He gradually rose up the ranks, first to midshipman in 1805, on the Pomone and Captain at Lisbon and home, as well on the Boreas and Lavinia in British waters and the Mediterranean.

[2] He was then elevated lieutenant in 1809, where he joined the Theban in 1810, assisting with the capture of a French merchant brig near Dieppe in 1811, and then surviving the ship's wreck in 1812 during a storm while it was en route to India.

During this latter period, he is said to have attracted the attention of Napoleon, whom Meynell described as having "refined manners and gentlemanly bearing, joined with the frankness and openness of a sailor".

[2] The cessation of his naval career led to Meynell being appointed as a gentleman usher quarterly waiter to George IV upon his coronation, with likely thanks due to Francis Ingram-Seymour-Conway, 2nd Marquess of Hertford, the Lord Chamberlain, and his wife, the regent's mistress.

[4][2] Upon his retirement, he lived a "quite, unobtrusive life", eventually dying at the Grand Hotel du Louvre, Paris in March 1865, and then buried at the family vault in Ashley, Staffordshire.