The Naval General Service medal awarded to Lieutenant F. J. Turner, Royal Navy, for his...

The Naval General Service medal awarded to Lieutenant F. J. Turner, Royal Navy, for his services as Midshipman aboard the Sirius in action with a French flotilla off the Tiber in April 1806 Naval General Service 1793-1840, 1 clasp, Sirius 17 April 1806 (Francis J. Turner, Midshipman.) extremely fine £14,000-£18,000 --- Importation Duty This lot is subject to importation duty of 5% on the hammer price unless exported outside the UK --- --- Provenance: Hyde Greg Collection 1887; Whitaker Collection 1890. 10 clasps issued for ‘Sirius 17 April 1806’, including two R.N. officers, one R.M. officer, and one Surgeon. Only 2 medals issued with this single clasp. On 17 April while cruising off the west coast of Italy, Captain William Prowse in the Sirius 36 gained intelligence of a French flotilla about to sail that morning for Naples. The Sirius closed with the flotilla soon after sunset within two leagues of the mouth of the Tiber, near Civita Vecchia, on the west coast of Italy. At about 7.00 pm, the Sirius attacked the enemy vessels which comprised the Bergère, three brigs, a bomb vessel with two heavy mortars, a cutter and three gun ketches, totalling 97 guns. The action, conducted at pistol shot distance, lasted for two hours until the Bergère hailed a surrender. Some of the other French vessels were badly damaged and had ceased firing but Sirius was prevented from pursuing due to her crippled rigging. Captain Prowse received a vase of 100 guineas for this action from the Lloyd's Patriotic Fund. Francis John Turner entered the Navy on 12 July 1800, as First-class Volunteer on board the Dorset yacht, Captain Sir Alexander Schomberg, employed off Dublin in attendance upon the Lord-Lieutenant. He served next on the Home and Mediterranean stations from February 1801 until 1 February 1803, in the Glenmore 44, Captains John Talbot and John Maitland, and from 23 September in the latter year until promoted to the rank of Lieutenant, 19 December 1807, in the Melpomène 38, Captains Robert Dudley Oliver and Sir Peter Parker. In 1804 he assisted, as Midshipman, in twice bombarding the town of Havre-de-Grace. He served in Sirius in action with a French flotilla of 15 sail off the Tiber in 1806 and in Pompée at the reduction of several fortresses on the coast of Calabria in the same year. His last appointments afloat were – 30 December 1807, to the Humber, Captain John Hill, on the Falmouth station; 25 August 1808, to the Comet 18, Captains Cuthbert Featherstone Daly and Richard Henry Muddle, employed in the Bay of Biscay, at Newfoundland, and among the Western Islands; 5 June 1813, after two years of half-pay, to the Goliath 74, Captain Frederick Lewis Maitland, from which ship, stationed at first in the West Indies and next on the coast of North America, he was sent, in March 1814, to the Hospital at Bermuda; and in September of the latter year, for a few months, to the Akbar 50, Captain Archibald Dickson, on the Halifax station.