Thomas Hardy

Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Hardy (13 September 1666 – 16 August 1732) was a Royal Navy officer and politician. Having joined the navy sometime before 1688, Hardy's career was supported by George Churchill, whom he served as first lieutenant during the Battle of Barfleur in 1692. Promoted to captain in 1693, Hardy served in the Channel Islands and off the coast of England until 1702 when he was given command of HMS Pembroke off the coast of Spain. He fought at the Battle of Cádiz, and subsequently discovered the location of the Franco-Spanish fleet through the intervention of his chaplain, which resulted in the Battle of Vigo Bay. Hardy was knighted for his services.

Having commanded several ships in the Mediterranean Fleet, in 1706 Hardy was given command of a small squadron in the west of the English Channel tasked with protecting arriving merchant ships. In 1707 Hardy was sent as escort to a 200-ship convoy sailing for Lisbon. While conveying the ships he met with the squadron of René Duguay-Trouin in late August, chasing him until dusk before returning to shepherd the convoy. Hardy returned to England in September and was court martialled in the following month for not fully engaging Duguay-Trouin. He was acquitted but was further investigated by a panel from the Admiralty and committees of the Houses of Commons and Lords, which again exonerated him.

Hardy became first captain to Sir John Leake in the Mediterranean in 1708, assisting in the transport of Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel to Spain for her marriage to the important British ally Archduke Charles, and participating in the capture of Cagliari and assault on Minorca. In 1711 he was promoted to rear-admiral and given command of a squadron to blockade Dunkirk. Pushed off station by a storm, he was unable to stop a force of privateers from escaping and destroying a British convoy. After briefly serving as commander-in-chief, the Nore, Thames and Medway Hardy commanded a squadron off Ushant where he failed to intercept the squadrons of Duguay-Trouin and Jean-Baptiste du Casse in 1712. In 1715 he was second-in-command of the Baltic Fleet sent to serve in the Great Northern War. He was dismissed in 1716 possibly because, as a Tory, he continued to support the deposed House of Stuart after the succession of the House of Hanover.

Naval career Early service Thomas Hardy was born on Jersey on 13 September 1666. He was the son of John le Hardy, Solicitor-General of Jersey, whose father had held the same position. |group=Note to blockade Dunkirk, France, with Canterbury as his flagship. While cruising he captured a French merchant ship, as it attempted to sail to Newfoundland, around 26 April. He continued in naval circles after his dismissal, serving two terms as Master of Trinity House between 1729 and 1730. The naval historian John Knox Laughton suggests that Hardy was reinstated in the navy and promoted to vice-admiral of the red, but there is no official report of such a promotion occurring. Hardy died on 16 August 1732, age 67, and was buried with his late wife in Westminster Abbey. His monument, designed in 1737 by Sir Henry Cheere, shows him dressed in Roman armour lying on top of a sarcophagus and is a pair to the monument to John Conduitt opposite his.

Personal life Hardy married Constance Hook (died 28 April 1720) sometime before 1710. She was the daughter of Colonel Henry Hook, Lieutenant-Governor of Plymouth. Together the couple had three children; one son and two daughters. Hardy's son, Thomas, and his younger daughter, Charlotte, never married. His other daughter, Constance, married the politician George Chamberlayne. She inherited Hardy's estate in Middlesex upon his death.

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