Richard Howe (1st Earl Howe, 1726–1799), naval commander, served in the Royal Navy for over fifty years, seeing action in the Seven Years War, the American Wars of Independence and the French Revolutionary Wars. He served as First Lord of the Admiralty from 1783 to 1788, during which period the decision to send the First Fleet to Botany Bay was made. He is thus commemorated in a number of Australian place names, notably Lord Howe Island, discovered and named by First Fleet officer Henry Lidgbird Ball in 1788.