THE WAR TILL THE END OF 1797
Authorities.—See the list of Authorities in the previous Chapter.
Also, _Projets et Tentatives de Débarquement aux Îles Britanniques_
by Captain Desbrière.
The victory of the 1st of June was followed by an interval of more
than two years marked by no great naval conflict. The French Navy
was at once too completely disorganised and too ill-directed to act
with effect. It was indeed driven to exertions injurious only to
itself by the Jacobin rulers in Paris, who were themselves driven on
by such passions as the “beastly froth of rage” which caused them to
issue their decree of the 24th May 1794—the decree forbidding their
armies and fleets to give quarter to Hanoverians or Englishmen. It
was repealed on the 30th December, five months after the fall of the
Terrorists on the 27th of July, and when experience had shown the
French that not they but their enemies were to have the more frequent
opportunities to refuse quarter. The English fleet had no substantial
opponent at sea at whom to strike, and was, moreover, but poorly led
for the most part.
In the Channel, Howe, who continued to hold the command though his
health never recovered from the strain of the campaign of 1794, cruised
from September till the end of the year.[2] But he continued to prefer
his own system of watching the French from an English channel port by
means of a lookout maintained by frigates. His infirmities and age were
in fact disqualifying him for active service. He would willingly have
retired, and indeed was never at sea after the spring of 1795, though
he was compelled, by the unwillingness of the Government to allow him
to resign, to retain the nominal command. Lord Bridport, brother of
Lord Hood, who first acted for him at sea and then succeeded him in the
Channel command, held the same views as to the best way of using the
fleet, and applied them with far less energy and faculty.
The Admiralty did not as yet impose a more vigorous line of action on
its admirals. Between the growing weakness of Howe, the natural want
of energy of Bridport, and the lack of intelligent direction from
Whitehall, the movements of the Channel fleet went somewhat by fits
and starts. In November, the =Canada=, 74, Captain Hamilton, came into
Torbay, where Howe was at anchor, with the news that he had barely
escaped from a French squadron which had taken his colleague, the
=Alexander=, 74, commanded by Captain R. R. Bligh, a different man
from the officer whose name is for ever associated with the mutiny of
the =Bounty=. Howe went at once to cruise off Ushant, believing that
the main French fleet was at sea. But it was only a small squadron
commanded by Nielly, which had taken the =Alexander= as she and the
=Canada= came back from convoy duty. Howe’s fleet, which included four
Portuguese liners, was much blown about and damaged by rough weather.
If the English ships, and to a greater extent our Portuguese friends,
suffered from the rough weather of the Channel in autumn and winter,
the French fleet at Brest was all but finally ruined. Villaret-Joyeuse
was hounded out to sea on the 24th December with thirty-five sail of
the line. Six of these were to form a detached squadron under Renaudin,
who had been promoted to Rear-Admiral for his gallant defence of the
_Vengeur_. He was to take his command round to Toulon. So great was
the distress of all France, and particularly of its poorest province
(Brittany) for food, that it had not been found possible to provision
any of these thirty-five ships except the six of Renaudin’s command
for more than three weeks. The hostility of all Europe and the penury
of their Government combined to deprive the French of naval stores.
Their ships were patched up by makeshift devices and with inferior
material. Half a century after 1795, the Prince de Joinville noted
that as the French maritime population was very poor and ill fed, the
men drawn from it for service in the fleet were inferior in size and
strength to the seamen of the north of Europe—including, of course,
Great Britain. He found that these men did not gain strength till they
had been well fed and well looked after in the navy for some months. In
1795 the French seacoast population was even poorer than about 1840,
and the men drawn from it were not sufficiently clad, and were fed
on almost starvation rations in the fleet. We must remember that our
successes were gained against overstrained and patched-up ships, with
inferior spars fished with bad material and sails of poor cloth; manned
by crews not only raw from want of practice, but weak from downright
want of food, and depressed by a sense of inferiority in knowledge
and force. Our ancestors rejoiced in looking at caricatures of the
starving French reduced to mere scarecrows by hunger, and in comparing
them with the typical Englishman, a mass of fat and brawn. The French
had made themselves hateful by their aggressions and plunderings, and
we resented their arrogant claim to impose regeneration and freedom
on their neighbours while they were themselves in a squalid welter of
bloodstained anarchy. Yet they were gallant men who faced storm and
battle in such destitution—and we shall not again have to meet enemies
enfeebled as they were.
Villaret-Joyeuse had to face a December gale with such a fleet when
he obeyed his orders on the 24th of December in 1794. It drove the
_Républicain_ on the rocks, and his fleet had to anchor in Camaret
Bay. He sailed on the 30th, only to suffer a month of misery. The
_Neuf Thermidor_ (the _Jacobin_ of the 1st of June renamed), the
_Scipion_, and the _Superbe_ sank. The _Neptune_ was driven on shore.
By the 2nd February the weakened fleet was back at Brest. The news
that the French were at sea brought Howe out for his last cruise, to
intercept them if possible, and to cover the trade. The stormy weather
disposed of Villaret-Joyeuse, who, however, captured a hundred of our
merchant-ships, and the =Daphne=, a 20-gun ship, and Howe returned to
Spithead after looking into Brest to be sure that the French fleet was
not at sea. If he had been outside Brest on the 24th of December, the
French might have been spared a disaster. Yet the weakness of his
method of watching from afar off and starting to pursue from a distance
was clearly demonstrated immediately after his return to Spithead.
Renaudin sailed with his six line-of-battle ships on the 22nd of
February, and reached Toulon unmolested by us, on the 2nd April, but
having suffered much from the weather, and with a long sick list.
The French took advantage of the absence of a blockading fleet off
Brest to send out squadrons to protect their own coast trade and attack
our commerce. In May an English watching squadron of five sail of the
line under Cornwallis was off Ushant. It saw and pursued a French force
of three liners under Rear-Admiral Vence, then engaged on convoy duty.
Vence fled to the Penmarchs, pursued by Cornwallis, who took part of
his convoy on the 8th and 9th of June. The danger of Vence brought
Villaret-Joyeuse out from Brest with nine sail. Cornwallis was pursued
and overtaken on the 16th, but so poor was the gunnery of the French
that though they attacked his rearmost ships on both sides, they did
little harm, and suffered not a little themselves. Cornwallis got safe
to Plymouth with his prizes, and his retreat was highly praised for its
steadiness and good management. Bad weather forced the French back to
Belleisle, and when they turned again to Brest on the 19th June they
fell in with another and a stronger opponent.
The Vendéens were still fighting for the royal cause in France, and
were calling for help to the Royalist exiles and for the presence of a
prince to lead them. An expedition had been prepared in England, which
was to have been commanded by the Count d’Artois—in after times King
Charles X. It included 200 exiled officers of the old French Navy,
and sailed on the 11th June from Spithead under the protection of Sir
John Borlase Warren, who had his flag in a frigate, but had three
line-of-battle ships and fifty transports. Lord Bridport accompanied
the expedition with fourteen sail of the line to protect it from the
Brest fleet. Warren’s mission was to land the Royalists at Quiberon. On
the 19th June Bridport dispatched him to Quiberon, and steered himself
for Brest. Immediately after Warren had parted from Bridport on his
way south-east to Quiberon, he sighted Villaret-Joyeuse on his way
back from Belleisle to Brest. He retreated, warned Bridport, and the
two rejoined on the 20th. Bridport took the three liners of Warren’s
squadron, and pursued Villaret-Joyeuse. On the 23rd June there was a
confused encounter about the island of Groix, which lies north-west
of Belleisle. The French admiral was ill obeyed by his overtaxed
subordinates, who disregarded signals, and fled to L’Orient, on the
mainland opposite Groix. Three of his ships were overtaken and captured
after a gallant resistance. The dangers of the coast and a fog added to
the disorders of the fight. The French admiral complained bitterly of
the conduct of his captains. Bridport, who had three prizes to show,
the _Alexandre_ (the English =Alexander= taken by Nielly on the 7th
November of the previous year through her bad sailing, and now retaken
for the same reason), the _Tigre_, and the _Formidable_, renamed by
us the =Belleisle=, was praised for his victory. But the opinion of
his fleet and the verdict of history was adequately expressed by
Codrington, then captain of the =Babet= frigate in his fleet. “It is
greatly to be regretted that His Lordship called the ships out of
action, as they could of course go where the large French three-decker
did. He might have captured or destroyed all the ships of the enemy.”
Warren remained on the coast till September a helpless eye-witness of
the dreadful fate of the French Royalists at Quiberon. Nearly all the
200 naval officers among them perished in the water, in action, or
before the Republican firing parties. Frenchmen who were prepared to
assert that Perfidious Albion had contrived the whole disaster in order
to secure the destruction of the dreaded royal corps, have not been
wanting. The French ships at L’Orient remained till the close of the
year, unmanned partly by desertion, partly by the disbanding of crews
which could not be fed. During the last days of 1795 and the first of
1796 they were remanned after a fashion, and slipped away to Brest and
Rochefort.
In the meantime the French armies had overrun Holland at the close
of 1794, had driven out the army of the Duke of York, and had set up
a subject republic. Our ally became our enemy, and a squadron had to
be told off to watch the Texel under Duncan, in company with a dozen
very ill-found Russian warships. But from the date of Lord Bridport’s
victory till the close of 1796 there was little for the fleet to do in
the Channel and North Sea but to watch. Want of funds compelled the
Republican Government to follow the example given by Louis XIV. after
1693—to lay up its main fleets and take to commerce destroying.
The operations in the Mediterranean from December 1793, when Hood was
forced to retreat from Toulon, till Jervis evacuated the Mediterranean
in December of 1796, correspond with the campaigns in the Channel—with
the exception that they include no 1st of June.
When he had withdrawn his ships filled with French refugees from
Toulon, Hood paused for a time at Hyères. The refugees had to be
provided for at Leghorn, from whence most of them returned home
after the fall of the Terrorists. The remnant of the French fleet
at Toulon could not move for months. An opportunity for dealing a
severe blow to France was presented by the state of the island of
Corsica. The Corsicans had not wholly renounced the hope of achieving
independence of the French, who had conquered them some thirty years
earlier. One party among them was deeply offended by the irreligion
of the French Republicans. It had for chief the famous Pasqual Paoli,
who had fought against the French conquest, and had for years been
a pensioner in England. He had returned to Corsica by favour of the
Revolution, and was now in the possession of great influence over his
countrymen. Paoli, who hoped to secure the independence of Corsica
under English protection,—which meant to govern the country himself
with our support,—offered his co-operation. Hood sailed from Hyères on
the 24th of January 1794, bringing with him the British troops under
Sir David Dundas. A storm forced the fleet to Elba and caused delay.
But the occupation of the island with the help of Paoli was an easy
undertaking. The few French troops took refuge in the coast towns of
Bastia and Calvi. Dundas declined to co-operate at Bastia on the ground
that he had no adequate force. But Bastia was taken between the 4th of
April and the 21st of May by the seamen, the marines, and the soldiers
appointed to serve as marines, who were under Hood’s orders. Calvi was
besieged on the 19th June, and surrendered on the 10th of August. The
fact that Nelson, the only one of our admirals whose personality has
stamped itself on the memory and imagination of the English people,
was concerned in these sieges and lost his right eye at Calvi, has
given them an undeserved prominence. The garrisons were cut off from
supplies by sea and land, and must have surrendered when they did,
if no shot had been fired against them. On the 14th June Corsica was
declared a kingdom, with George III. for its sovereign, and coins were
struck in his name. But our hold on the island was weak. It depended
in reality on the continued support of Paoli and on his retention of
influence over his countrymen. Sir Gilbert Elliot, our Commissioner
first at Toulon and then in Corsica, ruined the whole foundation of our
position. Sir Gilbert was a high-minded and able man, a conspicuous
member of that portion of the Whig Opposition which was shocked by the
French Revolution into allying itself with Pitt. He would not consent
to govern by the advice of Paoli, and would endeavour to introduce
clean-handed methods of administration, impartial justice, and the
British jury among a people divided by irreconcilable family feuds.
With the best intentions in the world, he mortally offended our only
possible friends, the Paolists, who hoped for a self-governing Corsica
administered by them, and he entirely failed to placate our enemies.
The calm and perfectly right-minded manifestation of the innate and
comprehensive superiority of Englishmen on the part of our officers,
did not fail to produce its unfailing effect. It exasperated the
Corsicans beyond endurance. We were soon universally hated, and our
tenure of Corsica was certain to end whenever a serious attack could be
made on us from outside. A very few months of English virtue converted
the population into partisans of the French. A far larger army than we
could spare, frequently reinforced, would have been required to hold
the island.
The attack came by the end of 1796. Until then we were employed in
beating back successive feeble sorties of the French from Toulon, and
in co-operating with the Austrian armies in Northern Italy. The efforts
of the French to maintain their hold on Corsica by expeditions from a
ruined dockyard were begun with a promptitude highly honourable to
their energy. As early as the 5th June, just over six months after the
expulsion of the allies, Admiral Martin sailed with seven ships of
the line. He met with a slight measure of success, for he retook the
_Alceste_, a frigate carried away in December, and assigned to Sardinia
as her share of the prizes. But when Hood, warned by his frigates, took
up the pursuit of the French squadron, it could but retire and seek
refuge in the Golfe Juan, commonly called by English sailors Gourjean.
Hood, who had an old experience of attacks on fleets at anchor, laid
a plan to fall on the French two upon one. But it was delayed by
unfavourable weather till Martin had fortified his ships by batteries
on shore. A scheme for using fireships was given up as impracticable.
Martin was blockaded by a combined English and Spanish squadron under
Hotham till a storm drove the watchers off, and he escaped to Toulon on
the 2nd of November. It would seem that the allies might as well have
been off Toulon in May. But the method of watching from afar, which in
the Mediterranean meant from San Fiorenzo or Leghorn, was as much a
favourite with Hood as with Howe. In November, Hood went home on leave,
and on the understanding that he was to return. But he could not agree
with ministers, and did not go to sea again.
Hotham, his successor, an easy-going gentleman, was not the man to
change a method of conducting war which gave him much time at anchor at
San Fiorenzo or Leghorn. He had gone to Leghorn to cover convoys which
could have been much better covered by a close blockade of Toulon, when
Martin put to sea again, on the 2nd March, with fifteen sail of the
line. The 12,000 men required to make up the crews of these vessels
had been found only by drafting 7500 soldiers into them. Martin had
only 2300 sailors in addition to officers and petty officers. A gleam
of good fortune was again allowed him. On the 7th March he took the
=Berwick=, 74. Her masts had been rolled out of her by the carelessness
of her officers, and she was following Hotham to Leghorn under jury
rig. But this small advantage was all Martin could gain. Hotham, who
sailed from Leghorn on the 9th, was informed of the whereabouts of the
French by his frigates on the 10th. He pursued in baffling breezes
and calms. On the 13th and 14th an encounter took place between them
which has some resemblance to Bridport’s action near Groix. The French
straggled, and the French admiral was ill obeyed. Two French vessels,
the _Ça Ira_, 80, and the _Censeur_, 74, were taken after a stout
resistance. Some vague cannonading on opposite tacks took place between
the fleets. It is to the credit of the French that they inflicted a
loss of 74 killed and 284 wounded on the English vessels most exposed
to their fire. The =Illustrious=, 74, Captain Frederick, lost 90
of the total. Hotham had with him a Neapolitan 74, the _Tancredi_,
commanded by a man whose name is associated closely with the Royal
Navy for another reason, the unhappy Carracciolo. When the fragmentary
battle was over, Hotham excited the wrath of his subordinate Nelson by
placidly putting aside advice to pursue with vigour on the ground that
two vessels had been taken and they had done very well.
An admiral of this kidney was not the man either to intercept Renaudin,
who joined Martin at Hyères on the 4th April, or to keep the French
confined to Toulon. They were almost ruined there by a mutiny of
starving, unpaid men, but got over the difficulty, and were at sea
again on the 7th June. The second sortie was even feebler than the
first. Martin chased Nelson, who had been detached to Genoa, back on
Hotham, at San Fiorenzo. Though reinforced by Renaudin, he was weaker
than the English admiral, who had been joined by Admiral Mann with nine
sail of the line on the 14th June. There was nothing for it but another
retreat, another ineffectual distant cannonade—the final retreat of
Martin to Toulon, and the return of Hotham to San Fiorenzo.
As the English admiral moved periodically from San Fiorenzo to Leghorn
and from Leghorn back to San Fiorenzo, there was obviously nothing to
prevent Richery from leaving Toulon on the 24th September with six of
the line and three frigates on a cruise to America. He did so, passed
the Rock of Gibraltar, and on the 7th October fell in with an English
convoy of thirty-one merchant-ships under the protection of two 74’s
and the French prize _Censeur_ armed _en flûte_. Richery retook the
_Censeur_ and captured nearly all the merchant-ships. Spain having
made peace with France in July, Richery was able to take his prizes
into Cadiz, where he was promptly blockaded by Rear-Admiral Mann with
six ships, and so remained for months. Hotham, again, was not the man
to prevent Honoré Ganteaume from leaving Toulon for a cruise in the
Levant on the 10th October. He did sail with one of the line and five
frigates, released some scattered French vessels watched by us, did
considerable damage to Russian and English trade, escaped the pursuit
of Troubridge, and was back at Toulon on the 5th February 1796. Hotham,
worn out by his exertions, resigned his command to Sir Hyde Parker on
the 1st November 1795, and sailed for home, to be rewarded by an Irish
peerage. Sir Hyde Parker was superseded by Sir John Jervis on the 30th
of the month.
During 1796 the new admiral could do little, for the French fleet was
paralysed by penury in the Mediterranean as in the Channel. He had to
look on almost helplessly while Napoleon, who took command of the army
of Italy in March, was conducting the first and perhaps the greatest of
his campaigns. It was at least a campaign which showed what genius and
enthusiasm, even if it be only enthusiasm for a full belly and plenty
of plunder, can do against professional pedantry and routine. By June
his victories had cowed Naples into deserting the coalition, and her
help, such as it was, was lost. On the 28th June he seized Leghorn,
and a source of supply to the fleet was lost, an opening for British
trade was closed. The loss of Corsica was seen to be at hand, and on
the 10th July Elba was seized as an alternative storehouse. Jervis’
fleet hampered the French coast trade, and captured a battering-train
on its way to the siege of Mantua. But Spain, whirled about by every
folly under the rule of Godoy, was seen to be coming into the war.
On the 25th August, Jervis received orders from home to evacuate
Corsica. Nelson was appointed to superintend the evacuation on the 26th
September, and when he withdrew from before Leghorn to execute the
order, a French expedition under General Gentili crossed to the island
on the 19th October, on the very day we retired somewhat harassed by
the partisans of France.
While we were withdrawing from Corsica, the movements of the fleets
seemed to be leading to a clash of battle. On the 29th of July, Jervis
wisely desirous to concentrate his forces, had recalled Mann from
before Cadiz. He came, but without stores, and Leghorn being now shut
to us and Corsica unfriendly, he had to be sent down to Gibraltar
to fill up. While he was absent, Richery had sailed on a plundering
expedition to Newfoundland, escorted by Don Juan de Lángara with a
Spanish fleet on the 7th August. Spain did not declare war till the 5th
October, but the declaration was then as always a mere formality. After
seeing Richery on his way, Lángara returned, and on the 29th September
left for Toulon with nineteen sail. On the 1st October he met Mann,
and chased him into Gibraltar. Then he went on towards Toulon, picking
up seven more ships of the line, which raised his force to twenty-six
sail. Mann, moved by reasons which pass all understanding, called a
council of war, which as usual agreed with the commanding officer,
and sailed for England. His withdrawal weakened Jervis vitally. In
after days the admiral said that if Mann had rejoined him, the battle
which was to be fought off Cape St. Vincent on the following 14th
February would have been fought in the Mediterranean. Yet it is to be
observed that Jervis fought at St. Vincent with fifteen ships against
twenty-seven. Now, when Lángara was seen off Cape Corso on the 5th
October with twenty-six sail, Jervis was near at hand in Mortella Bay
with fourteen. He had many responsibilities on him—the troops to be
withdrawn from Corsica, the garrison at Elba, and the French not far
off at Toulon. On the 14th February of next year he was free to make
play with his admirable squadron. Yet it can hardly be doubted that
if he had struck on the 15th October, as he did on the 14th February,
the absence of Mann would not have prevented him from gaining a
victory which would have dashed the Franco-Spanish naval coalition to
pieces. He judged the risk too great, and sailed for Gibraltar on the
2nd November. From Gibraltar he went by order of the Government to
Lisbon. We had left the Mediterranean, which was not to see an English
fleet again till the summer of 1798. Lángara, much troubled by gales,
formidable to his unseamanlike fleet, reached Toulon on the 26th
October. He left it again on the 1st December with a French squadron of
six sail under the command of Villeneuve. Lángara put in to Carthagena,
but the Frenchman went on to Brest. He passed the Straits on the 10th
December. Jervis had not yet left for Lisbon, and the French squadron
was sighted, but could not be pursued. A storm which blew right into
the anchorage at Gibraltar was raging at the time. One of Jervis’ ships
was driven on shore, and two were damaged. The admiral could do no
more than send a frigate home with the news that a French squadron had
escaped from the Mediterranean. Villeneuve went on to Brest. On the
21st December he was seen and chased by the blockading fleet of Admiral
Colpoys, but though forced to turn from Brest, he reached L’Orient
safely on the 23rd. Villeneuve’s was not the only reinforcement
received at this time by the French forces in the Channel and the Bay.
Richery, after doing considerable damage in Newfoundland, had reached
the island of Aix on the 5th of November, and had gone on to Brest
with part of his squadron. A part, detached on the coast of America,
had preceded him. Richery was swept into the most determined, and by
far the most nearly successful, of the efforts made during this war to
invade the British Isles in force.
The very nature of the struggle they had provoked taught the French to
dwell on the hope of delivering the much threatened blow at the heart
which was to bring their enemy to the ground. Schemes of invasion
abounded, and may still be read with interest (or amusement) in Captain
Desbrière’s history of _Les Projets et Tentatives de Débarquement aux
Îles Britanniques_ between 1793 and 1805. Some were only foolish.
Some, without ceasing to be foolish, were ferocious. The most notable
of these were the plans for carrying a _chouannerie_ into the British
Isles. A _chouannerie_ was a warfare of atrocious brigandage. It took
its name from the desperate Royalist partisans who, when no longer
able to oppose the Republican armies in the field in Brittany, betook
themselves to highway robbery, housebreaking, murder and torture of
political opponents, or even only of defenceless people who possessed
property. As they naturally preferred to act by night and by surprise,
they were known as the _Chouans_—the brown owls. In the fury of their
hatred the French planned to let loose hundreds of insubordinate
soldiers and common criminals on the English coast as a measure of
revenge for the evils which, so they argued, the support given by
England to the Royalist partisans had brought upon France. Soldiers
who were in prison for acts of indiscipline were formed into a corps
under the name of the _Légion des Francs_. Another corps, aptly
surnamed the _Légion Noire_, was formed of common criminals. The two
were to be landed on the English coast to burn, murder, and plunder.
The calculation made was that France stood to win in any case. If the
two legions did murder and pillage, loss would be inflicted on England.
If the English shot or hanged every man of them, France would be rid of
hundreds of violent blackguards. The calculation was silly, in spite
of its specious air of cunning. The _Chouans_ in Brittany knew the
country and the language, and had friends. The legions would have been
perfectly helpless in England—and so they proved in February 1797. In
that month a French naval expedition of two frigates, a corvette, and
a lugger, escaped unobserved from Brest, and landed about 1500 of the
_Légion des Francs_ and the _Légion Noire_ at Fishguard, in Pembroke.
Captain Castagnier, who commanded the ships, had hardly sailed out
of sight before these intended _Chouans_ with their leader, Tate, a
rascally American adventurer, surrendered to an inferior force of Welsh
militiamen under Lord Cawdor. They had no intention of losing their
lives in a frantic attempt to do mere mischief. The English Government
then called on the French to exchange a number of its English prisoners
for these cowardly ruffians. When the French refused, they were brought
to their senses by a threat to land the legionaries on the coast of
France without exchange. The mere prospect created a panic, and the
British Government had its way. The end of the Fishguard invasion was
therefore that hundreds of useful Englishmen were exchanged against
men who were a danger and a burden to France, while other hundreds
of honest Frenchmen who were capable of serving their country well
remained in prison for months.
Before the Fishguard Invasion ended in sour pleasantry, a more sane and
manly attack had failed, partly through mismanagement, but to a far
greater extent because of the protection which the superhuman powers
governing this universe have not seldom afforded to England. When the
war in La Vendée had fairly come to its close by June 1796, the general
commanding the Republican army, Lazare Hoche, urged that the large
army of 117,000 men left free by the submission of the Royalists should
be used for an invasion of the British Isles. His Government was ready
to approve, but for a time it distracted its general by double-minded
schemes. The belief that our empire in India was the cause, and not,
as in truth it was, the consequence, of our strength, was general in
France. The French Navy, conscious of its inability to contend with the
concentrated force of the Royal Navy in the four seas of Britain, and
longing for the warm seas and abundant prize money of the East, was
eager for an expedition to India. So the Government at Paris played
with dreams of a great expedition to the East Indies which was to drop
a body of French troops in Ireland on its way, and the naval officers
at Brest obstructed all other plans. The good sense of Hoche saw that
division of aim must be fatal to success, and he at last persuaded
his superiors to consent to attempt a vigorous invasion of Ireland.
An invasion of England in force would have inflicted the worse blow,
but it was rightly judged to be, if not impossible, yet so hazardous
that it was not entertained. What Castagnier was able to do with four
small vessels and a few hundred cut-throats in February 1797, might
conceivably have been done by ten line-of-battle ships and several
thousand good soldiers in 1796. But a Government which was ready to
risk a few small vessels and a flying column of men whom it would
willingly have seen at the bottom of the Channel was not disposed to
run an equal hazard with valuable ships and fine soldiers. An invasion
of Ireland would cause great, perhaps paralysing embarrassment to
England. The country was on the verge of rebellion, France was full of
Irish exiles who promised the co-operation of their countrymen. So an
invasion of Ireland was undertaken.
All through the summer preparations were made. The English Government
was well served by its spies in France. Some of them were among the
Irish exiles. But it could learn nothing definite as to the exact aim
of the invasion which was known to be in preparation. The vacillations
of the French Government served it in one way. No definite information
could be obtained where no definite plan was adopted. Nothing could be
done save stand on guard and watch. The measures of defence taken were
sufficient if they had been more effectually applied. A force kept at
about fifteen sail of the line cruised off Brest. A western squadron
of five, under Curtis, watched beyond the Brest blockade. The grand
fleet, under Bridport, lay at Spithead to support and reinforce. But
Spithead was too difficult to leave against head-winds and too far off
to give an adequate support to the Brest blockade, and the blockade
itself was somewhat slackly kept. Our measures were half measures. We
had partially dropped Howe’s plan of watch from afar, but had not yet
adopted St. Vincent’s close watch on the spot.
On the 15th December 1796 the French expedition drew out from the inner
harbour of Brest to the outer roadstead. Some collisions took place
among the vessels on their way, but they were not more serious than the
similar misfortunes which were to befall Bridport’s ships a few days
later. On the 16th the French fleet was ready to start. It consisted of
seventeen sail of the line, fourteen frigates, two corvettes, one brig,
and three luggers, with transports, and it carried 14,750 soldiers
under the command of Hoche. The French admirals—Morard de Galle,
Bouvet, and Nielly—had hoisted their flags in frigates, which they had
the option to do; but Richery had his flag in the _Pégase_, 74. Morard
de Galle was with Hoche in the _Fraternité_. The wind was from the
east, the weather frosty and clear. The orders were to steer through
the Raz du Sein, the southerly passage through the rocks which on that
side bound the roadstead of Brest. This course was adopted in order
to avoid the English blockading force the better. But on the 16th our
ships under Admiral Colpoys, who had just taken up the command, were
some fifty miles away to the west, too far off to strike quickly, with
the east wind against them—too far off also to be quickly warned by Sir
Edward Pellew, who with his own frigate, the =Indefatigable=, 44, and
others, was close to the French port. When through the Raz the French
were to steer for 120 miles W.¼S.W. and then head for Bantry.
A detailed account of their cruise belongs rather to the history of
the French than of the English Navy, which, for reasons about to be
given, as good as vanished for the next few days. But the fate of the
invasion cannot be left untold. As the day grew on on the 16th, the
wind drew round to the S.E., and became unfavourable to a fleet passing
the narrow Raz du Sein. With an unpardonable want of foresight, Morard
de Galle had not provided for this highly probable contingency. So when
he suddenly decided in the afternoon to take the direct course to the
west through the wide Iroise, and steered in that direction himself, he
was followed only by the _Nestor_, 74, and the _Romaine_ and _Cocarde_
frigates. The rest of the ships either followed Bouvet through the Raz
du Sein or hesitated and made movements which are now uncertain. One,
the _Séduisant_, was wrecked on the Grand Stevenec. Pellew, who watched
the French closely, added to their confusion by false fires and signals
of no meaning. He sent the =Phœbe= frigate to warn Colpoys, and when
assured of the direction the French were taking, went himself in search
of his admiral.
The French, therefore, were divided from the beginning, and so
remained. On the 17th Bouvet had with him the vessels which had
followed him through the Raz du Sein, eight line-of-battle ships and
eight frigates. The wind in drawing round to the S.E. had become
milder, bringing with it a drizzle of rain and fog. He steered for
Bantry, and on the 18th crossed the track of the _Fraternité_ which
was standing to the south to look for him. Thus the French naval and
military commanders-in-chief went roaming out to the Atlantic, looking
for their command, which was steering away from them. On the 19th,
Bouvet was joined by Nielly and Richery with six sail of the line and
two frigates. In variable and gusty winds they pushed on for Bantry.
The wind was from the west when he sighted Mizen Head on the 21st, but
it swung round to the east, and drove him to leeward of Bantry Bay,
and to the point of Dursey Island. Only eight of the line-of-battle
ships and six frigates succeeded in tacking into the bay with Bouvet,
where they anchored between Bear Island and the southern side, instead
of going into Beerhaven, between the island and the northern bank,
where they would have been safe. The others remained beating to and
fro outside. On the 24th the weather was fine, and there were 6000
soldiers in the ships with Bouvet. A landing could easily have been
effected, and as there were few troops in the south of Ireland, the
French might well have occupied Cork, where lay an immense mass of
military and naval stores. But the command in the absence of Hoche was
in the hands of Grouchy, whose name is associated with a still greater
French disaster eighteen years later. He hesitated. No landing was
made, and on the 25th the wind settled in the east, and blew with fury
down the bay. Bouvet was forced to sea in his frigate, lost heart, and
made for Brest, which he reached on the 1st January 1797. Bedout, of
the _Indomptable_, 80, to whom the command now fell, held on till the
29th, when he too cut his cables and fled seaward before the easterly
wind. All hope was not given up even yet, and some of the French
vessels went to the mouth of the Shannon, which had been named as the
alternative landing-place. They found nothing to do, and so turned
home to France. Meanwhile the two commanders-in-chief had been groping
for their commands. The _Fraternité_ had been lost in fog and tossed
in storm. She had sighted the lights of Bouvet, had mistaken them for
those of an enemy; had turned away; had been chased, compelled to throw
guns overboard to lighten herself for flight, and to alter her course
again and again; had returned off Bantry Bay on the 29th, only to find
the _Révolution_, 74, endeavouring to save the crew of the sinking
_Scévola_ frigate, and had finally steered for France. The wrecks of
the French armament reached home between the 11th and 14th January.
_Afflavit Deus et dissipati sunt._
One of the line-of-battle ships carried into Bantry Bay by Bouvet
was destined not to escape. The _Droits de l’homme_, 74, commanded
by Captain Baron La Crosse, had been among the vessels which went
to the mouth of the Shannon. While cruising there, she captured the
=Cumberland= letter of marque—that is to say, trading-ship, which
carried a commission authorising her to act as a privateer. The
=Cumberland= had on board thirty soldiers on their way home from the
West Indies. La Crosse took the English passengers and crew into his
own ship, and sent the =Cumberland= to France with a prize crew. Then
he headed for home, after looking once more into Bantry. He lost sight
of the Irish coast on the 9th, and on the 13th, in strong westerly
winds and thick hazy weather, calculated that he was seventy-five
miles to the west of the Penmarchs. Early in the afternoon two
vessels were seen to windward in the haze, and Captain La Crosse
steered to the S.E. to avoid them. At about 3.30 two other vessels
were seen to leeward cutting off his road to France. They were the
=Indefatigable=, 44, Captain Sir Edward Pellew, and the =Amazon=, 36,
Captain Reynolds. Captain La Crosse had to fight his way home between
them. In conversation with an English army officer, taken prisoner in
the =Cumberland=, Lieutenant Pipon, he had declared that he would sink
rather than surrender. His conduct was to show that these were not
words of idle boasting. The _Droits de l’homme_ was indeed a 74 and
her opponents were frigates, but though one 74 was adjudged more than
a match for two frigates, she was at a disadvantage. She was so built
that her lower deck ports were fourteen French inches—nearly sixteen
English—nearer the water than in other vessels of her class. While
under a press of sail to throw off the pursuit of the ships seen to
windward, she lost her fore and maintop. Having no sufficient spread of
sail aloft to steady her she rolled heavily, and the water poured on
to her main-deck. It ran down the cables on the English prisoners who
had been sent to the cable tier to escape the shot of their friends.
So Captain La Crosse was not able to make use of the 36-pounders on
his main deck but had to rely on the 18-pounders and smaller guns of
his upper decks, firing from a high and most unstable platform. The
_Droits de l’homme_ had in fact the use of a lighter broadside than
the =Indefatigable=, a very heavy frigate, armed with 24-pounders on
her main deck. Her sole advantage was that she carried 700 soldiers in
addition to her crew, and could replace the 250 casualties she suffered
in the action.
It began at 5.30. The _Droits de l’homme_ was steering to the west for
the coast of France. The =Indefatigable= overtook her, and tried to
rake her. The French captain baffled the attempt, and then Pellew shot
ahead, risking and receiving a raking broadside, which did his frigate
little harm, and placing himself on the Frenchman’s bow. At a quarter
to seven the =Amazon= came up and took her station on the other bow.
At 7.30 the two English frigates shot ahead, the =Indefatigable= to
repair damage to her rigging, the =Amazon=, because the press of sail
she carried to gain her station had given her so much way that she
could not stop. Then the action was resumed, to be again suspended to
repair damage at 10.30 and once more resumed. It lasted through the
night. The English crews fought with fine manhood and skill, often
up to their waists in water on the main decks. Guns broke from their
fastenings and had to be made secure again—as often as four times. They
were often filled with water after being loaded, and the charges had to
be withdrawn before they could be reloaded and safely fired. Repairs
had to be done in the rigging, and the =Amazon= used up every inch of
spare rope. The Frenchman fought with a heroism which surmounted the
loss of all hope of victory, or even of escape, manœuvring to board
so long as his ship could answer her helm, and always baffled by the
English frigates, which were under perfect control. At 4.30 the moon
broke through the clouds for a moment, and Lieutenant George Bell,
on the forecastle of the =Indefatigable=, saw the land. None of the
three ships could know where they were. It was only certain that they
were on a lee-shore, the wind blowing strong and the sea running high.
The =Indefatigable= was turned to the north, and was followed by the
=Amazon=. Just before daybreak breakers were seen on the lee-bow. The
=Indefatigable= was brought round to the south, but not the =Amazon=
which was unmanageable, and was driven on shore. As the =Indefatigable=
stood southward in the first light of day, her crew saw they were in
Audierne Bay, and _Droits de l’homme_ lay on her side in front of
Ploxevet with the sea breaking over her. Her mizen-mast, the lower
foremast, and bowsprit had gone. The cable of the only anchor she had
left was cut by English shot, and after a manful effort to reeve a new
one had been made, and the anchor had failed to hold, she drove ashore.
The position of the =Indefatigable= was terrible, for her one chance
of escape was to round the Penmarchs at the south point of Audierne
Bay, and she was damaged. But her crew and officers showed “their full
value,” as their captain gratefully acknowledged. She cleared the rocks
and gained the open sea.
The _Droits de l’homme_ lay without possibility of help, for two
days, in the breakers, and two more passed before the last survivors
were taken from the wreck. The story may be read in the narrative of
Lieutenant Pipon. The English prisoners were called up from the cable
tier with the cry _Pauvres anglais! Pauvres anglais! Montes Bien vite.
Nous sommes tous perdus_. When the boats were lowered some women and
children, who were among the English prisoners, were given the first
chance of escape. But the boats were shattered alongside, and they
all perished. The _Droits de l’homme_ lay breaking up, and the crew
perished slowly, one brave man, the sailmaker, Lamende, nearly lost his
life in an attempt to swim ashore with a line, and an army officer who
followed him was drowned. The English worked manfully in the common
cause, one of them, a merchant skipper, going over the side fourteen
times to save the people in the boats. They could get neither food
nor fresh water. The pangs of hunger can be outlived but not those
of thirst. Many drank urine and salt water and went mad. Of the 380
who remained on the wreck on the fourth night half were dead in the
morning. The French Government released the English prisoners freely,
and gave several of them rewards in money. The shipwrecked crew of the
=Amazon= were well treated. La Crosse survived and was promoted. The
loss of the _Droits de l’homme_ was an incident in a campaign, but
skill and manhood, heroism, humanity, and devotion to duty are noble
and immortal things. We cannot look at them too carefully or too long.
In all these events fortune had a great share, but excepting the
activity of a few frigates, the Royal Navy had little part. When
Admiral Colpoys heard from the captain of the =Phœbe= that the French
were at sea, his fleet was in want of stores, and he knew not where
the enemy was gone. So he bore up for Spithead, and, dropping part
of his ships at the western ports on the way, reached it on the 31st
December with six sail. Bridport, urged to get quickly to sea when the
Government learnt that the French were out, had started on the 25th,
four days after Bouvet reached Bantry. But he met difficulties. The
=Prince= ran into the =Sans-Pareil=, and the =Formidable= into the
=Ville de Paris=. The =Atlas= grounded. Then he was stopped in a gale,
and he did not sail with his fourteen ships of the line till the 3rd
January 1797. He cruised about, from Ushant to Cape Clear, chased
the much chased _Fraternité_ on the 9th, and intercepted nothing. He
was fifty-seven miles west of Ushant when the last of the returning
French ships entered Brest. Before he returned to Spithead on the 3rd
February, he detached Rear-Admiral Sir W. Parker to join Jervis with
the =Prince George=, =Namur=, =Irresistible=, =Orion=, =Colossus=, and
=Thalia= frigate. They were to be usefully employed, for it was this
reinforcement which enabled Jervis to fight the battle of Cape St.
Vincent.
The five line-of-battle ships and the frigate were sent to join Jervis
at his rendezvous at Cape St. Vincent in fulfilment of a promise that
the squadron carried off by Mann should be replaced, and his force
brought up again to twenty sail. They served to bring him up to the
fifteen he had had a few weeks before they joined him on the 6th
February. The =Courageux=, 80, had been lost, and the =Gibraltar=, 80,
driven on the Pearl Rock during the furious gale of the 10th December,
in which Villeneuve escaped from the Mediterranean. Shortly after
Jervis left Gibraltar for Lisbon on the 16th December, the =Zealous=,
74, struck on a rock in Tangier Bay, and was badly damaged. As he
entered Lisbon on the 21st, the =Bombay Castle=, 74, ran ashore and was
lost. When he left it on the 18th January to escort a Portuguese convoy
out of danger and to observe the Spaniards, the =St. George=, 98, after
running into and dismasting a Portuguese frigate, grounded heavily on
the great Cachop. His command had therefore been brought down to ten by
the 6th February. To complete the tale it may be added that the fifteen
were nearly reduced to fourteen or even thirteen while it was still
dark on the morning of the 12th, when the =Culloden=, 74, ran into the
=Colossus=, 74, because the second, after holding her wind too long
while the fleet was tacking in succession, suddenly bore up across the
bows of the first, and tore her fore-rigging badly.[3] The energy of
Captain Troubridge of the =Culloden= brought his ship quickly into
trim, and she took a leading part in the coming battle.
Lángara had been superseded by Don José de Córdoba at Carthagena, and
the Spanish fleet under its new admiral came on in pursuit of a wild
scheme to sail to Brest, join the French ships there, now under the
command of Villeneuve, then join a Dutch force in the Texel and renew
the attempted invasion of England. The scheme was wild on many grounds,
but particularly because of the utter want of quality in the Spanish
fleet. It has already been said, when speaking of the American War,
that the Spanish Government had endeavoured to form a great fleet by
building more ships than it could afford, and had never had money to
spend on training officers and men. Every evil it suffered from in 1779
had been intensified under the imbecile government of King Charles IV.
A mass of fine ships was heaped up, but they were manned with crews
which hardly included a tenth of seamen, and commanded by officers who
had had little practice. Nothing had been done to improve it since the
wars began in 1793. On the contrary, neglect, failure to pay or even
feed the men, made the service odious, and it grew even worse. The best
officer in the Spanish navy, Jose Mazaredo, had refused to take the
command unless the Government bound itself to commission no more ships
than it could man. He had been arrested, to punish him for questioning
the wisdom of his superiors. Every officer in the Spanish fleet knew
its unfitness to meet the English.
Every English officer knew its weaknesses too, and nobody better than
Jervis. He was aware that the narrow failure of the invasion of Ireland
had shaken the nerve of the country. The discontent in the fleet, which
was just about to break into mutiny, was not unknown to him. A victory
was very necessary to England. A weak man would have looked to numbers
alone, and would have been cautious. Jervis looked to the quality of
the enemy, and the greatness of the crisis. He saw how much better it
would be that every one of his fifteen ships should go to the bottom if
only she could take a Spaniard with her, than that Córdoba should reach
Brest. Therefore as Hood sailed from Antigua resolved to fight Grasse,
be his number what they might, so Jervis waited at Cape St. Vincent,
resolute to give battle whatever numbers the Spaniards might bring
against him.
On the morning of the 13th February he was joined by the =Minerva=,
36, which had just sighted the Spaniards, and had been chased by
them. Nelson had been sent up the Mediterranean in her to bring away
Sir Gilbert Elliot from Porto Ferrajo, whither he had retired after
the evacuation of Corsica. He now hoisted his commodore’s pennant
in the =Captain=, 74. At four in the afternoon the signal was made
to clear for action, and during the night the fleet remained under
reduced canvas, keeping its post of watch. The signal guns of the
Spaniards were heard at half-past one on the morning of the 14th, and
at half-past two, a Scotchman, Captain Campbell, in the Portuguese
service, who commanded the _Carlotta_ frigate, spoke the flagship, and
informed Jervis that the Spaniards were fifteen miles to windward—that
is, to the west of him. Daylight came on the 14th with fresh breezes
from the west and a thick haze. At six, reefs were shaken out and
the search for the enemy began. By seven, strange sails were seen in
the haze to the S.S.W. stretching across our route to the S.E. The
reconnoitring frigates and sloops reported their numbers, which were
discovered to be greater as the air cleared. At 8.20 the signal was
made to prepare for battle, and at 9.20 the =Culloden=, =Blenheim=,
and =Prince George= were ordered to chase. When at 9.47 the =Bonne
Citoyenne= sloop reported seeing more vessels to the S.W., the
=Irresistible= and =Colossus= were ordered to join in the chase. The
=Orion= joined without orders and was not recalled. About ten the air
cleared, and the two fleets were fully revealed to one another.
The Spaniards were aware of the approach of Jervis, and two of their
look-out frigates had actually seen part of his ships, but they
underestimated his strength. Their national carelessness, intensified
perhaps by the desperation of men who knew they were devoted to a
hopeless task, was never more conspicuous. Their ships were wandering
in two confused shoals, one of nineteen sail was to windward and
westward of the English, another of six was to leeward and eastward.
The two were trying to join, but there was a wide interval between
them. A twenty-sixth Spaniard was seen outside the windward division,
and a twenty-seventh was coming up from leeward. Jervis at once headed
from the open space between the two divisions. At 10.57 the order was
given to form in a line of battle ahead and astern of the flagship as
most convenient.
As the ships fell in to their places the line was formed thus:—
=Culloden= 74 T. Troubridge.
=Blenheim= 90 T. L. Frederich.
=Prince George= 98 { Rear-Admiral W. Parker.
{ T. Irwin.
=Orion= 74 Sir J. Saumarez.
=Irresistible= 74 G. Martin.
=Colossus= 74 G. Murray.
{ Admiral Sir J. Jervis.
=Victory= 100 { Captain-of-Fleet R. Calder.
{ Flag-Captain G. Grey
=Barfleur= 98 { Vice-Admiral W. Waldegrave.
{ J. R. Dacres.
=Goliath= 74 Sir C. H. Knowles.
=Egmont= 74 J. Sutton.
=Britannia= 100 { Vice-Admiral Thompson.
{ T. Foley.
=Namur= 90 J. Whitshed.
=Captain= 94 { Commodore Nelson.
{ " Miller.
=Diadem= 64 G. H. Towry.
=Excellent= 74 C. Collingwood.
The manifest confusion of the enemy, added to their knowledge of his
want of discipline, gave the British seamen a boundless confidence.
His numbers were naught, and Jervis’s men could dismiss that vain
show in the spirit of Alaric’s scoffing answer to the threats of the
Romans, “The thicker the hay the better the mowing.” There were fine
ships in the Spanish fleet, there was personal courage which might have
been trained to efficiency, there were some officers who could have
handled good instruments if they had had them. There was nothing else.
Therefore as the naval historian, James, puts it with more than his
usual liveliness, our seamen “rattled through the business, more as if
it were a game of harmless sport, than one in which the hazard thrown
was for life or death.”
It was half-past eleven when the =Culloden= opened fire, and by midday
the head of the line had cut into the gap between the disorderly shoals
of Spaniards. If it had stood on it would have passed, and the enemy
would have been free to unite behind it. At 12.8 Jervis signalled the
order to tack, and the =Culloden= came round to fall on the rear of the
Spaniards who were huddled to windward heading to the north to pass
our line as it went south. The =Blenheim= and =Prince George= tacked
in succession to follow the =Culloden=. Tacking in succession was not
only a slow movement, but if it had been carried out the fleet must
have fallen behind the weather division of the Spaniards. To keep them
permanently divided our line should have turned together, or should
have begun to turn in succession from the rear. At about 1 o’clock the
Spaniards had passed down our line to the rear. Their lee division
made a feeble effort at 12.30 to break through the line ahead of the
=Victory=, and join the ships to windward. Their road was barred,
and they were headed off in confusion by her heavy fire. One only
passed down the line to leeward—it was supposed she was the _Oriente_,
74—exchanged broadsides with the closing ship, the =Excellent=, and
joined the main body. As she passed the rear she was fired into by our
frigates which were in their station to rear and to leeward of the
line, and returned their fire without doing them any harm.
So far there was nothing to show that the battle would differ very
materially from many previous encounters of fleets passing in opposite
directions. It would not have differed if literal obedience had been
paid to the signal made by Jervis at 12.51—“To take suitable stations,
and engage as arrive up in succession,” which implied that the ships
were to continue following one another. But just before, or just at,
or just after this moment,[4] Nelson made a movement which altered
the whole character of the battle. He brought the =Captain= round on
her keel, passed astern of the =Diadem=, the vessel next behind him,
and ahead of the =Excellent=. Then he threw himself ahead of the
Spaniards, who were trying to pass the rear of the line, and turned
them off. He turned his ship from being the third from the rear into
being the first of the van, for as he came round he fell on the enemy
ahead of the =Culloden=. The =Captain= was hotly pressed, but was
relieved first by the =Culloden= then by the =Blenheim=, which passed
between her and the enemy, and pushed on. Other vessels turned and came
up to press on the enemy. The rear ships of the line did not follow the
example of the =Captain= till Jervis, who had tacked the =Victory=,
and was standing to the north, ordered them to do so. All then fell
on the retreating Spaniards, of whom four were taken. Meanwhile the
enemy to leeward had worked to windward, formed a line, and came up
to support the main body, falling into position to rear of it. Jervis
called his ships together to cover his prizes, and the battle ceased at
five o’clock. The circumstances of the capture of two of these prizes,
the _San Josef_ and _San Nicolas_, which were boarded and captured by
Nelson, are famous, but the details belong to his biography.
St. Vincent was a famous victory, and, moreover, it was a most timely
one. Therefore the joy it caused in England was thoroughly justified,
and Jervis nobly earned his earldom. It may seem ungracious to make
reservations, and yet some independence of judgment may be exercised
even on Jervis. When we have fully recognised the political courage he
showed in giving battle when he would not have been blamed for caution,
and for the strength of mind which enabled him to scorn vain shows, we
are free to ask whether the actual fighting of the battle on his part,
and the use made of it, justify us in thinking him “a great captain.”
I venture to suggest that they do not. But for the independence of
Nelson the battle might well have ended in a passage on opposite tacks
and an artillery duel. On the day following the battle he was in sight
of twenty-three Spaniards, and he was content to cover his prizes. In
his fleet only the =Captain= had been seriously injured, and the loss
acknowledged was only 300 men. He is reported to have said that if the
enemy came on he would have burnt his prizes—but why not burn them
and attack? He was between the Spaniards and Cadiz, and could have
forced on a battle. Their quality being what it was he could surely
have destroyed them utterly. Much has been said of Rodney’s failure to
follow up his victory on the 12th April 1782. We have heard a great
deal of Howe’s weakness on the 1st of June. Everyone has laughed at
Hotham, who was too much at ease in Zion, and has applauded Nelson’s
impatience with his easy-going ways. Yet Jervis cuddled his prizes as
tenderly as ever did Rodney, Howe, or Hotham. Four was a small part
of twenty-seven. Still Nelson said nothing, and Jervis stands as a
monument of energy. But Nelson was too busy glorying in his triumph,
and claiming to have done more than the fine thing he actually had
done, even at the expense of brother officers—(witness his acrid tone
to Parker, who called his attention to the fact that the =Captain= had
been early and well supported by the =Prince George=)—and Jervis was a
bully. The Spaniards were allowed to reach Cadiz, and Jervis went to
Lagos, where he began a new series of operations.
The battle of St. Vincent had ruined the left wing of the great
combined Spanish-French-Dutch army of invasion. The French, though as
resolute as ever to invade, were not ready so soon after the failure
of Morard de Galle to make another attempt. For the rest of the year,
therefore, the first part fell to the Dutch fleet. Since Holland
had been overrun by the French armies at the close of 1794, and had
established the Batavian Republic in February 1795, the Dutch had had
many reasons to regret the change. Their French friends fleeced them at
home, and England occupied their colonies and swept their trade off the
sea.[5] Although the French had dragged Holland into war with England,
the hostility of the Dutch was strong and spontaneous. They fretted
under the dictation of the French, but they had an active hatred of
England, which, after joining with Prussia to impose the rule of the
Stadtholder on them by force in 1786, had dragged him into war with
France, had failed to give him effective military support, and when the
country was overrun by France had at once—on the 19th January—begun
to embargo Dutch ships and cargoes lest they should fall into French
hands. We acted with reluctance and under the pressure of necessity,
but the Dutch, who lost the goods, attributed our action to greed and
malignity.
Therefore they entered readily enough into schemes for invading
England, but still with caution. They refused to ship French troops
in the fleet they prepared in the Texel, being afraid of their
allies. The French co-operation was dropped for this, and for other
reasons. The French Government of the day was very jealous of its
most famous generals, and at that moment of Hoche in particular. It
would gladly have seen him sail in search of glory on any venture, the
more desperate the better. The general, who perfectly understood the
real meaning of all this tender care for his glory—ended by declaring
that he would not play Don Quixote on the sea for the benefit of men
who would gladly see him at the bottom of it. The combined Dutch
and French army of invasion dwindled into a purely Dutch army, and
finally disappeared altogether. Daendaels, the general who was to
have commanded it, had an hereditary Dutch understanding of maritime
things, and he saw that the preliminary to an invasion of England was
the defeat of the English fleet in the North Sea. But it was not till
October 1797 that the Batavian Republic ordered its naval forces to act.
The command of the English fleet in the North Sea was given to Adam
Duncan, then vice-admiral, who was soon afterwards promoted to admiral.
Duncan had been a follower of Keppel’s, was commonly known as Keppel’s
Duncan, and was by common consent an excellent officer. He had been
long unemployed, and it may be the case that he owed his appointment to
the command in the North Sea, not only to his reputation as an officer
and seaman, but to the fact that he was closely connected by marriage
with Dundas, afterwards Lord Melville, who held the vitally important
post of general manager of corruption, and distributor of patronage in
Pitt’s ministry. When he took up his command he had but four ships of
the line with him. It is true that he had the co-operation of a Russian
squadron, but it was in a most inefficient state, and proved of small
value. In fact it embarrassed our squadron, for it was in incessant
need of stores and repairs, while the necessity to flatter the touchy
vanity of our ally, the Russian Government, compelled us to treat
it with much respect. Duncan had to struggle with even another and a
worse defect, which is very exactly indicated in a letter written to
him in August 1796, by Sir C. Middleton, afterwards Lord Barham, one
of the Commissioners for the navy, who wrote: “My own wish is to have
your force very strong, but I plainly perceive, from the many irons we
have in the fire, that I shall be overruled. The same cause obliges
us to employ your frigates on many extra services, and which I have
charged the secretary to acquaint you with as often as it happens; but
necessary as this information is for your guidance, I am afraid it is
often forgot.”
The best ships were taken for the Brest blockade, the Channel, the
Mediterranean. Duncan’s own flagship, the =Venerable=, 74, leaked
continually, and was only kept in service by endless care. It is
therefore not to be wondered at that in February 1796 two Dutch
squadrons, commanded by Braak and Lucas, succeeded in escaping from the
North Sea to the West Indies and the Cape. During the middle of 1797
Duncan’s troubles were enormously increased by the mutiny at the Nore,
which will be dealt with in the next chapter.
On the 3rd October Duncan, who had been cruising for eighteen weeks,
was compelled to return to Yarmouth for stores with the bulk of
his fleet, leaving Captain Henry Trollope with the =Russell=, 74,
=Adamant=, 50, and several frigates and smaller vessels to watch the
Texel. On the 7th the Dutch came out under the command of Jan Willem de
Winter, who had been trained as a naval officer, had gone into exile in
1786, had served in the French Republican armies, and was a general in
the army as well as vice-admiral in the fleet. His fleet consisted of
the
{ Vice-Admiral de
_Vryheid_ 94 { Winter.
{ Capt. van Rossern.
_Jupiter_ 94 { Vice-Admiral Reuntjes.
{ Rear-Admiral Menses.
_Brutus_ 74 { Rear-Admiral Bloys.
{ Capt. van Treslong.
_States General_ 74 Rear-Admiral Storij.
_Cerberus_ 64 Capt. Jacobson.
_Devries_ 64 Capt. Zegers.
_Gelykeid_ 64 " Ruysen.
_Haarlem_ 64 " Wiggerts.
_Hercules_ 64 " Van Rysvort.
_Leyden_ 64 " Musquetier.
_Wassenaer_ 64 " Holland.
_Alkmaar_ 50 " Kraft.
_Batavier_ 50 " Souters.
_Beschermer_ 50 " Hinext.
_Delft_ 50 " Verdoorn
with twelve frigates and other small vessels.
The Dutch were sighted at once by our look-out vessels, and news was
sent to Duncan, who left Yarmouth in pursuit. As De Winter was known to
be heading to the south, and the wind was northerly, ranging from N.E.
to N.W. and W. by N., Duncan stood over the North Sea from Yarmouth to
the Texel, to put himself between De Winter and his port, and to gain
the weather-gage, which gave him the means of forcing on a battle.
The Dutch, well observed by our look-out vessels to whose crews they
appeared to be somewhat awkwardly handled, stood over to Lowestoft, and
then returned to their own coast. They were seen at about half-past
eight on the morning of the 11th October by our fleet, which was coming
down from the north with the wind at W. by N.
The ships with Duncan were—
=Venerable= 74 { Admiral Duncan.
{ Capt. W. G. Fairfax.
=Monarch= 74 { Vice-Admiral R. Onslow.
{ Capt. E. O’Brien.
=Russel= 74 " H. Trollope.
=Montagu= 74 " J. Knight.
=Bedford= 74 Sir T. Byard.
=Powerful= 74 Capt. W. O’Brien Drury.
=Triumph= 74 Capt. W. Essington.
=Belliqueux= 64 " J. Inglis.
=Agincourt= 64 " J. Williamson.
=Lancaster= 64 " J. Wells.
=Ardent= 64 " Burgess.
=Veteran= 64 " G. Gregory.
=Director= 64 " W. Bligh.
=Monmouth= 64 " J. Walker.
=Isis= 50 " W. Mitchell.
=Adamant= 50 " W. Hotham.
with eight frigates and small vessels.
Elaborate comparisons have been made to show that one fleet was
stronger than the other, but they are idle in view of the simple fact
that some of the English did not come into action, and some of the
Dutch got out of it sooner than was becoming. Physical obstructions and
fortune played a part—and every man who wears a blue coat is not a hero.
As Duncan came down in pursuit his ships were scattered, the best
sailors in front, the worst behind. It would have been possible to
unite them all, only by causing the more advanced ships to lie to till
the laggards came up. At eleven the advanced ships did shorten sail to
unite the fleet. But the Dutch, who were in a line heading from S.W.
to N.E., with their heads towards the Texel, were gradually drawing
towards their own coast. Camperdown, in North Holland, was about nine
miles from them. Delay on Duncan’s part would have given them a chance
to slip off to the Texel. Therefore his plan for fighting the battle
was not, and could not, be carried out. His intention was to form his
fleet on the starboard line of bearing, which, with the wind at W. by
N., would be a line from S.W. to N.E. parallel to the Dutch. Then he
meant to act as Howe had meant to do on the 1st June, break through the
enemy from windward to leeward, all along from van to rear. As the day
wore on towards the early dark of October and the Dutch drew nearer
the land, the impatience of Duncan, which was patent to his officers,
grew beyond control. He renounced all attempt to form a line, ordered
Onslow, who was to the south and leeward of him, to break through the
enemy’s rear, and the whole fleet to break through. Then first Onslow,
and next the admiral went down on the enemy, setting an example to the
ships about them. Duncan, an old friend and correspondent of Clerk, was
penetrated with his confidence that the proper policy for an English
fleet was to break into the enemy’s formation and produce a mêlée.
Moreover, we have his actions to prove how well he understood that
whatever the fate of the English ships was to be, the country would be
served if the Dutch were left in no condition to invade for the next
six months.
The battle began at 12.40, and at 3 it ended. The two hours and a half
while it lasted were the hottest hours of battle in the whole war. The
Dutch were awkward in fleet manœuvres from want of practice, but they
were more phlegmatic, more solid, better gunners, and better ropemen
than the French. They reserved their fire till our ships were close,
and their two first broadsides, as English officers experienced them
confessed, “were terrible.” Onslow, who cut through the line astern
of the Dutch between the _Jupiter_ and the _Haarlem_, and Duncan, who
cut the line behind the _States General_, were both heavily pounded,
and so were the vessels which followed them. If there was final
concentration of English ships on the Dutch centre and rear, there
had been a preliminary concentration of Dutch ships on the English
leaders. Three vessels lost more than a hundred men each. The =Ardent=,
64, which belonged to Duncan’s division and was closely engaged with
the _Vryheid_, lost no less than 148 killed and wounded—more than a
third of her crew. Her captain, Burgess, and her master, Don, were
both slain. The total loss was officially stated to be 825, but the
committee appointed to distribute a public subscription for the wounded
and the families of the dead put it at 1040. The eleven Dutch ships
taken were so shattered as to be of no further use. Admiral De Winter
was taken prisoner. The ships in the Dutch van escaped too soon, after
doing too little to help the others. On our side all did not come
equally well into action. Captain John Williamson, of the =Agincourt=,
had hung about the outskirts of the fight in a very feeble way. In
1779 he had been a lieutenant with Captain Cook, and had witnessed the
murder of his commander from a launch, not only without attempting to
save him, but without attempting to rescue his body. He was brought to
a court martial and, though acquitted of cowardice, was sentenced to be
put at the bottom of the list of post-captains for misconduct.
Nelson once complained that actions fought near home were more thought
of than those fought far off. Camperdown is an exception to the rule—if
rule there be. It was early half forgotten, and is much neglected among
our battles. Yet it was a great deliverance from fear of invasion at
the time, and the quality of the enemy we conquered must place it far
above St. Vincent as a battle. At Trafalgar a far better appointed
fleet than Duncan’s fought a much less formidable enemy, on the same
method as he fought the Dutch. Much pedantry has been expended in
inquiring whether both admirals did or did not alter their first
plans—as if it could ever be a reproach to a leader of men that he
adapted his actions to the circumstances. That Duncan did not waste
time in forming the starboard line of bearing, and thereby give the
Dutch an opportunity to slip away, is manifestly true—and to a plain
man it appears that he did alter his plan. Nelson at Trafalgar may have
done what he had meant to do all along, but he had Duncan’s battle to
show the advantage of doing it. Yet Duncan is commonly spoken of to-day
as a brave old fellow who blundered on a victory, and nobody has noted
how little originality was required in 1805 to do what had been already
done in 1797. I know of no reason why Duncan is not to be credited with
sense enough to foresee, and intend, the consequences of his acts.