This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. The specific problem is: References need to be wikified.. Please help improve this article if you can. (May 2012)

Sir Alexander Inglis Cochrane
Born	(1758-04-23)23 April 1758
Died	26 January 1832(1832-01-26) (aged 73) Paris, France
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	Royal Navy
Rank	Admiral
Commands held	North American Station Plymouth Command
Battles/wars	American War of Independence War of 1812
Awards	Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath

Admiral Sir Alexander Inglis Cochrane GCB RN (23 April 1758 – 26 January 1832, born Alexander Forrester Cochrane^[1]) was a senior Royal Navy commander during the Napoleonic Wars.

Naval career [edit]

Born a son of the Scottish peer Thomas Cochrane, the eighth Earl of Dundonald,^[1] Cochrane joined the Royal Navy as a boy and served with British naval forces in North America, where he saw service in the American War of Independence.^[1]

Cochrane also participated in the Egyptian operations in 1801.^[1] When Alexandria fell, Cochrane, in the 74-gun third-rate HMS Ajax, with the sixth-rate HMS Bonne Citoyenne, the HMS Cynthia, the brig-sloops HMS Port Mahon and HMS Victorieuse, and three Turkish corvettes, were the first vessels to enter the harbour.

In 1805 he was made commander of the Leeward Islands station.^[1] He conducted operations against the French and Spanish on 6 February 1806 at the Battle of San Domingo,^[1] in which a cannon ball blew his hat off his head while he was on the deck of his flagship, HMS Northumberland. He was appointed KCB on 29 March 1806.^[1]

Other rewards included thanks from both Houses of Parliament, freedom of the city of London, and a sword valued at 100 guineas.^[1] In 1807 he sailed in HMS Belleisle (74 guns) in the expedition against Danish Islands, and in 1809 commanded naval forces in the Conquest of Martinique.^[2]

From 1814, during the War of 1812, Cochrane, then a vice admiral, served as Commander-in-Chief of the North American Station, based at the new dockyard in Bermuda.^[1] He landed the force under General Ross that burned Washington and also pushed successful naval forays at the same time. Initially he wanted to attack Rhode Island after the success at Washington, but was dissuaded by Ross and Admiral Cockburn, who wanted to go after the bigger prize of Baltimore. During the Battle of Baltimore, Cochrane was responsible for the bombardment of Fort McHenry in Baltimore, Maryland, which proved ineffectual and he resisted calls to attack the fort more aggressively with frigates. He did order a diversionary raid by boats to assist the army encamped near Baltimore in their proposed attack on Hampstead hill (which they canceled and withdrew), but this diversion also had no success. The army and navy's failure at Baltimore effectively canceled out the success of Washington. The use of bomb vessels and rocket ship was the event that gave rise to Francis Scott Key's poem that became "The Star-Spangled Banner". Cochrane also led the British force that won the Battle of Lake Borgne in December 1814 and succeeded in giving the army a hard short road to New Orleans over which to advance. However, the army was defeated at the Battle of New Orleans in January 1815. The Battle of New Orleans was actually fought after Britain had signed a Treaty of Peace that was in transit to Washington for ratification.

The Duke of Wellington held that the failure of the New Orleans campaign was largely the fault of Cochrane, commenting in eulogy to General Edward Pakenham, killed at New Orleans, that:

I cannot but regret that he was ever employed on such a service or with such a colleague. The expedition to New Orleans originated with that colleague.... The Americans were prepared with an army in a fortified position which still would have been carried, if the duties of others, that is of the Admiral (Sir Alexander Cochrane), had been as well performed as that of he whom we now lament.^[3]

Despite the lack of success and damage to British prestige that occurred by the defeat of British forces at the Battle of New Orleans, Cochrane was promoted to admiral in 1819. From 1821 to 1824, he was Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth.^[1] He died in Paris on 26 January 1832.

Family [edit]

In 1788 he married Maria Shaw; they had three sons and two daughters.^[1] His son Thomas John Cochrane rose to become admiral of the fleet.

Cochrane was the sixth of the surviving sons of Thomas Cochrane, 8th Earl of Dundonald. The eldest son Archibald Cochrane became the earl and lost the family lands on a series of inventions and investments. The next brother, Charles, was killed at the Siege of Yorktown; he was married to Catherine, the daughter of Major John Pitcairn. The third surviving son, John Cochrane, was a paymaster and provisioner to the army and navy; he was the father of Nathaniel Day Cochrane, a Royal Navy captain who published a book of his travels in Russia, and probably of the chess player John Cochrane. The next son, Basil Cochrane, made a fortune supplying the Royal Navy in India. Alexander was the sixth son; the seventh, George Augustus Frederick Cochrane, had an army career and served in Parliament. The youngest son, Andrew James, was an army officer, colonial governor, politician, and fraudster.

The Earl of St. Vincent wrote of the Cochrane brothers in 1806, "The Cochranes are not to be trusted out of sight, they are all mad, romantic, money-getting and not truth-telling—and there is not a single exception in any part of the family."^[4]

References [edit]

Bibliography [edit]

• Anderson, William. (1862). The Scottish Nation: Or The Surnames, Families, Literature, Honours, and Biographical History of the People of Scotland. Fullarton.

External links [edit]

• Significant Scots: Sir Alexander Cochrane - Biography from ElectricScotland.com