Early Life
Born at Banff, Scotland, the son of Banff Sheriff Clerk James Duff (1729–1804) by his marriage to Helen Skene 1734–1764, he was a kinsman (first cousin once removed) to the second and third Earls of Fife.
George Duff had a passion for the sea from early childhood, stowing away on a merchant ship for a voyage when not yet a teenager. At thirteen he joined his great uncle Captain (later Admiral) Robert Duff in the Mediterranean, and was commissioned lieutenant at sixteen, breaking several fleet regulations but made possible by his uncle's interest in his career. During these years, Duff saw action thirteen times on both sides of the Atlantic, including at the Great Siege of Gibraltar and culminating in the battle of the Saintes in 1782 when he was serving on HMS Montagu.
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