BLAKENEY, WILLIAM BLAKENEY, BARON (1672— '760, British soldier, was born at Mount Blakeney in Limerick in 1672. In 1747 George II. made him lieutenant-general and lieutenant-governor of Minorca. The governor of that island never set foot in it, and Blakeney was left in command for ten years. In 1756 the Seven Years' War was preluded by a swift descent of the French on Minorca. Fifteen thousand troops under marshal the duc de Richelieu, escorted by a strong squadron under the marquis de la Gallisonniere, landed on the island on April 18, and at once began the siege of Fort St. Philip, where Blakeney cOmmanded at most some 5,000 soldiers and workmen. The defence, in spite of crumbling walls and rotted gun plat forms, had already lasted a month when a British fleet under \Tice-admiral the Hon. John Byng appeared. La Gallisonniere and Byng fought, on May 20, an indecisive battle, after which the relieving squadron sailed away and Blakeney was left to his fate. A second expedition subsequently appeared off Minorca, but it was then too late, for after a heroic resistance of 71 days the old general had been compelled to surrender the fort to Richelieu (April 18–June 28 1756). Only the ruined fortifica tions were the prize of the victors. Blakeney and his little gar rison were transported to Gibraltar with absolute liberty to serve again. Byng was tried and executed; Blakeney, on his return to England, found himself the hero of the nation, and received a peerage. He died Sept. 20 1761.
See Memoirs of General William Blakeney (anon., 1757).