Sir James John Gordon Bremer (26 September 1786 – 14 February 1850) was a British Royal Navy officer. He served in the Napoleonic Wars against France, the First Anglo-Burmese War in Burma, and the First Opium War in China. Born in Portsea, Portsmouth, Bremer joined the Royal Naval College as a student in 1797. He became a midshipman in 1802, serving in the North Sea, then qualified as a lieutenant in 1805. The first ship he commanded was in 1807, stationed in the East Indies. He was promoted to post captain in 1814. After becoming commander of HMS Tamar, in 1824 he was sent to Melville Island, Australia, to establish a colony. Under his leadership, the north coast of Australia from 129° to 135° longitude was claimed as British territory. The colony was abandoned in 1828. He led British forces at the Battle of Berbera in 1827, a successful raid against tribes in the Horn of Africa. As a commodore, Bremer was the temporary commander-in-chief of British forces in the First Opium War, for two periods between 1839 and 1841. In 1841, he took possession of Hong Kong Island for the United Kingdom. From 1846 to 1848, he was joint commander (with Francis Augustus Collier) of the Channel Squadron and superintendent of Woolwich Dockyard. He retired in 1848, with the rank of rear admiral, and died in 1850. Early career Bremer was born on 26 September 1786 in Portsea, Hampshire, England. He was the only son of Royal Navy Lieutenant James Bremer (who went missing in the East Indiaman Halswell off the coast of Dorset, England, on 6 January 1786) and his wife Ann, daughter of Captain James Norman. In 1794 at around 12 years old he joined the Royal Navy as a first-class volunteer on board HMS Sandwich, the flagship of Rear-Admiral Skeffington Lutwidge, at the Nore, from which he was discharged in June 1795. On 8 October 1797, he became a student of the Royal Naval College in Portsmouth, and re-embarked on 2 April 1802 as a midshipman on board HMS Endymion under Captain Philip Durham. Until July 1805, Bremer served in the flagship of Vice-Admiral James Gambier and Rear-Admiral Edward Thornbrough, HMS Isis, on the Newfoundland and North Sea stations. Shortly after passing his examination, he was appointed sub-lieutenant of the gun-brig HMS Rapid. On 3 August 1805, he became a lieutenant on board HMS Captain as