Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood
Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood (12 December 1724 – 27 January 1816)[1] was an admiral in the Royal Navy. As a junior officer he saw action during the War of the Austrian Succession. While in temporary command of Antelope, he drove a French ship ashore in Audierne Bay, and captured two privateers in 1757 during the Seven Years' War. He held senior command as Commander-in-Chief, North American Station and then as Commander-in-Chief, Leeward Islands Station, leading the British fleet to victory at Battle of the Mona Passage in April 1782 during the American Revolutionary War. He went on to be Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth, then First Naval Lord and, after briefly returning to the Portsmouth command, became Commander-in-Chief, Mediterranean Fleet during the French Revolutionary Wars. His younger brother was Admiral Alexander Hood, 1st Viscount Bridport (1726–1814), and his first cousin once-removed was Admiral Sir Samuel Hood, 1st Baronet (1762–1814).
The Viscount Hood
27 January 1816 (aged 91)
London, England
1741–1794
Susannah Linzee
- Alexander Hood, 1st Viscount Bridport (brother)
- Sir Samuel Hood, 1st Baronet (first cousin once-removed)
Early life[edit]
Childhood[edit]
The eldest son of Samuel Hood, vicar of Butleigh in Somerset and prebendary of Wells, and Mary Hoskins, daughter of Richard Hoskins, Esquire, of Beaminster, Dorset.[2] In 1740, Captain (later Admiral) Thomas Smith was stranded in Butleigh when his carriage broke down on the way to Plymouth. The Rev Samuel Hood rescued him and gave him hospitality for the night. Samuel and his younger brother Alexander were inspired by his stories of the sea and he offered to help them in the Navy.[3] While granting permission for Samuel and Alexander to join the Navy, the Rev Samuel Hood and his wife decided to prohibit similar service by his other sons as "they might be drowned". Their third son Arthur William became Vicar of Butleigh but died of fever in his 30s. Another son drowned in the local River Brue as a boy.[4]
Early career[edit]
Samuel entered the Royal Navy in 1741.[5] He served part of his time as midshipman with George Brydges Rodney in the Ludlow and became a lieutenant in 1746.[5] He had opportunities to see service in the North Sea during the War of the Austrian Succession.[5] In 1754, he was made commander of the sloop Jamaica and served in her at the North American station.[5] In July 1756, while still on the North American station, Hood was promoted post captain, and assigned command of the sloop Lively, which was then under construction in England; however as Hood remained in North America he was unable to assume command of Lively.[6] Still in North America, Hood became flag captain to Commodore Holmes in the Grafton.[6]
Legacy[edit]
A biographical notice of Hood by McArthur, his secretary during the Mediterranean command, appeared in the Naval Chronicle, vol. ii.[22] His correspondence during his command in America was published by the Navy Records Society.[23]
In 1792, Lieutenant William Broughton, sailing with the expedition of George Vancouver to the Northwest Coast of North America, named Mount Hood in present-day Oregon,[24] and Hood's Canal in present-day Washington, after Hood.[25][26] Port Hood, Nova Scotia, is also named after him.[27]
Two of the three ships of the Royal Navy named HMS Hood were named after him as well. One of these, the battlecruiser HMS Hood (51), was sunk by the German battleship Bismarck in 1941 during the Second World War.[28]
Portrayal[edit]
Hood was portrayed by David Torrence in the 1935 film Mutiny on the Bounty.[29]
Several other members of the Hood family were notable figures in British history: