SHORT NOTES ON PROFESSIONAL SUBJECTS, 
1868. 
35. Shipwreck op the Transport “Phillis,” 1795. 
The following letter, addressed to the Adjutant, 4th Battalion, by Lieut. Howard 
Douglas, B.A. (afterwards General Sir Howard Douglas), describes with singular 
simplicity, the famous shipwreck of the transport Phillis with a detachment of the 
Royal Artillery in 1795. The tale has been often told,—and among other places 
will be found in that excellent little work “ England’s Artillerymen,” by Serjeant 
J. A. Brown, B.A. Band, with particulars to his honor, from other sources, which 
the modesty of young Douglas omitted in writing his own account: it will however 
bear repetition, and in the present authentic form acquires a fresh interest. He was 
in his nineteenth year at the time. The Committee are indebted for the original to 
the Rev. Sir Thomas Blomefield, Bt. 
Great Jarvis in the Island of Newfoundland, 
Dear Sir, 2nd Dec ‘ 1795 - 
A small vessel which sails by the first wind for England, gives me the opportunity 
of sending you (for the information of General Patisson) the following melancholy 
account, of the detachment of the Boyal Artillery, which embarked for Quebec, on 
board the ship Phillis in August last. 
On Sunday the 11th of October, which made exactly the ninth week of our voyage, 
we had only got as far as the Island of St Petus (about forty leagues to y e eastward 
of the southern entrance of the Gulph of St Laurence), during which nine weeks, we 
suffered every hardship, which could arrive from bad weather, and a scarcity of fresh 
provisions. It is necessary to mention that on the Thursday which preceeded, in a 
very severe gale of wind, a heavy sea broke both our boats from their lashings upon 
deck; a circumstance which greatly contributed to our future misfortunes, as in 
securing them again, we were obliged to lash them with their bottoms upwards, the 
cheeks having been lost. 
On the night of Sunday the 11th a gale of wind sprung up from the eastward 
which continued till four o’clock on the afternoon of Monday the 12th, when in an 
instant it fell quite calm. Between six and seven in the evening the chief mate of 
the ship came into the cabin, and called out the captain in a very mysterious 
manner, and soon after some of us going upon deck, heard very plainly the noise of 
Breakers , that noise increasing every instant, we were soon convinced we had got 
into a strong current, which set us towards the shore, and that we were inevitably 
lost unless a breeze sprung up from that quarter. 
Our cables being unbent all hands were turned up to bend them; which being 
done, we let go our best bower anchor in about twenty-five fathom water; the land 
beginning to appear on all sides of us—we soon perceived our anchor did not hold, 
and as the last resource, set to work to get out the boats, which on account of their 
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