Photography & Ephemera

[STAINES, Sir Thomas (1776-1830)]. Pair of indentures on vellum relating to Captain Sir Thomas Staines. 1814/16. Two multi-page documents on vellum. Both indentures bear George Regent stamps to indicate the reign of King George III. All bear original wax seals. Largest measures 584 x 685 mm. Documents mention Richard Halford, a banker and cousin of Staines with whose wife he was then engaged in an illicit affair. Both documents are signed by and bear the seals of Staines and Halford. Captain Sir Thomas Staines joined the British Navy when he was thirteen years old and within seven years was commissioned a lieutenant aboard the HMS Peterel under Commander Philip Wodehouse. In 1807 he was appointed commander of the HMS Cyane, and in 1809 Staines found himself in a heated battle in Naples Bay with the French frigate Cerere as well as twenty gunboats. Despite exhausting all of the Cyane’s ammunition the crew forced the French into a hasty retreat, albeit at the cost of many lives and one of Staines’s arms. Upon his return to England Staines was knighted by King George III. In later years he would command the HMS Briton which in 1814 would encounter John Adams, last surviving mutineer from the HMS Bounty, on Pitcairn Island, and despite an active warrant for his arrest Staines opted to leave him in peace due to his missionary work with the island’s natives.