GALLANT EXPLOIT OF CAPTAIN TYRREL.

The incidents of the war that happened in the West Indies, during these occurrences, may be reduced to a small compass. Nothing extraordinary was achieved in the neighbourhood of Jamaica, where admiral Coats commanded a small squadron, from which he detached cruisers occasionally for the protection of the British commerce; and at Antigua the trade was effectually secured by the vigilance of captain Tyrrel, whose courage and activity were equal to his conduct and circumspection. In the month of March, this gentleman, with his own ship the Buckingham, and the Cambridge, another of the line, demolished a fort on the island of Martinique, and destroyed four privateers riding under its protection; but his valour appeared much more conspicuous in a subsequent engagement, which happened in the month of November. Being detached on a cruise in his own ship, the Buckingham, by commodore Moore, who commanded at the Leeward Islands, he fell in with the Weazle sloop, commanded by captain Boles, between the islands of Montserrat and Gaudaloupe, and immediately discovered a fleet of nineteen sail, under convoy of a French ship of war carrying seventy-four cannon, and two large frigates. Captain Tyrrel immediately gave chase with all the sail he could carry, and the Weazle running close to the enemy, received a whole broadside from the large ship, which, however, she sustained without much damage; nevertheless, Mr. Tyrrel ordered her commander to keep aloof, as he could not be supposed able to bear the shock of large metal, and he himself prepared for the engagement. The enemy’s large ship, the Florissant, though of much greater force than the Buckingham, instead of lying-to for his coming up, made a running fight with her stern-chase, while the two frigates annoyed him in his course, sometimes raking him fore and aft, and sometimes lying on his quarter. At length he came alongside of the Florissant, within pistol shot, and poured in a whole broadside, which did considerable execution. The salutation was returned with equal vivacity, and a furious engagement ensued. Captain Tyrrel was wounded in the face, and lost three fingers of his right hand; so that, being entirely disabled, he was obliged to delegate the command of the ship to his first lieutenant, Mr. Marshal, who continued the battle with great gallantry until he lost his life; then the charge devolved to the second lieutenant, who acquitted himself with equal honour, and sustained a desperate fight against three ships of the enemy. The officers and crew of the Buckingham exerted themselves with equal vigour and deliberation, and captain Troy, who commanded a detachment of marines on the poop, plied his small arms so effectually, as to drive the French from their quarters. At length, confusion, terror, and uproar, prevailing on board the Florissant, her firing ceased, and her colours were hauled down about twilight; but her commander perceiving that the Buckingham was too much damaged in her rigging to pursue in any hope of success, ordered all his sails to be set, and fled in the dark with his two consorts. Nothing but this circumstance could have prevented a British ship of sixty-five guns, indifferently manned in respect to numbers, from taking a French ship of the line, mounted with seventy-four pieces of cannon, provided with seven hundred men, and assisted by two large frigates, one of thirty-eight guns, and the other wanting two of this number. The loss of the Buckingham, in this action, did not exceed twenty men killed and wounded; whereas the number of the slain on board the Florissant did not fall short of one hundred and eighty, and that of her wounded is said to have exceeded three hundred. She was so disabled in her hull, that she could hardly be kept afloat until she reached Martinique, where she was repaired; and the largest frigate, together with the loss of forty men, received such damage as to be for some time quite unserviceable.