'History of the Indian Navy. (1613-1863).' [‎194] (213/622)

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history of the indian nayy.
inquiries regarding his missing brother, and rescue him if, per
chance, his ship was cast away on that inhospitable shore. But
it was all to no purpose, and the sickening dread of the worst
was soon confirmed in the breast of the gallant commander of
the 4 Auckland.'
" How sleep tlie brave who sink to rest,
By all their country's wishes blest,"
No officer or man in the Indian Navy but offered the tribute
of a sigh to the memory of the good and noble Young, and his
brave officers and crew, who had added lustre to the Service,
and gained the applause of all with whom they had served by
their conduct in the recent affair in New Zealand.^
The ship's company of the ' Cleopatra' numbered one hun
dred and fifty-one souls, and, in addition, there were on board,
for passage to Singapore, one hundred convicts, with a strong
marine guard, under charge of Mr. Anderson, Chief Constable
of the port; so that probably there were nearly three hundred
souls on board the 4 Cleopatra' when she foundered in mid
ocean. A monument, executed in white marble, by Mr. Bovey,
of Plymouth, was erected, in Bombay Cathedral, to the memory
of the officers and crew of the ill-fated ship. The design is
simple and appropriate, and the entablature has the following
inscription :—" Sacred to the Memory of the Commander,
Officers, and Ship's Company of the Hon. East India Company's
steam frigate 4 Cleopatra,' which is supposed to have foundered
in a hurricane off the Coast of Malabar, on the 15th day of
# Lieutenant W. H. Carpendale, of the c Cleopatra/ who is now a clergyman
of the Church of England, writes to us as follows of the condition of the ship at
the time of her last voyage :—" I served in the 4 Cleopatra ' some time, and pro
ceeded in her in an awful south-west monsoon trip from Aden to Bombay in
June, 1846, when her waterways opened, and one of her bolts worked out of tlie
port side by the gangway as much as eight or ten inches. The sea was very high,
and Hamilton, who commanded, standing with one leg on either side of the
open seam on the quarter-deck, exclaimed, and I shall never forget it, ' Ah,
Cleopatra, this is the last trip you'll ever make in a heavy sea!' He was right.
Spite of all this, she was never docked. Spite of James Young's protest or
respectful remonstrance, for Young succeeded in command, she was only cooked
up by dockyard hands, and was sent to sea to join the Admiral at Singapore,
taking two hundred convicts on board. She foundered, and nothing more was
ever heard of her. I was one of the last officers in her, and prayed Young to
get the order cancelled that ordered me out into the ' Auckland' with Hamilton,
but he had no power with the chief. Sir Robert Oliver, and thus, in the Pro
vidence of Grod, I escaped. But it was a dastardly thing that she should have
been sent to sea, and on service, too, after such discoveries, without being docKed.
James Young was a fine fellow. Possibly you know all the details of his de
struction in this ship. I mean how surely he apprehended mischief—how, after
representing the state of the ship to the chief, who asked, 4 Ho you refuse to
command her ?' he replied, e No, Sir Robert/ How he left his plate on shore,
and other valuables, and how he returned a second time to say good-bye to nis
relation at Colaba. Poor old Oliver, I know, felt the loss of the ship, and once
earnestly questioned me about her during that last bad trip, and I told him we
all thought her rotten."