Henry Hart (Royal Navy officer)

There he was reunited with Pellew who made him his flag lieutenant and appointed him to a succession of acting commands, including to that of the frigate HMS Caroline in which he played an important role in the Raid on Griessie in 1807.

Hart's next command was the frigate HMS Sapphire which he sailed to the Leeward Islands to protect British interests in the warfare resulting from the Spanish American wars of independence.

There he was given temporary command of the frigate HMS Imogene to go on a diplomatic mission to Zanzibar where he secured the loyalty of the imaum and received a ship of the line as a gift for William IV.

[5] Hart left the East India Company for the Royal Navy in March 1796, becoming a midshipman on the frigate HMS Indefatigable under Captain Sir Edward Pellew in the English Channel.

[10][2] He also served in the Ferrol Expedition in August; while Impetueux bombarded fortifications he was given command of a small flat-bottomed boat and brought troops ashore on the beaches of the landings.

[2][8] Hart left Impetueux when the Peace of Amiens began in 1802, joining instead the ship of the line HMS Foudroyant which was the flagship of Admiral Lord Keith in the Mediterranean Fleet.

[4] He completed his necessary time of service as a midshipman on Foudroyant and was made an acting lieutenant on 2 April 1802 in the frigate HMS Medusa under Captain John Gore, still in the Mediterranean.

[2] He spent the rest of the Peace sailing on Medusa visiting all the French and Spanish ports in the Sea and acting as an escort to important personages such as Ferdinand IV and Sir William Drummond.

[2][14] His old captain Edward Pellew, described as his "sincere and valuable friend", was now a rear-admiral and Commander-in-Chief, East Indies and with Hart in Madras he took him from Medusa to serve as his flag lieutenant on board the ship of the line HMS Culloden.

[2] Caroline was serving with Pellew's squadron off Java and in August, before Hart's arrival, she had reconnoitred the Dutch-controlled port of Griessie and discovered Dutch ships of the line at anchor there.

[21] Around the same time as the Raid, Hart cut out a Dutch 14-gun sloop-of-war from Java's coast in broad daylight and soon afterwards participated in an action against a number of batteries and gun boats in the mouth of Manila Bay.

[2][25] While now a post-captain Hart did not receive immediate employment, possibly due to his ill health; again he relied on the favour of one of his old commanders, this time of the newly promoted Rear-Admiral Sir John Gore.

[19] In order to facilitate this transfer Hart was given acting-command, on 10 December 1813, of the post ship HMS Cyrus which was fitting out at Plymouth Dockyard to also join the Mediterranean Fleet.

[32] Hart and Sapphire sailed for Latin America to watch over British interests in Porto Bello to secure them against the Spanish American wars of independence igniting in the continent.

[26] Soon after these events Hart was sent in Sapphire on a diplomatic mission to Cartagena where he assisted the Governor-General of South America who had escaped there from Mexico due to the Mexican War of Independence.

[26][2] This was his last major service in the Americas before his health began to severely decline; this forced him to relinquish his command and return home to England, which he did by travelling as a passenger on the frigate HMS Tartar, arriving on 28 August 1820.

[2] After returning from Zanzibar he wrote a report on his negotiations that reassured the British establishment, with the imaum's political allegiance to Britain still strong and his relationship with America purely commercial.

[40][41][25] In the early 1840s Hart accompanied his friend Lord Prudhoe on a diplomatic mission to the United States and Canada, arriving in New York in July 1841 before making the journey to Halifax.

[45][46][47] Possibly influenced by his judicial work on the behalf of slaves in Jamaica, Hart supported a number of charitable endeavours in later life including the Merchant Seamans' Orphan Asylum.