Parker, Sir Hyde, Jr.

PARKER, SIR HYDE, JR. (1739–1807). British admiral. Second son of vice admiral Sir Hyde Parker, baronet (1714–1782), Parker served for some time in his father's ships, rising to the post of captain on 5 July 1763. From 1763 he served in West Indian and North American waters. At New York on 12-18 July 1776 he led the raid to Tappan Sea aboard the Phoenix (40 guns), and on 27 August his ship helped to cover General William Howe's landing on Long Island. In October he was again in action in the North River. He convoyed troops to Savannah at the end of 1778. In 1779 the Phoenix returned to Britain, where her captain was knighted for his services at New York Escorting an out-ward-bound Jamaica convoy, the Phoenix was wrecked in a hurricane off Cuba on 4 October 1780. Parker got most of his crew ashore with rescued provisions and guns, constructed defence works, and held off enemy forces until they were rescued. He was with his father's squadron in the Dogger Bank action on 5 August 1781 and, aboard the Goliath, he took part in the relief of Gibraltar in 1782. Promoted to rear admiral in February 1793, he served with Samuel Lord Hood at Toulon and Corsica. A vice admiral from 1794, in 1796 he promptly pursued a Spanish squadron across the Atlantic after it had escaped from Cadiz, and from 1796 to 1800 he was in command at Jamaica. At Copenhagen in 1801, his famously ill-judged signal to Admiral Horatio, Lord Nelson to withdraw, and his subsequent failure to advance into the Baltic Sea, ruined his reputation. He was not employed again. However, the hesitation and slowness of 1801, and the inevitable comparison with Nelson, should not be allowed to obscure his considerable achievements.

SEE ALSO Long Island, New York (August 1777); Tappan Sea.

                               revised by John Oliphant