Couch, J.: History of Polperro, edited by J. Q. Couch, 1870.
James's Naval History, 1876, Vol. IV.
Cobbett's Political Register, 1810, pp. 396-415, 459-464.
Cobbett gives a report of the courts-martial.
The story was also given in Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, 1848, pp. 147-51.
ADMIRAL RICHARD DARTON THOMAS
Richard Darton Thomas was born at Saltash on 2nd June, 1777, son of Charles and Mary Thomas of that place. Drinking in the sea air, living in the midst of sailors and fisher-folk, he early took a fancy for the sea, and entered as an able-bodied seaman in the Royal Navy, in 1790, at the age of thirteen. His intelligence, his pleasant manners, won the regard of his officers and he was raised to be midshipman in 1792, and became master's mate in the ensuing year. He was in the Boyne under Sir John Jervis when Martinique was captured, and on the return of the Boyne to England, he was on board when that vessel was burnt at Spithead, 1st May, 1795. The marines had been exercising and firing on the windward side, and it is supposed that some ignited paper of the cartridges flew through the quarter-galley into the admiral's cabin and communicated with the papers lying about on the table. It was at 11 a.m. that the fire broke out, the flames bursting through the poop before the fire was discovered, and it spread so rapidly that in less than half an hour this fine ship, in spite of every exertion of the officers and crew, was in a blaze fore and aft. As soon as the fire was discovered by the fleet, all the boats of the ships proceeded to the assistance of the Boyne, and the whole of the numerous crew, except eleven, were saved.