Leith; LETTERS OF MARQUE. 219
to Hull, Newcastle, Thurso, Orkney, and Shetland,
to Inverness, Fort George, and Invergordon, Cra
marty, Findhom, Burghead, Ban6 and other places
in the north, twice weekly; to Dundee, Aberdeen,
Stonehaven, Johnshaven, Montrose, and places
farther south, four days a week. A number of
steamers run in summer, on advertised days, between
Leith, Aberdour, Elie, North Berwick, Alloa, etc.
The first screw steamer fromLeith to London
was put on the station in 1853.
Several ships belonging to the port are employed
in the Greenland whale fishery, and a considerable
number trade with distant foreign ports,
especially with those of the Baltic and the West
Indies.
? In consequence of the want of a powder magazine,?
says a statistical writer, ?gunpowder sent
from the mills of Midlothian for embarkationtoo
dangerous a commodity to be admitted to any
ordinary storing-place, or to lie on board vessels
in the harbour-has frequently, when vessels do not
sail at the time expected, to be carted back to
await the postponed date of sailing, and, in some
instances, has been driven six times between the
mills and the port, a distance each time, in going
and returning, of twenty or twenty-four miles, before
it could be embarked?
The lighthouse has a stationary light, and exhibits
it at night so long as there is a depth of not
less than nine feet of water on the bar, for the
guidance of vessels entering the harbour.
The tall old signal-tower has a manager and
signal-master, who display a series of signals during
the day, to proclaim the progress or retrogression of
the tide.
The general anchoring-place for vessels is two
miles from the land, and in the case of large
steamers, is generally westward of Leith, and opposite
Newhaven. During the French and Spanish
war, the roadstead was the station of an admiral?s
flagship, a guardship, and squadron of cruisers.
Inverkeithing is the quarantine station of the
port, eight and three-quarter miles distant, in a direct
h e , by west, of the entrance of Leith Harbour.
In connection with the naval station in the
Roads, Leith enjoyed much prosperity during the
war, as being a place for the condemnation and
sale of prize vessels, with their cargoes; and in
consequence of Bonaparte?s great Continental
scheme of prevention, it was the seat of a most
extensive traffic for smuggling British goods into
the north of Europe, by way of Heligoland, a
system which employed many armed vessels of all
kinds, crowded its harbour, and greatly enriched
many of its bold and speculative inhabitants.
Foreign ventures, however, proved, in some instances,
to be severely unsuccessful ; ? and their
failure combined, with the disadvantages of the
harbour and the oppression of shore dues, to produce
that efflux of prosperity, the ebb of which
seems to have been reached, to give place,? says a
writer in 1851, ?to a steady and wealth-bearing
flood.?
The last prizes candemned and sold in Leith
were some Russian vessels, chiefly brigs, captured
by Sir Charles Napier?s fleet in the Baltic and
Gulf of Finland during the Crimean War.
It is singular that neither at the Trinity House,
in the Kirkgate, nor anywhere else, a record has
been kept of the Leith Letters of Marque or other
armed vessels belonging to the port during the
protracted wars with France, Spain, and Holland,
while the notices that occur of them in the brief
public prints of those days are meagre in the extreme
; yet the fighting merchant marine of Leith
should not be forgotten.
Taking a few of these notices chronologically,
we find that the ship Edinburgh, of Leith, Thomas
Murray commander, a Letter of Marque, carrying
eighteen 4-pounders, with swivels and a fully-armed
crew, on the 30th of August, 1760, in latitude 13O
north, and longitude 58O west, from London, fell in
with a very large French privateer, carrying fourteen
guns, many swivels, and full of men.
This was at eleven in the forenoon. The
Edinburgh, we are told, attacked, and fought her
closely ? for five glasses,? and mauled her aloft so
much, that she was obliged to fill her sails, bear
away, and then bring to, and re-fit aloft. The Edinburgh
continued her course, but with ports triced
up, guns loaded, and the crew at quarters ready to
engage again.
The privateer followed, and attempted to board,
but was received with such a terrible fire of round
shot and small-arms, that she was again obliged to
sheer of. Many times the conflict was renewed,
and at last ammunition fell short on board the
The gallant Captain Murray now lay by, reserving
his fire, while a couple of broadsides swept his
deck; and then, when both ships were almost
muzzle to muzzle, and having brought all his guns
over to one side, poured in his whole fire upon her,
? which did such execution that it drove all hands
from their quarters j she immediately hoisted all
her sails, and made OK?
The crew of the Ednaurgh now ?? sheeted home,?
and gave chase, but she was so heavily laden with
the spoils of her cruise that the enemy out-sailed
her, upon which Captain Murray, with a great
Edinburgh.
280 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Leith.
number of wounded men on his hands, bore awa]
to Barbadoes to re-fit.
In the spring of the following year, a Leitl
sloop, coming from Strichen, laden with wheat anc
cheese, was taken off St. Abb?s Head by two Frenct
privateers of twelve and sixteen guns-the latter was
Le MarichaZ Duc de NoaiZZes, painted quite black.
When the sloop struck a tremendous sea was run.
ning ; Laverock, the master, ransomed her for IOC
guineas, and reported at Leith that if these twc
great privateers were not taken soon, they wopld
ruin the east coast trade of Scotland.
Soon after another ship of Leith was taken by
them into Bergen, and ransonied for 500 guineas,
though a few days before the privateer had been
severely handled by the EZiza6efh, merchant ship,
Captain Grant, who had also to strike to her, afteI
a most severe combat.
In 1794, the Haith, of Leith, was captured by a
squadron of French ships on the zIst August,
together with the Dundee, whaler, of Dundee. The
latter was re-taken, and brought into Leith by H.M.
brig Fisher, which reported that, previous to re-capture,
the Dundee had picked up a boat, having on
board eight Frenchmen, part of a prize crew of
sixteen put on board the Raifir to take her to
Bergen ; but the mate and another Scottish seaman
had daringly re-taken her, and had sailed none
knew whither. Soon after a letter reached the
owners in Leith from Lyons, the mate, dated from
Lerwick, briefly stating that when fifteen miles
west of Bergen, ?1 retook her from the French,
sending nine of the Frenchmen away in one of the
boats, ancl put the rest in confinement.? Eventually
these two brave fellows brought the ship to
Leith, from whence their prisoners were sent to
the Castle.
In those days the Glass House Company had
their own armed ships, and one of these, the
Phemk, Cornelius Neilson, master, had the reputation
of being one of the swiftest sailers in Leith,
and was always advertised to sail with or without
convoy, as she fought her own way.
In 1797, the BreadaZbane Letter of Marque, of
Leith, captured a large Spanish brig off the coast
of South America, and sent her into Leith Roads
for sale, under the convoy of the RoyaZ ChrZoffe,
Captain Elder.
During the latter end of the eighteenth century
Leith possessed two frigate-built ships of remarkable
beauty, the RoseUe, a Letter of Marque, and
the MoreZan/E, her sister ship, which usually fought
their own way; and the former was so like a man-ofwar
in her size and appearance, that she frequently
gave chase for a time to laige foreign privateers.
In the NeraZd for 1798 we read that on her appeacance
off Peterhead, in March, she created such consternation
that the captain of the RoJert, a Greenlandman,
on a gun being fired from her, ran his
ship ashore, according to one account, and, according
to another, made his escape, with the assistance
of his crew, from the supposed enemy. The
MoreZand and the Lady Fwbes,,? of Leith, another
armed ship, seem always to have sailed in company,
for protection, to and from the West Indies.
After many escapes and adventures, the beautiful
RoseZZe, which carried fourteen guns of large calibre,
was captured at last by a Spanish line-of-battle ship,
which, report said, barbarously sank her, with all
on board, by a broadside.
On the 6th December, 1798, theBefsy, of Leith,
Captain Mackie, having the Angus regiment of
volunteers on board, from Shetland, in company
with an armed cutter, was attacked off Rattray
Head by two heavily-armed French privateers. A
severe engagement ensued, in which the volunteers
made good use of their small arms; the
privateers were crippled and beaten off by the
Befsy, which ran next day into Banff, and the
roops were put on shore.
In the same month The Generous Triends, sailing
from Leith to Hull, when a few miles off the
mouth of the Humber, in a heavy gale of wind,
was overtaken by a large black privateer, having a
?oop and fiddle-head painted red and white. The
ieavy sea prevented her from being boarded, and
:he appearance of the Baltic fleet compelling the
:nemy to sheer off, she bore up with the latter, and
yeturned to Leith Roads; but such little excitenents
were of constant occurrence in those stirring
imes
The Nancy, of Leith, Captain Grindley, was
:aken, in July, I 799, off Dungeness, by the Ado&h,
ugger, of eighteen guns and fifty men, who used
iim and his crew with great severity prior to their
Jeing cast into the horrible prison at Valenciennes.
?The behaviour of the Frenchmen to us, when
aken, was most shameful,? he wrote to his owners
n Leith. 6? When they got upon our deck, they
Kept firing their pistols, cutting with swords for some
ime, and dragging those who were below out of
Heir beds; they cut and mangled in a cruel manner
me of our men, William Macleod, who was then
it the helm, and afterwards threw him overhoard.
rhis obliged the rest of the crew to leave the
leck and go below. In a short time we were
It is interesting to remark that the original painting, after which the
rawing of Plate 32 ( ? I Leith Pier and Harbour, 1798 ?) was made, ws
iainted for Caprain Gourley, who was part owner of the Lady Fades,
The Editor is obliged
o bir. R. F. Todd, owner of the painting in question, for this information.
Letter of Marque that carried 14 mnada.
