| Notes |
- The widow Amy (Vernon) Nicholson married (2nd) William F. Owen s/o Capt. William Owen, R.N. original owner of Campobello Island.
Ref: York-Sunbury Historical Society Collection, MS15/9, pages 13-16.
1788 - Entered baby
1815 - March - Surveyed lakes of Canada
1847 - Commanded Columbia Surveying ship of Coast of North America
1854, - Vice Admiral
Owen family bible given to his housekeeper, Mary Elcegood Baker.
Ref: NB Historial Society, Vol1.
. 1770-1771 -Journal of Captain William Owen R.N., during his Residence On Campbell, by Wm Owen;
. 1842 - The Quoddy Hermit, a small book containing 16 conversation upon religion, in the course of one he gives his autobiography. The book was displeasing to his family & was recalled & destroyed but few copies are now extant.
Ref: NB Historial Society, 1897
Vice Admiral William Fitzwilliam Owen (17 September 1774 – 3 November 1857), was a British naval officer & explorer. He is best known for his exploration of the west & east African coasts, discovery of the Seaflower Channel off the coast of Sumatra & for surveying the Great Lakes.
The illegitimate son of Capt. Wm. Owen he was orphaned at the age of four, however, his father's friend Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Richie, kept an eye on both William & his elder brother Edward, in 1788 at age 13 he embarked as a midshipman in Rich's ship, HMS Culloden, & from that time the Royal Navy was his life. Self-willed & boisterous, he had not infrequent difficulties early in his naval career.
He served at home & on ships in the East Indies. From 1815 to 1816, he surveyed the upper Canadian Great Lakes with Lieutenant Henry Bayfield, naming an inlet in southern Georgian Bay, "Owen's Sound" in honour of his elder brother, Admiral Sir Ed. Wm. Campbell Richie Owen. Between 26 October 1815 & 31 May 1816 he was the senior Royal Navy Officer on the Great Lakes.
Owen mapped the entire East African coast from the Cape to the Horn of Africa between 1821 & 1826 in the sloop Leven & in company with the brig Barracouta. When they returned in 1826, with 300 new charts, covering some 30,000 miles of coastline, over half the original crew had been killed by tropical diseases. In 1827 he was in charge of settling a colony at Ferando Po. During the first year, he was joined by Lieutenant James Holman who was famous in his time as "the Blind Traveller".
In the mid-1830s, having little hope of further naval appointment, he removed with his family to New Brunswick. He secured title to Campobello Island, which had been granted to his grandfather & was lord proprietor of the same as well being involved in other investments in New Brunswick. From 1841 he served as a Justice of Peace as well as concurrently as Judge of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas.
Between 1837 & 1842 he was a very visible member of the New Brunswick House of Assembly for Charlotte County. Following his defeat for reelection, he was appointed in December 1843 to the New Brunswick Legislative Council of which he was an active member through 1851.
In the final action of his naval career, between September 1842 & December 1847, he conducted the definitive survey of the Bay of Fundy for the Admiralty. Indeed some charts of the area are still based upon his surveys
Family: Vice Admiral Owen was twice married: first in January 1818 to Martha Evans with whom he had 2 daughters (see Captain John James Robinson-Owen), secondly 11 December 1852 in Saint John, New Brunswick to Amy (née Vernon) Nicholson widow of Captain Thomas L. Nicholson.
Owen was promoted rear-admiral in1841 & vice-admiral in 1854. He died on 3 November 1857 at Saint Johns.
Ref: Wikipedia, 2012.
Transcriptions & research by PJ Ahlberg. Thank you.
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1774 - 1857 (83 years)