Captain Peter Parker (1785-1814), by John Hopper, made 1808-1810
He was the son of Vice Admiral Christopher Parker, who in turn was the son of Admiral Sir Peter Parker, 1st Baronet, and Vice Admiral John Byron's daughter Augusta Byron. The poet George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron, was his cousin.
Parker attended Westminster School and was in the Royal Navy from 1798, serving under his grandfather, Viscount St Vincent and under Lord Nelson. In 1804 he became Commander and commanded the brig Weazel. She was the first to observe the departure of the Franco-Spanish fleet from Cadiz in the run-up to the Battle of Trafalgar, for which Parker was promoted to Captain. In 1809 he married Marianne Dallas, daughter of Sir George Dallas, 1st Baronet, and had three sons. His son Peter Parker (1809-1834), 3rd Baronet, was Commander on HMS Vernon.
In 1810/11 he was briefly a member of the House of Commons as MP for Wexford. On the death of his grandfather in 1811 he inherited the peerage of Baronet, of Bassingbourn in the County of Essex.
In 1810 he was given a command on the frigate Menelaus. He was involved in the suppression of a mutiny on the Africaine and in the capture of Mauritius in late 1810. In 1812 the Menelaus was part of France's naval blockade of the Mediterranean, particularly off Toulon, and from 1812 he was engaged in the British-American War against the USA, breaking up ships on the Maryland coast and attacking coastal towns. In 1814 he operated against the French in the Atlantic, capturing a valuable Spanish merchant ship as a prize in January.
After the French surrender in 1814, he was sent to Bermuda and from there to the Chesapeake Bay, where he blockaded Baltimore under Admiral George Cockburn and interdicted American commercial traffic. He also ruthlessly destroyed farms and American property along the coast. He had already been ordered back from the Chesapeake Bay after the destruction of Washington, D.C. by the British, but after a night meal with his officers, he wanted to attack once again in a commando raid a unit of Maryland militia that had set up camp near Chestertown, Maryland. A one-hour night hand-to-hand fight developed in which the British were repulsed and he was hit in the leg and bled to death before he got back to his ship. In 1814, Lord Byron wrote a poem in his memory.
