User:Euryalus/Timmins

Thomas Timins (d. 23 October 1828) was a Royal Marines officer who served in the American Revolutionary War, as a member of Australia's First Fleet, and aboard HMS Dreadnought (1801) during the Battle of Trafalgar.

Early life Timins was born into a military family. Two of his older brothers were Royal Navy officers and a third had served as a soldier with the East India Company. In the mid-1770s he enlisted in the Navy and was promoted to the rank of midshipman with a family expectation that he would subsequently take the officers examination. Instead, in 1778 he sought and received a commission as second lieutenant in the Royal Marines and was assigned to the 105th Company based in Portsmouth.

American Revolutionary War In 1779 Timins was transferred to the 4th Company of Marines and embarked for America as part of the British effort in the American Revolutionary War. He saw active service in General Henry Clinton's successful Siege of Charleston in 1780, and again in the Battle of the Chesapeake in 1781. For this service he was promoted to first lieutenant, but saw no further action before the War ended in 1783. Following the British surrender at Yorktown and the Treaty of Paris, Timins returned to England and was reposted at half pay to the 86th Company of Marines, headquartered at Chatham Dockyard.

First Fleet Deprived of its American colonies, the British Government was forced to find an alternative location for the transportation of convicts. In January 1785 sough elsewhere for a location to which convicts might be transported and prison overcrowding in England relieved. In January 1785 a plan by

Governmetn of Britain sought elsewhere for feat in the American Revolution deprived Britain of its ability to transport convicts to the [[Thirteentraditional location for the transportation of convicts, and inspired the establishment of a penal colony in the newly discovered continent of Australia. Deprived of its American colonies, the British Government sought elsewhere for Massive overcrowding in British prisons, and the loss of Britain's American colonies, led Napoleonic Wars

Death