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John Perkins

Biography

United Kingdom

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Biography

Captain John Perkins (died 27 January 1812), nicknamed Jack Punch, was a Royal Navy officer who served in the American War of Independence and French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. The first Black officer in the British navy, he rose from obscurity to enjoy a successful naval career in which he captured at least 315 enemy ships. Later in his career, Perkins acted as a spy for the Royal Navy and undertook missions to Cuba and Saint-Domingue.

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Biography text · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source checked 2026-10-13

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