298 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 231. 



one hour and forty-six minutes, when he struck, 

 and we boarded him, and have him safe at anchor, 

 as we have not had a good wind. I am sorry to 

 say poor Lord Nelson was wounded the second 

 broadside. He went down and got his wounds 

 dress'd, and he was wound'd a second time, and 

 he just lived to hear of the victory. The ship we 

 took, her name is the " San Ildifonzo," eighty-two 

 guns, and a very fine ship, new. I don't think we 

 will save more than twelve sail of them : but we 

 have sunk, burnt, drove on shore, twenty-one sail 

 of the line in all ; and if we had not had a gale of 

 wind next day we would have taken every one of 

 them. We were riding close in shore with two 

 anchors a-head, three cables on each bower, and 

 all our sails were shot to pieces, ditto our rudder 

 and stern, and mainmast, and everything ; but, 

 thank good, I am here safe, though there was more 

 shot at my quarters than any other part of the 

 ship. We are now at anchor, but expect to go to 

 Gibraltar every day. I hope in good you are all 

 in health : I was never better in all my life. My 



comp ts to all friends [&c ] and my dear 



father and mother. 



I am 

 Your affectionate brother, 



(Signed) Charles Reid. 



You must excuse this letter, as half our hands 

 are on board our prize, and have had no time. I 

 have been two days writing this ; five minutes one 

 time and ten minutes another time, and so on. 

 We are just getting under way for Gibraltar. 



Now for the French and Spanish ships taken, 

 burnt, run on shore, &c. &c. : 



Bucentaure, 80, taken. French. 



Santiss' Trinidada, 130, sunk. Spanish. 



Santa, taken, but afterwards got into Cadiz. 



Rayo, 110, sunk. French. 



Bahama, 74, taken. French. 



Argonauta, 80, sunk and burnt. 



Neptuna, 90, on shore. 



San Ildifonzo, 80, taken by the Defence. 



Algazeras, 74, on shore ; Swiftsure, 74, Gib. ; 

 Berwick, 74, Gib. All English ships taken by the 

 French last war. 



Intrepid, 74, burnt. 



Aigle, 80, on shore. 



Tonguer, 80, on shore [MS. uncertain]. 



De . . . . , 74, Gibraltar [ditto]. 



Argonauta, 74, Gib. 



Redoubtable, 74, sunk. 



Achell, 74, burnt. 



Manareo, 74, on shore. 



San Augustino, 74, Gibraltar. 



There is not one English ship lost, but a num- 

 ber lost their masts. (Signed) C. R. 



The writer had a brother, Andrew Reid, who 

 bore a commission in the ships of Captain Parry 

 in the first Arctic expedition. G. N. 



HERALDIC ANOMALY. 



I beg to call the attention of the heraldic 

 readers of " N. & Q." to a singular custom of dis- 

 playing their coats of arms, peculiar to the Knights 

 of St. John, of the venerable Language of England. 



It is well known that the members of this valiant 

 brotherhood, throughout Europe, bear their pa- 

 ternal shield alone, surmounted, as the badge of 

 their profession, with the particular device of the 

 order, that is, On a chief, gules, a cross argent. 

 The English knights, with their paternal coat, bore 

 also, party-per-pale, that of their mothers, with 

 the chief of the order over both, a strange he- 

 raldic anomaly ! 



I have somewhere read, but where, for lack of 

 a " note," I cannot recollect, that in making their 

 proofs of nobility previous to their admission into 

 the order, unlike the other Languages, the cavaliers 

 of England gave in only the names of their father 

 and mother, but at the same time it was requisite 

 that these two names should be able to prove a 

 nobility of two hundred years each. 



Perhaps the custom of bearing the paternal 

 shield impaled with the maternal sprung from 

 these proofs. 



In the British Museum, Harl. MSS. 1386., may 

 be seen three examples of this custom, in a paper 

 entitled, A Note of certain Knights of Rhodes, " in 

 prioratu Sancti Johannis Jerusalem." 



1. Sir Thomas Docwra, Grand Prior of Eng- 

 land, a.b. 1504, a knight not more renowned as a 

 valiant man-at-arms, "preux et hardi," than as 

 a skilful diplomatist ; and who, on the death of 

 Fabricio Caretto, a.d. 1520-1, was thought worthy 

 to be put in competition for the Grand Master- 

 ship with the celebrated Villiers de LTsle Adam, 

 and, as Vertot tells us, only lost that dignity by a 

 very trifling majority. His paternal coat — Sable, 

 a cheveron engrailed argent, between three plates, 

 on each a pale, gules — is impaled with that of his 

 mother, Alice, daughter of Thomas Green, of 

 Gressingham, in Yorkshire ; Argent, a bugle-horn 

 sable, stringed gules, between three griffins' heads, 

 erased, of the second ; over all, the chief of the 

 order. 



2. Sir Lancelot Docwra, near kinsman to Sir 

 Thomas, and son of Robert Docwra, of Docwra- 

 Hall, in Cumberland. His arms are impaled with 

 — Or, a cross flory sable — the coat armour of his 

 mother, Jane, daughter of Sir John Lamplugh, of 

 Lamplugh, in the same county ; one " of a race," 

 as Denton says, " of valorous gentlemen, succes- 

 sively for their worthiness knighted in the field, 

 all, or most part of them." The chief of the 

 order also surmounts his shield. 



3. The third is the shield of Sir John Randon ; 

 Gules, a bend checquy or and azure, impaling 

 Argent, a frette, and on a chief, gules, three es- 

 callops of the field; over all, the chief of the order. 



