British vice-admiral
Born 1762 Died 1814
Samuel Hood, cousin of Lord Hood and of Lord Bridport, entered the Royal Navy in 1776. His first engagement was the battle off Ushant in 1778, and, soon afterwards transferred to the West Indies, he was present, under the command of his cousin Sir Samuel Hood, at all the actions which culminated in Rodney's victory of April 12th, 1782. After the peace, like many other British naval officers, he spent some time in France, and on his return to England was given the command of a sloop, from which he proceeded in succession to various frigates.
In the Juno his gallant rescue of some shipwrecked seamen won him a vote of thanks and a sword of honour from the Jamaica assembly. Early in 1793 the Juno went to the Mediterranean under Lord Hood, and her captain distinguished himself by an audacious feat of coolness and seamanship in extricating his vessel from the harbour of Toulon, which he had entered in ignorance of Lord Hood's withdrawal. Soon afterwards he was put in command of a frigate squadron for the protection of Levantine commerce, and in 1797 he was given the Zealous (74), in which he was present at Nelson's unsuccessful attack on Santa Cruz. It was Captain Hood who conducted the negotiations which relieved the squadron from the consequences of its failure. The part played by the Zealous at the battle of the Nile was brilliant. Her first opponent she put out of action in twelve minutes, and, passing on, Hood immediately engaged other ships, the Guerrier being left powerless to fire a shot. When Nelson left the coast of Egypt, Hood commanded the blockading force off Alexandria and Rosetta. Later he rejoined Nelson on the coast of the two Sicilies, receiving for his services the order of St Ferdinand.
In the Venerable Hood was present at the action of Algesiras and the battle in the Straits of Gibraltar (180f). In the Straits his ship suffered heavily, losing 130 officers and men. A year later Captain Hood was employed in Trinidad as a commissioner, and, upon the death of the flag officer commanding the Leeward station, he succeeded him as Commodore. Island after island fell to him, and soon, outside Martinique, the French had scarcely a foothold in the West Indies. Amongst other measures taken by Hood may be mentioned the garrisoning of Diamond Rock, which he commissioned as a sloop-of-war to blockade the approaches of Martinique (see James, Naval History, iii. 245). For these successes he received, amongst other rewards, the KB.
In command next of the squadron blockading Rochefort, Sir Samuel Hood had a sharp fight, on 25th September 1805, with a small French squadron which was trying to escape. Amongst the few casualties on this occasion was the Commodore, who lost an arm. Promoted rear-admiral a few days after this action, Hood was in 1807 entrusted with the operations against Madeira, which he brought to a successful conclusion, and a year later went to the Baltic, with his flag in the Centaur, to take part in the war between Russia and Sweden. In one of the actions of this war the Centaur and Implacable, unsupported by the Swedish ships (which lay to leeward), cut out the Russian 50-gun ship Sevolod from the enemy's line and, after a desperate fight, forced her to strike. The king of Sweden rewarded the admiral with the Grand Cross of the Order of the Sword. Present in the roads of Corunna at the re-embarkation of the army of Sir John Moore, Hood thence returned to the Mediterranean, where for two years he commanded a division of the British fleet. In 1811 he became vice-admiral. In his last command, that of the East Indies station, he carried out many salutary reforms, especially in matters of discipline and victualling. He died at Madras, 24th December 1814. A lofty column was raised to his memory on a hill near Butleigh, Somersetshire, and in Butleigh Church is another memorial, with an inscription written by Robert Southey|Southey].
See Naval Chronicle, xvii. I (the material was furnished by Flood himself; it does not go beyond 1806).
Being the entry for HOOD, SIR SAMUEL in the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica, the text of which lies within the public domain.
| 
