Archibald Cochrane was born in 1783, the son of
Archibald Cochrane, 9th Earl of Dundonald and his first wife Anna Gilchrist. Archibald had two elder brothers,
Thomas Cochrane and
William Erskine Cochrane, both of whom would have successful military careers, Thomas in the
Royal Navy and William in the
British Army. Sent to sea at a young age, by 1799 Archibald was serving alongside Thomas, styled Lord Cochrane, as a
midshipman in the
ship of the line HMS Barfleur, flagship of
Lord Keith in the
Mediterranean. Following the capture of the French ship of the line
Genereux in February 1800, Lord Cochrane was placed in temporary command of the prize and took his younger brother aboard as part of the prize crew. The ship passed through a severe storm on the voyage to
Port Mahon, and was almost sunk, the Cochrane brothers forced to climb the mainmast alone at the height of the storm to reef the sails. For his exertions, Lord Cochrane was promoted to commander and given command of the 14-gun
sloop HMS Speedy, again taking his brother aboard. Archibald Cochrane was involved in most of his brother's successful operations during the following year, including the capture of the Spanish frigate
Gamo on 6 May 1801. Attacked by the much larger warship, Cochrane took his tiny vessel alongside, and the Spanish sailors could not depress their guns sufficiently to open fire on it. Leading a boarding party, Archibald assisted in the fighting on deck and the successful capture of the ship. He later participated in a landing operation at
Oropesa del Mar, but was captured when
Speedy was seized by a French squadron under
Charles Linois on 3 July 1801. In 1804, during the
Napoleonic Wars, Cochrane was promoted to lieutenant, sailing for the
East Indies in the sloop
HMS Victor. Rapidly promoted, by 1807 he was
post captain in command of the
frigate HMS Fox and participated in the
Raid on Griessie against the Dutch port of
Griessie on
Java in December. Cochrane remained in the East Indies until 1811, when he returned to Britain and was not employed at sea again. He married in 1812 to Jane Mowbray and had six children, the family retiring to
Sunderland, where he was respected in the community. He died in 1829 in Paris. ==Notes==