Sir Charles Hardy
(c.1714-1780).

His father was a Vice-admiral. The son, Charles, made captain by age 27. In 1745, young Hardy was in command of the H.M.S. Torrington which was assisting in the protection of the convoy which brought reinforcements from Gibraltar to the newly captured fortress of Louisbourg.

In 1755, Charles Hardy was knighted and appointed as New York's governor. In 1756 he made Rear-admiral of the Blue and ordered to escort Lord Loudoun and his army up from New York to Halifax in 1757, where, he was to put himself under the command of Vice Admiral Francis Holburne. The gathering at Halifax was for an intended attack on Louisbourg, but that was called off. The following year he was to serve under Admiral Edward Boscowan in the Second Siege of Louisbourg.

Though seemingly valued as a strategizer, Hardy, likely because of his self-effacing manner, was always most successful filling a position as second in charge. In 1756, as we have mentioned, Hardy was under Holburne; and, in 1758, under Boscowan. That fall, in 1758, he acted in concert with Wolfe to soften up the French by attacking their posts around the mouth of the St. Lawrence and brought ruination to all of the French fishing stations along the northern shores of present day New Brunswick and further up along the Gaspe coast.

Between the years 1764-68, Hardy was in parliament and then again 1771 and in 1780. Hardy, in 1771, was made Governor of Greenwich Hospital. In 1778, he was made Admiral of the White. Sir Charles died in 1780.1

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