Sketched portrait of Marsh, Purser of the Queen Charlotte ca.1794
Mounted with PAH4887.; Bound with PAH4886-PAH4887, PAH4889-PAH4943. Though not fully visible on this image (since it appears to go onto the back of the paper) the supplementary inscription added below the title in the same hand appears to explain the death of the sitter, who locked himself in his cabin when the 'Queen Charlotte' (then under Captain Todd) caught fire by accident on the evening of 17 March 1800 about five miles off Leghorn (Livorno): about 800 men including Todd died by drowning or by the explosion when she blew up. Only twenty comissioned and warrant officers and 142 seamen survived. The ship was at the time Lord Keith's flagship as C-in-C in the Mediterranean, but he and some of his staff had gone ashore to Leghorn that morning so had a lucky escape. [PvdM 10/12]
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