At Le-Feock aforesaid, temp. Charles II. was the dwelling, by lease, of Captain Thomas Penrose, whose father married Verman; originally descended from the Penroses of Penrose in Sythney. This gentleman having in his youth, temp. Charles I. been bred at sea, in the study and practice of the art of navigation, it appears from his journal that, in the year 1650, he was by the Admiral of the States of England made Captain or Commander of the Bristol frigate or man-of-war, in which he fought, together with the English fleet under command of General Blake, near Dover, against the Dutch fleet, under their General Van Tromp, who was shrewdly worsted by Blake. He was also in the engagement against the Dutch fleet under Sir George Ayscough, 1652, before Plymouth, where the victory inclined to neither side, but great losses on both. He also, 28th of October, the same year, fought in General Blake’s squadron against the General of the States De Witt, who was then worsted, on one side of the North Foreland, in the Downs. Captain Penrose was also in that engagement between General Blake and Van Tromp wherein the English Fleet was worsted, and came off with great loss, so that Van Tromp sailed into the Downs in great triumph, with a broom on his main-topmast.
But, maugre his success, pride, and insolence, the States of England fitted forth their shattered ships sooner than was expected, to the number of eighty sail of men-of-war, when Captain Penrose was removed from the Bristol to the command of the Maidstone frigate. Then also were Penn and Burne discharged from command of particular
squadrons, and the supreme command of the fleet was put into the hands of General Blake, General Monk, and General Dean; when soon after happened that bloody and tremendous sea-fight betwixt the English and the Dutch fleets, before Weymouth and Dungeness, wherein General Monk declared (upon the sudden death of General Dean, killed at breakfast on the deck of their ship by Monk’s side, with a defiance gun-bullet shot at random by the Dutch to his destruction) that this fifth battle should put an end to the war one way or other, and gave forth strict order and command to the officers of the English fleet upon penalty of death, that they should neither take from nor give quarter to the enemy; which commands in the engagement being for a considerable time kept and observed by the English, the terror thereof so amazed the Dutch, that, after great losses of men and ships by them sustained, they declined to fight, and bore or ran away with their fleet, leaving the victory and British Channel wholly to the English fleet. In this fight, as appears from Penrose’s Journal, he lost above fifty men out of the Maidstone, besides had many more wounded. Afterwards the English fleet, coasting westwards in pursuit of the vanquished Dutch fleet, were by cross winds forced into Falmouth harbour, where also for some days, as appears from Penrose’s Journal aforesaid, he entertained at his house in this place of Le-Feock (opposite the harbour aforesaid) General Monk, General Blake, Sir George Ayscough, and many other officers and gentlemen of the fleet, to good content and satisfaction.
Afterwards they sent him many letters concerning the war, fleet, and ship he sailed in, and the course he should take; and in particular, amongst others, thanked him for his great valour and conduct in the several engagements aforesaid. From some of which it appears General Blake was a better soldier than scholar, as being very badly able to write the letters of his name to the letters his secretary had formed, as yet may be seen; which is not to be wondered
at, as I am credibly informed he was at first but a man of no higher education than that of a petty mechanic, viz. a ribbon and galloon weaver in Taunton; whereof, at last, for his valour in the siege, in opposition to Charles the First, he was made governor thereof by the Parliament.
Captain Penrose fought also in the Maidstone frigate under General Monk, in the sixth and last engagement of the English at sea against the Dutch fleet, wherein Van Tromp their general was slain, and his fleet extremely shattered, sunk, and disabled, to the great terror of the United Provinces. Then also the Maidstone frigate underwent the loss of many seamen; and the Captain continued his post till the restoration of Charles the Second, when he was dismissed from his command, and another commander placed in his room; after which he retired to his country-house of Le-Feock aforesaid.
It also appears from Penrose’s Journal whilst he commanded the Maidstone, that she was one of the five ships under Sir George Ayscough that was ordered by the then Parliament of England to sail into the Sound, or German Sea, to assist the King of Sweden against the Danes. But a peace being concluded betwixt those nations, soon after the arrival of those ships, nothing of action was performed by them. Nevertheless, the King of Sweden rewarded the five captains of those ships in this expedition, with so many medals and neck-chains of gold, with the King of Sweden’s face on one side of the medal, and the several arms of those gentlemen on the other, weighing about eighteen ounces each together with the chain. Penrose’s medal is yet to be seen with his daughter.
In the year 1664, when another Dutch and French war broke out between them and Charles the Second, and able sea-officers were wanted for the fleet, Penrose (who as aforesaid for several years had been displaced) had divers letters sent to him from James Duke of York, and the Duke of Albemarle (formerly General Monk), by order of
Charles the Second, requesting in this time of need that he would come up to London, accept of the command, and take the charge of the Monk frigate, in the Dutch war; which at length with some reluctance he accepted. In which post he discharged the place with such care and faithfulness as before he had done in the Parliament service. And, moreover, in the three sea-fights which the Duke of York and the Duke of Albemarle had with the Dutch fleets, (in all which he was commanded, though but a third-rate ship, to follow the admiral or general’s ships,) he behaved himself with such prudent valour and conduct (though with the loss of several hundreds of his men) that he preserved his ship, to the admiration of all that saw her, from destruction, though often boarded and surrounded with enemies.
In brief, those matters are so abundantly set forth in the several letters of thanks, after those engagements, from the said Dukes and their Secretaries to Penrose, that if I should take the pains to transcribe them, they would only be thought a romance, as containing in them almost unparallelled adventures and dangers, which he most valiantly and successfully passed through, in the midst of seas, slaughter, fire, and bullets, were not the originals yet extant, and to be seen.