Captain Sir William Hoste, 1st Baronet, KCB (26 August 17806 December 1828) was a Royal Navy officer who served in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. A protégé of Lord Nelson, he was one of the most talented frigate captains of the Napoleonic Wars, taking part in six major engagements, including the capture of the heavily fortified port of Kotor during the Adriatic campaign of 1807–1814. Hoste was, however, absent from the Battle of Trafalgar, having been sent with gifts to the Dey of Algiers.
Childhood and education
He was the second of eight children of Reverend Dixon Hoste (1750–1805) and Margaret Stanforth. At the time of his birth his father was rector of Godwick and Tittleshall in Norfolk. He was born at Ingoldisthorpe, and the family later moved to Godwick Hall, east of Tittleshall, which was leased from Thomas Coke, who later became the 1st Earl of Leicester, of Holkham Hall. His next brother, George Charles Hoste, became an officer in the Royal Engineers.
Hoste was educated for a time at King's Lynn and later at the Paston School in North Walsham, where Horatio Nelson himself had been to school some years previously. Dixon Hoste had arranged for Hoste's name to be entered in the books of as a Captain's servant when he was just 5 years old, although he would not actually go to sea until he reached the age of 12 or 13.
That time coincided with the outbreak of war with France in February 1793. Lacking any influence or naval contacts himself, Dixon Hoste asked his landlord, Thomas Coke, for assistance and was introduced to Nelson, then living nearby in Burnham Thorpe and who had recently been appointed as Captain of a 64-gun third-rate, which was being fitted out at Chatham Dockyard.
Captain started the battle towards the rear of the British line. Instead of continuing to follow the line, Nelson disobeyed orders and wore ship, and made for the Spanish van, which consisted of the 112-gun San Josef, the 80-gun San Nicolas and the 130-gun Santísima Trinidad. Captain engaged all three, assisted by which had come to her aid. After an hour of exchanging broadsides which left both Captain and Culloden heavily damaged, Nelson found himself alongside the San Nicolas which he boarded and forced her surrender.
In July, Theseus was present at the Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, although Hoste remained aboard and took no part in the assault. Nevertheless, the battle was a decisive victory for the British.
Following the battle, Nelson sent his report to London, taking the precaution of sending a duplicate in the brig , commanded by Lieutenant Thomas Capel. At Naples, Capel was to carry on with the dispatch, handing command of Mutine to Hoste. Upon taking command, Hoste became an acting-captain at the age of 18. Hoste, carrying news of the victory, first sailed to Gibraltar, before rejoining the fleet, under St Vincent, off Cádiz. He wrote to his father – "Not to have been in it is enough to make one mad, but to have lost such a friend besides is really sufficient to almost overwhelm me" (Hoste's letters).
A number of successes while engaged on active service in the Mediterranean over the following 18 months brought Hoste to the attention of Lord Collingwood, who sent him into the Adriatic Sea. Here he single-handedly conducted an aggressive campaign against the ships and coastal installations of the French and their allies, bringing much of the coastal trade in the region to a halt.
Personal life
He married Lady Harriet Walpole (1 March 179218 April 1875) on 17 April 1817. She was the daughter of Horatio Walpole, 2nd Earl of Orford and Sophia Churchill.