The diary of Henry Teonge, chaplain on board H.M.'s ships Assistance, Bristol, and Royal Oak, 1675-1679 / transcribed from the original manuscript and edited with an introduction and notes by G.E. Manwaring.

  • Henry Teonge
Date:
[1927]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The diary of Henry Teonge, chaplain on board H.M.'s ships Assistance, Bristol, and Royal Oak, 1675-1679 / transcribed from the original manuscript and edited with an introduction and notes by G.E. Manwaring. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    8 Thomas Knevet (spelt Nevett in the MS.), Commander of the Giles ketch in 1663, and of the Lilly in the following year, whence he was shortly removed into the Richmond. At the commencement of the Dutch War he was particularly a&rve in distressing the enemy’s trade by the capture of a number of their merchant-vessels. Appointed to the Algier, 1672 ; and he appears to have been the firSt officer in the English navy who used the Stratagem of disguising his ship for the purpose of drawing the enemy within his reach. This he did while commanding the Algier by housing his guns, showing no colours. Striking even his Hag-Staff, and working his ship with much apparent awkwardness. He succeeded in deceiving a Dutch privateer off Aid- borough who had done much injury to our coaSting trade and eluded our swifteSt-sailing cruisers, so that she ran boldly down to him as to a certain prize, and discovered not her mistake until it was too late to escape. [Charnock, i, 87.] The Algier, to which Teonge refers, was wrecked 17th July, 1673. [Calendar of State Papers : Domestic, 1673, p. 442.] Knevet died in 1676, and in September of that year his widow was petitioning the Admiralty for relief. [Navy Records Soc., lvii, 348.] 9 South-EaSt of the Oaze. 10 The Kentish Flats extend five and a half miles from the coaSt between Reculvers and Warden Point. 11 See p. 261, note 20. 12 i.e. The lead-line for sounding. 13 The Galloper Shoal; now marked by a lightship. 14 See Preface, p. 3. 15 A small flag, or Streamer. 16 Spelt Scippio in the MS.: it belonged to the Turkey Company. 17 See Mariner’s Mirror, vol. ix, p. 10. This tune does not appear to have survived under this name. The Assistance carried six trum¬ peters, and Teonge refers to them several times. p«, is Leading sleeves, or leading Strings, from dade—to lead, support. Teonge’s use of the word is the earlieSt recorded in the New Eng. Dili. 19 The cuStom of saluting with an odd number of guns appears to have been observed from a very early period : the origin of the usage, as peculiar to the Navy, is not ascertained. Captain Nathaniel Butler, writing in 1634, says : “ The odd nomber is, in these wayes of salute and ceremonie, soe observable at sea, that whensoever anie gunnes are given in an even nomber, it is received for an infallible expression that either the Captaine, or maSler, or maSter gunner, is dead in the voiage. ... It is a generail cuStome alsoe uppon the deathe either of the captaine, maSter, maSter gunner of the shippe, or anie other prime officer, when the corpse is to be throwne over-