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29-536: Captain Daniel Woodriff CB (17 November 1756 – 25 February 1842) was a British Royal Navy officer and navigator in the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. He made two voyages to Australia. He was Naval Agent on the convict transport Kitty in 1792 and, in 1803, the captain of HMS  Calcutta for David Collins ' expedition to found a settlement in Port Phillip . Woodriff

58-546: A yellow admiral ). A junior post-captain would usually command a frigate or a comparable ship, while more senior post-captains would command larger ships. An exception to this rule was that a very junior post-captain could be posted to command an admiral's flagship, which was almost always a large ship of the line . The admiral would usually do this to keep his most junior captain under close observation and subject to his direct supervision. Captains commanding an admiral's flagship were called " flag captains ". One example of this

87-492: A means of ridding the service of ineffective or incompetent officers who had too much political influence to be dismissed entirely. Such officers would be placed on half-pay and never recalled to active service. In periods of extended conflict, the half-pay lists became a significant expense for militaries when it was coupled with the selling of half pay-commissions, which was common in the British Army. The half-pay system

116-409: A single epaulette on the right shoulder, and a post-captain with three or more years seniority wore an epaulette on each shoulder. In the O'Brian series, Aubrey "wets the swab" – that is, he celebrates his promotion to commander and the acquisition of his "swab" or epaulette with the consumption of copious amounts of alcohol. The term post-captain was descriptive only. It was never used as a title in

145-411: Is the appointment of Alexander Hood to the command of HMS Barfleur , flagship of his cousin, Admiral Sir Samuel Hood . Sometimes, a high-ranking admiral would have two post-captains on his flagship. The junior would serve as the flag captain and retain responsibility for the day-to-day operation of the vessel. The senior would be the fleet captain , or " captain of the fleet ", and would serve as

174-579: Is used instead of pension. The current retirement system was adopted after World War II to maintain competitiveness with the civilian market, maintain a pool of experienced officers and NCOs, to care for the large numbers of officers and senior enlisted personnel leaving the service after the end of the war. The maritime adventure novels of the Horatio Hornblower series, set during the Napoleonic Wars , include numerous references to

203-490: The Calcutta was forced to surrender. Woodriff, his officers, and crew were landed at La Rochelle three months later, and marched to Verdun , 600 miles (970 km) away. In June 1807, Woodriff was released in a prisoner exchange , and promptly court-martialled for the loss of his ship. He was honourably acquitted, and his conduct was pronounced to have been that of "a brave, cool, and intrepid officer." In 1808 Woodriff

232-844: The Department of War . Such a large list of officers drawing half-pay created similar problems for the United States as it had in Great Britain . In an attempt to control the growing number of aging officers still on the government payroll and to promote a younger officer corps, in 1855, the Secretary of the Navy was given the right, with the recommendation of a review board, to terminate involuntarily officers who were deemed incapable or unfit for duty. Soon, officers with 40 years of service were allowed to retire voluntarily. In 1889,

261-467: The Royal Navy of the 18th and 19th centuries, an officer might be promoted from commander to captain, but not have a command. Until the officer obtained a command, he was "on the beach" and on half-pay . An officer "took post" or was "made post" when he was first commissioned to command a vessel. Usually this was a rated vessel – that is, a ship too important to be commanded by a mere commander – but

290-445: The admiral's chief-of-staff. These two captains would be listed in the ship's roll as the "second captain" and "first captain", respectively. After 1795, when they were first introduced on Royal Navy uniforms, the number and position of epaulettes distinguished between commanders and post-captains of various seniorities. A commander wore a single epaulette on the left shoulder. A post-captain with less than three years' seniority wore

319-419: The burdens of military discipline . They had to ask for permission to marry or to travel outside their commune (municipality). Also, their mail was opened, and they had to report to police. The image of the demi-solde as a nostalgic Bonapartist organising conspiracies for the return of his Emperor is an exaggeration, but some of them were actually involved in anti-Bourbon plots. On the other hand, most of

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348-471: The crew of Calcutta assisted in suppressing the Castle Hill convict rebellion . For that service, Woodriff received a 1,000-acre (400 ha) land grant near Penrith, New South Wales in 1804. Calcutta then sailed back to England via Cape Horn and Rio de Janeiro, arriving at Spithead on 23 July 1804, thereby completing a circumnavigation of the globe in ten months and three days. The Calcutta

377-642: The form of forfeiture of half of pay and entitlements. There is no specific punishment described as "half-pay" in the Uniform Code of Military Justice , but the term is used as a common shorthand for the forfeiture of pay. The guidelines for the maximum length of time of this punishment are defined by Article 15 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. For commissioned officers, the length of forfeiture cannot exceed two months at half-pay or detention of half months pay for three months. For enlisted personnel,

406-415: The half-pay list were approved at the discretion of the Secretary at War . In the 19th century, armies and navies used the half-pay list, which served a similar function to the reserve officer components of modern forces, with officers who were retired or otherwise not required for active service receiving half of the salary of their fully commissioned counter-parts. The half-pay list could also serve as

435-562: The half-pay retirement benefit was extended to enlisted personnel who had completed 30 years of active service by General Order No. 372. Following the Second Bourbon Restoration in 1815, the remnants of the Grande Armée were disbanded; because of wholesale defection to Napoleon upon his return from Elba, the end of the various Coalition Wars since 1792 and the precarious situation of public finances. Many of

464-705: The intention of setting up a settlement there under the command of David Collins . Calcutta sailed from Spithead on 28 April 1803, in company with the storeship Ocean , calling at Rio de Janeiro in July, and the Cape of Good Hope in August, arriving at their intended destination in October. Calcutta then sailed alone to Port Jackson to take on a cargo of 800 long tons (810 t) of timber. Whilst in Sydney, Woodriff and

493-507: The long period of peace that the reduced British Army experienced after the Napoleonic Wars , the half-pay system became a means by which arduous overseas service could be avoided. Well-to-do officers who were promoted through the purchase system could transfer to the half-pay list if their regiment was posted to India or elsewhere. They could then purchase new appointments to regiments assigned to home service in Britain. Transfers to and from

522-580: The manner of "Post-Captain John Smith". Half-pay Half-pay ( h.p. ) was a term used in the British Army and Royal Navy of the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries to refer to the pay or allowance an officer received when in retirement or not in actual service. In the English Army the option of half-pay developed during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, at the same time as

551-532: The officers reintegrated into civil life by becoming farmers, industrialists or traders. Others were eventually recalled to the military when it needed to be expanded. Still others emigrated, mainly to the Americas . From 20,000 in 1815, they numbered only 3000 by the July Revolution . In the modern US military , the term "half-pay" refers to the punishment of low-level offences by service members in

580-458: The officers were deemed suspect of Bonapartism or Republicanism and so were thought to be unreliable. Consequently, many of the pre-Waterloo officers were put on demi-solde ("half-pay"), and some of these were replaced by émigrés . These officers were removed from active service but still retained their ranks and had to be ready to serve the military at any time. Their perceived political unreliability caused them to continue to be under

609-496: The rank of O-4 and above may impose the forfeiture of half-a-month's pay for two months or the detention of half-a-month's pay for three months. The term may also be used in reference to the retirement pay that members of the US Armed Forces receive if they retire after 20 years of service. They are technically subject to recall to active service if needed and so the legal term retired pay (reduced pay for reduced service)

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638-441: The severity of the available punishments is limited by the rank of the commanding officer and the rank. For example, to punish a noncommissioned officer for the same length of time as a junior enlisted service member, the commanding officer must be of a higher rank than would otherwise be required. Officers below the rank of O-4 ( Major or Lieutenant Commander ) may impose the confiscation of only up to seven days' pay. Officers of

667-470: The system of purchasing commissions and promotions by officers took hold. Serving officers could go on half-pay voluntarily, or be obliged to do so if their services were not required. In both cases, they could be summoned back to their regiments if there was a sudden need for their services. As an example, during the Jacobite rising of 1715 , all listed half-pay officers were recalled to the army. During

696-967: Was appointed agent for prisoners of war at Forton , near Gosport . Towards the end of the war he served as Resident Commissioner at Jamaica . He was admitted into the Royal Hospital, Greenwich , on 9 November 1830, and was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath on 26 September 1831, on the occasion of King William IV 's Coronation Honours . He was born on 17 December 1756, the son of John Woodriff of Deptford, Kent. He married Asia Sumarel (1764–1827); they had three daughters, and three sons: Capt. Daniel James Woodriff RN (1787–1860), Cdr. John Robert Woodriff RN (1790–1868), and Lt. Robert Mathews Woodriff RN (1792–1820). Post-captain The term served to distinguish those who were captains by rank from: In

725-525: Was commissioned as a lieutenant on 1 April 1783, and received promotion to the rank of commander on 18 September 1795, and to captain on 28 April 1802. Towards the end of 1802, Woodriff was appointed to command of the Calcutta , a 50-gun ship armed en flûte , and fitted to transport convicts. They were bound for Port Phillip in the Bass Strait , on the southern extremity of Australia , with

754-617: Was implemented in 1778 by the Continental Congress as an incentive to compensate for the extremely low pay that officers in the Continental Army received, which made it difficult to retain officers for long periods of time. The half-pay benefit was granted to all officers for seven years after the end of the American Revolutionary War but was later extended to a lifetime benefit. The benefit

783-533: Was occasionally an unrated one. Once a captain was given a command, his name was "posted" in The London Gazette . Being "made post" is portrayed as the most crucial event in an officer's career in both Forester's Horatio Hornblower series and O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series . Once an officer was promoted to post-captain, further promotion was strictly by seniority; if he could avoid death or disgrace, he would eventually become an admiral (even if only

812-609: Was promised to all officers serving in the Continental Army, but after the war the Congress of the Articles of Confederation voted against paying for those pensions and so only officers from certain state regiments, which had established an independent half-pay list, received that pay. After extended lobbying by retired officers after the war, Congress in 1783 authorized the full pay of officers for five years to be paid by

841-499: Was refitted as a 50-gun ship, and sent to Saint Helena to escort merchant ships back to England. She arrived there on 3 August 1804 and sailed with six merchant ships back to England. Unfortunately, on 26 September, as the convoy approached the entrance to the English Channel , they encountered a powerful French squadron. Woodriff attacked, sacrificing his ship to give the convoy a chance to escape, which all but one did, while

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