THE TWO COLONIAL WARS
AUTHORITIES.—Beatson, _Military Memoirs_; Campbell’s _Lives of the
Admirals_; Schomberg’s _Naval Chronology_; Burrows’ _Life of Hawke_.
From the signing of the Peace of Utrecht in 1713 till the beginning
of the colonial war with Spain in 1739, the Royal Navy was used as
an instrument in the hand of diplomacy to keep the peace, or as the
police of the seas. Europe was disturbed in the North by the last
stages of the struggle between Peter the Great of Russia and Charles
XII. of Sweden, in the South by the foolish ambitions of Philip V., the
first Bourbon king of Spain, and his second wife, Elizabeth Farnese.
But the statesmen who controlled the policy of Western Europe during
most of these years, Sir Robert Walpole in England and Cardinal Fleury
in France, were unwearied in warding off another war. Once, in 1718,
a strong fleet sent into the Mediterranean, to put a stop to one of
the Italian ventures of Philip V., destroyed a much weaker and very
ill-handled Spanish fleet off Cape Passaro, in Sicily. As a rule, the
appearance of our ships was enough. Now and then an officer found some
chance of distinction in service against the pirates, largely recruited
among the privateers of the war, who swarmed in distant seas. The most
signal example was the suppression of a noted adventurer of this class,
named Roberts, by Sir Chaloner Ogle, on the West Coast of Africa in
1722. Meanwhile war on a vast scale was being prepared by two causes—on
the Continent by the rivalries of France and Austria in Germany, and
Spain and Austria in Italy, together with the ambition of the rising
kingdom of Prussia and its great King Frederick; and on the sea by the
collision of England with Spain and France in America, and with France
in India. Great Britain was drawn into the Continental War by the
Hanoverian interests of the royal family and the desire to maintain the
balance of power. Here the navy played an indispensable but secondary
part. But in the colonial struggle it was the foremost combatant, and
exercised a decisive influence.
A common interest drew France and Spain into alliance against us,
but the causes of hostility were various. As regards Spain, they go
back to the reign of Charles II. From the time of our settlement in
Jamaica it had been our constant wish to secure the right of trading
with the Spanish colonies, while firmly refusing the Spaniards all
access to our own. The buccaneer wars, in so far as they were more
than plundering raids conducted by miscellaneous scoundrels, were
the attempts of private adventurers to carry out this policy. By
the Peace of Utrecht we secured the right to share in the trade of
Spanish America. Agents were allowed to establish themselves at
Carthagena on the Eastern, and Panama on the Western side. We secured
an _asiento_, or contract for the supply of negroes. We were also
authorised to send one trading ship of 500 tons burden laden with
manufactured goods to the Spanish Main in each year. This arrangement
led, as it was bound to lead, to much smuggling. As Spain revived,
under the more intelligent administration of the Bourbon dynasty,
the abuse of English treaty rights was resented. The Spaniards said
that the treaty ship was continually supplied with fresh goods by
tenders, and complained that other smugglers haunted their coast, and
were guilty of many excesses. To protect themselves, they insisted
on searching English vessels found near their coast, and condemning
those they considered guilty, and Spanish adventurers retaliated by
piracy. Hence arose a long angry conflict of claims and counter-claims
between England and Spain, complicated by political disputes in Europe,
and only prevented from ripening into war by the resolute peace
policy of Walpole. The Parliamentary Opposition, composed largely of
disappointed office-seekers, and, as they afterwards proved, incapable
administrators, took up the cause of the West India traders. There
was much general denunciation of the atrocities of the Spaniards. The
best known instance given was that of a certain John Jenkins, master
of a trading vessel called the =Rebecca= of Glasgow. Jenkins asserted
that in 1730 his vessel had been boarded by a Spanish _guarda costa_,
or revenue cutter, in the West Indies, and that the Spanish captain,
who is habitually described as “the infamous Fandino,” had cut his ear
off. His vessel was undoubtedly searched near Havana, but was allowed
to proceed on her voyage, and there is no evidence for the story that
his ear was cut off except his own word. As the country grew tired of
the long predominance of Walpole, and was worked into a pugnacious mood
by the Patriots, use was made of Jenkins’s case to appeal to popular
sentiment. A theatrical scene was arranged before a Committee of the
House of Commons, and the man was prompted to declare “that he had
recommended his soul to god, and his cause to his country” when he was
subject to the violence of Fandino. At last Walpole, seeing that the
country was resolved on war, yielded, dishonestly, to what he believed
to be a mistaken policy for the sake of keeping office. War with Spain
was declared in July 1739.
The Colonial quarrel with France arose in another way—and one more
honourable to us. The trade of her colonies was less worth striving for
than the Spanish, and she was too strong to be hectored. The aggression
came from her. In America her agents endeavoured to unite her
possessions, in Canada and Louisiana, by annexing the valleys of the
Ohio and the Mississippi, which were first explored by her brilliant
and daring adventurers. The result would have been to confine the
growing British colonies between the Alleghanies and the Atlantic. In
India the French Company was bankrupt. It endeavoured to gain the means
of expelling its prosperous English rival, by acquiring political power
among the native princes. For a time the Colonial conflict with France
was postponed by the great European war arising over the scramble for
the heritage of the house of Austria on the death of Charles VI. It was
our exceeding good fortune that, when the decisive struggle for trade
colonies and supremacy at sea had to be fought out, the attention and
the resources of France were mainly employed on an attempt to acquire a
predominant position in Central Europe.
This was the happier for us because years were to pass before we could
afford to dispense with any of the help fortune gave us. Never was the
Government of England less able than during the fag end of Walpole’s
rule and the administration of the so-called Patriots. Never, save
during the last ignoble days of Charles II., was the navy less fit to
meet the calls of a great war. Its paper strength was indeed imposing.
There were 124 ships of the line—of from 100 to 50 guns each, and 104
of lesser rates—that is, of 40 guns each or less. The total was 228,
and it exceeded the united navies of France and Spain in everything
except the quality of the individual ships. But it was suffering
from the moral and intellectual diseases spoken of in the previous
chapter. The long peace had afforded no opportunity of testing the
quality of officers. In the earlier years its chiefs were worn-out and
commonplace, or brutal and noisy. All those years did for us was to
bring forward the men who were to lead gloriously in after times. From
the point of view of the navy, the struggle waged under various names,
the Spanish War, the War of the Austrian Succession, and the Seven
Years’ War from 1739 to 1763 with an eight years’ truce in the middle,
was one and the same war. Fortunately for us, if we were bad, our
enemies were worse. Spain was languid, brainless, and could only fight
on the defensive. France was overtaxed, distracted by a multiplicity
of aims, drifting to bankruptcy, corrupt at heart and frivolous. Great
Britain was a mighty force, healthy, though afflicted by bad habits,
but capable of reform, and even at its worst advancing on sound lines.
Therefore it could bear its administrative scum as a mighty river
carries driftwood and rubbish on its surface. This floating trash may
make a block and delay the current for a short space, but the moving
water flows below, and accumulates in irresistible pressure till one
day it sweeps the obstruction out of its path.
In describing this struggle only a brief space need be given to the
early years, and in them what is best worth looking at is the promise
of better times. Vernon in the West Indies and Mathews and Lestock in
the Mediterranean are the dominant figures of the first period—and
the types of all the navy had to succeed in shedding, or to perish.
Beside them we see the gradual rise of Anson and Hawke, and with their
predominance the triumph of the good over the bad.
The Spanish War, or War of Jenkins’s Ear as it came to be called when
the rage of the country was over, began by attacks on the possessions
of Spain in the New World. A rigid blockade of our enemy’s ports at
home and invasion of his territory in Europe would have brought him to
terms more effectually. But we had no sufficient army, and the navy,
besides being hardly yet fit for prolonged blockade in stormy seas,
much preferred colonial expeditions rich in prize and plunder. To the
country nothing seemed more likely to be effectual than the seizure of
Spanish colonies—or more lucrative. During the long peace, in 1726,
’27, a powerful fleet had been sent to blockade the port of Porto Bello
for the purpose of stopping the sailing of the treasure-ships, and so
depriving King Philip V. of the means of being mischievous in Europe.
Admiral Hozier who commanded, his successor, and many thousands of
officers and men died miserably of fever. The memory of this sacrifice
to Walpole’s peace policy rankled, and an expedition to Porto Bello was
sure to be popular. It was the port of lading for the treasure from
the South Seas, and the headquarters of the _guarda costas_ employed,
as we said, to destroy our trade—but as the Spaniards put it, to stop
our smuggling. An attack on it had been vehemently supported by the
Patriots, and particularly by a sailor who was very conspicuous among
them.
Edward Vernon had been a captain in the navy since 1706 and was the son
of a Secretary of State. He owed his rapid rise to family influence,
and no conspicuous service is recorded of him. During the peace he
had been for several years member for Ipswich, and had been among
the loudest-mouthed of those who first assailed the “profligate”
administration of Sir R. Walpole, and then imitated him in everything
except his love of peace and his admirable finance. The navy now and
then produces a person who “has the gift of the gab ‘although’ he was
bred to the sea,” and is continually playing the British seaman to the
gallery. Vernon was the example of the type in his generation. He was
as brave as any man, but too proud of what he ought to have taken for
granted. He was clever, but far too conscious of his cleverness. Withal
he was arrogant, had no control over his temper, and was afflicted with
an insatiable vanity. Already he had boasted that he would take Porto
Bello with six ships. When the war began, he was sent with nine vessels
to keep his promise. Vernon left in July 1739, and reached Jamaica late
in October. On the 20th November he sailed into Porto Bello with six
ships, and took it almost without resistance. The fortifications were
not complete, nor were all the guns mounted. The garrison was crippled
by tropical fever and was seized by a panic. They ran from their guns
under the fire of our ships, and the town was captured with less loss
than has often accompanied the taking of a sloop. Vernon behaved with
humanity when in possession of the place. This easy success threw the
nation into a delirium of joy, and turned Vernon’s head completely.
He became convinced that all fortifications could be taken by merely
rushing at them. In the position of unchecked authority he held in his
own squadron, surrounded by men who deferred to him in obedient silence
even when they did not toady him, his arrogance and self-assertion
swelled till they grew to the proportions of mania. Vernon made an idle
demonstration off Carthagena on the 6th March 1740, but nothing else
was done.
Meanwhile the country was preparing to follow up the first success.
After changes of plan, hesitations, and much administrative confusion,
it was finally decided to make a double attack on Spanish America. A
small squadron under Anson was to go round Cape Horn and range the
west coast of South America as far north as Panama, while a great
expedition carrying a body of troops under command of Lord Cathcart was
to sail to the West Indies, join Vernon, and other troops drawn from
the British possessions in America, and then the whole was to fall on
the Spaniards. The actual point of attack was left to the discretion
of the chiefs. Anson’s justly famous voyage may be left aside for the
present with the observation that as part of a combined operation it
was a failure through the delays shown in dispatching the expeditions.
According to the original plan, Lord Cathcart was to have reached
the West Indies at the end of October 1740 under protection of six
warships. But the Government heard that the Spaniards were sending
out a fleet. France was also beginning to move for the purpose of
supporting Spain. The Government delayed the expedition till a more
powerful fleet could be collected. It left England under the care of
25 warships commanded by Sir C. Ogle on 26th October, at which date it
ought to have been on the field of operations. On the 19th December
it reached Dominica, where Lord Cathcart died, and was succeeded
by General Wentworth. It was not at Jamaica till the 7th January.
Meanwhile the enemy had not been idle. The attention of France, still
nominally at peace with us, was drawn off by the death of the emperor
and the opening of the Austrian Succession. Spain was left to her own
resources, which, however, proved greater and were better handled than
we had expected. Don Rodrigo de Torres sailed on the 10th July, reached
the West Indies unmolested by us, sent part of his ships to reinforce
Carthagena under Don Blas de Leso, and then went on, still unmolested
by us, to Havana. It may be added that he finally brought the Spanish
trade home unseen, and even unsought by us.
The great English expedition reinforced by troops from the North
American colonies, and by negroes to do the work of the trenches, left
Jamaica by the 26th January 1741, and after some further hesitation was
led against Carthagena. It reached its destination on the 4th March.
The town stands at the north end of lagoons, and can only be entered at
the western end by large ships at the Boca Chica, or Small Mouth. It
was not accessible from the sea front because of the shoal water and
the heavy surf. The Boca Chica was well fortified, and there were other
outworks dotted along the lagoons. These had to be beaten down before
the body of the place, which was further defended by a strong outwork
called the San Lazaro and a double wall, could be reached. From the
9th to the 26th March we were fighting up along the lagoons with good
success. Vernon accused the military men of sloth and incompetence,
and afterwards repeated his charges in a scolding pamphlet full of
provable misstatements of fact. At Carthagena he pestered his military
colleagues in a tone which revolted the pride of General Wentworth.
Still, by the end of March we were close to the town, and on the 1st
April, a fatal date, Vernon dispatched a vessel to England with a
report of victory. It was soon followed by another with authentic
tidings of disaster. The wet season begins at Carthagena at the end of
March, and the troops were already very sickly. Their condition was
aggravated by the fact that the admiral seized the only supply of good
water for the fleet. At last Wentworth, who was plainly a weak man
unfitted to contend with a bully, had the feebleness to allow himself
to be badgered into making an attempt to storm the unbreached San
Lazaro, and was repulsed with frightful loss. Vernon made no use of his
ships against the town, though there was ample depth of water for them,
as M. de Pointis had shown when he took the place in 1697.
It was now clear that Carthagena could not be taken without a regular
siege, an operation at that season, and with our resources, impossible.
A council of war was held in the cabin of the flagship. The soldiers
when asked what they proposed to do answered that they must first
learn what help they were to expect from the fleet. Vernon burst out
in an explosion of abuse, and was firmly answered by Wentworth. Then
he flung out of the cabin in a fit of shrewish rage, and remained
during the rest of the council in the stern gallery, bawling occasional
interruptions. There could be but one end to the debate. The expedition
retired with shame, and the odd hits, and the loss of several thousand
men.
Nor would there be any profit in going into the details of the war in
the West Indies. Few conflicts have ever been more insipid. Operations
similar in purpose to this at Carthagena but on a smaller scale were
carried out by Vernon and Wentworth near St. Jago de Cuba in the autumn
of 1741, and at Porto Bello in the spring of 1742. In 1743 a squadron
under Sir Charles Knowles was beaten off with severe loss in attack
on Puerto Cabello and La Guayra on the Main. Then the war died down
to mere privateering for a time, to revive slightly towards the end.
Knowles fought a moderately successful action with a Spanish force
near Havana in September 1748. But he was disliked by some of his
officers and accused of not doing enough, was tried by court martial,
and reprimanded. A feud arose among his officers, who fought it out in
duels. The West Indies in this war were destined to give us no glory,
and very doubtful profit. The honour of the flag was deeply stained by
Captain Cornelius Mitchell, who while in command of a superior English
force showed mere cowardice in the presence of the French in August
1746. For this he was only dismissed the service by a very weak court
martial. Some good did, however, come to the navy and the country from
this scandal. In 1749, after the conclusion of the war, it helped to
persuade Parliament to revise the Naval Discipline Act of Charles II.
The rest of the war in the West Indies deserves no further notice.
The Spaniards avoided battle except on the one occasion named, and
applied themselves to bringing home their trade, with fair success.
The French were too overtaxed elsewhere to appear in force. We not
being put on our mettle, drowsed on in sloth, quarrels, and scandals.
On both sides the privateers were active. Throughout the course of the
war we took from the Spaniards 1249 ships, and they from us 1360. Our
prizes included several treasure-ships, and were the more valuable. To
conclude this side of the subject, it may be added that after France
joined in the war against us we took from her 2185 ships, and she from
us 1878. The balance in our favour was therefore 196.
Here also may be put what remains to be said of Vernon. It is to
the honour of a man of whom little good can be told, that if he
was insolent to colleagues and harsh to his officers, he showed an
intelligent humanity to his crews. He reduced the excessive allowance
of rum given to men in the West Indies, and introduced the custom of
diluting it with water. The mixture is said by tradition to have got
its name of “grog” from his nickname of “Old Grog,” given him for his
practice of wearing a grogram boat-cloak. This is the only kindly
trait (for we cannot praise him for not behaving like a buccaneer at
Porto Bello) in an unamiable character. Vernon had offered to resign
after the failure at Carthagena, but was flattered into remaining by
ministers who were unwilling to see him among them till his tar-barrel
popularity had waned, as they no doubt began to see it would soon do.
He did return at the close of 1742. In 1744 his name was passed over
in a promotion of admirals, and he resented the slight in a letter of
incredible insolence to the Board. Yet in April 1745 he was promoted
Admiral of the White, and appointed to a home command during the
Jacobite rising. On service he began a course of violent wrangling
with the Admiralty, and finally threw up his post in a pet. Then he
appealed to the public in anonymous pamphlets with clap-trap titles,
consisting largely of official letters which he had clearly no right
to publish. When called to account for what was at the best a gross
irregularity, he refused to acknowledge his responsibility, and was,
by the king’s orders, struck off the list of admirals. He died on his
estate at Nacton, in Suffolk, on the 30th October 1757, forgotten and
obscure—an example of the worthlessness of mob popularity.
It is indeed a pleasure to turn from this story of loud talk and little
performance to Anson’s immortal voyage. Not that it was without dark
shades and disasters, not only because it ended in triumph, but because
there was at the head of it a hero, and round him a band fit to follow
a hero. Of Anson himself it may be said that in him English manhood
gave itself a witness amid the vulgar crowd of Vernons, Knowleses,
Mitchells, Mathews, and Lestocks. Stern but just, asking for no
affection, but deserving it, and commanding absolute confidence, he was
indeed “the flower and pattern of all bold mariners ... unchangeable
of purpose, crafty of counsel, and swift of execution; in triumph most
sober, in failure ... of endurance beyond mortal man.”
It had at first been intended to send two expeditions to the South
Seas, one under Anson to Manila, and another under Captain Cornwall
round the Horn. But the Government changed its mind. Anson alone
sailed, and was directed not on Manila but on Panama. There was delay,
as always at that time, and the squadron did not leave England till the
18th September 1740. It consisted of six ships:—
+--------------+-------+-------+--------------------------+
| | Guns. | Men. | |
| +-------+-------+ |
| =Centurion= | 60 | 400 | George Anson, commodore. |
| =Gloucester= | 50 | 300 | Richard Norris. |
| =Severn= | 50 | 300 | Honourable Edward Legge. |
| =Pearl= | 40 | 250 | M. Mitchell. |
| =Wager= | 28 | 160 | Dandy Kidd. |
| =Trial= | 8 | 100 | Honourable G. Murray. |
+--------------+-------+-------+--------------------------+
There were two victuallers, transports to carry stores—the =Anna= and
=Industry=. The squadron was fairly provided, but was hampered by a
number of so-called soldiers who were in fact Chelsea pensioners,
sent on board in disregard of Anson’s protest. All who could walk
deserted. The others died before the ships entered the Pacific; among
them it is said that there was a veteran who had fought at the Boyne
for King William. On the 25th October the squadron was at Madeira, and
it reached St. Catherine, in Southern Brazil, on the 21st November.
Already the scurvy had broken out, and Anson stopped to restore the
health of his crews till the 18th January 1741. From St. Catherine
the squadron fought its way South through storms to Port St. Julian,
famous in the voyages of Magellan and of Drake. From thence it went
on to the Pacific by the Straits of Le Maire and the Horn. It was a
less dangerous route than the Straits of Magellan, but the incessant
tempest made it perilous. Through one unbroken fury of wind and wave
the squadron struggled on to the Pacific, but all did not reach it.
The navigation of the time was rude, there were no chronometers, no
means of finding the longitude. Two of the ships of the squadron, the
=Severn= and the =Pearl=, came up on the wrong side of South America,
and returned to England. Of the others the =Wager= rounded the Horn,
but was wrecked in the Golfo de Peñas. Anson did not reach Juan
Fernandez, the island of Robinson Crusoe, or at least of his original
Alexander Selkirk, till 10th June, with his crew reduced to a mere
handful by scurvy. The =Trial=, the =Gloucester=, and the =Anna= came
in one after the other. The last was broken up, and her crew taken into
the other vessels. It was September before the crews were sufficiently
revived for service. During the last months of 1741 and the first of
1742, Anson remained on the coast taking prizes and capturing Paita.
The =Trial= was condemned. His squadron was too weak to effect anything
against Panama, and he missed the heavily laden ship, which came yearly
from the Philippines to Acapulco, in Mexico. On the 28th April he left
the American coast and stretched across the Pacific. Storms and scurvy
raged round him again, and the =Gloucester= had to be sacrificed. The
=Centurion= now alone remained. With her, Anson reached Canton, 21st
November 1742, where he refitted. Then he took the sea once more
to look for the Manila treasure-ship. On the 20th June 1743 he met
and captured the _Nuestra Señora de Covadonga_, a prize of immense
value, off Cape Espiritu Santo, in the Philippines. As a feat of war
the achievement was naught, for the Spaniard had most of his guns
dismounted, and fought at hopeless disadvantage. Anson’s greatness
comes from this—that he conquered so much to be there at all. He
returned with his prize to Canton, sailed for home on the 15th October
1743, and reached Spithead on the 15th June 1744.
The naval operations carried out against Spain in Europe were in
themselves insignificant, and are only worth noticing because they led
to war with France. The actual declaration of war was not made till
1744, by France on the 20th March, by England on the 31st, but it was
a pure formality. Conflicts had already taken place on the sea between
the ships of the two nations; the battle of Dettingen, in which English
troops took part as allies of Maria Teresa, had been fought, and an
attempt had been made to cover an invasion of England in the interests
of the Jacobites. France was openly giving moral and material support
to Spain before actually joining her. While the great expedition to
the West Indies was preparing, Sir John Balchen was dispatched to the
Spanish coast with a small squadron. It was characteristic of our
half-hearted way of conducting the war that he was ordered out only to
capture the treasure-ships. They, however, were warned in time, and so
came safe home to Santander. Balchen was in some danger of falling in
with a much superior force sent out by the Spaniards to look for him,
and returned having effected nothing. Meanwhile Haddock was watching
Cadiz, not so vigilantly, however, but that a Spanish squadron got away
unimpeached by us, and reached Ferrol. The Spanish Government collected
troops on the east coast as if to threaten Minorca, and on the north
as if in preparation for an invasion of England, to be supported, it
was hoped, by help from the Jacobites. The apparent danger of Minorca
distracted Haddock, who was even short-handed till reinforced by a
squadron under Lestock. At home a powerful force was collected under
Sir John Norris to repel the threatened invasion. He sailed twice to
watch Ferrol, but was driven back by storms in July and August. When
1740 ended, we had certainly done nothing proportionate to our immense
numerical superiority. The Spanish fleets lay quiet in port, or slipped
away to the West Indies, and the Basque privateers were active even in
the Channel. In 1741 there was no change. Sir John Norris was again at
sea in the Channel and Bay of Biscay, but to little purpose. Haddock,
with his fleet reinforced by Rear-Admiral Lestock, continued to watch
Don José Navarro at Cadiz. In December the English fleet had become
very foul, and was compelled to go into Gibraltar and clean. Navarro
at once put to sea, and entered the Mediterranean. Meanwhile a French
fleet under M. de Court had left Toulon, and advanced south along the
coast of Spain. So soon as he knew that the Spaniards had passed him,
Haddock started in pursuit, but only came up in time to see the French
and Spanish fleets join, and to find himself in the presence of a very
superior force. It was notorious that M. de Court would support Navarro
if attacked, but since France was still endeavouring to make war and
keep peace at one and the same time, he would not attack us. Haddock
was allowed to go on to Minorca. The allies covered the passage of some
Spanish troops to Italy, and then went into Toulon. Here they remained
till February 1744. Haddock, old and worn-out, resigned his command to
Lestock at the close of 1741. In May 1742 Admiral Mathews came out with
a commission not only to command the fleet but to be Minister at the
court of Sardinia. It would have been difficult to make a worse choice.
He was stupid, boorish, illiterate, and of a violent temper, which
earned him in Italy the nickname of “Il Furibondo.” Moreover, he had
a long-standing quarrel with Lestock, and had asked that this officer
might be recalled. The Ministry did not consent, and Mathews revenged
himself by coarse insolence to his subordinate. A proud man would have
sought his own recall; but Lestock was only sulky and malignant.
During 1742 some service was done. In June a squadron of Spanish
galleys was burnt at St. Tropez by fireships under the command of
Captain Callis, who earned the last gold collar and badge given for
this kind of service. In August a detached squadron under Captain
Martin forced the Bourbon king of the Two Sicilies to withdraw the
troops he had sent to serve against our ally the Queen of Hungary by
threatening to bombard Naples. With these exceptions, 1742 and 1743
wore away, while Mathews was mostly at Turin, and his fleet lay at
anchor without practice at sea. Some acts of violence on the coast
of Italy are recorded against our captains. The British Minister
at Florence, Sir Horace Mann, who looked upon them, with the sole
exception of Captain Temple West, as “genteel porpoises,” asserts that
when some of our men robbed a church of a cross and of the sacrament,
Mathews hung the cross round the neck of his pet monkey, and stuck the
consecrated wafer on the beast’s forehead. The tardy determination of
France to take an active part on the sea gave a stimulus to the war in
the early days of 1744.
In this year she acted with some vigour both in the Channel and in
the Mediterranean. At the close of 1743 troops had been collected
at Dunkirk for an invasion again, in the hope of causing a Jacobite
rebellion. A fleet of twenty-four sail was armed at Brest, and put
under the command of M. de Roquefeuil. He sailed at the end of January,
was off the Eddystone on the 3rd February 1744, and had come as high as
Dungeness by the 24th. The peril served for a moment to calm the feuds
of the politicians, for the country was terribly frightened. English
soldiers and foreign mercenaries were called in from abroad, and we
applied to the Dutch for the contingent they were bound to supply by
treaty. A fleet was collected under Sir John Norris in the Downs, and a
battle seemed inevitable. But a succession of heavy gales from the east
and north-east drove the French out of the Channel back to Brest, and
the peril passed away.
While the wind and the inefficiency of the enemy were standing
our friends in the Channel, a transaction was taking place in the
Mediterranean which did us little honour and was the beginning of
infinite bitterness. It was known by the end of 1743 that France was
coming actively into the naval war. In January 1744 Mathews came
down from Turin, where he had been acting as Minister, and resumed
his functions of admiral. His fleet was at anchor in the roadstead
of Hyères, between the mainland and the islands of Porquerolles, and
there it remained till M. de Court and Don José Navarro put to sea
from Toulon on the 19th February. It consisted of twenty ships of
the line when he rejoined it, but was raised by reinforcements to
twenty-nine. The allies numbered twenty-eight, twelve of them being
Spaniards. One of the Spanish ships, the _Real Felipe_, carried 116
guns, and her fellows were fine ships. The French were somewhat
inferior, and the weight of metal as well as of numbers was in favour
of Mathews, but the battle which followed was a disgrace alike to the
discipline, the intelligence, and, with a few exceptions, even to the
manhood of the navy.
When the enemy was known to be at sea, we struggled out from Hyères,
foul from long lying at anchor, and clumsy from want of practice.
The code of signals, too, was arbitrary and poor. The same signal
was found both in the fighting and the sailing orders, and meant
different things in each. During the 10th February and the night of the
10th-11th Mathews’ fleet struggled towards the enemy in light breezes
and baffling currents. On the morning of the 11th it had got between
the enemy and Toulon. The van under Admiral Rowley and the centre
where Mathews was himself, were in a position to force a battle on the
allies, who lay in a line to the south and west of them, heading to
the west with the French in the van and centre, and the Spaniards in
the rear, and therefore nearest us. But the English rear under Lestock
had drifted apart in the night, and was five miles astern. In the
light breezes it could not come up in time to be of use. Yet Admiral
Mathews decided to give battle. We bore down at one in the afternoon,
so that the English van came into action with the French centre, and
the English centre with the Spanish ships behind M. de Court. If the
breezes had been stronger, or the French more alert, their van might
have doubled back, and have put our leading ships between two fires.
They did not, and Admiral Rowley maintained a lively cannonade with
M. de Court till the French admiral turned in the evening to help the
Spaniards, whom he believed to be hard pressed. At that part of the
line there had been not only failure but shame. Admiral Mathews brought
the Spaniards to an action. He would have made it close had several
of his captains not been “shy.” He himself in the =Namur= showed the
courage which is the redeeming quality of his type, and stood out of
his line with the signal for the line still flying in order to come
closer to the enemy. Captain Cornwall of the =Marlborough= fought the
great _Real Felipe_ nobly, being himself mortally wounded, and his
ship cut to pieces. Captain Edward Hawke in the =Berwick= set a fine
example, and compelled the Spanish _Poder_ to strike. But with these
exceptions nobody did brilliantly and several captains showed what, if
it was not actual cowardice, was the kind of confusion and stupidity
which keep a man well away from the enemy. These “cankers of a long
peace” proved once more that a loud voice, a blustering manner, and a
parade of brutality are no guarantees of courage. A notable feature
of the battle was that it gives the last example of the old practice
of using a fireship in action. One was sent down to burn the _Real
Felipe_, but the result showed the limitations of this old-fashioned
weapon. She was reduced to a sinking state by the well-directed fire
of the Spaniard, who also sent out a boat to tow her clear. It was
perhaps fortunate for us that she was shattered by an explosion, and
went down, since the enemy might possibly have turned her against the
=Marlborough=, then lying crippled where she had pushed in among their
own ships. Night and the confusion of both sides ended the battle, but
the allies had suffered some rough handling, and were chiefly intent on
retreat. Mathews might well have renewed the action when he was at last
joined by Lestock. He came, however, to the strange conclusion that
he could not follow the enemy, because it was his duty to protect the
coast of our allies in Italy—though it would surely have taxed a less
torpid intellect than his to say what that coast was to be protected
against, unless it were the very fleet he was refusing to pursue. The
enemy was actually allowed to recover the _Poder_, which he abandoned,
and to retire unmolested to Carthagena. The _Poder_ was then burnt by
us. Mathews returned to Mahon, where he solaced his feelings by putting
Admiral Lestock under arrest.
The failure off Toulon, coming as it did after a long succession of
repulses in the West Indies, and futilities in Europe where nothing
effectual had been done to intercept the Spanish fleets, stirred the
country to deep anger. The news came slowly, and it was not until
Lestock had returned under arrest, and Mathews had resigned and had
come home, that their recriminations began to bring out the whole
truth. Parliament took the matter up, and carried out a preliminary
inquiry during April and March of 1745. Lestock and others were heard
at the bar, and Mathews, who was a member, in his place. The debate
left him, according to Horace Walpole, “in the light of a hot, brave,
imperious, dull, confused fellow,” and it also left the House persuaded
that a court martial must be held on the whole battle. On the 18th
of April, the Commons with their Speaker waited on the king at St.
James’s Palace with a petition that a “court martial may be held in the
most speedy and solemn manner, to inquire into the conduct of Admiral
Mathews, Vice-Admiral Lestock, Captains Burrish, Norris, Ambrose,
Frogmore, and Dilk,” together with that of the lieutenants of the
=Dorsetshire=, who were accused of misleading their captain, Burrish.
The king granted the petition. The measure was somewhat irregular, and
might be represented as trenching on the rights of the Admiralty,—it
was so considered by Anson who was now on the Board,—but the case was
exceptional, and it was by no means certain that the Admiralty would
have acted if Parliament had not applied firm pressure. The action
it took is one more reminder that, in the dullest times, the country
has always been in earnest about its navy. It may, as Sir Charles
Pasley has said, have played with the army, which it long regarded
with jealous distrust and dislike, but where the navy was concerned
it knew that its very existence was at stake. Therefore, though
tolerant of much corruption in the naval, as in other branches of the
administration, it was roused to wrath, and the resolve to have the
whole truth out, by any failure on the sea.
A court martial, consisting of no less than twenty-four members, and
presided over by Sir Chaloner Ogle, began to sit on the 11th September
1745. First it tried the four lieutenants of the =Dorsetshire=, whom
their captain had accused in order to clear himself, and acquitted
them. Then it tried Captain Burrish, and condemned him to be cashiered.
Captain E. Williams of the =Royal Oak= was next tried and condemned,
but with less severity on the ground that he was old and nearly blind.
Captain John Ambrose of the =Rupert=, who had shown courage and zeal
in single ship actions, was yet condemned for misconduct at Toulon,
and sentenced to be cashiered during the king’s pleasure. He was
restored in rank, but never again employed, and died a superannuated
rear-admiral. Captain Dilk of the =Chichester= shared his fate. Captain
Frogmore of the =Boyne= died before the trial. Captain Norris of the
=Essex= did not dare to face a court martial. He fled into Spain from
Gibraltar, and was never heard of more. Five supplementary trials
were held on Captains Pelt, Sclater, Temple West, Cooper, and Lloyd.
The last three named were sentenced to be cashiered, but the finding
was generally considered unjust, and all three were restored. The
sentence of the court in this case is worth noting. Temple West and
his colleagues had been stationed in the van with Admiral Rowley, and
had taken steps to prevent the French ships, which stretched ahead of
our line, from doubling back and putting us between two fires. It is
doubtful whether the enemy had any such design, though his movements
seemed to show that he had, and the counter-measures of these captains
were correct. But they had acted without the express orders of their
superior. They were therefore to be punished, not for doing what was
wrong, but for doing what was right without orders. Observe that the
punishment inflicted on them for what at the worst was a pardonable,
even an honourable error of judgment, was identical with the penalty
imposed on Captain Burrish, who showed the white feather. We have to
come to the conclusion that, according to the principles of a court
martial at that time, it was better that an English fleet should be
defeated than that an officer should disregard an order no longer
applicable to the circumstances, or act with independent intelligence.
If this rule had continued to prevail, Nelson would have been cashiered
for his bold move at St. Vincent.
That some such rule did prevail in their dim minds is indeed obvious
from the result of the two great trials which followed on these small
ones. Vice-Admiral Lestock was tried in May 1746, and honourably
acquitted. The charges against him were, in substance, that on the
night before the battle, when the signal to form the line was flying,
the admiral signalled the fleet to lie to for the night. At that moment
Admiral Lestock’s squadron was separated from the main body of the
fleet. On any intelligent interpretation of the orders it is clear that
Lestock should first have joined the other ships, and should then have
lain to with them. He preferred to lie to at once, and drifted still
farther apart in the night. Next day he was five or six miles astern.
He pleaded that he could not come up, and that as the signal for the
line was flying he was bound to remain in a line even although that
kept him out of the action. One thing is abundantly clear from his
defence, and it is that whenever he saw a conflict of orders Lestock
habitually preferred that one of the two which kept him away from his
admiral, and well out of reach of the enemy. In after times Rodney, who
served in this fleet before the battle, and who knew the men, recorded
on the margin of Clerk’s _Naval Tactics_ his firm conviction that
Lestock had betrayed his admiral. Rodney was headlong in his judgments,
but his is the voice of one seaman of that time judging another, and
shows what charges were not thought incredible. Certain it is that
Lestock behaved like a man who was very glad of any excuse not to help
a superior whom he hated. Yet he was honourably acquitted.
There now remained nothing to be done but to try Admiral Mathews. He
appeared before a court martial in June 1746—and was sentenced to
be cashiered. That he was a stupid man, and was equally unfit to be
a minister plenipotentiary or an admiral, is true. In giving up the
pursuit of the allies, and so losing his chance to renew the battle,
he showed extreme dulness and even want of spirit. But in the action
he had fought manfully, and if his example had been well followed the
Spanish squadron would in all probability have been cut to pieces. His
great sin in the opinion of the court was that he engaged in such a
way as to make the maintenance of the line impossible while the signal
to preserve it was flying. Again we have to arrive at the conclusion
that, from the point of view of the court martial, it was better that
the enemy should not be brought to action than that the line should be
disordered. Such a result could only have been reached by men who had
never spent an hour in thinking out the methods of fighting a battle to
the best purpose, but had simply accepted the sixteenth article of the
Fighting Orders with the docility of pedants. The consequence of their
finding was to rivet the tyranny of a pedantic rule so firmly that it
required forty years of war, and an extraordinary combination of happy
circumstances at the end of them, to free the navy from its bonds.
In the course of these trials an incident took place which is of
interest, because it settled the question of the subordination of the
military to the civil courts. The President of the court martial formed
to try Admiral Mathews was Perry Mayne, Rear-Admiral of the Blue. It
happened that Admiral Mayne had sat on a court martial in the West
Indies to try a lieutenant of marines named Frye, and had sentenced
him to dismissal and imprisonment. Lieutenant Frye took proceedings
against the members of the court in England for acting beyond their
powers and for imprisoning him illegally. He gained his case, and £800
damages. In the course of these proceedings a writ was issued by Sir
John Willes, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, against Perry Mayne and
Captain Rentoul, another of Mathews’ judges, who also had sat on the
court martial. The other members of the court were extremely angry at
this interference with their President, and recorded a violent protest
against the action of Sir John Willes, in which they were encouraged
not only by the king, who was a German prince, and very ignorant of
English ways to the end of his life, but by the Lords of the Admiralty
and Corbet the Secretary, who ought to have known better. Sir John
Willes at once asserted his authority by attaching all the members of
the court for contempt. They were compelled to present a very humble
and public apology.
While the failures of the chiefs who had risen during the long peace
and their quarrels were filling the eyes and ears of the world, a great
work was beginning to be done for the Royal Navy, quietly and within
the walls of the Admiralty. It dated from December 1744, when Anson
was appointed as a member of the new Board, with the Duke of Bedford
as head. The duke was an indolent, great noble, who served the state
because public life was proper to a man of his rank. But he was honest
and sincerely patriotic. Though too much accustomed to a splendid and
pleasure-seeking life to be a hard worker himself, he supported Anson
steadily. Other politicians, and notably the Duke of Newcastle, were
too incapable, and too completely devoted to jobbery, to give any
active help, but self-interest made them understand that something
must be done for the navy. The country would not tolerate a repetition
of the miscarriages of the early years of the war, and efforts must
be made to bring about an improvement, if the eminent persons engaged
in the parliamentary, and court, scuffling of kites and crows, were
to be safe in their lives and estates. A good method of securing this
desirable end was to obtain the services of a competent workman, and to
let him labour unhampered. No better help could have been found than
Anson’s. The great seaman’s connection with the administrative work of
the navy began in 1744, and continued with brief interruptions till
his death in 1762. Until 1751 he served as a subordinate under Bedford
and Bedford’s successor, the Earl of Sandwich, who both trusted him.
After that date he was himself First Lord, almost continually. Anson
was not fitted to shine in the society of London. He could not shake
off the silent retiring habits formed during long years of cruising
in solitary command at a time when the chief was accustomed to keep
all subordinates at an awful distance. He was proud and shy, a little
hard too, and inclined to be grasping, as strenuous ambitious men
commonly are. It is therefore not surprising that he excited a good
deal of dislike, and laid himself open to the attacks of writers so
different, and so well able to make their voices heard, as Horace
Walpole and Smollett. We, whose ambitions he has not disappointed, and
whose advances he did not snub, can judge him by another standard. We
can remember that if he took care of his own fortunes, he also worked
hard to improve the quality of our shipbuilding, and, what was even
more important, to improve the quality of the senior ranks of the navy,
while he did a great deal to promote inquiry into, and reform of, the
corruptions of the dockyards.
Some years had to pass before the new spirit, hampered as it
necessarily was by inherited evils, could produce much effect. A glance
at the operations of 1744 will show from what a low level of energy
the naval administration had to be raised. Though the retreat of M. de
Roquefeuil before Sir John Norris and the February gales had shown the
weakness of our enemy, we yet called upon the Dutch to send the twenty
ships they were bound to supply by treaty. These vessels were duly
sent. Nothing effectual was done with the large force now collected.
In April and May Sir Charles Hardy with the Grand Fleet escorted the
Mediterranean trade as far south as Lisbon. The French, after the
failure of Roquefeuil’s cruise, had reverted to the plundering warfare
of the former war. Fourteen vessels were sent out in twos and threes
with orders to join at sea and attack our commerce, under the command
of M. de Rochambeau. Admiral Hardy protected the trade against his
attacks till it was safe in the Portuguese ports, and then returned
home. The return voyage was marked by an incident which gives no high
opinion either of the discipline of the fleet or of its intelligence.
On the 8th May a sail was seen to the northward, and Captain Watson
of the =Northumberland=, 74, was ordered to chase, but not to lose
sight of the fleet. He did lose sight. A mist came on, but a gun was
heard by the officers on deck, Captain Watson himself being in his
cabin, and was understood to be a signal of recall. The captain came
up, but continued to hold on, although a second signal was reported by
the midshipman on the forecastle. In the afternoon the mist lifted,
and the =Northumberland= was found to be close to two large French
warships, the _Content_, 60, and the _Mars_, 68, which had a frigate,
the _Venus_, 26, with them. At this time the =Northumberland= was not
cleared for action, nor indeed was she ever in proper order throughout
the fight. The master, James Dixon, implored the captain to get his
ship into better condition, but no notice was taken. A midshipman
named Best swore at the court martial that he heard the master say to
the chaplain that it was sad Captain Watson should take the ship into
action in the condition he was in. When asked what he understood by
this, he answered that he supposed the master to mean that captain
“was in liquor.” The evidence was not tested, though both the master
and chaplain were present. Captain Watson’s actions were certainly
not those of a sober man. He bore down on the two Frenchmen, passing
the _Content_, which was nearest and engaging the _Mars_, whereby he
enabled both to fall on him at once. The =Northumberland= was cut to
pieces. Captain Watson received first one wound and then a second.
He staggered to the accommodation ladder, and stood holding to the
railing and bleeding to death. The master, it was sworn, came on the
quarter-deck “with his hands in his breeches and his hat on, seemingly
in a surly mood.” He declared that there were no men to fight the ship,
and indeed the crew were running from the guns, while all the marines
on the poop who were not shot had escaped below. In these conditions
the flag was hauled down. The master gave the command after appealing
to the captain to surrender, in order to save the men from being killed
“like cows.” The first lieutenant, Craven, made a motion to hoist it up
again, and even spoke of blowing the ship up rather than surrender her
to the enemy. But his heroism did not go beyond words, and indeed the
=Northumberland= was in no condition to fight further. Yet he was the
superior officer, and, if he had wished to repeat the heroism of Sir
Richard Grenville, had all the necessary authority. The court martial
acquitted the lieutenant honourably, but sentenced the master to
imprisonment for life in the Marshalsea. It would have sentenced him to
death, but took the more merciful course in consideration of the good
advice he gave the captain, which, if it had been followed, would have
prevented the loss of the ship.
Here, by way of illustration, may be taken the case of another vessel,
lost in the following year. This was the =Anglesea=, 40, commanded by
Captain Elton. She was cruising on the south coast of Ireland, and fell
in, off the Old Head of Kinsale, with the _Apollo_, a French privateer
of 56 guns. Captain Elton rushed into action with all the folly of
Captain Watson. His decks were not cleared, nor his men properly at
quarters. The gunner could not as much as get the key of the powder
magazine till the last moment. So ill did Captain Elton handle his
ship that he allowed the Frenchman, who was to windward, to cross his
stern, rake him, and range up on the lee side. As the =Anglesea= was
one of the crank ships then common in our navy, she heeled over so
much that the water ran in at her ports. Thus she lay, with her upper
deck exposed to the small-arm fire of the Frenchman, her hull and
rigging at the mercy of a heavier broadside than her own. In twenty
minutes she was a beaten ship. Captain Elton fell, shot through the
body. Two of his men took him down to the surgeon, but on reaching
the main-deck from the quarter-deck found he was dead, and so left
him. The ship was surrendered by Lieutenant Baker Philipps. The court
martial found that the chief cause of the loss of the vessel was the
negligent and unofficerlike conduct of Captain Elton. Yet it sentenced
Philipps to be shot, though with a recommendation to mercy in which all
joined except the President. Baker Philipps was shot. Admiral Vernon
afterwards quoted this as a proof that naval courts martial did their
duty. The shocking contrast between the cruel severity shown to this
young officer and the scandalously light sentences passed on greater
offenders, had probably not a little to do with making Parliament see
that the naval court martial had to be taken in hand.
Sir Charles Hardy’s own work was half done. He returned home, leaving
M. de Rochambeau at sea. The Frenchman blockaded the merchant ships
in Lisbon. Among them were vessels on their way out with stores for
the garrisons and ships in the Mediterranean. The necessity for
action was pressing, and a fleet was sent out. It is a proof of the
little confidence felt in the senior officers of the day that the
work was entrusted to Sir John Balchen, a veteran of the wars of King
William and Queen Anne, who had fought some forty years before as
captain against Duguay-Trouin with more courage than success, and had
lately been appointed Governor of Greenwich Hospital as a reward for
long service. In spite of his great age (he was seventy-five), and
his claim to exemption, Balchen left his well-earned rest, and took
command of the fleet. He drove off Rochambeau, saw the trade safe to
Gibraltar, and returned home in September. On the 4th October the
fleet was scattered by a great storm at the entry to the Channel.
Balchen’s flagship, the =Victory=, disappeared during the night of the
4th-5th October with her crew of a thousand men. She was considered an
ill-built vessel and may have capsized, but Guernsey tradition asserted
that the sound of minute guns was heard from the Casketts through the
gale, and it was guessed that the =Victory= had been driven on the
rocks. In one way or the other the sea took its own.
During 1745 the fleets cruised unopposed. In the Mediterranean
Admiral Rowley, who had succeeded Mathews, blockaded the Spaniards
at Carthagena. He was so superior that he was able to send ships to
harass the French trade as far off as the West Indies, to watch Cadiz,
and to act against those Italian states in alliance with France. In
America a squadron sent from the Leeward islands under Commodore
Warren, covered the expedition from New England, a partly patriotic and
partly commercial speculation of the colonists, which took Louisbourg
in Cape Breton from the French in April, May, and June. Our enemies
were so incapable and so unenterprising that our fleet had little to
do. During the latter part of the year the interest of the country was
mainly turned on the Jacobite rising. The share of the navy in this
passage of our history was naturally important, since it had to prevent
the French from sending help to the Jacobites. But no serious move was
made by the French fleet, and no opportunity for service other than
patrolling the coast, and capturing single ships which endeavoured to
slip in with money and stores for the Prince, presented itself. The
navy did indeed contribute materially to make the rising less serious
than it might have been. Prince Charles had sailed from Nantes with two
vessels, the _Doutelle_, a small craft in which he himself sailed, and
the _Elizabeth_, a 64-gun ship employed to carry the bulk of his arms.
When on the 47th parallel and thirty-nine leagues west of the Lizard,
they were met by the =Lion=, 58, commanded by Piercy Brett. He had been
one of Anson’s lieutenants, and had been appointed by him captain of
the =Centurion= at Canton. As the commodore was not authorised to have
a captain under him the Admiralty refused to confirm the commission.
Anson, in great anger, had refused to accept promotion to the rank of
the rear-admiral. The ministerial change of December 1744 had brought
him back, and Brett, who had been made captain in the interval, was
allowed to date his seniority from his appointment at Canton. He now
attacked the _Elizabeth_, and the two fought one of the fiercest of
recorded single ship actions. They were so well matched that they beat
one another to a standstill, but the substantial fruits of victory
remained with the =Lion=, for the _Elizabeth_ was compelled to put
back. The _Doutelle_ went on and reached Scotland.
In 1746 the success of the Colonial expedition against Louisbourg,
encouraged the Government to fit out an imitation of it to attack
Quebec. Lestock, who retained a very ill-deserved reputation for
capacity, was appointed to command the ships, and Lieutenant-General
St. Clair, the troops, consisting of some engineers and artillery with
six regiments of foot. The preparations were delayed till the season
was passed for a voyage across the Atlantic. It was therefore sent to
the French coast on raiding expedition. Nothing need be recorded of it
save that it did not sail till the 14th of September, that troops were
landed cleverly enough to the west of Port Louis on the southern coast
of Brittany, and then re-embarked when it was found that they had no
means of taking the town of L’Orient, which lies a little behind Port
Louis and further up the river Blavet. L’Orient was the dockyard of
the French East India Company, and its destruction was much desired by
us. After failing at L’Orient, the expedition went on to Quiberon Bay,
where it again landed soldiers, and again found that there was nothing
to be done. Finally the transports carried the soldiers to Ireland, and
Lestock returned to Portsmouth.
In the following year, 1747, the new spirit at the Admiralty began to
tell. The fleet was employed with vigour on well-selected services,
and was rewarded with proportionate success. It was no longer used to
convey insufficient military expeditions to besiege towns they had not
the means of taking, or to invade countries they were not numerous
enough to occupy. The French Government was stung by the fall of
Louisbourg, and by the news from India, into making efforts to use its
fleet to better purpose, and the increase of activity on both sides
gave an energy to the naval war it had not as yet possessed. In spring
it was known that two squadrons were to sail from France together and
were to divide at sea—one, commanded by M. de la Jonquière, was then
to steer for America, and the other, of which M. St. George was the
chief, was to sail for India. They were composed of eight king’s ships,
and of six of the vessels of the French East India Company. Transports
and merchant vessels were to go under their protection. A squadron of
sixteen ships of from 40 to 90 guns were formed to intercept them, and
Anson took the command while still retaining his seat on the Board. It
is characteristic of the prevailing jobbery of the time that this force
was not got together without the necessity of defeating an intrigue.
Two of the vessels selected to serve under Anson were the =Defiance=,
60, Captain Grenville, and the =Bristol=, 50, of which William
Montagu, commonly called Mad Montagu, a brother of Lord Sandwich, was
captain. Neither of these officers was wanting in spirit. Grenville
was killed in the action of the 3rd May, fighting most gallantly, and
whatever could have been said against the sense of Mad Montagu, a
noisy violent man of much deliberate eccentricity whose rôle it was to
play the rattlepated Jack Tar, his courage was above dispute. But both
would have preferred to cruise alone, and pick up prizes. Grenville
belonged to the famous “cousinhood” of the name, and his cousin George
Grenville, who was on the Board, attempted a little manœuvre on his
behalf. An order to Anson not to keep the =Defiance= and =Bristol= with
him for more than seven days was put into a letter which the Duke of
Bedford was expected to sign without looking at it. The Duke did detect
the trick, and refused to sign, declaring that “they should deserve to
be hanged for it if it was done.”
Anson sailed for his station off Finisterre on the 9th April, sent his
look-out sloops to watch Rochefort, and stretched his fleet out in a
line abreast, each ship a mile from the other, in order to diminish
the risk that the enemy would pass undiscovered. In the early morning
of the 3rd May the =Falcon= sloop brought the news that she had seen
the French the day before steering for the west. Anson called in all
cruisers, collected his ships, and steered to cross the presumed route
of the enemy. Between nine and ten the French squadron was seen to
the S.W. It was at first not possible to estimate its strength, for
warships and transports were all sailing together, and the one could
not be distinguished from the other. Anson therefore kept his fleet
in a body lest he should meet an equal enemy whom it would be rash to
attack in disorder. As the space between the two fleets was reduced,
it was seen that the French had divided. Nine vessels were formed in a
line to meet our attack, while the others were making off to leeward.
La Jonquière and St. George had, in fact, no more than that number
of vessels fit to meet line-of-battle ships. When the inferiority of
the enemy’s force was seen, Anson ordered a general chase. The English
captains went into action at their best speed, attacking the enemy
on both sides. The French fought brilliantly, but the superiority of
force against them was so overwhelming that they could do no more
than sacrifice themselves bravely in order to give their charge time
to escape, which many of the merchant ships did succeed in doing. Six
of the French king’s ships and four of the Company’s were taken. Yet
the French sold their defeat dear. Five hundred and twenty men were
killed and wounded in our ships. The loss of the enemy was about seven
hundred. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when the first of
the English ships—Anson’s old ship the =Centurion=, now commanded by
his former lieutenant, Denis—came up with the rear of the French ships
as they were edging away to leeward, and hoping to delay our attack by
showing a firm front till the night should come. The action was over at
seven. Anson was made a peer for the victory, which filled the country
with well-grounded delight. Our superiority in numbers and weight of
ships was great, and as a battle the action of the 3rd May was not
glorious, but here was a success won by foresight, good management, and
activity against a gallant enemy. It was the first time that so much
could be said since the war began in 1739, and it was the promise of
greater things to come.
On the 21st-22nd June, some six weeks after Anson had ruined the French
expeditions to America and India, Captain Thomas Fox, who was cruising
with a small squadron on the 47th degree of North Latitude, met and
scattered the valuable convoy coming home from San Domingo. Forty-eight
prizes were taken by our ships, and the injury inflicted went beyond
the material loss, for the disaster showed how little able the French
were to protect their sea-borne commerce against the British Navy. They
were too weak to keep the road open, in face of energetic direction
given to our forces by the new Admiralty. Before the close of the year
a third blow drove the lesson well home, and did a great deal to bring
France to recognise the necessity for making peace. The outward bound
trading ships to the French West Indies were collected at Rochelle. A
strong squadron of eight line-of-battle ships of the French Royal Navy,
and of one 64-gun ship belonging to the Indian Company, was told off
to protect them. The Chef d’escadre, or Rear-Admiral, Desherbiers de
l’Etanduère, was in command, with his flag flying in the _Tonnant_, 80,
a noble vessel. Indeed l’Etanduère’s squadron was a stronger one than
La Jonquière’s, and the vessels composing it were superior in build and
strength to our ships of the same nominal force. A powerful squadron
was prepared to intercept this convoy. What was wanted in quality of
ships we made up in number, and fourteen vessels were sent to overpower
the French nine. The command was given to Rear-Admiral Edward Hawke,
the captain of the =Berwick=, whose gallantry had stood out brilliantly
against a background of blundering and pusillanimity in the battle of
Toulon five years before.
Being fixed by the necessity they were under of reaching the West
Indies soon after the end of the hurricane season in October, the
enemy’s time of sailing could be calculated. Hawke left England on the
9th August for his cruising ground, the latitude of from 46° to 48°
N. The enemy was sighted on the 14th October. The ensuing action was
an almost exact reproduction of Anson’s engagement with La Jonquière.
Hawke has had an affectionate biographer in our time, and the glory he
won twelve years after this meeting with the convoy reflects back on
all his life. Therefore he has naturally been credited with displaying
great originality, but the truth is that he followed the pattern given
him by Anson six months before, down to the details. The English ships
approached in order, till they were near enough to estimate the enemy’s
inferior numbers. Then they went ahead in general chase, attacking
on both sides, and crushing their opponent by weight of numbers. As
l’Etanduère’s squadron was stronger than La Jonquière’s, it made a
harder fight. The French flagship, the _Tonnant_, proved too much for
any of our vessels, and in company with the _Intrépide_, commanded by
the Count of Vaudreuil, broke her way through and escaped. Captain
Philip Saumarez in the =Nottingham=, 60, who pursued the two for a
time, was killed. But six of the eight French were taken. They did
not surrender till they were thoroughly wrecked. As his own vessels
were severely cut up, Hawke made his way home and reached port on the
31st October. Meanwhile the French merchant ships, protected by the
_Content_ and a frigate, had continued their voyage and had escaped for
the time being. Hawke, however, took the precaution to send a sloop
to the West Indies with the news, and many of the French vessels were
captured by our cruisers when nearing their destination.
It will be observed that on both these occasions the French officers
secured the escape of the vessels put under their protection. The
substantial victory may therefore, in a sense, be said to have been
theirs, since they did what they were sent out to do. The question then
arises whether Anson and Hawke could not have done better, since they
were sent out to interrupt the enemy’s commerce, and since they had a
superiority of nearly two to one in fighting ships. They might have
detached four sail to pursue the trading vessels, and still have left
themselves a superiority over the French squadron of twelve to nine on
the 3rd May, and of ten to eight on the 9th October. Yet the policy of
making the destruction of the fighting force of our enemy as near as
might be a certainty was the sound one, since, if his fleet was once
driven off the sea, his convoys could not sail at all. Moreover, it
is to be remembered that in 1747 the general bad quality of our ships
might well lead our admirals to think that they could not afford to
dispense with any superiority of numbers over the French.
With Hawke’s victory the naval war in Europe came to an end. In the
East Indies, however, it continued. One of the few relieving features
in the dulness of this war—or these wars, the Spanish and the French—is
the extension of the activity of our fleet into the remote east.
Hitherto when the Royal Navy had gone to the Indian Seas it had been
on particular missions, but from 1744 it acted there continuously, and
in squadrons, for so long as the countries were at war in Europe. Not
that anything the navy did there was very flattering to our pride.
Rather the contrary, indeed, since the dispensation by which it was
arranged that while we were bad, our enemy should be even worse, was
nowhere more conspicuously to our advantage. Yet it marks one step in
the growth of the navy that it is found taking over its duties on the
other side of the world.
In 1744 a squadron of 4 ships, two of 60, one of 50, and one of 20
guns, was sent to the Eastern Seas under Commodore Curtis Barnett.
Here at once there is occasion to note how well we were served by
the folly of our opponent. A man was then at Paris who was admirably
qualified to defeat any enterprise we might undertake against the
French posts in India. This was Bertrand Mahé de la Bourdonnais,
governor of the French islands of Bourbon and Mauritius. He had not
been trained as a king’s officer, though the rank of Capitaine de
Frégate was conferred upon him. He was a native of St. Malo, a merchant
skipper and trader. But he had acquired all the knowledge needed to
make a skilful naval commander, and had shown great faculty in his
government. La Bourdonnais was convinced that England would attack
the French settlements in the East, and he laid a scheme before the
king’s ministers for forestalling us. His plan was accepted, and he was
promised a squadron of five vessels. But La Bourdonnais, most happily
for us, had excited the hostility of the French East Company by his
self-assertive character, and his exposures of its corruptions, and
his talent for scornful retort. The company opposed his scheme, and
had influence enough to get it laid aside. It persuaded itself and
the king’s ministers that it would be possible to maintain neutrality
with the English East India Company. Neither thought fit to consider
the probable action of the British Government, which might very well
decline to be guided by the company. Being deprived of the force
promised to him, La Bourdonnais was driven back on his own resources,
and on those he could draw from the islands.
Commodore Barnett sailed from Spithead on the 5th May 1744, and after
touching at Porto Praya in the Cape Verd islands, went on to the Indian
Ocean. After rounding the Cape, he visited Madagascar, where fresh meat
could always be got from the natives, and then stood over to the coast
of Sumatra. He detached two of his vessels to take post in the Straits
of Malacca, between Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula, and himself went
through the Straits of Sunda, between Sumatra and Java, and took up his
station in the Banca Straits, between Sumatra and Borneo. He was thus
on the trade route between China and the European possessions on the
coast of Coromandel. On the 25th January 1745 three French China ships
of great value sailed right into his hands. In these far seas he did
not trouble to look for an Admiralty Court, but carried his prizes into
Batavia, sold them to the Dutch for £92,000, and divided the proceeds
at the capstan head. Then he came across to Madras.
The relations between the English and the French Company did, to some
extent, justify those who held that a neutrality could be maintained if
the traders only were considered. The English Company was flourishing,
and asked nothing better than to be allowed to trade in peace. The
French Company was not so well off, and therefore was much more lean,
hungry, and disposed to adventure. But it was not strong on land, and
at sea had so far no force. A tacit arrangement was made by which
the French promised to abstain from attacking us by land, so long as
Barnett did not assail them from the sea. The Company persuaded the
commodore to accept this arrangement, and 1745 passed in insignificant
movements. Barnett died in the spring of 1746 at Fort St. Davids.
The command now fell to the senior captain, Edward Peyton, and its
fortunes in his hands have caused the death of Barnett to be esteemed
a misfortune. The arrival of reinforcements from home and arming of a
prize taken from the French had raised the number of the squadron to
six, one of 60, three of 50, one of 40, and one of 20 guns. It had,
therefore, a total of 270 guns, and all the vessels, with the exception
perhaps of the French prize, were built for war. The quality of the
squadron must be taken into account in estimating what followed. While
our ships were idly parading the Bay of Bengal, La Bourdonnais was
straining every nerve to fit out a squadron at the Île de France,
now Mauritius. In the spring of 1746 he had scraped together, by all
kinds of devices and makeshifts, eight vessels, one of them being a
man-of-war mounting 70 guns, and the others converted merchant ships
of from 26 to 36 guns. The total was 292, and most of the pieces were
small. The vessels were indeed full of men, but a large proportion
of them were Lascars and Caffres. La Bourdonnais sailed on the 29th
March, and after nearly suffering total shipwreck on Madagascar left
it for the Coromandel coast in May, and arrived there in June. On
the 25th of this month, before he had touched at any of the French
settlements, he met the English squadron at sea between Fort St.
Davids, at Cuddalore, and Negapatam, to the south of Pondicherry, the
chief French port. Knowing his inferiority in artillery La Bourdonnais
tried to come to close quarters and overpower the English by the number
of his men. Peyton baffled this effort by keeping well to windward, and
the encounter resolved itself into a distant cannonade, by which one of
the French ships was crippled and very little harm was done to us. That
little was enough to deprive Peyton of all desire to meet the French
again. He held a council of war next morning, and by its advice sailed
away to Trincomalee, leaving La Bourdonnais free to continue his voyage
to Pondicherry. The decision was without excuse, for if Peyton had used
his eyes at all during the cannonade of the day before, he must have
learnt that he had to deal with ships of very inferior armament. But
some of his own vessels were in no good condition, and he could think
of nothing but of their defects, and of the excuse afforded him for a
retreat.
La Bourdonnais anchored at Pondicherry on the 9th July, and began at
once to prepare for attacks on our settlements. The history of his
quarrels with Dupleix, the governor-general, does not concern the naval
operations, since they did not prevent him for carrying out his attack
on Madras. He was at sea again on the 4th August to look for Peyton,
and met the English commander coming back from Ceylon. From the 8th
to the 11th August the two squadrons were in sight of one another,
but so convinced was Peyton of the inferiority of his squadron that
he not only avoided action but sailed away to Bengal. La Bourdonnais
now returned to Pondicherry, picked up soldiers, and sailed for Madras
on the 15th August. The action of Peyton was again unpardonable,
for even if he felt too weak to engage the French at sea, he could
have contributed men and guns to the defence of Madras. The help his
mere presence on the coast would have afforded is proved by the fact
that when in the middle of the siege La Bourdonnais received a false
report of the appearance of large English ships, he was preparing to
re-embark his men. But the French commander was not one of those who
are to be drawn off by mere rumours. He waited for confirmation, and
when it did not come, he pushed the siege, and the place surrendered
on the 29th September. This event and its consequences, the breach of
the capitulation made by La Bourdonnais and the seizure of the town
by Dupleix, were the beginning of the great fight between the two
companies. At the change of the monsoon in October, which suspended
naval operations for sailing ships, La Bourdonnais returned to his own
government in the islands, and appeared no more in those seas. He was
compelled to return home, was accused of corruption by his opponents
of the company, and died ruined and broken-hearted. Once more our best
help came from our enemy.
In the following year, 1747, Peyton was superseded by Rear-Admiral
Griffin, who is accused of treating his predecessor with great
brutality. It is very possible, for Griffin was one of the bad officers
who then infested our navy, insolently tyrannical to his subordinates,
and shy before the enemy. His own conduct was no better than Peyton’s,
for he allowed M. de Bouvet, with a much inferior squadron from
Mauritius, to revictual the French garrison of Madras, and did nothing
against him either coming or going.
Now, however, the East Indies began to profit by the revival of
energy and intelligence at the Admiralty. A squadron of ten ships,
of which six were of the line, was sent out at the end of 1747 under
the command of Edward Boscawen, one of the new race of officers who
were being brought forward by Anson and Bedford. Boscawen owed much
to family influence, for he was a brother of the Viscount Falmouth,
who once cowed a recalcitrant secretary of state by significantly
saying, “Remember, sir, we are seven,” that being the number of pocket
boroughs owned by the Boscawen family. But the admiral was a man of
ability, who would have won promotion at any time when it was to be won
by merit. He sailed in November, but did not reach Fort St. Davids,
which since the loss of Madras had become the Company’s chief station
on the Coromandel coast, till the 29th July 1748. The length of the
voyage was due partly to delay at the Cape to recruit the health of
the crews and partly to an unsuccessful attempt to land at Mauritius.
The force collected under Boscawen was the greatest seen as yet in
eastern waters, for it consisted of ten English line-of-battle ships,
and five smaller vessels, together with armed vessels belonging to
our own Company and the Dutch. The French had nothing to oppose to
this armament on the sea, and as the admiral had brought 1500 soldiers
with him, it would seem that it ought to have been easy to sweep the
French from the coast of Coromandel altogether. But the military forces
were of inferior quality, consisting of independent companies raised
for the service of the Company, and had as yet no military spirit.
The scientific branches, and in particular the engineers who were of
the first importance for siege work, were very poor. The siege of
Pondicherry, undertaken in revenge for the capture of Madras, was badly
managed, and turned out a complete failure. Boscawen, who directed
the operations on shore, was no general, and was badly served by his
engineers. A bombardment by the fleet took place on the 26th September,
but it was little better than a farce, for the shallow water made it
impossible for our ships to approach near enough for their fire to
be effective. At a later period in the fighting in the Carnatic the
Company’s soldiers found that they were being fired at with the cannon
balls then wasted on Pondicherry. After lasting from the 8th August to
the 30th September, after not a few panics among the raw soldiers of
the army and the sailors landed to work the guns, the siege was raised
with a loss of 1065 Europeans.
Peace had now been made in Europe, and Madras was restored in return
for Louisbourg. The war indeed was only beginning between the
Companies, but henceforward it was carried on ashore, and in the name
of the native princes. Boscawen returned in the following year.