Captain David Aird.
Born c.1817 in Ireland, son of John Aird and Janet Buckie.
He served on HMS Fly and later HMS Bramble.
Extract from “Rattlesnake”
“The Bramble” had been a tender to HMS Fly on the earlier and incomplete survey of the Torres Strait and the southern shore of New Guinea.
When , in December 1845, Captain Francis Blackwood had decided he had enough of the survey and was returning to England, he gave instructions to Lieutenant Yule just before his departure to continue the survey himself in company with Lieutenant David Aird who had taken command of the newly commissioned Castlereagh. Both ships left Sydney for the Torres Strait in the same month as the Fly returned home.
When all three ships met up in Sydney, many of the crew and officers of the Bramble and the Castlereagh had been away from home for more than five years. They were not happy ships. There were disciplinary problems galore, accusations of drunkenness and dereliction of duty; “a most blackguard set of officers the Asst Surgeon excepted”, in Midshipman Packe’s opinion. Stanley, as we know, didn’t like the look of either ship but he considered the officers “the greatest defect of all”. On 31stJuly, he mustered the crew and officers of the Bramble and Castlereagh on the Rattlesnake and paid them off. He now prepared to send them home, apart from Yule and Archibald McClatchie, the Asst Surgeon to the Bramble. While they waited for a ship bound for London, Stanley offered the Castlereagh as a temporary home. “ We threw off our uniform and donned our shooting coats and snakebelts,” recalled John Sweatman , the clerk in charge of provisions on the Bramble. Events moved quickly. Three weeks after they were paid off Stanley arranged a contract for passage home and a dozen men were put on the Thomas Arbuthnot, bound for London. The others, apart from one who remained in Sydney by choice and another who was detained by creditors, decided to work their way back to England on a merchant ship. Though they were all tired and yearning to return home, their departure was more ignominious than joyful. Their leaving certificates did not sing their praises and one of the midshipman, George Walsh, was told by Stanley that he should never attempt to join the service again. The return voyage was nothing short of a nightmare ; they were confined to tiny dark cabins in steerage, the food was inedible, the skipper was “a most disagreeable old beast who used to eat himself mad with opium” and the Chief Mate “a great vulgar bully, was almost as bad”.
CAREER AFTER AUSTRALIA
In 1850 he served in HMS Sparrow on the coast of Ireland
He was also HMS Spirit surveying in the North of Ireland.
In the summers of 1859 and and 1860 he was surveying in Strangford Lough.
In May 1861 he went to the Hebrides under Captain Otter on Porcupine.
In 1862 and 1863 he was also in the Hebrides.
In 1864 he was in command of HMS Asp surveying in The Bristol Channel
In July1866 he joined the Lightning under Captain Bedford.
Lightning sailed under sealed orders in Dec 1867 and remained off the Welsh coast, watching, as some Fenian trouble was apprehended.
In January 1868 he became very unwell, and retired in April due to ill health.
MARRIAGE
David Aird married Elizabeth Alcock (1823-1899) 26.11.1850
(see Alcock notes)
Issue:
Janet Marianne Aird 1859-
David Ashly Aird 1857-
John Henry Aird 1855-
Evelyn Crosbie Aird 1865-
Ellen Elizabeth Aird 1851-
Mary Constance Aird 1852-
Amy Douglas St Clair Aird 1854-
Kathleen Dorothea Aird 1862
James George Alexander Aird 1861-
Alice Brandon Aird 1864-
Henry Alcock Aird 1867-
AIRD FAMILY IN PEMBROKE
CAPTAIN DAVID AIRD
ELIZABETH
ELIZABETH
ELIZABETH
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