Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The important and rare Post Captain’s Naval Gold Medal awarded to Admiral of the Red the Hon. Sir Thomas Pakenham, G.C.B., Captain of the 74-gun H.M.S. Invincible at the memorable ‘Glorious First of June 1794’

Naval Small Gold Medal 1794-1815, the reverse engraved in capitals ‘THE HON: THOMAS PAKENHAM CAPTAIN OF H.M.S. THE INVINCIBLE ON THE 1 OF JUNE MDCCXCIV + THE FRENCH FLEET DEFEATED +’, enclosed within plain gold band and glass lunettes, small integral ring for suspension from later gold wire straight suspension, fitted with gold three-pronged ribbon buckle, good very fine £60,000-£80,000

Shown by Spink at British Numismatic Society, February 1927; Baldwin’s 1936; Glendining’s, May 1946 (£115); John Barnett Collection 1963.

For Earl Howe’s dramatic and overwhelming victory on 1 June 1794, His Majesty King George III presented Gold Chains to six of the seven Flag Officers, as well as to the Captain of the Fleet, Sir Roger Curtis, Kt. (the First Captain of the Queen Charlotte). It was then announced that His Majesty had signified his intention to institute a Naval Gold Medal to reward the admirals and captains who were ‘conspicuous for courage and conduct’ in that action, as well as those who might distinguish themselves on future occasions. Immediate measures were then taken to design and manufacture these new medals, but it was nearly two and a half years before they were ready. The larger medal was given only to Flag Officers, Commodores and Captains of the Fleet, which in this case meant all seven recipients of the Gold Chains to which they now appended the large medal. The smaller medal went to fifteen captains of ships of the line, whilst captains of the 11 repeating frigates, which did not lie in the line of battle, were ineligible for the award.

The Honourable Thomas Pakenham was born on 29 September 1757, fourth son of Thomas, 1st Lord Longford. He was the younger brother of Captain Lord Longford who commanded the America 74 at the Battle of Ushant on 27 July 1778, and was the uncle of Major-General Sir Edward Pakenham who was killed at the Battle of New Orleans in 1814.

He entered the Royal Navy at an early age in 1771 on board the Southampton frigate, with Captain John MacBride, with whom he moved to the Orpheus in 1773. In 1774 he was on the coast of Guinea with William Cornwallis in the Pallas, and in 1775 was Acting-Lieutenant of the Sphinx on the coast of North America. In the following year he was promoted by Lord Shuldham to be Lieutenant of the frigate Greyhound, and while in her saw much boat service, in the course of which he was severely wounded. In 1778 he joined the Courageux, commanded by Lord Mulgrave, in the fleet under Keppel, and was present in the Battle of Ushant on 27 July.

In the following spring he was moved into the Europe, going to North America with the flag of Rear-Admiral Mariot Arbuthnot, and on 21 September 1779 was promoted to the command of the 14-gun sloop Victor, newly captured from the enemy. He was then sent to the Jamaica station, where, on 2 March 1780, he was posted by Sir Peter Parker the elder, as Captain, to the 22-gun San Carlos, as a reward for his distinguished services as Acting-Captain of the Bristol, under Commodore Cornwallis. His old wound, however, received while in the Greyhound, broke out again, and compelled him to return to England in the autumn.

In December 1780 he was appointed to the Crescent of 28 guns and 198 men, attached to the fleet under George Darby, which relieved Gibraltar in April 1781, and was sent on to Menorca in company with the Flora, under William Peere Williams-Freeman. On their return journey, in passing through the straits, they fell in, on 30 May, with two Dutch frigates. In the ensuing Battle of Cape St Mary, one of the Dutch frigates, the Castor (commanded by Pieter Melvill van Carnbee), struck to the Flora, while the other, the 36-gun Den Briel, overpowered and captured the Crescent. The Crescent was immediately recaptured by the Flora, the Den Briel making her escape; but both Crescent and Castor had received so much damage in the action that they fell into the hands of two French frigates on the way home, 19 June, the Flora escaping. Pakenham had, however, refused to resume the command of the Crescent, maintaining that by his surrender to the Den Briel his commission was cancelled, and that when recaptured the ship was on the same footing as any other prize.

For the loss of his ship he was tried by court-martial and honourably acquitted, it being proved that he did not strike the flag until, by the fall of her masts and the disabling of her guns, further resistance was impossible. In the month of July following, Captain Pakenham was tried by a court-martial at Portsmouth, for having struck his colours to the Dutch frigate, and the following highly honourable sentence was pronounced:
‘The Court are unanimously of opinion, that the Hon. Captain Pakenham throughout the action, in a variety of instances, behaved with the coolest and ablest judgement, and with the firmest and most determined resolution; and that he did not strike the Crescent’s colours until he was totally unable to make the smallest defence; the court therefore doth unanimously and honourably acquit the Hon. Captain Pakenham.
The Court cannot dismiss Captain Pakenham, without expressing their admiration of his conduct on this occasion, wherein he has manifested the skill of an able and judicious seaman, and the intrepidity of a gallant officer; and from the great and extraordinary number of killed and wounded on board the Crescent, as well as the state she was in at the time of her surrender, their highest approbation of the support given by the officers and men to their Captain, and of their courage and steadiness during the action; a circumstance that, at the time it reflects honour on them, does no less credit and honour to the discipline kept up by Captain Pakenham.’

He was therefore at once appointed to the frigate Minerva, of 38 guns, which he commanded in the following year at the relief of Gibraltar by Lord Howe.

At the commencement of the war with revolutionary France, in 1793, we find him commanding the Invincible, of 74 guns, attached to the Channel Fleet, under the orders of Earl Howe. On the glorious 1st June, in the following year, that ship acquired at least her due portion of renown, having, by her heavy and animated fire, in a little while, so crippled and annoyed a French 84-gun ship, that she bore up and became an easy conquest to the Queen Charlotte. On this memorable day, the Invincible lost her main-top-mast; had her fore and main lower-masts and yards shot through; rigging and sails much cut; 14 men killed and 31 wounded. So little, however, did her commander think of his ship’s casualties, that on seeing the crippled state of the Queen Charlotte, he sent an officer expressly to say to the Earl Howe, Commander-in-Chief, that the Invincible was sufficiently manageable to bear his flag. The boat that conveyed this message afterwards took possession of the subdued ship.

The honours that were conferred upon Earl Howe and his brave associates, were commensurate with the victory they had achieved, Captain Pakenham being one of the officers who were named in his Lordship’s official despatch, as having ‘particular claim to his notice’, and subsequently honoured with a gold medal for their distinguished conduct.

He was nominated a Colonel of Marines in 1790, and in 1795 he was turned over to the 84-gun ship Juste, in the capture of which, on 1 June, he had had a principal hand. He held the command of this ship until the end of October 1796, after which he had no further active service in the navy.

In 1783, Pakenham had entered the Irish House of Commons for Longford Borough and sat until 1790. Subsequently, he represented Kells until 1798 and again Longford Borough until the Act of Union in 1801.

On 14 February 1799, he was promoted to be Rear-Admiral, becoming Vice-Admiral on 23 April 1804, and Admiral on 31 July 1810. He was appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Military Order of the Bath in May 1820, and was advanced in rank to Admiral of the Red on 19 July 1821. He was afterwards for some time Master-General of the Ordnance in Ireland, and died Senior Admiral of the Red on 2 February 1836.

He married in 1785 Louisa Anne, daughter of the Right Hon. John Staples, and granddaughter of William Conolly of Castletown House, Co. Kildare. They had issue a large family of eight sons and seven daughters, of whom Edward, his eldest son, became an M.P.; his second son joined the East India Company, and his fourth son, John, entered the Royal Navy in 1804, was posted Captain in 1826, and married the daughter of Rear-Admiral Sir Home Riggs Popham. His fifth son, Sir Richard Pakenham, was a diplomat who served as British ambassador to Mexico, the United States and Portugal, and his seventh son, Lieutenant Henry Pakenham R.N., died in April 1839.