ANSON GEORGE, LORD, a celebrated naval officer, was born in 1697, and was the third son of William An son, Esq. of Shuckborongh, in the county of Stafford. After having passed through the inferior gradations of rank, he was appointed second lieutenant of the Hamp shire, in 1716. In 1722, he received the command of the Weasel sloop ; and in 1724 he obtained the rank of post-captain, with the command of the Scarborough man of war. He made three voyages to North Caro lina between 1724 and 1733, during which he amassed considerable wealth, and erected a small town, bearing his own name, from which the name of Anson county was given the surrounding district. In the years 1738 and 1739, he performed another voyage to America and the coast of Africa ; and without having recourse to measures of hostility, he removed those interruptions which the French had given to the English trade with Guinea.
In the war of the merchants, as sir Robert 1Valpole called it, which broke out between England and Spain in 1739, captain Anson was appointed, to the command of a squadron of five ships of the line, which set sail in September 1740, to attack the Spanish settlements on the coast of the Pacific, and to co-operate, across the isthmus of Darien, with admiral Vernon, who was sent to the gulf of Mexico. After touching at Madeira, at St Catharines in Brasil, and at St Julian in Patagonia; he doubled Cape Horn during the storms and tempests of the vernal equinox. In a violent gale of wind, which lasted for forty days, two of his ships, unable to double the cape, were completely separated from the squadron, and many of his sailors were cut off by the scurvy. Having arrived at the island of Juan Fernandez, he rc paired the remnant of his shattered fleet, and proceeded to the coast of Peru, where he reduced to ashes the opulent town of Paha. He afterwards sailed to the coast of Mexico, and would have reduced Panama, at the time that admiral Vernon had taken Portobello, on the opposite coast, had his force been less enfeebled by the numerous dangers which he encountered. With
his own vessel, the Centurion, in company with the Gloucester, he stretched across the Pacific, with the hopes of intercepting the Spanish galleon which traded annually between Acapulco and the Philippines. In this passage, the Glouc,;ster became so leaky, that it was necessary to abandon her; and it was with great difficulty that the two crews, reduced by sickness, could reach Tinian, one of the Ladrolie isles. When the com modore, with the greater part of his crew, were seek ing refreshments on shore, the Centurion slipped her anchor, in a violent gale, and was driven out into the sea. During the dreary interval of eighteen days, every eye had been fixed with anxious expectation on the horizon, and much labour had been spent in fitting up a small vessel that had been found in the island. The Centurion, however, came in sight, and dissipated all their fears. From Tinian the commodore sailed to Mocao; and in returning from this place, he captured a rich Man.11a galleon, and sailed back to Canton with his prize. Loaded with the rich spoils of the enemies of his country, he returned by the Cape of Good Hope to England, and reached Spithead on the 15th of June 1744. Immediately upon his return, he was made rear admiral of the blue, and, after a short interval, a com missioner of the admiralty. Soon after, he became rear admiral of the white ; and in 1746, he was promoted to the rank of vice-admiral. In the winter • of 1746-7, the command of the channel fleet was entrusted to his care; and in the May following, he captured, off Cape Finis terre, six sail of the line, that had been dispatched, under admiral Jonquiere, to protect the fleets of mer chantmen destined for the East and West Indies. When M. St George, one of the French captains, surrendered his sword to Anson, he observed, with the characteristic gaiety of a Frenchman, " Vous aver vaincu L'INVINCI BLE, et LA GLOIRE vows suit ;" alluding to the two French ships, the Invincible and the Glory, which had surrendered to the English.