister), in 1821 Symonds built an experimental yacht, which was copied by the rich yachtsman George Vernon, who aided his publication of a pamphlet on naval architecture. Vernon also convinced the Admiralty to employ Symonds as a
corvette A corvette is a small warship. It is traditionally the smallest class of vessel considered to be a proper (or " rated") warship. The warship class above the corvette is that of the frigate, while the class below was historically that of the slo ...
designer, with promotion to
commander Commander (commonly abbreviated as Cmdr.) is a common naval officer rank. Commander is also used as a rank or title in other formal organizations, including several police forces. In several countries this naval rank is termed frigate captain. ...
, by standing his surety with a bond of £20,000 should Symonds fail in his designs, and by then introducing him to the Duke of Portland in December 1826. Of his two yacht designs for the Duke, one ( ''Pantaloon'', 1832) was later bought by the Admiralty for adaptation as a 10 gun
brig A brig is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: two masts which are both square rig, square-rigged. Brigs originated in the second half of the 18th century and were a common type of smaller merchant vessel or warship from then until the ...
. When Portland entered
George Canning George Canning (11 April 17708 August 1827) was a British Tory statesman. He held various senior cabinet positions under numerous prime ministers, including two important terms as Foreign Secretary, finally becoming Prime Minister of the Unit ...
's Cabinet in April 1827, he then promoted Symonds as a designer to the Lord High Admiral, the Duke of Clarence, who appointed Symonds to the royal yacht and granted him his captaincy on 5 December the same year. Sailing trials in 1827 and 1831 were won by Symonds' entries, and (with Clarence's accession as William IV, the Whig abolition of the Navy Board and Earl Grey's ministry) he was taken on to design a 50 gun frigate, which he named after his patron.


Naval surveyor

Symonds was appointed the Surveyor of the Navy on 9 June 1832 by Sir James Graham, the Whig First Lord of the Admiralty. He was intended to control the Navy's dockyards and shipbuilding programme, but (thanks to his title of Surveyor of the Navy and the vague wording of the instructions given him) he also began to meddle in ship design, forcing the Navy to adopt his designs despite much opposition to this, to his appointment being a political one rather than one based on aptitude, and to his position as a favourite of the king (who, for example, omitted to inform the Admiralty of his intention to make him a Knight Bachelor but still went ahead with it, on 15 June 1836 at
St James's Palace St James's Palace is the most senior royal palace in London, the capital of the United Kingdom. The palace gives its name to the Court of St James's, which is the monarch's royal court, and is located in the City of Westminster in London. Altho ...
). He also became a Fellow of the Royal Society in June 1835. Ship-design was no longer the important part of Surveyor's role that it had been, and so Symonds was its first holder to have been an amateur ship-designer rather than a professional shipwright. Nevertheless, the observations and experience gained in such design allowed him to introduce radical changes to ship design, such as widening Navy ships' beams and making their bottoms more wedge-shaped (to decrease the amount of ballast needed and to increase stability, speed, stowage and the weight of guns that could be carried). (However, with the decline in the sailing navy, most of Symonds' huge wooden sailing designs - larger, heavier-rigged, wider-beamed, more spacious for working their guns and heavier armament than ever before - became obsolete with the decline of sail and were later converted to steam-screw.) During his time in office, he also took on George Rennie's suggestion of creating watertight compartments in ships (something first suggested for the Royal Navy by Samuel Bentham). In 1840 he privately published a book of sketches of men-of-war and yachts, under the title "Naval Costume". He also travelled much overseas, accurately observing the timber resources and navies of foreign powers such as the Russian Baltic and Black Sea Fleets (whose inefficiency at a time of increased Anglo-Russian tension proved a useful observation). This informed his reporting of British oak supplies from the forest of Dean and the New Forest, improved timber supplies and (along with a new means of construction invented by the talented Chief Clerk in the Surveyor's Office,
John Edye John Edye FRS (7 August 1789 – 1 March 1873)School of Naval Architecture (closed in 1832), and the "traditional" school led by Master Shipwrights from the Royal Dockyards. Autocratic in office, demanding obedience and support from subordinates and superiors alike and taking any criticism or suggested alteration to his designs as a personal slight, he turned on his opponents in the pamphlet ''Facts versus Fiction'' (1844). Determined to prove Symonds' designs to be failures, the new Tory
Board of Admiralty The Board of Admiralty (1628–1964) was established in 1628 when Charles I put the office of Lord High Admiral into commission. As that position was not always occupied, the purpose was to enable management of the day-to-day operational requi ...
sent out successive " Experimental Squadrons" in 1844, 1845 and 1846. Outside factors such as individual captains' political bias or stowage's influence on how well a ship sailed were underappreciated in these trials - the success of Symonds' designs depended on the skill of their captains (they handled badly under clumsy ones, or ones opposed to him, but very well under skilled commanders) - whilst his larger ships were fast but unsuited to use as gun platforms due to rolling too rapidly. They did, however, handle well in all but the worst weather. Nevertheless, in the face of the Tory First Sea Lord Lord Ellenborough's institution of a "Committee of Reference" in 1846 to oversee Symonds and modify his designs according to the Board's wishes, a command to make a radical alteration to his design for a new 90 gun ship, and loss of most of his Whig support even on their return to power in July 1846, Symonds resigned his role in October 1847 (despite retaining the Duke of Portland's continued support), and was succeeded by Sir
Baldwin Walker Admiral Sir Baldwin Wake Walker, 1st Baronet, (6 January 1802 – 12 February 1876) was Surveyor of the Navy from 1848 to 1861. and was responsible for the Royal Navy's warship construction programme during the 1850s naval arms race and at th ...
.


Retirement

Despite his fall from grace, he was granted an Order of the Bath (civil) on 1 May 1848, and in June 1853 James Graham, having again become First Sea Lord, was convinced by the Duke of Portland to take Symonds back on, as the Queen's naval Aide-de-Camp. Becoming a retired
rear admiral Rear admiral is a senior naval flag officer rank, equivalent to a major general and air vice marshal and above that of a commodore and captain, but below that of a vice admiral. It is regarded as a two star "admiral" rank. It is often regarde ...
the following year, he and his third wife from then on lived abroad, principally in Malta and Italy, for reasons of his health. He died at sea in 1856, en route from Malta to
Marseilles Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...
, and was buried at the Protestant Cemetery at the latter. His will required the publication of a biography in his favour – this repeated the arguments over his sailing-ship designs despite the Navy's having long abandoned sail by this date.


Family

On 21 April 1808, William married Elizabeth Saunders Luscombe, daughter of Matthew Luscombe of Plymouth. They had one daughter and four sons: * Theresa Aubrina Symonds (1808 – 19 January 1872), married Daniel Smith Bockett, and had 18 children * William Cornwallis Symonds (1810–1841), eldest son, who became an army captain, a member of the
Royal Geographical Society The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers), often shortened to RGS, is a learned society and professional body for geography based in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1830 for the advancement of geographical scien ...
and Deputy Surveyor-General of New Zealand, but was drowned in November 1841 when a boat carrying him across the Manukau Harbour capsized. Symonds Street in Auckland is named after him. * Sir Thomas Matthew Charles Symonds (1811–1894), Royal Navy officer * Julian Frederick Anthony Symonds (1813–1852), Army surveyor * John Jermyn Symonds (1816–1883), who stayed in New Zealand after his brother William's death; Symonds Street in Onehunga is named after him. After Elizabeth's death from tuberculosis on 10 November 1817, William remarried on 10 March 1818, Elizabeth Mary, daughter of Rear-Admiral Philip Carteret, of Trinity Manor, Jersey. After her death, he married a third and final time, in 1851, to Susan Mary, daughter of the Rev. John Briggs.


Bibliography

*A. D. Lambert,'' The last sailing battlefleet: maintaining naval mastery, 1815–1850'' (1991) *J. A. Sharp, ''Memoirs of the life and services of Admiral Sir William Symonds'' (1858) *A. S. Turberville, ''A history of Welbeck Abbey and its owners'', 2 vols. (1938–9), vol. 2 *Cape Town University Library, Walker manuscripts (MSS) *NMM, Minto MSS · TNA: PRO, Admiralty MSS *University of Nottingham Library, Portland MSS *British Library, Martin MSS and Peel MSS *D. K. Brown, ''Before the ironclad'' (1990) *National Archives, Ellenborough MSS *C. J. Bartlett, ''Great Britain and sea power'', 1815–1853 (1963) *F. Boase, ''Modern English Biography: containing many thousand concise memoirs of persons who have died since the year 1850'', 6 vols. (privately printed, Truro, 1892–1921); repr.(1965) *Royal Military College of Canada, Kingston, Ontario, Massey Library, bound plans relating to system of classifying ships


See also

*


Footnotes


Sources

* *http://www.pdavis.nl/Experimental.htm
Falmouth Packet archive


* ttp://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?LinkID=mp61528 Portrait of him {{DEFAULTSORT:Symonds, William 1782 births 1856 deaths Royal Navy personnel of the French Revolutionary Wars Royal Navy personnel of the Napoleonic Wars Companions of the Order of the Bath Fellows of the Royal Society Military personnel from Bury St Edmunds Surveyors of the Navy People who died at sea Royal Navy admirals Knights Bachelor William