Benedictus spent the next six years aboard her, and in her assisted at the capture of Admiral Jean-Baptiste Perrée's squadron of three frigates and two brigs on 19 June 1799.

[2] Adamant was ordered to escort a convoy of East Indiamen as far as the Cape of Good Hope and on 6 May 1806 he assisted in the capture of the 30-gun Spanish frigate Reparadora.

In August 1807 he moved to the 32-gun HMS Daedalus and served under a succession of commanders, Frederick Warren, William Ward, and Samuel Hood Inglefield.

Kelly was then given command of the boats of Daedalus and the frigate HMS Aurora and sent to chase down and capture the officers and men of the privateers, who had escaped upriver.

He then spent a period on half-pay without active employment, despite petitioning the Admiralty for a posting during the War of 1812 and Lord Exmouth's expedition to Algiers.

[5][6] He left £200,000 for the establishment of Kelly College, built at Tavistock, as a boarding school "for the sons of Naval Officers and other gentlemen".