"Old England's sons are English yet,
Old England's hearts are strong;
And still she wears her coronet
Aflame with sword and song.
As in their pride our fathers died,
If need be, so die we;
So wield we still, gainsay who will,
The sceptre of the sea.
We've Raleighs still for Raleigh's part,
We've Nelsons yet unknown;
The pulses of the Lion-Heart
Beat on through Wellington.
Hold, Britain, hold thy creed of old,
Strong foe and steadfast friend,
And still unto thy motto true,
'Defy not, but defend.'
Men whisper that our arm is weak,
Men say our blood is cold,
And that our hearts no longer speak
That clarion note of old;
But let the spear and sword draw near
The sleeping lion's den,
Our island shore shall start once more
To life, with armèd men."
--HERMAN CHARLES MERIVALE.
On the night of February 13, 1797, an English fleet of fifteen ships of
the line, in close order and in readiness for instant battle, was under
easy sail off Cape St. Vincent. It was a moonless night, black with
haze, and the great ships moved in silence like gigantic spectres over
the sea. Every now and again there came floating from the south-east
the dull sound of a far-off gun. It was the grand fleet of Spain,
consisting of twenty-seven ships of line, under Admiral Don Josef de
Cordova; one great ship calling to another through the night, little
dreaming that the sound of their guns was so keenly noted by the eager
but silent fleet of their enemies to leeward. The morning of the
14th--a day famous in the naval history of the empire--broke dim and
hazy; grey sea, grey fog, grey dawn, making all things strangely
obscure. At half-past six, however, the keen-sighted British outlooks
caught a glimpse of the huge straggling line of Spaniards, stretching
apparently through miles of sea haze. "They are thumpers!" as the
signal lieutenant of the _Barfleur_ reported with emphasis to his
captain; "they loom like Beachy Head in a fog!" The Spanish fleet was,
indeed, the mightiest ever sent from Spanish ports since "that great
fleet invincible" of 1588 carried into the English waters--but not out
of them!--
"The richest spoils of Mexico, the stoutest hearts of Spain."
The Admiral's flag was borne by the _Santissima Trinidad_, a floating
mountain, the largest ship at that time on the sea, and carrying on her
four decks 130 guns. Next came six three-deckers carrying 112 guns
each, two ships of the line of 80 guns each, and seventeen carrying 74
guns, with no less than twelve 34-gun frigates to act as a flying
cordon of skirmishers. Spain had joined France against England on
September 12, 1796, and Don Cordova, at the head of this immense fleet,
had sailed from Cadiz to execute a daring and splendid strategy. He
was to pick up the Toulon fleet, brush away the English squadron
blockading Brest, add the great French fleet lying imprisoned there to
his forces, and enter the British Channel with above a hundred sail of
the line under his flag, and sweep in triumph to the mouth of the
Thames! If the plan succeeded, Portugal would fall, a descent was to
be made on Ireland; the British flag, it was reckoned, would be swept
from the seas.
Sir John Jervis was lying in the track of the Spaniards to defeat this
ingenious plan. Five ships of the line had been withdrawn from the
squadron blockading Brest to strengthen him; still he had only fifteen
ships against the twenty-seven huge Spaniards in front of him; whilst,
if the French Toulon fleet behind him broke out, he ran the risk of
being crushed, so to speak, betwixt the upper and the nether millstone.
Never, perhaps, was the naval supremacy of England challenged so boldly
and with such a prospect of success as at this moment. The northern
powers had coalesced under Russia, and only a few weeks later the
English guns were thundering over the roofs of Copenhagen, while the
united flags of France and Spain were preparing to sweep through the
narrow seas. The "splendid isolation" of to-day is no novelty. In
1796, as it threatened to be in 1896, Great Britain stood singly
against a world in arms, and it is scarcely too much to say that her
fate hung on the fortunes of the fleet that, in the grey dawn of St.
Valentine's Day, a hundred years ago, was searching the skyline for the
topmasts of Don Cordova's huge three-deckers.
Fifteen to twenty-seven is enormous odds, but, on the testimony of
Nelson himself, a better fleet never carried the fortunes of a great
country than that under Sir John Jervis. The mere names of the ships
or of their commanders awaken more sonorous echoes than the famous
catalogue of the ships in the "Iliad." Trowbridge, in the _Culloden_,
led the van; the line was formed of such ships as the _Victory_, the
flagship, the _Barfleur_, the _Blenheim_, the _Captain_, with Nelson as
commodore, the _Excellent_, under Collingwood, the _Colossus_, under
Murray, the _Orion_, under Sir James Saumarez, &c. Finer sailors and
more daring leaders never bore down upon an enemy's fleet. The picture
offered by the two fleets in the cold haze of that fateful morning, as
a matter of fact, reflected the difference in their fighting and
sea-going qualities. The Spanish fleet, a line of monsters, straggled,
formless and shapeless, over miles of sea space, distracted with
signals, fluttering with many-coloured flags. The English fleet, grim
and silent, bore down upon the enemy in two compact and firm-drawn
columns, ship following ship so closely and so exactly that bowsprit
and stern almost touched, while an air-line drawn from the foremast of
the leading ship to the mizzenmast of the last ship in each column
would have touched almost every mast betwixt. Stately, measured,
threatening, in perfect fighting order, the compact line of the British
bore down on the Spaniards.
[Illustration: THE BATTLE OFF CAPE ST. VINCENT. Cutting the Spanish
Line. From Allen's "Battles of the British Navy."]
Nothing is more striking in the battle of St. Vincent than the swift
and resolute fashion in which Sir John Jervis leaped, so to speak, at
his enemy's throat, with the silent but deadly leap of a bulldog. As
the fog lifted, about nine o'clock, with the suddenness and dramatic
effect of the lifting of a curtain in a great theatre, it revealed to
the British admiral a great opportunity. The weather division of the
Spanish fleet, twenty-one gigantic ships, resembled nothing so much as
a confused and swaying forest of masts; the leeward division--six ships
in a cluster, almost as confused--was parted by an interval of nearly
three miles from the main body of the fleet, and into that fatal gap,
as with the swift and deadly thrust of a rapier, Jervis drove his fleet
in one unswerving line, the two columns melting into one, ship
following hard on ship. The Spaniards strove furiously to close their
line, the twenty-one huge ships bearing down from the windward, the
smaller squadron clawing desperately up from the leeward. But the
British fleet--a long line of gliding pyramids of sails, leaning over
to the pressure of the wind, with "the meteor flag" flying from the
peak of each vessel, and the curving lines of guns awaiting grim and
silent beneath--was too swift. As it swept through the gap, the
Spanish vice-admiral, in the _Principe de Asturias_, a great
three-decker of 112 guns, tried the daring feat of breaking through the
British line to join the severed squadron. He struck the English fleet
almost exactly at the flagship, the _Victory_. The _Victory_ was
thrown into stays to meet her, the Spaniard swung round in response,
and, exactly as her quarter was exposed to the broadside of the
_Victory_, the thunder of a tremendous broadside rolled from that ship.
The unfortunate Spaniard was smitten as with a tempest of iron, and the
next moment, with sails torn, topmasts hanging to leeward, ropes
hanging loose in every direction, and her decks splashed red with the
blood of her slaughtered crew, she broke off to windward. The iron
line of the British was unpierceable! The leading three-decker of the
Spanish lee division in like manner bore up, as though to break through
the British line to join her admiral; but the grim succession of
three-deckers, following swift on each other like the links of a moving
iron chain, was too disquieting a prospect to be faced. It was not in
Spanish seamanship, or, for the matter of that, in Spanish flesh and
blood, to beat up in the teeth of such threatening lines of iron lips.
The Spanish ships swung sullenly back to leeward, and the fleet of Don
Cordova was cloven in twain, as though by the stroke of some gigantic
sword-blade.
As soon as Sir John Jervis saw the steady line of his fleet drawn fair
across the gap in the Spanish line, he flung his leading ships up to
windward on the mass of the Spanish fleet, by this time beating up to
windward. The _Culloden_ led, thrust itself betwixt the hindmost
Spanish three-deckers, and broke into flame and thunder on either side.
Six minutes after her came the _Blenheim_; then, in quick succession,
the _Prince George_, the _Orion_, the _Colossus_. It was a crash of
swaying masts and bellying sails, while below rose the shouting of the
crews, and, like the thrusts of fiery swords, the flames shot out from
the sides of the great three-deckers against each other, and over all
rolled the thunder and the smoke of a Titanic sea-fight. Nothing more
murderous than close fighting betwixt the huge wooden ships of those
days can well be imagined. The _Victory_, the largest British ship
present in the action, was only 186 feet long and 52 feet broad; yet in
that little area 1000 men fought, 100 great guns thundered. A Spanish
ship like the _San Josef_ was 194 feet in length and 54 feet in
breadth; but in that area 112 guns were mounted, while the three decks
were thronged with some 1300 men. When floating batteries like these
swept each other with the flame of swiftly repeated broadsides at a
distance of a few score yards, the destruction may be better imagined
than described. The Spanish had an advantage in the number of guns and
men, but the British established an instant mastery by their silent
discipline, their perfect seamanship, and the speed with which their
guns were worked. They fired at least three broadsides to every two
the Spaniards discharged, and their fire had a deadly precision
compared with which that of the Spaniards was mere distracted
spluttering.
Meanwhile the dramatic crisis of the battle came swiftly on. The
Spanish admiral was resolute to join the severed fragments of his
fleet. The _Culloden_, the _Blenheim_, the _Prince George_, and the
_Orion_ were thundering amongst his rearmost ships, and as the British
line swept up, each ship tacked as it crossed the gap in the Spanish
line, bore up to windward and added the thunder of its guns to the
storm of battle raging amongst the hindmost Spaniards. But naturally
the section of the British line that had not yet passed the gap
shortened with every minute, and the leading Spanish ships at last saw
the sea to their leeward clear of the enemy, and the track open to
their own lee squadron. Instantly they swung round to leeward, the
great four-decker, the flagship, with a company of sister giants, the
_San Josef_ and the _Salvador del Mundo_, of 112 guns each, the _San
Nicolas_, and three other great ships of 80 guns. It was a bold and
clever stroke. This great squadron, with the breeze behind it, had but
to sweep past the rear of the British line, join the lee squadron, and
bear up, and the Spanish fleet in one unbroken mass would confront the
enemy. The rear of the British line was held by Collingwood in the
_Excellent_; next to him came the _Diadem_; the third ship was the
_Captain_, under Nelson. We may imagine how Nelson's solitary eye was
fixed on the great Spanish three-deckers that formed the Spanish van as
they suddenly swung round and came sweeping down to cross his stern.
Not Napoleon himself had a vision more swift and keen for the changing
physiognomy of a great battle than Nelson, and he met the Spanish
admiral with a counter-stroke as brilliant and daring as can be found
in the whole history of naval warfare. The British fleet saw the
_Captain_ suddenly swing out of line to leeward--in the direction from
the Spanish line, that is--but with swift curve the _Captain_ doubled
back, shot between the two English ships that formed the rear of the
line, and bore up straight in the path of the Spanish flagship, with
its four decks, and the huge battleships on either side of it.
The _Captain_, it should be remembered, was the smallest 74 in the
British fleet, and as the great Spanish ships closed round her and
broke into flame it seemed as if each one of them was big enough to
hoist the _Captain_ on board like a jolly-boat. Nelson's act was like
that of a single stockman who undertakes to "head off" a drove of angry
bulls as they break away from the herd; but the "bulls" in this case
were a group of the mightiest battleships then afloat. Nelson's sudden
movement was a breach of orders; it left a gap in the British line; to
dash unsupported into the Spanish van seemed mere madness, and the
spectacle, as the Captain opened fire on the huge _Santissima
Trinidad_, was simply amazing. Nelson was in action at once with the
flagship of 130 guns, two ships of 112 guns, one of 80 guns, and two of
74 guns! To the spectators who watched the sight the sides of the
_Captain_ seemed to throb with quick-following pulses of flame as its
crew poured their shot into the huge hulks on every side of them. The
Spaniards formed a mass so tangled that they could scarcely fire at the
little _Captain_ without injuring each other; yet the English ship
seemed to shrivel beneath even the imperfect fire that did reach her.
Her foremast was shot away, her wheel-post shattered, her rigging torn,
some of her guns dismantled, and the ship was practically incapable of
further service either in the line or in chase. But Nelson had
accomplished his purpose: he had stopped the rush of the Spanish van.
At this moment the _Excellent_, under Collingwood, swept into the storm
of battle that raged round the _Captain_, and poured three tremendous
broadsides into the Spanish three-decker the _Salvador del Mundo_ that
practically disabled her. "We were not further from her," the domestic
but hard-fighting Collingwood wrote to his wife, "than the length of
our garden." Then, with a fine feat of seamanship, the _Excellent_
passed between the _Captain_ and the _San Nicolas_, scourging that
unfortunate ship with flame at a distance of ten yards, and then passed
on to bestow its favours on the _Santissima Trinidad_--"such a ship,"
Collingwood afterwards confided to his wife, "as I never saw before!"
Collingwood tormented that monster with his fire so vehemently that she
actually struck, though possession of her was not taken before the
other Spanish ships, coming up, rescued her, and she survived to carry
the Spanish flag in the great fight of Trafalgar.
Meanwhile the crippled _Captain_, though actually disabled, had
performed one of the most dramatic and brilliant feats in the history
of naval warfare. Nelson put his helm to starboard, and ran, or rather
drifted, on the quarter-gallery of the _San Nicolas_, and at once
boarded that leviathan. Nelson himself crept through the
quarter-gallery window in the stern of the Spaniard, and found himself
in the officers' cabins. The officers tried to show fight, but there
was no denying the boarders who followed Nelson, and with shout and
oath, with flash of pistol and ring of steel, the party swept through
on to the main deck. But the _San Nicolas_ had been boarded also at
other points. "The first man who jumped into the enemy's
mizzen-chains," says Nelson, "was the first lieutenant of the ship,
afterwards Captain Berry." The English sailors dropped from their
spritsail yard on to the Spaniard's deck, and by the time Nelson
reached the poop of the _San Nicolas_ he found his lieutenant in the
act of hauling down the Spanish flag. Nelson proceeded to collect the
swords of the Spanish officers, when a fire was opened upon them from
the stern gallery of the admiral's ship, the _San Josef_, of 112 guns,
whose sides were grinding against those of the _San Nicolas_. What
could Nelson do? To keep his prize he must assault a still bigger
ship. Of course he never hesitated! He flung his boarders up the side
of the huge _San Josef_, but he himself had to be assisted to climb the
main chains of that vessel, his lieutenant this time dutifully
assisting his commodore up instead of indecorously going ahead of him.
"At this moment," as Nelson records the incident, "a Spanish officer
looked over the quarterdeck rail and said they surrendered. It was not
long before I was on the quarter-deck, where the Spanish captain, with
a bow, presented me his sword, and said the admiral was dying of his
wounds. I asked him, on his honour, if the ship was surrendered. He
declared she was; on which I gave him my hand, and desired him to call
on his officers and ship's company and tell them of it, which he did;
and on the quarterdeck of a Spanish first-rate--extravagant as the
story may seem--did I receive the swords of vanquished Spaniards,
which, as I received, I gave to William Fearney, one of my bargemen,
who put them with the greatest _sang-froid_ under his arm," a circle of
"old Agamemnons," with smoke-blackened faces, looking on in grim
approval.
This is the story of how a British fleet of fifteen vessels defeated a
Spanish fleet of twenty-seven, and captured four of their finest ships.
It is the story, too, of how a single English ship, the smallest 74 in
the fleet--but made unconquerable by the presence of Nelson--stayed the
advance of a whole squadron of Spanish three-deckers, and took two
ships, each bigger than itself, by boarding. Was there ever a finer
deed wrought under "the meteor flag"! Nelson disobeyed orders by
leaving the English line and flinging himself on the van of the
Spaniards, but he saved the battle. Calder, Jervis's captain,
complained to the admiral that Nelson had "disobeyed orders." "He
certainly did," answered Jervis; "and if ever you commit such a breach
of your orders I will forgive you also."