George Anson, the commodore on this expedition, was born in 1697, being the third son of William Anson, Esq. of Shuckborough, in the county of Stafford. Taking an early inclination for the naval service, and after passing through the usual inferior steps, he was appointed second lieutenant of the Hampshire in 1716. He was raised to the rank of master and commander in 1722, and obtained the rank of post captain in 1724, with the command of the Scarborough man-of-war. Between that time and the year 1733, he made three voyages to North Carolina; and having acquired considerable wealth, he appears to have purchased an estate in that colony, where he erected a small town of his own name, which gave the name of Anson County to the surrounding district. In the years 1738 and 1739, he made another voyage to America and the coast of Africa; and, without proceeding to hostilities, removed certain obstructions under which the English trade on the coast of Guinea had suffered from the French. In the _War of the Merchants_, as it was called by Sir Robert Walpole, which broke out in 1739 between Britain and Spain, Captain Anson was appointed to the command of the expedition, the narrative of which forms the subject of the present chapter. Immediately after his return to England from this circumnavigation, Captain Anson was made rear-admiral of the blue, and shortly afterwards, one of the commissaries of the Admiralty. In 1746 he was farther promoted to the rank of Vice-admiral; and in the winter of 1746-7, was entrusted with the command of the channel fleet. In May 1747, off Cape Finisterre, he captured six French ships of the line under the command of Admiral Jonquiere, which had been dispatched for the protection of the merchant ships destined for the East and West Indies. On this occasion, when Mons. St George, one of the French captains, surrendered his sword to Admiral Anson, he addressed him in the following terms: _Vous avez vaincu L'Invincible, et La Gloire vous suit._--"You have defeated the Invincible, and Glory follows you:" alluding to two of the French ships, the Invincible and the Gloire, which had surrendered to him.