Herbert Clifford

Captain Herbert John Clifford (1789, Nova Scotia – 9 September 1855, Tramore, Waterford, Ireland) was an officer in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars and the founder of the Loochoo Naval Mission (1843).

[1] In 1818, he published Vocabulary of the Language Spoken at the Great Loo-Choo Island, in the Japan Sea, which "remained the single most important source on Ryukyuan in the West for decades.

He was on board HMS Leander when it captured the French frigate Ville de Milan on 23 February 1805.

During the Napoleonic Wars, he fought in the Mauritius campaign of 1809–1811 and was at the Invasion of Isle de France and was chosen as the bearer of despatches to England.

[3] Author Patrick O'Brian wrote about Captain Clifford on board HMS Boadicea is his novel The Mauritius Command.