• Edward Little's handwritten letter II


    A second handwritten letter from Edward Little I've found at TNA, this one is from October 28th 1834

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    TNA ADM 1/4866


    It reads :


    N°9 St Michaels Terrace Stoke

    Devonport October 28th 1834

    Sir,

    Having been informed that Captain Chesney of the Royal Artillery is about to processed on an Expedition to the Euphrates, and that two passed Mates are to be employed under that officer, I take the earliest opportunity of offering my humble services on the occasion trusting, that an abscence of eight years on foreign service may entitle me to favourable consideration

    In June 1826 I joined His Majesty's Ship Forte Captain J. Coghlan, where I remained untill that ship left the west coast to South America for England. I then joined successively His Majesty's Ships Sapphire, Alert and Dublin, and was paid off from the last named ship on 1st October last,

    In June 1832, I passed my examination for Seamanship 

         To Captain the Hon'ble 

          George Elliott RN

          &&&

          Admiralty                                                                                    and


    and on my arrival in England I also passed at the Royal Naval College Lord James Townshend, my last Captain is now in London, to whom, as well as my other Captain’s I can with safety refer for character and general fitness, I have the honor to be,

    Sir, your most obedient

    Very humble servant

    E Little late Mate

    of the Dublin


    In the corner :

    ? November

    As there

    ? have no(thing ?) to say

    & and the expe(dition?) he alludes to


    (Thanks to everyone on Discord who helped me with that last part, please feel free to add your own transcription as it's quite hard to read)


    But this confirm several things to us : his adress being 9 Michael's Terrace, Stoke Devonport, which I have already found some mentions of it being the family's adress at the time (before any census)

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    And it also confirm to us that the Edward in the description book really is the same one, as we can link his Lieutenant service record to the one from the description book, before his promotion


    We also now know that he passed his examination for Seamanship in 1832 while on board the Dublin, and passed his Lieutenant examination at the Royal Naval College in 1834 (Portsmouth)


    But based on his service record, Edward did not join the Euphrates Expedition, as his next appointment after leaving the Dublin on Oct 2 1834, was on the Royale Adelaide, Sept 5 1835, still as Mate

    His first appointment as Lieutenant would be in Dec 1837, on HMS Donegal


    James Fitzjames actually took part in the Euphrates Expedition as Mate, which he joined on October 25th 1834, here is @jamesfitzjamesdotcom's post about it

  • Edward Little on AMC’s The Terror I would’ve given you a Mediterranean post and kept you alive forever

  • The Court Martial Testimony Part 1.5


    Since you were all so enthusiastic, I did my best to quickly transcribe that part of the record, so here is Edward's testimony

    I'll transcribe the whole record when I can, because it's sixty pages long, and with several annexed letters (that I'll add when necessary to give you some more context to this)


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    TNA ADM 1/5480


    The "The manner is which this Gentleman gave his evidence called forth the animadversions of the Court" from the newspaper arcticle has a different ring to it now :')


    (Sorry for the potential typos, I kept them from the original record)

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