Naval Career
Markham had no great conviction for a naval career, but accepted the constraints it placed upon him in return for the opportunities it presented to further his other interests. He followed the advice he had been given to join and stick with the navy, although he suffered from seasickness and disliked the customary cruelty of service punishments. However, his austere upbringing had better suited him to the rigours of navy life than had his cousin's.
Markham joined the Royal Navy in 1856 at the age of 15 and spent the first eight years of his career on the China Station, travelling out in Camilla and later serving on Niger, Retribution, Imperieuse, Coromandel and Centaur.
His brother John was also in Hong Kong, where he was suffering food poisoning from arsenic added to flour by local Chinese. Chinese pirates were the chief preoccupation of the navy as they would regularly make raids on the harbour. On one occasion aged fifteen Markham led a party of six boys and two marines against a pirate junk. The pirates abandoned ship and those captured were taken ashore and eventually beheaded. On another occasion he commanded a lorcha armed with a 12-pounder howitzer against a pirate ship holding two British captives. After a three hour fight he boarded the ship with five men while heavily outnumbered and took eleven prisoners. The British prisoners were found to have been crucified, so the pirates were executed. He became acquainted with a British Consulate official who encouraged an interest in ornithology and shooting snipe.
In 1862, Markham received a promotion to lieutenant. In 1864, he returned to Britain where he took naval exams and stayed with Clements and his wife Minna, at what was to be his only permanent home in England for 30 years. In November he was appointed to the last three-decker constructed for the Royal Navy, Victoria, in the Mediterranean. Life sailing in the Levant was considerably less dangerous, and normally only required the arrival of a British ship to settle a dispute. There was plenty of time for leave and Markham visited Turkey, Egypt, the Holy Land, Greece and the Aegean islands. Appointment to the fleet patrolling the eastern end of the Mediterranean was considered by many as less desirable than the western patrol which visited France and Italy, but the historical sites in the east suited Markham's interests. He kept a journal describing the places he visited, as he did throughout his life. One of his greatest delights was to meet Minna and Clements ashore and to accompany them on archaeological expedition in the region.
In 1868, Markham was appointed first lieutenant of Blanche on the Australia Station where he helped suppress "blackbirding", the illegal trading of slaves between Queensland and the South Sea Islands. This included time spent as an acting commander in Rosario. The issue was not straightforward, because the Queensland government was ambivalent towards the trade, which provided workers for its plantations. Some of the native workers were pleased to be travelling to Queensland, while others hated all white men. A bishop and three others were murdered in one incident, and Markham led a party to Nukapu to exact revenge, destroying a local village. Markham's actions were fuelled by his righteous indignation at an attack upon churchmen and he was criticised in parliament and the press for overreacting. The admiralty, however, approved of his decisive actions. Markham himself found the work more worthwhile than the Mediterranean posting, although it meant he no longer saw Clements and Minna.
In 1869 he submitted a design to George Bowen, the Governor of New Zealand for a national ensign for the fledgeling nation. His proposal, incorporating the Southern Cross, was approved and remains in use to this day.
On 29 November 1872 he was promoted to commander and spent the next six years engaged in Arctic Exploration. As a reward for his efforts in the British Arctic Expedition of 1876, he was promoted to captain. From 1879 to 1882 he was the captain of Triumph, the flagship of the Pacific Station. In 1883 he was appointed as captain of HMS Vernon, a naval torpedo school in Portsmouth. From 1886 to 1889 he acted as commodore of the training squadron, and on 14 May 1888 he was appointed naval aide-de-camp to Queen Victoria. On 1 August 1891, he was promoted to the rank of rear-admiral.
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