Batten, william

William Batten (c. 1600-1667) - English naval officer, vice admiral and politician, member of the House of Commons from 1661 to 1667.

Batten was the son of Andrew Batten, captain in the Royal Navy. In 1625, he was appointed one of the commanders of two ships sent for whaling to Svalbard by the yarmouth merchant Thomas Hort. In August 1626, he received a privateer certificate from London for the ship Salutation , owned by Andrew Haves. He became the captain of this ship again in 1628, and in April of the following year Batten, along with Hort and Haves, received an order from the Privy Council not to send Salutation , while Yarmouth was standing, to Greenland ( Svalbard ), but they sailed there anyway on this and another ship. The ships of the Moscow company captured both ships on Svalbard and sent them back empty. In 1630, he became captain and co-owner of the Charles ship in London, and in 1635 served as captain of a merchant ship. In 1638, he received the position of surveyor of the Navy, probably for a bribe.

In March 1642, Batten was appointed deputy Earl of Warwick , the admiral of parliamentary forces, who took the fleet from the hands of the king, and until the end of the First Civil War proved himself to be a strong supporter of parliament. It was he who, as vice admiral, commanded the squadron that bombed Scarborough when Henrietta Maria of France was there . He was accused (perhaps unfairly) by the royalists of allegedly ordering the ships to direct their fire at the queen's house. In 1644, he was serving in Plymouth , where he strengthened the tip of the peninsula, which has since been called Mount Batten. Towards the end of the First Civil War, Batten continued to patrol the English seas, and his actions in 1647 to capture several Swedish warships and merchant ships in Portsmouth that refused to greet the English flag were marked by parliament.

When the Second Civil War broke out, he lost the confidence of the government and was fired from the team, although he acknowledged his continued willingness to serve the state. When part of the fleet rebelled against parliament and joined the Prince of Wales in May 1648, Batten also joined them. He was knighted by the prince, but, being under suspicion of the royalists, he was landed in Holland. He returned to England and lived on a pension during the period of the English Republic .

During the Stuart Restoration, Batten became once again a surveyor of the Navy. In this position, he was in constant correspondence with Samuel Pips , who often mentions him in his diary. Pips expressed insinuations against him, but there is no evidence that Batten in profit from his work fell below the standards of his time.

Batten was elected a member of parliament from Rochester in 1661 and was a member until his death. In 1663, became the owner of Trinity House. He died in 1667.