"Britannia needs no bulwarks,
No towers along the steep;
Her march is o'er the mountain waves,
Her home is on the deep.
With thunders from her native oak,
She quells the floods below,
As they roar on the shore
When the stormy winds do blow;
When the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow.
The meteor flag of England
Shall yet terrific burn,
Till danger's troubled night depart,
And the star of peace return.
Then, then, ye ocean warriors,
Our song and feast shall flow
To the fame of your name,
When the storm has ceased to blow;
When the fiery fight is heard no more,
And the storm has ceased to blow."
--CAMPBELL.
Aboukir Bay resembles nothing so much as a piece bitten out of the
Egyptian pancake. A crescent-shaped bay, patchy with shoals,
stretching from the Rosetta mouth of the Nile to Aboukir, or, as it is
now called, Nelson Island, that island being simply the outer point of
a sandbank that projects from the western horn of the bay. Flat
shores, grey-blue Mediterranean waters, two horns of land six miles
apart, that to the north projecting farthest and forming a low
island--this, ninety-eight years ago, was the scene of what might
almost be described as the greatest sea-fight in history.
On the evening of August 1, 1798, thirteen great battleships lay drawn
up in a single line parallel with the shore, and as close to it as the
sandbanks permitted. The head ship was almost stern on to the shoal
which, running out at right angles to the shore, forms Aboukir Island.
The nose of each succeeding ship was exactly 160 yards from the stern
of the ship before it, and, allowing for one or two gaps, each ship was
bound by a great cable to its neighbour. It was a thread of beads,
only each "bead" was a battleship, whose decks swarmed with brave men,
and from whose sides gaped the iron lips of more than a thousand heavy
guns. The line was not exactly straight; it formed a very obtuse
angle, the projecting point at the centre being formed by the _Orient_,
the biggest warship at that moment afloat, a giant of 120 guns.
Next to her came the _Franklin_, of 80 guns, a vessel which, if not the
biggest, was perhaps the finest sample of naval architecture in
existence. The line of ships was more than one mile and a half long,
and consisted of the gigantic flagship, three ships of the line of 80
guns, and nine of 74 guns. In addition, it had a fringe of gunboats
and frigates, while a battery of mortars on the island guarded, as with
a sword of fire, the gap betwixt the headmost ship and the island.
This great fleet had convoyed Napoleon, with 36,000 troops crowded into
400 transports, from France, had captured Malta on the voyage, and
three weeks before had safely landed Napoleon and his soldiers in
Egypt. The French admiral, Bruéys, knew that Nelson was coming
furiously in his track, and after a consultation with all his captains
he had drawn up his ships in the order which we have described, a
position he believed to be unassailable. And at three o'clock on the
afternoon of August 1, 1798, his look-outs were eagerly watching the
white topsails showing above the lee line, the van of Nelson's fleet.
Napoleon had kept the secret of his Egyptian expedition well, and the
great Toulon fleet, with its swarm of transports, had vanished round
the coast of Corsica and gone off into mere space, as far as a
bewildered British Admiralty knew. A fleet of thirteen 74-gun ships
and one of 50 guns was placed under Nelson's flag. He was ordered to
pursue and destroy the vanished French fleet, and with characteristic
energy he set out on one of the most dramatic sea-chases known to
history. With the instinct of genius he guessed that Napoleon's
destination was Egypt; but while the French fleet coasted Sardinia and
went to the west of Sicily, Nelson ran down the Italian coast to
Naples, called there for information, found none, and, carrying all
sail, swept through the straits of Messina.
On the night of June 22 the two fleets actually crossed each other's
tracks. The French fleet, including the transports, numbered 572
vessels, and their lights, it might be imagined, would have lit up many
leagues of sea. Yet, through this forest of hostile masts the English
fleet, with keen eyes watching at every masthead, swept and saw
nothing. Nelson, for one thing, had no frigates to serve as eyes and
ears for him; his fleet in sailor-like fashion formed a compact body,
three parallel lines of phantom-like pyramids of canvas sweeping in the
darkness across the floor of the sea. Above all a haze filled the
night; and it is not too much to say that the drifting grey vapour
which hid the French ships from Nelson's lookout men changed the face
of history.
Nelson used to explain that his ideal of perfect enjoyment would be to
have the chance of "trying Bonaparte on a wind"; and if he had caught
sound of bell or gleam of lantern from the great French fleet, and
brought it to action in the darkness of that foggy night, can any one
doubt what the result would have been? Nelson would have done off the
coast of Sicily on June 22, 1798, what Wellington did on June 18, 1815;
and in that case there would have been no Marengo or Austerlitz, no
retreat from Moscow, no Peninsular war, and no Waterloo. For so much,
in distracted human affairs, may a patch of drifting vapour count!
Nelson, in a word, overran his prey. He reached Alexandria to find the
coast empty; doubled back to Sicily, zigzagging on his way by Cyprus
and Candia; and twelve hours after he had left Alexandria the topsails
of the French fleet hove in sight from that port. Napoleon's troops
were safely landed, and the French admiral had some four weeks in which
to prepare for Nelson's return, and at 3 P.M. on August 1 the gliding
topsails of the _Swiftsure_ above Aboukir Island showed that the
tireless Englishman had, after nearly three months of pursuit,
overtaken his enemy.
The French, if frigates be included, counted seventeen ships to
fourteen, and ship for ship they had the advantage over the British
alike in crew, tonnage, and weight of fire. In size the English ships
scarcely averaged 1500 tons; the French ships exceeded 2000 tons.
Nelson had only seventy-fours, his heaviest gun being a 32-pounder.
The average French 80-gun ship in every detail of fighting strength
exceeded an English ninety-eight, and Bruéys had three such ships in
his fleet; while his own flagship, the _Orient_, was fully equal to two
English seventy-fours. Its weight of ball on the lower deck alone
exceeded that from the whole broadside of the _Bellerophon_, the ship
that engaged it. The French, in brief, had an advantage in guns of
about twenty per cent., and in men of over thirty per cent. Bruéys,
moreover, was lying in a carefully chosen position in a dangerous bay,
of which his enemies possessed no chart, and the head of his line was
protected by a powerful shore battery.
Nothing in this great fight is more dramatic than the swiftness and
vehemence of Nelson's attack. He simply leaped upon his enemy at
sight. Four of his ships were miles off in the offing, but Nelson did
not wait for them. In the long pursuit he had assembled his captains
repeatedly in his cabin, and discussed every possible manner of
attacking the French fleet. If he found the fleet as he guessed, drawn
up in battle-line close in-shore and anchored, his plan was to place
one of his ships on the bows, another on the quarter, of each French
ship in succession.
It has been debated who actually evolved the idea of rounding the head
of the French line and attacking on both faces. One version is that
Foley, in the _Goliath_, who led the British line, owed the suggestion
to a keen-eyed middy who pointed out that the anchor buoy of the
headmost French ship was at such a distance from the ship itself as to
prove there was room to pass. But the weight of evidence seems to
prove that Nelson himself, as he rounded Aboukir Island, and scanned
with fierce and questioning vision Bruéys' formation, with that
swiftness of glance in which he almost rivalled Napoleon, saw his
chance in the gap between the leading French ship and the shore.
"Where a French ship can swing," he held, "an English ship can either
sail or anchor." And he determined to double on the French line and
attack on both faces at once. He explained his plan to Berry, his
captain, who in his delight exclaimed, "If we succeed, what will the
world say?" "There is no 'if' in the case," said Nelson; "that we
shall succeed is certain; who will live to tell the story is a very
different question."
[Illustration: THE BATTLE OF THE NILE. Doubling on the French Line.
From Allen's "Battles of the British Navy."]
Bruéys had calculated that the English fleet must come down
perpendicularly to his centre, and each ship in the process be raked by
a line of fire a mile and a half long; but the moment the English ships
rounded the island they tacked, hugged the shore, and swept through the
gap between the leading vessel and the land. The British ships were so
close to each other that Nelson, speaking from his own quarter-deck,
was able to ask Hood in the _Zealous_, if he thought they had water
enough to round the French line. Hood replied that he had no chart,
but would lead and take soundings as he went.
So the British line came on, the men on the yards taking in canvas, the
leadsmen in the chains coolly calling the soundings. The battery
roared from the island, the leading French ships broke into smoke and
flame, but the steady British line glided on. The _Goliath_ by this
time led; and at half-past five the shadow of its tall masts cast by
the westering sun fell over the decks of the _Guerrier_, and as Foley,
its captain, swept past the Frenchman's bows, he poured in a furious
broadside, bore swiftly up, and dropped--as Nelson, with that minute
attention to detail which marks a great commander, had ordered all his
captains--an anchor from the stern, so that, without having to "swing,"
he was instantly in a fighting position on his enemy's quarter. Foley,
however, dropped his anchor a moment too late, and drifted on to the
second ship in the line; but Hood, in the _Zealous_, coming swiftly
after, also raked the _Guerrier_, and, anchoring from the stern at the
exact moment, took the place on its quarter Foley should have taken.
The _Orion_ came into battle next, blasted the unfortunate _Guerrier_,
whose foremast had already gone, with a third broadside, and swept
outside the _Zealous_ and _Goliath_ down to the third ship on the
French line. A French frigate, the _Sérieuse_, of thirty-six guns,
anchored inside the French line, ventured to fire on the _Orion_ as it
swept past, whereupon Saumarez, its commander, discharged his starboard
broadside into that frigate. The _Sérieuse_ reeled under the shock of
the British guns, its masts disappeared like chips, and the unfortunate
Frenchman went down like a stone; while Saumarez, laying himself on the
larboard bow of the _Franklin_ and the quarter of the _Peuple Sovrain_,
broke upon them in thunder. The _Theseus_ followed hard in the track
of the _Orion_, raked the unhappy _Guerrier_ in the familiar fashion
while crossing its bows, then swept through the narrow water-lane
betwixt the _Goliath_ and _Zealous_ and their French antagonists,
poured a smashing broadside into each French ship as it passed, then
shot outside the _Orion_, and anchored with mathematical nicety off the
quarter of the _Spartiate_. The water-lane was not a pistol-shot wide,
and this feat of seamanship was marvellous.
Miller, who commanded the _Theseus_, in a letter to his wife described
the fight. "In running along the enemy's line in the wake of the
_Zealous_ and _Goliath_, I observed," he says, "their shot sweep just
over us, and knowing well that at such a moment Frenchmen would not
have coolness enough to change their elevation, I closed them suddenly,
and, running under the arch of their shot, reserved my fire, every gun
being loaded with two, and some with three round shot, until I had the
_Guerrier's_ masts in a line, and her jib-boom about six feet clear of
our rigging. We then opened with such effect that a second breath
could not be drawn before her main and mizzen-mast were also gone.
This was precisely at sunset, or forty-four minutes past six."
The _Audacious_, meanwhile, was too impatient to tack round the head of
the French line; it broke through the gap betwixt the first and second
ships of the enemy, delivered itself, in a comfortable manner, of a
raking broadside into both as it passed, took its position on the
larboard bow of the _Conquerant_, and gave itself up to the joy of
battle. Within thirty minutes from the beginning of the fight, that
is, five British line-of-battle ships were inside the French line,
comfortably established on the bows or quarters of the leading ships.
Nelson himself, in the _Vanguard_, anchored on the outside of the
French line, within eighty yards of the _Spartiate's_ starboard beam;
the _Minotaur_, the _Bellerophon_, and the _Majestic_, coming up in
swift succession, and at less than five minutes' interval from each
other, flung themselves on the next ships.
How the thunder of the battle deepened, and how the quick flashes of
the guns grew brighter as the night gathered rapidly over sea, must be
imagined. But Nelson's swift and brilliant strategy was triumphant.
Each ship in the French van resembled nothing so much as a walnut in
the jaws of a nut-cracker. They were being "cracked" in succession,
and the rear of the line could only look on with agitated feelings and
watch the operation.
The fire of the British ships for fury and precision was overwhelming.
The head of the _Guerrier_ was simply shot away; the anchors hanging
from her bows were cut in two; her main-deck ports, from the bowsprit
to the gangway, were driven into one; her masts, fallen inboard, lay
with their tangle of rigging on the unhappy crew; while some of her
main-deck beams--all supports being torn away--fell on the guns. Hood,
in the _Zealous_, who was pounding the unfortunate _Guerrier_, says,
"At last, being tired of killing men in that way, I sent a lieutenant
on board, who was allowed, as I had instructed him, to hoist a light,
and haul it down as a sign of submission." But all the damage was not
on the side of the French. The great French flagship, the _Orient_, by
this time had added her mighty voice to the tumult, and the
_Bellerophon_, who was engaged with her, had a bad time of it. It was
the story of Tom Sayers and Heenan over again--a dwarf fighting a
giant. Her mizzen-mast and mainmast were shot away, and after
maintaining the dreadful duel for more than an hour, and having 200 of
her crew struck down, at 8.20 P.M. the _Bellerophon_ cut her cable and
drifted, a disabled wreck, out of the fire.
Meanwhile the four ships Nelson had left in the offing were beating
furiously up to add themselves to the fight. Night had fallen, by the
time Troubridge, in the _Culloden_, came round the island; and then, in
full sight of the great battle, the _Culloden_ ran hopelessly ashore!
She was, perhaps, the finest ship of the British fleet, and the
emotions of its crew and commander as they listened to the tumult, and
watched through the darkness the darting fires of the Titanic combat
they could not share, may be imagined. "Our army," according to
well-known authorities, "swore terribly in Flanders." The expletives
discharged that night along the decks and in the forecastle of the
Culloden would probably have made even a Flanders veteran open his eyes
in astonishment.
The _Swiftsure_ and the _Alexander_, taking warning by the _Culloden's_
fate, swept round her and bore safely up to the fight. The
_Swiftsure_, bearing down through the darkness to the combat, came
across a vessel drifting, dismasted and lightless, a mere wreck.
Holliwell, the captain of the _Swiftsure_, was about to fire, thinking
it was an enemy, but on second thoughts hailed instead, and got for an
answer the words, "_Bellerophon_; going out of action, disabled." The
_Swiftsure_ passed on, and five minutes after the _Bellerophon_ had
drifted from the bows of the _Orient_ the _Swiftsure_, coming
mysteriously up out of the darkness, took her place, and broke into a
tempest of fire.
At nine o'clock the great French flagship burst into flame. The
painters had been at work upon her on the morning of that day, and had
left oil and combustibles about. The nearest English ships
concentrated their fire, both of musketry and of cannon, on the burning
patch, and made the task of extinguishing it hopeless. Bruéys, the
French admiral, had already been cut in two by a cannon shot, and
Casablanca, his commodore, was wounded. The fire spread, the flames
leaped up the masts and crept athwart the decks of the great ship. The
moon had just risen, and the whole scene was perhaps the strangest ever
witnessed--the great burning ship, the white light of the moon above,
the darting points of red flame from the iron lips of hundreds of guns
below, the drifting battle-smoke, the cries of ten thousand
combatants--all crowded into an area of a few hundred square yards!
The British ships, hanging like hounds on the flanks of the Orient,
knew that the explosion might come at any moment, and they made every
preparation for it, closing their hatchways, and gathering their
firemen at quarters. But they would not withdraw their ships a single
yard! At ten o'clock the great French ship blew up with a flame that
for a moment lit shore and sea, and a sound that hushed into stillness
the whole tumult of the battle. Out of a crew of over a thousand men
only seventy were saved! For ten minutes after that dreadful sight the
warring fleets seemed stupefied. Not a shout was heard, not a shot
fired. Then the French ship next the missing flagship broke into
wrathful fire, and the battle awoke in full passion once more.
The fighting raged with partial intermissions all through the night,
and when morning broke Bruéys' curved line of mighty battleships, a
mile and a half long, had vanished. Of the French ships, one had been
blown up, one was sunk, one was ashore, four had fled, the rest were
prizes. It was the most complete and dramatic victory in naval
history. The French fought on the whole with magnificent courage; but,
though stronger in the mass, Nelson's strategy and the seamanship of
his captains made the British stronger at every point of actual battle.
The rear of the French line did not fire a shot or lose a man. The
wonder is that when Nelson's strategy was developed, and its fatal
character understood, Villeneuve, who commanded the French rear, and
was a man of undoubted courage, did not cut his cables, make sail, and
come to the help of his comrades. A few hundred yards would have
carried him to the heart of the fight. Can any one doubt whether, if
the positions had been reversed, Nelson would have watched the
destruction of half his fleet as a mere spectator? If nothing better
had offered, he would have pulled in a wash-tub into the fight!
Villeneuve afterwards offered three explanations of his own
inertness--(1) he "could not spare any of his anchors"; (2) "he had no
instructions"! (3) "on board the ships in the rear the idea of weighing
and going to the help of the ships engaged occurred to no one"! In
justice to the French, however, it may be admitted that nothing could
surpass the fierceness and valour with which, say, the _Tonnant_ was
fought. Its captain, Du Petit-Thouars, fought his ship magnificently,
had first both his arms and then one of his legs shot away, and died
entreating his officers not to strike. Of the ten French ships
engaged, the captains of eight were killed or wounded. Nelson took the
seven wounded captains on board the _Vanguard_, and, as they recovered,
they dined regularly with him. One of the captains had lost his nose,
another an eye, another most of his teeth, with musket-shots, &c.
Nelson, who himself had been wounded, and was still half-blind as a
result, at one of his dinners offered by mischance a case of toothpicks
to the captain on his left, who had lost all his teeth. He discovered
his error, and in his confusion handed his snuff-box to the captain on
his right, who had lost his nose!
What was the secret of the British victory? Nelson's brilliant
strategy was only possible by virtue of the magnificent seamanship of
his captains, and the new fashion of close and desperate fighting,
which Hood and Jarvis and Nelson himself had created. It is a French
writer, Captain Gravière, who says that the French naval habit of
evading battle where they could, and of accepting action from an enemy
rather than forcing it upon him, had ruined the _morale_ of the French
navy. The long blockades had made Nelson's captains perfect seamen,
and he taught them that close fighting at pistol-shot distance was the
secret of victory. "No English captain," he said, "can do wrong who,
in fight, lays a ship alongside an enemy." It was a captain of
Nelson's school--a Scotchman--who at Camperdown, unable, just as the
action began, to read some complicated signal from his chief, flung his
signal-book on the deck, and in broad Scotch exclaimed, "D---- me! up
with the hellem an' gang in the middle o't." That trick of "ganging
into the middle o't" was irresistible.
The battle of the Nile destroyed the naval prestige of France, made
England supreme in the Mediterranean, saved India, left Napoleon and
his army practically prisoners in Egypt, and united Austria, Russia,
and Turkey in league against France. The night battle in Aboukir Bay,
in a word, changed the face of history.