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J.L.R. Stoll: An Afrikaans-Speaking South African in the Royal Navy

You could be forgiven for thinking that John Luke Richard Stoll was a "pukka" Englishman, born and bred in verdant England, or so his name would suggest. But he was not. Stoll was the son of Joachim Wilhelm Stoll, at one stage Treasurer and Accountant-General at the Cape of Good Hope (South Africa), and also a member of the Excecutive and Legislative Councils of the Cape Colony, and Catherine Charlotte Liesching. He was was born at the Cape of Good Hope in 1812, and entered the Royal Navy, "The Senior Service", as a First-class Volunteer aboard the frigate "Andromache" at Cape Town, on the 1 January 1824 (being only twelve-years-of age at the time), the "Andromache" bearing the broad pendant of Commodore Joseph Nourse. It was either then or perhaps later, in his naval career that he anglicized his Christian names, from "Johannes Lukas Diedrich Stoll" to "John Luke Richard Stoll", in an obvious bid to obviate any confusion or difficulty on the part of his Royal Navy colleagues in pronouncing his first names! Discharged in February 1825, Stoll then entered the Royal Naval College. Two years later, he joined the sloops, "Acorn" and the "Satellite", under the command of captain Alexander Ellice, and Captain John Milligen Laws, respectively, as well as the "Maidstone ", bearing the broad pendants of Commodores William Skipsey and Charles Marsh Schomberg at the Cape of Good Hope. While at the Cape, he transferred, in August 1830, to the "Espoir ", and upon that vessel being paid off, he was then "received, Jan[uary] 1831, on board the Winchester 52, fitting for the flag of Sir Edw.[ard] Griffith Colpoys, Commander-in-Chief on the North America and West India station."

Stoll attained the rank of Lieutenant on the 6 October 1832, and was thereafter appointed to the "Fly", under Captain Peter M'Quahe, in the West Indies, on the 29 October 1832. He remained thus until February 1835, and was appointed, on the 4 February 1836, as supernumerary to the "Thalia ", the flag-ship of Rear-Admiral Patrick Campbell, stationed at the Cape of Good Hope; the "Thalia" making "prize of two slave vessels" while Stoll served aboard . His first command's came in April 1837 as captain of the "Buzzard", and in March 1838, as captain of the "Bonetta", commanding these ships, each equipped with three-guns, along the African coast. The "Buzzard" suffered "severely from fever at Fernando Po", and Stoll joined

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