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Description area
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History
Keppel entered the Navy in 1822 and was promoted to lieutenant in 1828, when he was appointed to the GALATEA in home waters and later in the West Indies. He then went to the East Indies in the MAGICIENNE. In 1833, he was promoted to commander and the following year commanded the CHILDERS off Spain during the Carlist War. In 1837, he was promoted to captain and in 1841 commanded the DIDO during the China War. After this he remained in the East Indies, helping Sir James Brooke (1803-1868) to suppress pirates off Borneo. He commanded, after two years on half-pay, the MEANDER on the same station, returning to England in 1851. In 1853 he was appointed to the ST JOAN D'ACR in the Baltic and then, in 1855, went to the RODNEY in the Black Sea, serving with distinction in the Crimea. In 1856 he went again to China where he lost his ship the RALEIGH; Keppel was acquitted in the subsequent court martial. He commandeered the Hong Kong, a river steamer, and at the battle of Fatshan Creek, on the Canton River, destroyed a powerful force of pirates in 1857, the year he was promoted to rear-admiral. In 1860 he was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Cape and Brazil Station. He became a vice-admiral in 1864 and from 1866 to 1869 commanded the China Squadron. Between 1872 and 1875 he was Commander-in-Chief at Devonport and in 1877 was promoted to Admiral of the Fleet. Keppel published his memoirs, A sailors life under four sovereigns (London, 1899). See also Sir Algernon Edward West, Memoir of Sir Henry Keppel G.C.B. Admiral of the Fleet (London, 1945) and V.E. Stuart, The beloved little admiral (London, 1967).