William Compton Bolton
Officer in the United States Navy
William Compton Bolton (died 22 February 1849), born William Bolton Finch in England, was an officer in the United States Navy during the mid-19th century.
As William Bolton Finch, he was a midshipman from 20 June 1806, lieutenant from 4 January 1813 and captain from 21 Feb 1831. He served with distinction in the War of 1812, serving on the Essex from 1812 to 1814, and in 1829-30 commanded Vincennes in her first around-the-world voyage by a US Navy vessel.
He changed his name to William Compton Bolton on 14 January 1833; his sister Elizabeth changed her surname from Finch to Bolton at the same time.
Bolton commanded the Pensacola Navy Yard from 1836 to 1837.
From 2 August 1839 to 1841 he commanded the Brandywine. In 1848, he was the commander of the Mediterranean Squadron and later the Africa Squadron in the sloop-of-war USS Jamestown in manoeuvres off the Cape Verde islands, Madeira and the Mediterranean.
He died on 22 February 1849 at Genoa.
His widow, Mary H. Lynch Bolton, married Charles Wilkes on October 3, 1854. Commodore Bolton had sat on Wilkes' court-martial board in 1842.
“William Compton Bolton” enters the record as officer in the United States Navy. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what William, Compton and Bolton can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“William Compton Bolton” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, William, Compton and Bolton provides the most credible route into that argument.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q8007038. VIAF identifies the subject as 60881554. The Library of Congress control number is n99830341. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1849, 1806, 1813 and 1831.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “William Compton Bolton”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow William Compton Bolton primary sources, William Compton Bolton archive and William research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “William Compton Bolton”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “William Compton Bolton” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.