| Rowland Mainwaring | |
| Birth Date: | 31 December 1783 |
| Death Date: | 1862 (aged 73) |
| Branch: | Royal Navy |
| Branch Label: | Service |
| Battles: | |
Rowland Mainwaring, (1783–1862) was an English officer in the Royal Navy.
Rowland Mainwaring, born on 31 December 1783, was the eldest surviving son of Rowland Mainwaring, Esq., of Four Oaks, County Warwick, a field officer, by Jane, daughter of Captain Latham, Royal Navy.[1] He was a cousin of Rear-Admiral Thomas Francis Charles Mainwaring; and was the representative of an ancient Staffordshire family, settled for many centuries at Whitmore Hall, near Newcastle-under-Lyne.
He entered the Royal Navy in May 1795, on board the Jupiter, Captain William Lechmere, at Sheerness, and during that year became Midshipman of the Scipio, 64 guns, Captain Robert McDoual, on the West India station, where, after serving for a short time with Captain Francis Laforey in the frigate Beaulieu and Ganges in early 1796 he joined HMS Majestic Captains George Blagden Westcott and Robert Cuthbert, bearing the flag at first of Sir John Laforey.
He was also on board HMS Majestic at the battle of the Nile, after which, in consequence of Captain Westcott having been killed, he was, in October 1798, removed into the frigate Thalia, commanded by Lord Henry Paulet, under whom he was further employed in the Defence, 74 guns, on different European stations, until within a short period of his being made Lieutenant, on 7 December 1801, he was appointed lieutenant of the Harpy sloop, Captains Charles Worsley Boys and Edmund Heywood.
Mainwaring's subsequent appointments were to the frigate Leda, under Captain Robert Honyman; the Terrible, 74 guns, under Captain Lord Henry Paulet; and, as first lieutenant, to the Narcissus and Menelaus frigates, and in the latter ships he was actively employed, off Brest, in the Bay of Biscay, on the coast of Portugal, in the West Indies, and on the southern coasts of France and Spain, under the successive commands of Captains Charles Malcolm, the Hon. Frederick Whitworth Aylmer, and Sir Peter Parker, Bart., until some time after his promotion to the rank of commander, by commission dated 13 August 1812. On 18 August 1807, he assisted in capturing the Spanish national schooner Cantela, pierced for twelve guns; and in April 1809, he was present at the reduction of the Saintes, near Guadaloupe.[2] The services in which he participated between July 1809 and December 1810 were in connexion with Captain Frederick Aylmer.[3] [4] The following is the copy of an official letter written by Sir Peter Parker, who was once Mainwaring's messmate in the Leda:
The St. Joseph was pierced for sixteen guns, but had none mounted. One of the batteries on shore suffered severely from the fire of the launch of the Menelaus. On 27 April 1812, while off Toulon, the Menelaus was approached by two French frigates, one of them of the largest class, and both under a press of sail. The British ship lay-to and cleared for action; but to the great surprise of all on board, the enemy hauled their wind when nearly within gun-shot, and declined giving battle. In the ensuing month, Sir Peter Parker reported as follows:
In July 1812 the Menelaus was cruising on the coast of Italy, and Sir Peter Parker reported the capture of the French xebec La Paix, mounting two long 6-pounders, with a complement of thirty men, "under circumstances peculiarly honourable to Lieutenant Mainwaring, who boarded and brought her out from within pistol-shot of the towers of Terracina, under a galling fire. If any thing from my pen", he continues, "could do justice to his merit, I would write it with pleasure, but that I feel to be impossible. The Menelaus was anchored well within range of the batteries; the distance, however, in consequence of the shoal water, prevented her fire being of that effect, against such strong defences, which was intended. I have to regret one seaman killed by a grape-shot."[5]
During the night of 2 September 1812, the French letter of marque St. Esprit, pierced for twelve guns, but with only two six-pounders mounted, was cut out from the river Mignone, near Civita Vecchia, under a heavy fire from the batteries. This service was performed in a calm, without loss, and in a manner "highly creditable to Lieutenant Mainwaring", by whom the boats were again commanded. Sir Peter Parker's next official report was to the following effect:
After commanding for some time the Gorgon, 44 guns, armed en flûte, at Port Mahon, Mainwaring was successively appointed acting captain of the Edinburgh, 74 guns, Undaunted and Euryalus frigates, and Caledonia first-rate, the latter ship bearing the flag of Sir Edward Pellew.[6] He was subsequently placed by that officer in the Kite sloop, and sent to the Archipelago, where he destroyed a French privateer, rescued a valuable merchantman which she had captured, and obtained from the Bey of Salonica a promise, that in future no vessels of the same description should be equipped in his harbours. He afterwards commanded the Paulina sloop, in which he obtained restitution of two merchant vessels, taken by an American privateer and carried to Tripoli, where he remained watching the enemy until the final cessation of hostilities, thereby preventing her from giving any further annoyance to the British trade in the Mediterranean. The Paulina was paid off, at Deptford, towards the close of 1815, from which period there is no official mention of Mainwaring, until his advancement to the rank of captain on 22 July 1830.
Rowland Mainwaring married, first, in January 1811, Sophia Henrietta, only child of Major William Duff, 20th Regiment, and daughter-in-law to Captain George Tobin, Royal Navy, CB. Secondly, in 1827, Eliza, daughter of the Rev. M. J. Hill, rector of Snailwell, in Cambridgeshire. His son, Rowland Mainwaring, midshipman of the Warspite, 76 guns, died at Port Jackson, of dysentery, on 27 October 1826.
| Escutcheon: | Argent, two bars, gules. |
| Motto: | Devant si je puis. |
| Crest: | Out of a ducal coronet, or, an ass's head, haltered, proper. |
| Rowland Mainwaring, Esq.[7] | |
Attribution: