Captain John Loring RN: From Toulon to the Caribbean
Captain John Loring RN (c.1761–1808) served through the American War of Independence, the French Revolutionary Wars and the opening years of the Napoleonic Wars. His career took him from the Mediterranean to the Caribbean and eventually back to Fareham.
During the French Revolutionary War he served at the Siege of Toulon in 1793. When the city fell back into French hands, Loring’s ship was still under repair, and he was forced to burn her rather than allow her to be captured. A few years later he became acting captain of HMS Bellerophon, one of the Royal Navy’s best-known ships.
He later returned to command Bellerophon as a full post-captain. When war with France resumed in 1803, Loring was made commodore of a British squadron blockading Saint-Domingue, modern Haiti. His squadron captured French privateers and warships and helped prevent French forces from escaping by sea.
Loring was also involved in the final evacuation of the French garrison from Saint-Domingue. It was a significant moment in the conflict that ended with the establishment of an independent Haiti in 1804.
After returning to Britain, he commanded the enormous 112-gun HMS Salvador del Mundo as a guardship at Plymouth. His final appointment was closer to home, commanding the Sea Fencibles between Emsworth and Calshot, a coastal defence force raised during fears of French invasion. Contemporary naval biography remembered him as a particularly zealous, brave and humane officer.
Loring died at Fareham in November 1808. The St Peter & St Paul’s churchyard record gives his dates as 1761–10 November 1808, although naval biographical sources give his death as 9 November 1808.
His family continued the naval tradition. His son Hector Loring, born in Fareham, also became a Royal Navy officer and served in Burma and the Mediterranean.
Captain John Loring’s grave therefore connects Fareham with Toulon, HMS Bellerophon, the Caribbean wars and the fall of French Saint-Domingue—a remarkably wide story for one name in the churchyard.
