Rob Moody with research by FOFC members Carole M & James S.
An unmarked grave by the road in Folkestone Old Cemetery made Carole curious when mapping the plots there. It belongs to a married couple of the Georgian era; Alfred, born c1787, and Leonora, born 1801, both of whom died in Boulogne.
Leonora Maria was the only daughter of Thomas Rowcroft, a City of London Merchant and Alderman, well known for his good deeds and charities; including supporting the families of soldiers who’d been killed fighting Napoleon’s forces, and famine victims in Ireland. Leonora had three known brothers, two of them settling in Australia.
Alfred Samuel appears to be the son of James Herring Robinson and Ann Townsend, who married at St Mary in Marylebone, London in 1781. We believe that James was a Purser in the Royal Navy. That would put him in the Petty Officers’ ranks; skilled men with responsibility, but not of higher social status.
In 1801, aged about 14, Samuel went to sea in the Royal Navy as a ‘First Class Volunteer’. We can guess that his father knew a naval captain who’d agreed to have the youngster aboard. He would have been educated / literate with reasonable maths, so that he could progress to be a mid-shipman, then possibly an officer. Luckily, his career is outlined in the ‘Naval Biography’. Alfred started on HMS Standard, a 64 gun two decker, which with Napoleon’s control of Europe was patrolling hostile North Sea shores in 1801.
Alfred sailed around the world in 1802. As a Mid-shipman, he had been posted to HMS Gratton, 50, in May and found the two decker being adapted for a voyage to Australia. Her armament seems to have been reduced, but she was left with enough cannon to hold off any likely opponent. Cabins were put in for some members of the Royal Household and 30 Free Settlers, but many unwilling were to be carried on the lower decks; in all 135 female and 270 male prisoners for the penal colony. They set sail on the 23rd September, taking the winds down to South America and a supply stop at Rio de Janeiro, as water could run short with so many aboard. Now the Glatton headed sou’eastward across the South Atlantic to pick up the ‘Roaring Forties’ south of Cape Town. Those winds would have swept her along between the India and Southern Oceans, and along Australia’s south coast. They anchored at Sydney on the 13th March 1803. Only twelve people had died on the voyage, but 100 were suffering from scurvy due to shortage of fresh vegetables / fruit. When the ship was fit to return, they took the strong winds eastward, eventually rounding Cape Horn into the Atlantic. On 22nd September they were home, a year from when they’d sailed; in all 277 days at sea.
Frigates were the hunters of the Navy and Captain Barrie’s ‘Pomone’, 38, was often in action off the French coast and south to Lisbon. Aboard her, Alfred took part in destroying and capturing enemy warships and cargo vessels. When Barrie sighted a convoy anchored and protected by the shore batteries at Sables d’Olonne, he attacked the escorting brigs, capturing one and driving the other on shore. Maybe, waiting ‘til half-light, he sent his boats to capture or destroy the trading vessels. Midshipman Alfred commanded a cutter, rowing to board and seize ‘prizes’. In all 13 small ships were captured and a schooner driven ashore, all the while being under cannon fire. In just the spring of 1807, they had accounted for 21 French vessels.
Alfred gained Lieutenant’s rank in January 1810, on a small sloop, the Fly, protecting British shipping in The Downs off Deal, then shadowing Danish warships at the entrance to the Baltic Sea. In the last years of the Napoleonic Wars, after 4 months on half-pay, Alfred was on the frigate ‘Semiramis’, 36, protecting shipping heading to round the Cape of Good Hope. They destroyed ‘Le Puvier,16; then captured a 14 gun privateer. Peace came and Alfred had to live on half-pay for 9 years.
Leonora Maria Rowcroft, called ‘Ellie’ by the family, was 14 when those wars ended in 1815. That year her mother Jeanette Guest Rowcroft, died in November, leaving ‘Ellie’ as the ‘lady of the house’. Thomas, her father, supported some literary and artistic societies, and had sent a son to Eton. We guess that Leonora would have been well educated. She may have gained a wider education, sharing the boys’ tutor, then maybe going to a small girls’ school. At the least she would have been able to manage house accounts and be a hostess. She may have filled that role from the time her mother died, becoming relied on by her father.
Thomas Rowcroft is described as a prominent merchant, who traded widely. He may have been reasonable in French as he had traded with Russia until the Napoleonic Wars, which caused him loses of £300,000. Portugal being a major trade partner of Britain, he could have spoken that language and Spanish; a useful attribute as Foreign Secretary, George Canning chose him to be Britain’s first Consul General of Peru.
Simon Bolivar had begun South America’s quest for independence from Spain, and Britain was quietly aiding that, while European dynasties ‘quarrelled’ at home. Now we were sending out consuls to Argentina, Chile, Uruguay and Peru, with vice-consuls to support them in various ports. Thomas Rowcroft and Leonora
were amongst the party that sailed from Portsmouth on January 5th 2024. It sounds like a rough voyage, as the ship needed to re-fit at the end of February, at Rio de Janeiro. They were at Montevideo on March 12th where they took a ferry to Buenos Ayres. Rowcroft got his party equipped and provisioned with spare horses before heading across the Pampas for the high Andes. We could guess that the Rowcrofts had a ladies’ maid and a manservant with them. With autumn beginning, temperatures could be dropping and winds fierce in the 12,000 foot high passes. However, they completed the 900 mile ride to Valparaiso, on the Chilian coast before their ship arrived on March 26th.
They sailed north along the Pacific coast and were landed at Callao harbour amid fighting between Royalists and the Patriots of General Bolivar, who wanted independence. The capital Lima was only 5 miles from the harbour, but to go between them was hazardous, with passes needed even when bullets weren’t flying. Rowcroft had dealings with Simon Bolivar, whose rebels were gaining the upper hand, and with the Royalists. He seems to have been given the task of buying silver and gold bullion while there. Our Navy’s ship often anchored off the harbour to collect dispatches, but avoided diplomatic incidents by sailing off if a Spanish gunship was in the offing.
The “Scots Magazine’s Register – Foreign Intelligence” of 1825 reported the situation in Peru during December 1824, when the Patriots held the capital, Lima, and the Royalists had pieces of artillery on the road to defend the port of Callao. Thomas Rowcroft was in the habit, when meeting the opposing leaders, of wearing official dress, including sword. He rode beside his servant, carrying a scrawled safe pass, with Leonora in the coach behind them. Approaching the Patriot pickets they were challenged, but being slow to halt, were fired on. Leonara took her wounded father to a British merchant’s house in the port, where Thomas died in the morning. (usually quoted as December 7th ). Simon Bolivar visited Leonora to express his condolences. HMS Cambridge collected Leonora and Captain Maling buried Rowcroft on nearby San Lorenzo island.
On June 23rd 1823, after 9 years on half-pay (and so far un-traceable) Alfred Samuel Robinson was given a post by the Admiralty. The Lieutenant joined with other officers, petty-officers and a few crew to fit-out what had been an 82 gun vessel, but now needed to accommodate 72 important passengers, as well as being a warship. This was HMS Cambridge, which had full complement and was ready to sail as 1824 began. They passed close to Madeira, briefly anchored off Santa Cruz, Tenerife, sailed south, sighted Cape Verde, then west across the ocean to Brazil. After most of the passengers disembarked at Montevideo, Cambridge sailed to Cape Horn and against the prevailing winds into the Pacific and north to Valparaiso. Once Rowcroft’s party was landed, they supported the new consuls, carrying dispatches, making new surveys of harbours and contacting British traders / settlers.
Obviously, Alfred and other officers had met their passengers on the voyage out, maybe dining with them at times. Then at the end of 1824, the bereaved Leonora was onboard the Cambridge again, until she could be put ashore, maybe with a British consul’s family at another port. How she returned to Britain is not known. Alfred served on HMS Cambridge until 1827, when in October they were in Chatham for ‘small repairs’.
What we do know is that Leonora married Alfred on December 4th 1827 at St John, Havering, Essex, four years after her father’s killing. Where they settled is not known, as they aren’t mentioned on any census. Alfred had a final ten months sea-time in 1843, as First Lieutenant on HMS Tartarus and HMS Porcupine, steam surveying- vessels; but was on half-pay after June 1846.
As with so many retired naval officers, Alfred and Leonora lived abroad to conserve their pension and funds. Boulogne was their choice. It had several well-known ex-pat families, was close for news and on the route of many British travellers.
Alfred Samuel Robinson died August 8th 1870, aged 90, at Rue du Renard 14. The Boulogne register also records that he’d been a naval officer. Leonara Maria Rowcroft Robinson, lived as a widow in Boulogne, until 1883 when she died on March 28th aged 86, at Rue Vieillards 3. Boulogne records say that she had been living on income from renting out houses. The death was registered by Henry Killington Jarrett, a merchant, and Floride Delahodde. We don’t know how they arranged for their burials in Folkestone.
An intriguing story of two people’s perseverance and devotion.
