Rodney was should not have known French. Most people have heard the
story--the truth of which is well established--of Rodney's detention in
Paris, at the outset of the war, owing to his debts, and how the Duc de
Biron advanced him the money which enabled Rodney to leave for England.]
[Footnote 53: It is rather difficult to reconcile these two statements
by De Grasse, one to Dr. Blane and the other to Rodney.]
[Footnote 54: According to the _London Magazine_ for August 1782, King
George, at an audience granted to De Grasse shortly after the French
admiral's arrival in England, returned him the sword that De Grasse
had surrendered to Rodney. 'This _etiquette_,' the _London Magazine_
proceeds, 'enabled the Count to appear at Court.' He spent the week he
was in London, we are told, 'in paying visits to the great officers of
State and some of the principal nobility of the kingdom, by whom he was
entertained in a sumptuous and hospitable style. He likewise took a
view of the Bank and other public edifices, and of Vauxhall and other
places of amusement.... Every mark of respect was shown to him, even by
the common people, in testimony of his valour.']
[Footnote 55: Practically everybody: four or five officers were
called before the court at the close of the proceedings, and formally
reprimanded for not having done all they might. De Vaudreuil came off
with flying colours, and all documents containing reflections on him
were ordered to be suppressed. The warmest commendation was bestowed on
the captains who rallied with De Vaudreuil to the support of De Grasse.]
[Footnote 56: 'The most virulent expressions of disgust were hurled on
his misfortune and his fame; epigrams circulated from mouth to mouth,
and even the women carried ornaments called "à la De Grasse," having
on one side a heart and on the other none.' (Sir E. Cust's _Annals of
the Wars of the Eighteenth Century_, vol. iii. p. 329). Also General
Mundy in his _Life of Lord Rodney_ (vol. ii. p. 290, note), says of De
Grasse: 'On his return to France he was disgraced by his Court, and in
the gardens of the Tuileries his life was nearly sacrificed to the fury
of an exasperated mob.']
[Footnote 57: Wraxall's _Memoirs_, iii. p. 104. Several of the medals,
in silver and bronze, struck to commemorate the great occasion are now
in private collections. A lady's fan of the period, bearing a portrait
of Rodney with emblematical devices in honour of the victory, was
on view two or three years ago at a small exhibition of fans of the
eighteenth century in Bond Street.]
[Footnote 58: Letter quoted in Mundy's _Life of Lord Rodney_, vol. ii.
p. 309.]
[Footnote 59: Mr. Schetky, the artist, whose picture of Rodney's
victory is reproduced in this book, relates in a note the following
anecdote. 'It is in reference to this famous action (Rodney's victory)
that the story is told of the old one-legged veteran, a patient in the
Edinburgh Infirmary, who, being asked by Dr. John Barclay, "Where did
you lose your leg, my man?" briefly replied, "At the 12th of April,
your honour." The doctor, not immediately calling to mind that great
day, inquired again, "_What_ 12th of April?" Jack looked him in the
face with supreme contempt, and retorted indignantly, "What 12th of
April? Who ever heard of any 12th of April but One."']
III
WON AT THE CANNON'S MOUTH
HIS MAJESTY'S SHIP _UNDAUNTED_
Sound, sound the clarion, fill the fife!
To all the sensual world proclaim,
One crowded hour of glorious life,
Is worth an age without a name.
Scott.
There is no incident quite like it in all the annals of the Royal Navy.
There is hardly a finer tale, all said and done, hardly a more stirring
story, than that which tells how we came by our first _Undaunted_--why
there is an _Undaunted_ to-day on the roll of the British fleet. Better
name for British fighting ship there could be none; none, assuredly, of
happier omen. In a sense, indeed, it is, so to speak, a self-made name.
No Admiralty Lord of high degree in the comfortable surroundings of a
sanctum at Whitehall first made choice of or appointed it. No lady fair
with customary libation of foaming wine on dockyard gala day wished
'God speed' to our first _Undaunted_. In quite another way, indeed, was
the name first given. Amid the clash and ring of hostile steel, in the
heat of a hard-fought fight, with shells bursting round, and grape-shot
hurtling through the powder smoke, with bullets flying thick, while
men closed hand to hand with cutlass and bayonet and boarding pike,
came the first idea of the name _Undaunted_, and the scene of its first
appointment, of its first bestowal on a British man-of-war, was the
quarter-deck of a British flagship, as the last echoes of battle were
dying down.
[Illustration: THE FIRST CAPTAIN OF THE FIRST _UNDAUNTED_--CAPTAIN
ROBERT FAULKNOR
From Holl's portrait engraved by Ridley.]
The West Indies, Nelson's 'station for honour,' was the scene of the
event, off the island of Martinique, and Thursday the 20th of March
1794 was the day. There had been turbulent doings in Martinique for the
past six weeks. Ever since the second week of February, day after day,
almost incessantly, the quiet valleys and hillsides of the fair island
had re-echoed with the crackle of musketry and the booming of cannon.
It was the old story, of course, red-coats fighting blue; the old
story--with the old result. We were in the second year of the war with
the French Revolution, and a British army had been sent over to drive
the French from their West Indian possessions. Martinique was the first
to be attacked, and three columns of British troops had landed there at
different points to fight their way inland until they met, driving the
French field force and garrisons before them. Outmatched in the open,
the French troops and local militiamen had in the end fallen back on
Fort Royal, whither General Rochambeau, the French Commander-in-Chief
in the West Indies, had called in all his forces and massed his
battalions to make a final stand at bay. The fate of Martinique
depended on their power of holding out until help from outside should
reach them.
A large and powerful British fleet under Vice-Admiral Sir John
Jervis, the future Earl St. Vincent, had escorted the troops across
the Atlantic. After assisting the soldiers in the earlier stages of
the campaign it had closed in and fastened its grip on the seaward
approaches to Fort Royal.
Fort Royal was the headquarters station of the French in the West
Indies. It was situated at the head of a deep bay, Cul de Sac Royal
as it was called. The place was strongly fortified, and was the great
arsenal and dockyard of France across the Atlantic. For a hundred years
past and more French fleets and squadrons had fitted there for war, and
had put in to repair after battle. Thence Du Casse had sailed to fight
Benbow. From there, as we have seen, De Grasse put out to meet his fate
off the 'Saints' at the hands of Rodney. Two fortified positions of
considerable strength and with heavy cannon, besides outlying redoubts
and batteries, defended the town of Fort Royal; one position fronting
inland, the other facing towards the sea.
Against the former, Fort Bourbon, an entrenched work set on high ground
at the back of the town of Fort Royal, the main force of our soldiers
was to operate, attacking with a siege train of heavy guns and mortars
and opening zigzags and parallels in the orthodox way. Fort Louis on
the sea front, blocking the entrance to the _carénage_, or man-of-war
harbour, and the dockyard, was to be attacked by the Naval Brigade,
assisted by a number of grenadier and light infantry companies, with
siege batteries made up of ships' 24-pounders. At the entrance to Fort
Royal Bay, to 'keep the ring,' as it were, rode the big two-deckers and
frigates of the fleet.
The bombardment began on the 7th of March and lasted ten days, during
which time the enemy resisted stoutly. Their sorties were, however,
beaten back, and by the 16th of the month the advanced batteries of the
second parallel had been pushed forward to within 500 yards of Fort
Bourbon. The sappers and miners had in the same time got nearer still
to Fort Louis. As yet though no date had been fixed for the assault.
On the 17th of March an accidental circumstance suddenly brought on
the crisis. Lieutenant Bowen of the flagship _Boyne_, who commanded
the guard boats of the fleet, heard that there were some British
seamen prisoners on board a French frigate that lay in the _carénage_
moored close under the walls of Fort Louis. He was a young fellow of
exceptional daring, and a fine piece of work suggested itself to his
mind. It was to dash in on his own account and try and cut out the
French ship and rescue the prisoners. Young Bowen said nothing about it
to any one. He took his boats in and made the attempt. He boarded the
frigate in the face of a sharp fire, only, however, to find that the
prisoners had been removed. Then he tried to bring the prize off. It
proved, however, impossible. The frigate had been moored with chains
and had no sails bent to her yards. Lieutenant Bowen had to retire,
but his daring attempt gave an idea to the British admiral. It took
shape on paper, and the co-operation of the military on shore was
arranged for. Sir John Jervis's plan was to send in all the boats of
the fleet _en masse_, carrying landing parties of sailors and marines,
and attempt Fort Louis itself by a _coup de main_. At the same time, it
was arranged, a brigade of troops, detached from before Fort Bourbon,
should move down and threaten the town of Fort Royal and the landward
bastions of Fort Louis.
The plan was put in hand at once, and Thursday the 20th of March
was fixed on for the attempt. It was to be made in broad daylight,
going straight at the enemy. This, briefly, was to be the order of
the attack. The _Asia_, a 64-gun ship, Captain John Brown, with the
_Zebra_, a 16-gun sloop of war, Commander Robert Faulknor, were to push
on ahead of the boats. Having got as close in to the ramparts as the
tide would allow, the _Asia_ was to batter away at the fort and breach
the sea-wall. The _Zebra_ at the same time was to sweep the ramparts
with grape and canister and cover the approach of the boats with the
storming parties, which were to come up a little astern of her. All the
boats in the fleet--flat-bottomed boats, barges, and pinnaces, carrying
1200 seamen and marines--were to be employed, each provided with a
number of bamboo scaling-ladders of from 20 to 36 feet long. Everything
was ready by the appointed time, seven on Wednesday night, and at five
o'clock on the morning of the 20th the signal was given to set off.
Promptly the _Zebra_ led in. There was a brisk north-easterly breeze
blowing, and standing right before it she headed directly for the
French batteries. The enemy on their side opened fire on her at once,
a long-range cannonade, but without effect. She was a small object to
hit. Without checking her course the _Zebra_ held on steadily. The
_Asia_ followed, and all went well until just as she was getting
within grape-shot range. Then suddenly an amazing thing happened. To
the blank astonishment of the whole squadron, the 64 suddenly wore
round and stood out of the bay. She turned round deliberately and drew
off from the enemy. What was the matter? Something very serious indeed
must have happened on board. Sir John Jervis himself, the admiral,
thought it could only be that Captain Brown had been killed, and sent
off his flag-captain to take charge. It was not that, however. Not a
man had been touched by a shot. Captain Grey[60] was only a few moments
on board, and then went down the side into his boat to return to the
flagship, after which the _Asia_ stood in again. It was a great relief
to all--when suddenly, just as she got to the same spot as before,
within grape-shot range, round went the _Asia's_ bows once more, and
she for the second time put back. What on earth had happened now?
This is the story. It is not a very nice one.
A French naval officer who had deserted to the British was on board the
_Asia_ in charge of the pilotage arrangements for the day's attack.
He was a M. de Tourelles, a Royalist, formerly harbour-master at Fort
Royal. He had volunteered for the post and had been accepted for his
pilot knowledge. The failure of the _Asia_ was due to Lieutenant de
Tourelles' nerves. All of a sudden, as the enemy's opening shots began
to fly overhead through the _Asia's_ rigging, M. de Tourelles got
alarmed and lost his head. Whether it was sheer cowardice, or a qualm
of conscience at the part he was taking against his own countrymen,
or a fear for his own skin if anything went wrong and the French got
hold of him--from one cause or another M. de Tourelles broke down
abjectly. Before any one on board knew what was happening, he had put
the _Asia's_ helm hard over and rounded the ship out of action. That
was the first failure, and the Frenchman's explanation was that he had
somehow got out of his reckoning. After Captain Grey of the _Boyne_
came on board M. de Tourelles said he would try again. He did so; and
the same thing happened again. There was, though, another failure on
board besides that of the pilot. Once more, to the surprise of all on
deck in the _Asia_, Captain Brown did nothing. He was an officer who
had seen service--of the same seniority as Nelson on the post list, and
not far off flag rank in the ordinary course--yet he let the Frenchman
for the second time carry the ship out of battle. Lookers-on expected
him to pistol De Tourelles on the spot, or cut him down; at the least
to send him below under arrest and take charge himself. The tide
was flowing, it was nearly three-quarters high water, and he might
well have risked touching on a shoal and borne up directly for the
batteries. Captain Brown, however, did nothing of the kind. The _Asia_
for the second time headed tamely out of action, this time to remain
out.[61]
It was a disheartening spectacle and a bad start. The whole attack
indeed was jeopardised. The _Asia_ dropped back nearly outside the bay.
The boats lay on their oars just within the bay. The _Zebra_, all by
herself, entirely unsupported, was some distance ahead; all the time
under fire from the enemy, stormed at by round-shot and shell and grape
from every gun that the French could bring to bear on her.
Fortunately Commander Faulknor was not of the stamp of Captain Brown.
He might well have anticipated a signal of recall and turned his little
sloop away to retire out of range and wait for further orders. But he
was not that sort of man. When he saw the _Asia_ go about and retreat
for the first time, although he had already got so far in as to be
within musket-shot of the nearest French battery, he lay-to and waited.
The French were already firing at him, but not the smallest notice
would he allow to be taken of the enemy's shots. The _Asia_, as he
saw, headed in and came on again; after which, for the second time she
turned away and stood back. Commander Faulknor knew what that meant. He
saw that he had been left in the lurch. He saw now that he must expect
no assistance from the _Asia_, the big ship that was to have been the
mainstay of the attack. The odds against him might well have daunted
the bravest man. They did not, however, daunt Robert Faulknor. He then
and there determined to undertake the whole duty of tackling the French
batteries and covering the boat attack single-handed, with his own
little ship and her crew of one hundred men all told.
It was a daring resolution, for Fort Louis was a very formidable work,
mounting heavy guns and strongly held. It crowned a rocky eminence
that jutted out menacingly into Fort Royal Bay. The sea face rose
abruptly from the water's edge, with a wall and parapet, 15 feet high,
scored with embrasures for big guns all along that side. In rear of
the parapet three lofty tiers of platforms, rising one above another,
with the muzzles of guns showing at all points, frowned fiercely down
on all who should venture to approach in hostile guise. Fort Louis
guarded the fairway into the _carénage_, or man-of-war harbour, round a
bend immediately in rear of the fort, and it also covered the town and
warehouses of Fort Royal proper, the civil settlement, which fringed
the harbour on the farther side.
The perilous nature of the task he was taking in hand did not, however,
count with the gallant officer who had charge of the _Zebra_. He was
used to taking risks. Commander Faulknor had already in this campaign
shown the stuff he was made of, and that not once nor twice. He was not
the man to blench here.
The commander of the _Zebra_ was indeed a man in a thousand. Hardly
a finer fellow in every respect than Robert Faulknor ever trod the
quarter-deck of a British man-of-war in any age. He could not, perhaps,
well help being so. If ever a British naval officer had the sea 'in
his blood,' as the old saying went, Faulknor had it. Not many families
ever did more for the Sea Service than the Faulknors of Hampshire in
the eighteenth century. A round dozen of its sons, as captains and
admirals, walked the quarter-deck in the times between Queen Anne and
William the Fourth. As a fact, he owed his very origin to a naval
romance. His father was 'Bob Faulknor of the _Bellona_,' perhaps the
most popular man in the service in his day, who in the first year of
George the Third's reign took a big French 74, the _Courageux_, off
the coast of Spain, in a ship-to-ship duel fought out to the bitter
end, and won a fortune and a beautiful bride, our hero's mother, at
one and the same time. The newspapers were full of the dashing fight,
a story full of incidents of heroism on the part of the _Bellona's_
captain, and the young lady reading the story there, gave her heart to
the gallant captain she had never seen. Meeting 'Captain Bob' on his
return to England at a ball, quite by chance, he for his part, in turn,
fell violently in love with her, and they married and lived afterwards
the happiest of wedded lives. Commander Faulknor's grandfather was old
Admiral Balchen's flag-captain, who was lost with his veteran chief and
upwards of a thousand officers and men, in the wreck of the _Victory_
of George the Second's fleet, the predecessor of Nelson's _Victory_,
off the Caskets near Alderney, one stormy October night of the year
1744. Commander Faulknor's great-grandfather got his lieutenant's
commission three years after the battle of La Hogue, fought all
through 'Queen Anne's War,' and died in George the First's reign,
Lieutenant-Governor of Greenwich Hospital. Such was the stock that
Commander Faulknor came of.
Faulknor gave orders to let fall the foresail and hoist every stitch
of canvas that the ship's masts would stand. Then he again headed
the _Zebra_ up the bay, pointing in directly for the ramparts of Fort
Louis. All round her, as the little sloop dashed forward, the water
leaped and splashed, torn into spray under the tornado of grape and
canister and round shot--any single one of which hitting the _Zebra_
fairly must have torn the little vessel open and sent her to the bottom
like a stone--with which the French batteries met her as she came on.
But it made no difference. A special Providence--in the form of a
drizzling squall that suddenly came on, blowing in from the sea right
in the faces of the French gunners--seemed to be protecting the ship
and her men, and she passed through practically unscathed. One shot cut
the main-topmast away, but that was all. The balls whizzed through the
rigging and within a few inches of the men's heads but not a single man
was harmed.
At the instant that the _Zebra_ was seen to make sail and move
ahead, the boats of the squadron set off rowing after her at their
best speed, while the Naval Brigade batteries on shore, facing the
flanking bastions of Fort Louis on either side, redoubled their fire
on the enemy's works to distract the attention of the French as far as
possible. At the same time, to hold Fort Bourbon on the hill behind
Fort Louis in check and prevent reinforcements being sent down to
assist the lower fort, the British siege batteries up above burst out
into a tremendous fire of round-shot and shell that swept the French
ramparts in the upper fort from end to end.
On board the _Zebra_ it was an anxious time for every one; and with it
all, simultaneously, Commander Faulknor had yet another trial sprung
upon him. The risk from the enemy's shot was not the severest ordeal
that the captain of the _Zebra_ had to go through. By an extraordinary
coincidence, exactly the same thing happened on board the _Zebra_
as had already happened with such unfortunate results on board the
_Asia_.[62] The pilot's nerve failed. The pilot of the _Zebra_ was an
old man-of-war's man, who had been employed for many years in the West
Indies on account of his pilot knowledge of the islands. He now broke
down at the critical moment. But, as has been said, Commander Faulknor
was not a Captain Brown.
As he gave the pilot the order 'to place the sloop close under the
walls of Fort Royal,' he instinctively noticed that something was
wrong. The man, he thought, seemed to hesitate. He turned aside to one
of his officers.
'I think Mr. ---- seems confused, as if he doesn't know what he is
about. Has he been in action before?'
'Many times, Sir,' was the reply; 'he has been twenty-four years in the
service.'
But Faulknor was not satisfied. He eyed the pilot closely and then
stepped up to him and asked him a trifling question to test him. His
suspicions were fully confirmed. The pilot's 'agitation was such as to
render him incapable of giving any answer.' Recovering himself to some
extent a moment later the wretched man, keeping his eyes on the deck,
in a low voice addressed Faulknor, who was bending over him, with this
startling admission:
'I see your Honour knows me. I am unfit to guide her. I don't know what
is come over me. I dreamt last night I should be killed, and I am so
afraid I don't know what I am about. I never in all my life felt afraid
before.'
One cannot help feeling pity for the unhappy fellow; but it was no time
for pity. Commander Faulknor could do only one thing, and he did it.
Without for an instant losing his presence of mind, he replied to the
man in a still lower tone:
'The fate of this expedition depends on the helm in your hand. Give it
to me, and go and hide your head in whatever you fancy the safest part
of the ship. But mind--fears are catching. If I hear you tell yours to
one of your messmates, your life shall answer for it to-morrow!'
[Illustration: CAPTAIN FAULKNOR STORMING FORT LOUIS
'The poor fellow,' in the words of the _Naval Chronicle_,
'panic-struck, went away, and overcome with shame sat down upon the arm
chest, whilst Captain Faulknor seized the helm and with his own hand
laid the _Zebra_ close to the walls of the Fort, but before he had got
upon them at the head of his gallant followers, a cannon-ball struck
the arm chest and blew the pilot to atoms.' He was the only man killed
of all the _Zebra's_ crew that day.
From the engraving by James Daniell, after Henry Singleton.]
Would the pilot have escaped had he pulled himself together and stuck
to the helm? This is what Commander Faulknor wrote home to his mother
after the fight.[63] 'I had a ship's cartouch box, which is made of
thick wood, buckled round my body with pistol cartridges in it, for
the pistol I carried by my side. As the _Zebra_ came close to the
fort, a grape-shot struck, or rather grazed my right-hand knuckle,
and shattered the cartouch in the centre of my body: had it not
miraculously been there I must have been killed on the spot.'
Faulknor ran the _Zebra_ in and laid her as close under the French
guns as the depth of water at that state of the tide would allow,
within fifteen feet of the walls of Fort Louis. The next instant 'the
scaling-ladders flew from the rigging, the boats in tow astern became
the bridge, and Captain Faulknor headed his boarders over the parapet
into the fort.'
The boats of the squadron, led by Captains Nugent and Riou--'the
gallant, good Riou,' killed before Copenhagen seven years later, as all
the world knows--were coming up astern, flying through the water after
the _Zebra_, as fast as the men, bending their hardest to their oars,
could send them forward; but they were still some way off.