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Updated: May 15, 2025
On the 26th of January, 1796, when the Indefatigable was lying in Hamoaze, after having been docked, the Dutton, a large East Indiaman, employed in the transport service, on her way to the West Indies with part of the 2nd, or Queen's regiment, was driven into Plymouth by stress of weather. She had been out seven weeks, and had many sick on board.
No sooner had the ship anchored than an order from Loral Keith was delivered to Captain Maitland, from which the following is an extract: Extract of an Order from Admiral Viscount Keith, G. C. B., addressed to Captain Maitland, of H. M. S. "Bellerophon," dated Ville de Paris, Hamoaze, 23d July 1815.
A dark squall came whistling down the Hamoaze; and standing there in the fringe of it he saw it strike and spread itself out like a fan over the open Sound at his feet, blotting the sparkle out of the water, while some of the small boats heeled to it and others ran up into the wind and lay shaking.
At first the feat of damming out such a high tide as that of the Hamoaze seemed very doubtful, because the stiff slate silt was a treacherous and difficult material to penetrate. But now, he thought, the driving would be rendered comparatively easy. With Captain Brandreth's consent the contractors ordered of me two of my steam hammer pile-drivers.
Later on real raids did materialise but by that time we had moved our billets to Bowden Battery, near Crownhill though for a few months we were ferried to and from Hamoaze House by lorry.
I was allocated quarters in a small room together with six or eight others; beds consisted of three bed-boards on two low wooden trestles augmented with three "biscuits" for comfort and the whole ensemble was completed with four blankets. I was directed to join a GOR team and shown the ropes as it were. The GOR was located on Mount Wise in the end room of Hamoaze House.
The only troops there in my time were of the Royal Corps of Signals, the odd Royal Artillery gunner or bombardier and some Royal Ulster Rifles doing guard duties. Initially the GOR shifts were taken to Hamoaze House by lorry but after a while the GOR was moved to Fort Austin though we always knew this fort as Egg Buckland Keep.
Having seen our prize into Hamoaze, and taken our officers and men out of her, we left her in charge of the prize agent, and repaired to our station off Ushant. We joined the fleet, consisting of thirteen sail of the line and two frigates.
On the morning of the 17th, there being nothing further to detain us in Hamoaze, steam was got up, and ere long we were leaving, for a few years, the old and familiar "Cambridge" and "Impregnable," the one-time homes of so many amongst us; and bidding king "Billy" and his royal consort a long good bye! until Devil's Point hides from us a picture many of us were destined never to behold again.
Here begins the broad estuary known as the Laira, at the mouth of which stands Plymouth, the town covering the land between the Laira and the Hamoaze, the estuary of the Tamar, with its adjoining suburbs of Stonehouse and Devonport.
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