The Naval Gold Medal awarded to Captain Charles Tyler who served aboard H.M.S.Tonnant,

Footnotes

Provenance:
Charles Tyler and thence by direct family decent

Britain’s great successes at sea during the 18th century prompted many young men to make their careers in the Royal Navy, and Charles Tyler was typical of them. As the scion of a good family and with a taste for adventure, he and others like him formed the backbone of the Service as Nelson rose to senior command. In return for their loyalty, Nelson encouraged and promoted them, even referring to the best as his ‘band of brothers’. Tyler, his protégé since 1795, was a member of this inner circle on whose fate and skill Britain’s supremacy at sea came to depend so heavily.

Admiral Sir Charles Tyler, GCB, was born in 1760, the third son of Captain Peter Tyler. He joined the Royal Navy in 1771 as a so-called ‘Captain’s Servant’ on the Barfleur, and went initially to the North American Station where, in the run-up to the American War of Independence, he witnessed the famous ‘Boston Tea Party’ in 1773.

Tyler then began his steady climb up the ranks. He was made Lieutenant in 1779 and then Commander in 1782, both promotions undoubtedly the result of his services during the American War. In 1790, he was made Captain and, after taking command of the 32-gun frigate Meleager, he captained the 64-gun Diadem in Admiral Hotham’s action with the French off Genoa in 1795. It was at this point that he first became acquainted with Nelson. However, Tyler missed the opportunity to fight under Nelson at the Battle of the Nile because his ship, the Aigle, was wrecked in July 1798. But, once back home, he was given the 74-gun HMS Warrior, taking her first to the blockade of Cadiz and then to the battle of Copenhagen in April 1801.

After commanding the Sea Fencible Regiment in South Wales from 1803-05, Tyler was appointed to the 80-gun HMS Tonnant in September 1805. In this, he fought in the Battle of Trafalgar where he was severely wounded. For this wound, he received a pension of £250 a year, and for his conduct at the battle he won the Naval Gold Medal, a £100 sword of honour from the Patriotic Fund, and the thanks of both Houses of Parliament. Tyler was promoted to Rear Admiral in 1808 and appointed Commander-in-Chief at the Cape of Good Hope in 1812, where he remained until 1815. Made Vice-Admiral in 1813 and a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) in 1815, Tyler received his final promotion to Admiral in 1825 and was made a Knight Grand Cross of the Bath (GCB) two years before his death in Gloucester in 1835.