Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Naval General Service 1793-1840, 1 clasp, Guadaloupe (J. L. Thompson.) extremely fine £2,000-£2,400

Seaby, July 1963; Christie’s, February 1982.

John L. Thompson is confirmed as Acting Master of H.M.S. Blonde at the capture of Guadaloupe.

John Last Thompson was born on 9 December 1779, and entered the Navy, 20 January 1804, as Acting-Master, on board the Snipe 12, Lieut-Commander Chas. Champion, employed on the Home station, where, and at Newfoundland and in the West Indies, he served as Master, from May 1805, until April 1810, in the Volcano bomb, Capt. Edward Killwick, Leveret 18, Capt. George Burgoyne Salt, Camilla 20, Capt. John Bowen, Dart receiving-ship (at Barbadoes), Capts. Duller and Bremer, and Blonde 42, Capts. Volant Vashon Ballard and William Paterson. When in the Volcano he was often in action with the enemy’s batteries and flotilla at Boulogne, and saw, as a volunteer, much hazardous boat-service. On 24 September 1809, being then in the Blonde, he offered, of his own accord, to cut out a privateer schooner from under two batteries in the south-east part of Guadeloupe; and while endeavouring to accomplish this object he lost his right arm, and was otherwise much injured in the side by a grape-shot shattering his musket. He was in consequence presented by the Patriotic Society with the sum of £150, and was allotted, 7 May 1810, a pension of £91. 5s. per annum. Prior to uniting in the Blonde in the operations immediately connected with the reduction of Guadeloupe, Mr. Thompson aided, in December 1809, in destroying, in Anse la Barque, the French 40-gun frigates Loire and Seine, together with a heavy battery by which they had been defended. He had witnessed in the same ship the surrender, in December 1807, of the Danish islands of St. Thomas and Ste. Croix. In May and July 1810, he was nominated Acting-Lieutenant of the Statira 38 and Neptune 98, both commanded by Capt. V. V. Ballard, with whom, in November of the same year, he returned to England. He was officially promoted 17 December following, and was lastly, from 1 August 1812 until 30 November 1814, employed in command of a Signal station at Gunton, near Lowestoffe. Lieutenant Thompson is married and has an only child. (O’Byrne’s Naval Biographical Dictionary refers)