View source for James Lucas Yeo

{{Short description|Royal Navy officer}}
{{other people|James Yeo}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2022}}
{{Infobox military person
|honorific_prefix = [[Captain (Royal Navy)|Captain]]
|name             = Sir James Lucas Yeo
|honorific_suffix = {{post-nominals|country=GBR|size=100%|KCB}}
|image            = Portrait of Sir James Lucas Yeo (1782-1818).jpg
|image_size       = 
|caption          = 1810 portrait of Yeo by [[Adam Buck]]
|birth_date       = {{birth date|1782|10|7|df=y}}
|death_date       = {{death date and age|1818|8|21|1782|10|7|df=y}}
|birth_place      = [[Southampton]], [[Hampshire]]
|death_place      = [[Atlantic Ocean]]
|placeofburial    = [[Portsmouth]]
|nickname         = 
|allegiance       = [[Kingdom of Great Britain]]<br />United Kingdom
|branch           = [[Royal Navy]]
|serviceyears     = 1792–1818
|rank             = [[Post-Captain|Captain]]
|unit             = 
|commands         = 
|battles          = 
{{tree list}}
* '''[[Napoleonic Wars]]'''
** [[Invasion of Cayenne (1809)|Invasion of Cayenne]]
** [[Action of 3 February 1812]]
* '''[[War of 1812]]'''
** [[Engagements on Lake Ontario]]
** [[Second Battle of Sacket's Harbor]]
** [[Battle of Fort Oswego (1814)|Battle of Fort Oswego]]
{{tree list/end}}
|awards           = Knight Commander of the [[Order of the Bath]] 1815<ref name=LG1815>{{London Gazette |issue=16972|date=4 January 1815|page=19}}</ref><br />[[Knight Bachelor]] 1810<ref name=LG1810>{{London Gazette |issue=16380|date=19 June 1810|page=902}}</ref><br />Knight Commander of the [[Order of Aviz|Royal Portuguese Military Order of St. Bento d'Avis]] 1809<ref name=NC1810>{{cite journal |journal=The Naval Chronicle|date=1810|volume=24|title=Memoir of the Public Services of Sir James Lucas Yeo, Knt.|pages=265–285}}</ref><ref name=Yeo>{{cite book|title= The Portuguese Army of the Napoleonic Wars
|last=Chartrand|first=Rene|publisher= Osprey Publishing|date=2000-11-25|isbn= 9781855329812|page=40|work=Reference to Captain James Yeo award with date and unit}}</ref>

|relations = 
|laterwork = 
}}

[[File:SceneOnLakeOntario1812.jpg|thumb|A scene on Lake Ontario – United States sloop of war ''Gen. Pike'', Commodore Chauncey, and the British sloop of war ''Wolfe'', Sir James Lucas Yeo, preparing for action, 28 September 1813]]

'''Sir James Lucas Yeo''', [[Order of the Bath|KCB]] (7 October 1782 – 21 August 1818) was a [[Royal Navy]] officer who served in the [[French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars]] and the [[War of 1812]]. Born in [[Southampton]], [[Hampshire]], he joined the British navy at the age of 10 and saw his first action in the [[Adriatic Sea]]. Yeo distinguished himself in combat multiple times, most notably during the [[Portuguese conquest of French Guiana]], earning [[knighthood]]s in the Portuguese [[Order of Aviz]] and the British [[Order of the Bath]]. He was subsequently given command of the frigate {{HMS|Southampton|1757|2}} in 1812, but she was later wrecked in the [[Bahamas]], although he was acquitted of blame for its loss. Yeo was then given command of the British [[Squadron (naval)|squadron]] on [[Lake Ontario]] and commanded it in several [[engagements on Lake Ontario]] with American forces. He died off the [[Africa]]n coast in 1818.

==Service history==

===Early life and career===
Yeo was born in [[Southampton]], England on 7 October 1782 to a naval victualling agent. Yeo was sent to an academy near [[Winchester]] for his formal education. Yeo joined the [[Royal Navy]] as a [[midshipman]] aboard {{HMS|Windsor Castle|1790|2}} at the age of 10, thanks to his patron, Admiral [[Phillips Crosby]]. In 1796, he was made acting-[[Lieutenant (navy)|lieutenant]] and placed in command of the 16-gun [[Sloop-of-war|sloop]] {{HMS|Albacore|1793|2}}.{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|pp=115–116}} He was made lieutenant permanently on 20 February 1797.<ref name=canadian>Spurr, ''Dictionary of Canadian Biography''</ref> The vessel was deployed to the [[West Indies]], where Yeo contracted [[Yellow fever]] and was ordered home to England to convalesce in 1798. By 1802, Yeo was [[first lieutenant]] aboard {{HMS|Genereux||2}} in the [[Adriatic Sea]].{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|pp=115–116}} He distinguished himself during the [[siege]] of [[Cesenatico]] in 1800, when thirteen merchant vessels were burned or sunk.{{citation needed|date=July 2017}} Following the [[Peace of Amiens]] in 1802, Yeo was demoted to [[half-pay]].{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|p=116}}

===Napoleonic Wars===
Once war began again between Britain and France in 1805, Yeo became [[first lieutenant]] of the [[frigate]] {{HMS|Loire|1798|2}}. The frigate was patrolling off the northwest coast of Spain when ''Loire''{{'}}s commanding officer, [[Captain (Royal Navy)|Captain]] [[Frederick Lewis Maitland|F.L. Maitland]], chose to attack shipping in [[Muros, A Coruña|Muros]] Bay, Spain. Lieutenant Yeo led fifty men ashore to attack a [[Coastal artillery|shore battery]] that was firing on the frigate. Once there, they found a second, more powerful emplacement and captured that one too. During the battle, Yeo was stabbed with a bayonet. The Spanish suffered over forty casualties in the engagement, the British six. ''Loire'' captured three vessels at Muros Bay including the 22-gun [[corvette]] {{ship||Confiance|1797 ship|2}}.{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|p=116}}     As a reward, he was promoted to [[Commander (Royal Navy)|commander]] on 21 June and given the command of the captured ''Confiance'', which had been taken into Royal Navy service.<ref name=canadian/>{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|p=116}}

In 1807, ''Confiance'' was part of Admiral [[Sidney Smith (Royal Navy officer)|Sidney Smith]]'s fleet off Portugal. ''Confiance'' transported [[Percy Smythe, 6th Viscount Strangford]] to [[Lisbon]] to negotiate an alliance with Britain. Lord Strangford also negotiated the passage of the Portuguese Prince Regent [[John VI of Portugal|Dom João]] and the Portuguese royal family to Brazil. Yeo was ordered by Admiral Smith to bring word of Strangford's success to Britain, an honour that led Yeo being named to the list of [[post-captain]]s. Due to his rank, ''Confiance'' was reclassified as a [[post-ship]]. The following year, ''Confiance'' was part of Smith's fleet stationed off Brazil.{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|p=116}}

Yeo was ordered by Smith to bring dispatches to a Portuguese general from whom he learned of French [[privateer]]s based at [[Cayenne]], French Guiana. On 6 January 1809, he took command of a small force consisting of ''Confiance'', two Portuguese [[brig]]s, and 550 Portuguese soldiers. With them he [[Invasion of Cayenne (1809)|captured Cayenne]], a fortified position of two hundred guns, and took a thousand prisoners. The [[Portuguese conquest of French Guiana|conquest of French Guiana]] would remove the French from their last South American colony. During the operation, Yeo was among the many British who became sick. In 1810, he was [[knight]]ed for his services at Cayenne, both by the Portuguese who decreed him a member of the [[Order of Aviz]] and the British, who decreed him a knight commander of the [[Order of the Bath]] and was given his own [[coat-of-arms]]. Yeo was the first [[Protestant]] to be made a member of the Order of Aviz.{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|pp=117–118}}

In 1811 Yeo was given command of the frigate {{HMS|Southampton|1757|2}}. The frigate was ordered to [[Jamaica]] where it joined the fleet of Vice Admiral [[Charles Stirling]].<ref name=canadian/>{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|p=118}} In 1812, he was stationed in the [[Bahamas]]. There he captured the privateer [[French frigate Félicité (1785)|''Heureuse Réunion'']], a [[brig]] and a corvette in the [[action of 3 February 1812]], and the American brig {{USS|Vixen|1803|2}} in November 1812. However, shortly afterwards ''Southampton'' and ''Vixen'' were wrecked in the Crooked Island passage, although there were no deaths. As was customary in the case of the loss of a ship from any cause, Yeo was [[court martial]]led, but the court accepted that the reef on which he was wrecked was not charted, nor were the local currents documented, and Yeo was exonerated.{{sfn|Malcomson|2001|pp=118–119}}

===War of 1812===
The importance of the naval warfare on the [[Great Lakes]] raised "The Lakes Service" to the status of a Flag Command and [[Kingston, Ontario|Kingston]] was the Commodore's headquarters. Yeo was sent to Canada in 1813 aboard {{HMS|Woolwich|1785|2}} to command the British naval forces in the Great Lakes. He was appointed [[Commodore (rank)|commodore]] of the fleet on [[Lake Ontario]].<ref name=canadian/> Yeo's use of his small navy was always determined and skillful, but he was hampered by a lack of cooperation from the British army. The commander of these forces, Sir [[George Prevost]], failed to follow up key advances made by Yeo at [[Sackets Harbor, New York|Sackett's Harbour]] and elsewhere that might have resulted in major British victories. On the whole, [[historian]]s regard the war on [[Lake Ontario]] as having been a draw. During 1814 both Yeo and [[Isaac Chauncey]], the American commander, tried to out build the other. Yeo captured [[Oswego, New York]] and then blockaded Sacketts Harbour on 6 May 1814, when reinforced by two frigates built on [[Point Frederick (Kingston, Ontario)|Point Frederick]]. During the final months of the war, Yeo ensured British control of the lake by the 1814 launch of {{HMS|St. Lawrence|1814|2}}, a 112-gun [[first rate]] [[ship of the line]] built in Kingston specifically for use on the lake, a three-decker man-of-war, and he had two more building. The Americans also had two first line men-o'-war on the stocks.

In August 1815, Yeo was posted to {{HMS|Inconstant|1783|2}}, 36 guns, at [[Plymouth]].<ref name=canadian/> After the British-American War, Yeo held important commands on the [[West Africa]]n and [[Caribbean]] stations, but saw no further action. He died in 1818 at the age of 35, while returning from [[Jamaica]] to England.

==Legacy==
[[File:Royal Military College of Canada, Yeo Hall.jpg|thumb|220px|Yeo Hall, [[Royal Military College of Canada]]]]
[[File:Sir James Lucas Yeo plaque at Royal Military College of Canada.jpg|thumb|220px|Sir James Lucas Yeo plaque at the Royal Military College of Canada]]
The Yeo Hall at the [[Royal Military College of Canada]] in Kingston, Ontario was named in his honour in 1936. This multifunctional building houses the Cadet Dining Hall and the Cadet Mess. The barber and [[Canadian Forces Exchange System]] (CANEX) are located in the basement.
A plaque erected by the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada at the Royal Military College of Canada states "Born in Southampton, England, Yeo entered the British Navy, served throughout the Napoleonic Wars and won rapid promotion by his ability. In 1813, already a Commodore, he came to Canada to command British forces on the Great Lakes. Yeo successfully blockaded the American fleet in Sackett's Harbour for some months and subsequently commanded the naval forces at the capture of Oswego in 1814. Returning to England after the war he was posted to the West African Coast and died at sea while returning from that tour of duty."

Yeo was one of the actual historical officers on whom [[C. S. Forester]] modeled his fictional naval hero [[Horatio Hornblower]].{{citation needed|date=August 2020}} Forester briefly mentions him in the 1946 novel ''[[Lord Hornblower]]''. The opening scene is a church service for members of the Order of the Bath, attended by a number of prominent historical naval officers, including Yeo, although the novel is set in 1813, when Yeo was in Canada and before he became a Knight of the Bath.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Lord Hornblower |last=Forester|first=Cecil |chapter=1 |quote="Lord St. Vincent, huge and grim, the man who took his fleet down into the heart of a Spanish squadron twice its strength; Duncan, who destroyed the Dutch Navy at Camperdown; and a dozen more of admirals and captains, some of them even junior to him in the Navy List--Lydiard, who captured the Pomona off Havannah; Samuel Hood, who commanded the Zealous at the Nile; and Yeo, who stormed the fort at El Muro." |date=1946|publisher=Michael Joseph|location=London |language=en |oclc=16481131}}</ref>

==Citations ==
{{reflist}}

==Sources==
* {{cite book|last=Malcomson |first=Robert |date=2001 |orig-year=1998 |title=Lords of the Lake: The Naval War on Lake Ontario 1812–1814 |publisher=Robin Brass Studio |location=Toronto |edition=Paperback |isbn=1-896941-24-9}}
* {{cite DCB |first=John W. |last=Spurr |title=Yeo, Sir James Lucas |volume=V |url=http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/yeo_james_lucas_5E.html}}

==External links==
* [http://www.warof1812.ca/yeo.htm Biography of James Lucas Yeo, Commander of the Great Lakes]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yeo, James Lucas}}
[[Category:1782 births]]
[[Category:1818 deaths]]
[[Category:Royal Navy captains]]
[[Category:Royal Navy personnel of the French Revolutionary Wars]]
[[Category:Royal Navy personnel of the Napoleonic Wars]]
[[Category:Royal Navy personnel of the War of 1812]]
[[Category:Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath]]
[[Category:Knights Bachelor]]
[[Category:Commanders of the Order of Aviz]]
[[Category:Military personnel from Southampton]]
[[Category:Naval history of Canada]]
[[Category:Persons of National Historic Significance (Canada)]]