John Huntington, Master

[PMarione]

Not good news in fact:

As you found his first master warrant was dated 17 November 1796.

He joined the Naiad frigate on 4 February 1804 but was dismissed from the ship on 9 April 1805 by sentence of a Court Martial.

So he missed Trafalgar.

Maybe you can find the CM proceedings ?

@+P

[brian]

Small comfort Bob, but Court Martials did not necessarily result in hanging, flogging and disgrace. One CM merely removed a Master from his post (he took up another later) for overstaying his leave. Perhaps Huntington was in a simliar position. On the other hand Naiad could not have been a happy ship: the same year that he got into trouble, one lieutenant was court martialled for striking the First Lieutenant who was himself dismissed for ungentlemanly conduct.

Material on Masters at this time is patchy, but what is available can all be found in the National Archive at Kew. Alas, living where you do, you will need someone to do the work for you. If you are really keen you might want to check the following:
- the CM records for 1804 in adm 1/5366
- Steel's Navy Lists (published quarterly during the whole period) which lists all ships, officers and warrant officers (including Masters). There will be some copies of this in the National Library in Sydney.
and, in the NA -
Registers of Masters 1808-32 - adm106/1672-713
Masters' Passing Certificates 1660-1830 - adm 106/2908-50
Masters' Certificates of Service for Pension or Promotion 1800-1850 - adm 6/135-68
Half Pay correspondence, Masters 1819-22 - adm 11/5
Service Registers, Masters 1800-50 - adm 6/135-68
Succession Books , Masters etc 1770-1807 - adm 106/2899-901

Ships Muster Lists often say where a crew member came from and where he was posted thus enabling you (with a bit of luck) to trace part at least of someone's career. With Huntington the starting point would appear to be Naiad.

Brian

[PMarione]

Bob,

I didn't imply any "villainy" from the part of your ancestor, just that he missed Trafalgar and so is far more difficult to track.

As Brian says there was plenty of reasons for CM. For the officers (a Master was an important officer) most of the CM arose from inter-personal conflicts as there was no other way to solve them in a time when an unfortunate remark could lead to a duel for heavy drinkers who lived in a (very) confined space for years.
It often ended of one officer asking for a CM on another and the other doing the same, and the CM had to find some solomonian judgement.

The only really serious CM (besides mutiny stuff) were those about the losses of ships and embezzlements.
Sometimes CM were highly political like Palliser vs Keppel or Cochrane vs Gambier.

Moreover CM didn't seem to leave permanent blemish on careers: I have found that most of the officers "rendered incapable to serve in His Majesty's service" where reinstated by Order in Council (at least on half-pay) some months after.
Peter Heywood is a good example: he was condemned to be hanged for mutiny, was reprieved by the King, and made an honourable career being a Captain in 1803. He just only died too young to get his flag.

Huntington was "dismissed his ship" which was a benign sentence and so his "sin" must have been benign.

This is only a tought but Michael Phillips says:

[PMarione]

[PMarione]

Bob,

Thank you for this interesting info.

In fact for accounting purpose, the RN was using a lunar year of 13 months of 28 days ie 364 days and no leap year.
So a "month" was simply 4 weeks of 7 days ie 28 days and the 13 months explain why you can have 1y 12m.

Another problem is that log books starts the day at noon (the time to take a fix) so you can have one day difference between an English date and a French one.

@+P

[PMarione]

He could have been "acting master" but as such he would have received the pay and the time of a master.

Depends where the ship was and the time for the warrant to be issued : he had to pass an examination at Trinity House.

@+P