correspondent of the _Standard_ newspaper, Mr. Cameron, afterwards
killed in battle in the Soudan, who was on board the flagship
_Invincible_. 'At half-past six,' he says, 'a quiet order was passed
round the decks, "Load with common shell." A gleam of satisfaction
shone on the men's faces. Half-an-hour later a signal was made to
the _Alexandra_ to fire the challenging gun. That was done, and, the
Egyptians continuing hostile preparations, the flags ran up at the
_Invincible's_ mast-head for the fleet to commence action. The order
was given on board the _Invincible_ to begin "independent firing."
A deafening salvo from five 9-inch guns went from the side of the
_Invincible_, while overhead the ten Nordenfelt guns in the tops
swelled the din which burst forth from all the ships with a succession
of drum-like tappings.
'The smoke from the very commencement of the engagement was so dense
that we could see nothing of the effect which our fire was producing,
nor of what the enemy were doing; but soon after we began, a sharp
scream overhead, followed by the uplifting columns of spray to seaward
as the shots struck the water, made it clear that the enemy were
replying to our iron salute.... They appeared to have got our range
pretty accurately, and round and conical shot whistled thickly through
the masts. I went round the ship and found the men fighting the
main-deck guns all stripped to the waist. Between each shot they had to
sit down and wait until the smoke cleared a little.'
Meanwhile the _Condor_ and the other gun-vessels lay in the offing,
behind the battle-ships that were engaging Fort Mex, looking on and
awaiting their opportunity. The first thing that came the _Condor's_
way was to assist the _Téméraire_, which had got aground. The
_Téméraire_ was got off about eight o'clock, and immediately after that
the _Condor's_ chance offered.
[Illustration:
Emery Walker sc.
BOMBARDMENT OF ALEXANDRIA: JULY 11, 1882--9 A.M.
(In the course of the morning the _Inflexible_ and _Téméraire_, and the
_Alexandra_, _Sultan_, and _Superb_, shifted their positions.)]
Lord Charles Beresford, as he watched the battle, had observed
that the westernmost of the forts, Fort Marabout, was firing at the
British inshore-squadron opposite Mex, the _Invincible_, _Monarch_,
and _Penelope_, and apparently annoying them. He sent for one of his
officers and said, 'I shall stand down and make myself useful by
engaging that fort.' 'You must be mad, sir,' was the reply. 'It is the
second heaviest fort, and one shot from the heavy guns would knock us
into smithereens.' But the commander of the _Condor_ was not to be put
off that way. 'The apparently impossible,' he answered, 'is often the
easiest. Anyway, nothing can be done unless we try.... If I can get on
the angle of the fort, I believe we can hit their guns without their
hitting us. The thing is to get there.'
Fort Marabout mounted three 9-inch Armstrongs, firing 250-lb.
shells; one 7-inch Armstrong, firing 115-lb. shells; eight 10-inch
muzzle-loaders, firing 84-lb. hollow shot, or 100-lb. solid shot;
seventeen 32-pounders, smooth-bores; and seven mortars, two firing
13-inch shells and five 11-inch mortars. There were also in this
fort--whether mounted or not was unknown--two 10-inch Armstrongs,
firing 400-lb. shells; two more 9-inch Armstrongs, and one 7-inch.
Against that the little _Condor_ set out to match herself, with
one 7-inch gun, firing 12-lb. shells, and two 64-pounders, three
7-pounders, and one or two Gatlings. As has been said also, the
little sloop had not an inch of armour on her sides or deck:--boilers,
engines, magazines, all were open to the lightest of the enemy's shot.
All the same they steamed off towards the grey ramparts of the big fort
without a moment of doubt or hesitation.
Mr. Villiers carries on the story.
'The _Condor_ steamed ahead. Our men stripped off their jackets. The
decks were sanded, and the racers, or rails, on which the guns run were
oiled.
'As we neared Fort Marabout, its terraces and embrasures bristling
with Armstrong guns, not a man aboard but knew the peril of our
audacity,--for a little gun-boat, one of the smallest in Her Majesty's
service, to dare to attack the second most powerful fortress in
Alexandria,--but the shout of enthusiasm from the crew when the order
was given to "open fire!" readily showed their confidence in their
beloved leader. The guns, run out "all a-port," blazed away. The smoke
hung heavily about the decks. The flash of the cannonade lit up for a
moment the faces of the men, already begrimed with powder, and steaming
with exertion, for the morning was hot and sultry. The captain from the
bridge, glass in hand, watching anxiously the aim of her gunners, would
shout from time to time: "What was that, my men?" 'Sixteen hundred
yards. Sir!' "Then give them eighteen this time, and drop it in."
"Aye, aye, Sir!"
'Then a shout from the men on the main-mast told us on deck that
the shot had made its mark. The little ship quaked again with the
blast of her guns. The men were now almost black with powder, and
continually dipped their heads in the sponge buckets to keep the grit
from their eyes. One of our shots had fallen well within the enemy's
works; another had taken a yard of scarp off--for a slight breeze had
lifted the fog of smoke, and all on board could plainly see the enemy
working in their embrasures. The Arab gunners now trained one of their
Armstrongs in our direction. Our engine-bell sounded, and the _Condor_
at once steamed ahead. A puff of smoke from the fort, a dull boom, a
rush of shell through the air, and a jet of water shot up far astern,
followed by a shout from our men. The enemy had missed us. When the
Arabs reloaded and brought to bear, the _Condor_ steamed back again,
and the shell whistled across her bows.
[Illustration:
_Photo, London Stereoscopic Co._
VICE-ADMIRAL LORD CHARLES BERESFORD, K.C.B.]
'The enemy's fire on the ships attacking Fort Mex slackened, and
soon ceased altogether. Irritated by the constant fire of the little
_Condor_, the Egyptian gunners now devoted their entire attention to
us. They set about slewing their other Armstrongs in our direction.
Their long black muzzles slowly turned their gaping mouths towards
us. We looked at each other, then some of us looked at the captain,
for the situation was becoming critical.... In an instant he decided,'
proceeds Mr. Villiers, 'and gave the order for the _Condor_ to run
in closer, and we came within 1200 yards. We all saw in a moment the
wisdom of the seeming audacity. We were well within their guard; though
the Gyppies blazed at us, they could only practise at our masts; they
could not depress their guns sufficiently to hull us. We cheered again
and again as their abortive attempts to get at us failed, for a shot
below water-mark, with the lurch the _Condor_ was already making with
all her guns abroadside, would have sent her down to Davy Jones's
locker in less than ten minutes.
'The Egyptians, in their rage, opened fire with their smooth-bores from
the lower parapet. The round-shot would whistle through our rigging,
making us lie low awhile; but we would scramble to our feet again,
dropping another 9-inch shell well within their works, scattering their
gunners, and making things quite unpleasant for them. Only once did the
enemy touch us, when a deep thud started the little ship trembling from
stem to stern. The carpenter was ordered below. There was an anxious
moment or two, when at last he returned, reporting the glad news that
"all was well"; we had only been grazed.'
It may be noted, by the way, that at twelve hundred yards a gun like
the 9-inch guns on Fort Marabout has a velocity of 1233 feet a second,
and a penetrative power equal to carrying their 250-lb. shot clean
through a target of wrought iron nine and a half inches thick. Had
only one of these projectiles hit fairly, there would have been an end
of the _Condor_, there and then. That is certain. At the same time,
at twelve hundred yards the time of flight of a shot from muzzle to
mark would be 2.72 seconds, and the shot in that period would drop
75-1/2 feet. It was not an impossible task for the Egyptian gunners
on the ramparts to hit the _Condor_. That they failed utterly was the
_Condor's_ luck--the fortune of war, pure and simple. The _Condor's_
crew through it all seemed to bear charmed lives. Shots fell thick
in the water all round, as other ships observed, or cut the rigging
overhead. One big shot tore the awning over the quarter-deck. A 10-inch
shell struck the water close underneath the ship's bows, and the column
of water sent up by the splash knocked an officer and two men off the
forecastle.
To resume with Mr. Villiers.
'It was a scorching, thirsty time on deck. The particles of carbon from
the powder floating in the air dried our throats till we almost choked.
The captain's steward was always ready to quench the thirst of the
guests, Mr. Moberly Bell, the now famous manager of the _Times_, and
myself, with cool drinks whenever we found time between the shots to
rush below; but just as the tumbler reached our lips the blast of the
guns would almost shatter the glass against one's teeth, and we would
rush on deck to see how the shot had told.
'All the time the navigating lieutenant, with eyes fixed on the chart,
was calmly moving the vessel up and down a narrow tortuous passage
which we could distinctly see, by peering over the side of the vessel,
for the reefs on either flank of the narrow channel glistened from out
the blue-black of the waters.'
Here is Lord Charles Beresford's own account of the _Condor's_ day at
Alexandria, as briefly given once to an interviewer. 'The _Téméraire_
got aground on the northern part of the Boghaz Pass, so we went down
and towed her off. Whilst doing so the Marabout Fort opened fire on
the English ships inside the bar. The idea struck me that the _Condor_
being small, with low freeboard, might get through the zone of fire
and under the fort. It wasn't altogether easy work, for had one shell
struck the _Condor_ fair and square we should have been sunk to a dead
certainty. However, she was easy to handle, and when once we were on
the angle of the fort and under it we were all right. My dodge was to
throw a couple of missiles into the fort at a time, and then back or
fill, as the case might be, so that just when the Egyptians thought
they had got our right range, the _Condor_ was out of the way, and so
it went on pretty well all day.[122] The men behaved splendidly,--upon
my word, I don't think they have their equals!'
For upwards of two hours the _Condor_ fought Fort Marabout, and then
the Admiral, apparently thinking that she had as much as she could
manage, signalled to the _Beacon_, another gun-vessel (Commander
G.W. Hand), and the senior officer's ship of the flotilla, for the
_Bittern_, _Cygnet_, and _Decoy_ to go to her assistance. The fort,
though, had already, by that, been practically subdued. The Egyptians
had had enough, and soon afterwards ceased firing, although they kept
their flag flying until next day, when the officer who is now Admiral
Sir A.K. Wilson, V.C., landed, and hauled it down. He presented the
colours of Marabout to Lord Charles Beresford, in whose possession they
are now, together with another trophy of the fight, a fragment of one
of the _Condor's_ shells which was found to have passed through the
magazine of Fort Marabout, and did not explode until outside. Among
his most treasured mementos Lord Charles also preserves the _Condor's_
binnacle, as taken from the ship when, some ten or twelve years later,
she passed into the shipbreakers' hands at Dead Man's Bay, Plymouth
Sound.
In her action with Fort Marabout the _Condor_ expended over nineteen
and a half hundredweights of powder (a ton all but fifty-four
pounds), and two hundred and one projectiles:--65 rounds of 7-inch
shell, 128 64-pounder shells, and eight 7-pounder shells; besides 200
rounds of Gatling gun ammunition, 13 war-rockets, and 1000 rounds of
Martini-Henry small-arm ammunition.
When the gun-boats had finished their work Admiral Seymour made the
signal of recall, and they returned, passing close to the _Invincible_
to their stations.
Now it was that the celebrated signal to the _Condor_ was made. The
little vessel was passing the flagship, from on board which the
_Invincible's_ men were cheering her enthusiastically, when the Admiral
on the quarter-deck turned to his flag-lieutenant, Lieutenant Hedworth
Lambton,--the future captain of the _Powerful_ and the man who saved
Ladysmith,--and said, as if musing to himself, 'I should like to tell
them something.' Lieutenant Lambton made a suggestion, and within less
than a minute, the flags went up at the _Invincible's_ mast-head making
the words, 'Well Done, _Condor_!' That is the story of the _Condor_ at
Alexandria. The day ended for her with covering the landing-party sent
ashore at the close of the bombardment to spike the guns of Fort Mex.
* * * * *
The story of the _Condor_ alone, of all the ships at the bombardment of
Alexandria, has been told. For one reason or another, what the little
gun-boat did in the action appealed specially to people at the time,
and attracted universal attention. It was, of course, largely a matter
of opportunity--the seizing of an exceptional chance for an effort of
individual daring. All at Alexandria did well, and the _Condor_ had
the best of the luck. In fairness, a few words must be also said of
others of the ships present on the occasion, and of the part that they
individually took in the fighting.
In addition to the _Condor_, another ship won the honour of a special
signal 'Well Done!' from the Admiral--the big _Inflexible_, captained
on that day by the officer who is now Admiral Sir John Arbuthnot
Fisher, G.C.B., First Sea Lord of the Admiralty. The _Inflexible_
during the earlier part of the engagement was posted outside the reefs
off the 'Corvette Pass' entrance to Alexandria harbour, enfilading the
Lighthouse batteries. 'It is invidious to particularise,' says the
_Times_ correspondent, who was on board another ship in the fleet,
'but the _Inflexible's_ firing to-day was certainly second to none.'
Describing how the _Inflexible_ shifted her position, and at ranges
between 3000 and 5000 yards shelled the Mex Fort with one turret, and
the Ras-el-Tin batteries with the other, the correspondent continues:
'Every shell seemed either to burst right over the Ras-el-Tin works,
or to pitch upon the very parapet of the Mex Fort upon the hill.'
It was just after this that Admiral Seymour signalled, 'Well done,
_Inflexible_!' The _Inflexible_ bore the brunt of the firing from the
Ras-el-Tin batteries for three and a half hours, until she had silenced
the Egyptian guns. After that, with the aid of the _Téméraire_, she
silenced the Lighthouse Fort and Fort Adda, the front of which strongly
fortified work her fire is said to have literally blown in.
It was on board the _Inflexible_ also that the late Commander
Younghusband performed an exploit of great daring--though only
characteristic of the man, and of the spirit that has ever existed in
the service to which he belonged. In the midst of the fighting the vent
of one of the _Inflexible's_ 80-ton guns had become choked; with the
result that for the time being the gun was completely out of action.
Lieutenant Younghusband (as the gallant officer then was) calmly got
inside the gun--a muzzle-loader--and caused himself to be rammed by
the hydraulic rammer right up the bore of the gun (a tube 16 inches in
diameter) until he reached the powder-chamber, when he managed with
his fingers to remedy the defect, all the time at imminent risk of
suffocation from the powder gases. When he had done his work, a rope
fastened to his feet hauled him back and drew him out of the gun.
The _Inflexible_ at Alexandria had numerous dents made in her armour,
and the unarmoured part of the hull was pierced by shot in several
places. Her most serious injury was from a 10-inch shell, which struck
the ship below the water-line outside the central armoured 'citadel,'
and, glancing up, passed through her decks, killing one of the men, and
mortally wounding Lieutenant Francis Jackson as he was directing the
fire of one of the light guns on the superstructure.
Her due, too, must be given to the 'Old _Alex_,' as the Navy used to
call the favourite flagship of the Fleet during the closing years of
Queen Victoria's reign. On board the _Alexandra_ (Captain C.F. Hotham)
Mr. Israel Harding, the chief gunner of the ship, won the V.C. Just
at ten o'clock, about three hours after the action began, a 10-inch
spherical shell crashed through the _Alexandra's_ side, at a part where
the ship was unarmoured, and with its fuse burning rolled along the
main-deck. With great gallantry and presence of mind, Mr. Harding, who
from below had heard the shout, 'There's a live shell just above the
hatchway!' rushed up the ladder, and taking some water from a tub near
by, dashed it upon the burning fuse, after which he seized the shell
and plunged it bodily into the tub, rendering it harmless. For this
act of valour, which undoubtedly saved many lives, Mr. Harding was
deservedly awarded the Victoria Cross. The shell was presented to His
Majesty King Edward, then Prince of Wales. It was in the circumstances
by no means an inappropriate presentation. The _Alexandra_ was so named
in honour of Her Majesty Queen Alexandra, then Princess of Wales, who
launched the ship on an April day of the year 1875 that Chatham is not
likely to forget. On the stocks, until a few days before she was sent
afloat, the ship had been known as the _Superb_, and her re-naming as
the _Alexandra_ was meant as a special compliment to her royal sponsor,
which met with universal applause. It drew forth, among other poetical
tributes elsewhere, the following Latin verses in the _Times_:--
THE LAUNCH OF THE ALEXANDRA
Fulcra securifera fabri succidite dextra;
Omen habet primas si bene tangit aquas.
Dicite--Sit Felix--proraeque invergite vina;
Nomen _Alexandrae_ dulce _Superba_ tulit.
Nomine mutato, sit et omine fausta secundo;
Sit sine rivali, nec tamen ipsa ferox.
Jam neque tormentis opus est, nec triplice lamna,
Forma tumescentes sola serenat aquas.
Te capiente capi qui non velit ipse phaselus,
'Ferreus, et verè ferreus iste fuit.'
H.K.
To add to the _éclat_ of the _Alexandra's_ launch, the Archbishop of
Canterbury (Dr. Tait), with the Bishop of Rochester, conducted the
religious service on the occasion--the first time that a religious
service of any kind had been used at the launch of a British man-of-war
since the Reformation. To Queen Alexandra we owe the restoration of
the ancient usage of invoking, at the outset of their existence, the
protection of Almighty God on the ships by which our homes and our
Empire are guarded, and also on those who are to man them; and the
practice, so instituted, has continued to be observed at the launches
of all British men-of-war, ever since the launch of the _Alexandra_.
The _Alexandra_ came out of action after the bombardment of Alexandria
with twenty-four hits from shot or shell on the hull outside the
armour-plating, and with several dents in her armour, one of her
funnels damaged, and her rigging a good deal cut about. Most of the
enemy's shots, fortunately, had been aimed too high.[123]
The _Invincible_ (Captain R.H. More-Molyneux), on board which ship
Sir Beauchamp Seymour had his flag for the day,--the _Alexandra_ was
really his flagship, but he had removed into the _Invincible_ a short
time before because of her lighter draught in order to enter the
harbour,--had also numerous dents in her armour near the water-line,
and the unarmoured parts of her hull had holes through it in several
places. Her part in the fighting was for most of the time at anchor
off Fort Mex, and the precision of her firing was enthusiastically
applauded by the officers of the American ships who watched it from
the offing. It was from the _Invincible_ that the landing-party of
four officers and twelve men--all volunteers--went off, towards the
close of the action, to disable the guns of Fort Mex. The duty was an
extremely dangerous one. There was no means of knowing what troops
the enemy might not have under cover close behind the fort. To effect
their landing the little party--the officers were Lieutenants Barton
Bradford and Poore, Flag-Lieutenant Lambton, and Major Tulloch of the
Welsh Regiment (Military Staff Officer to the Admiral)--had to swim
through the surf. No opposition, however, met them, and after bursting
the guns with charges of gun-cotton the party returned on board without
a casualty.
Less is on record about what took place on board the other ships. All
did their duty, and it was not their fault that no chances of special
distinction came their way. The _Superb_[124] (Captain T. Le H. Warde)
was hit badly near the water-line, just above the armour-belt, by a
shell that shattered a hole in the hull 10 feet long by 4 feet wide.
One shot made a hole, 10 inches across, in the fore part of the ship
near one of her torpedo-ports, and another a hole, a foot across, a
little aft of her battery; besides which her armour was dented and her
foremast shot through. The _Sultan_ (Captain W.J. Hunt-Grubbe, C.B.,
A.D.C.) had an armour-plate on the water-line dented and 'started,'
four boats damaged, and one funnel shot through. The _Penelope_
(Captain St. G.C. d'Arcy-Irvine) was hulled eight times, and one of her
guns had its muzzle chipped. The _Téméraire_ and _Monarch_ (Captains
H.F. Nicholson and H. Fairfax, C.B., A.D.C.)--though the value of the
work they did and the way they were handled were second to none--came
out of action with little or no damage to report.
* * * * *
Here we break off finally and close the book. Alike in our stories of
the far-off past and the last story of the nearer past, the men whose
names have been mentioned, round whom the incidents related centred,
are, after all, only typical of their fellows in the Sea Service at
the present hour. As occasion will prove too, when the time next comes
for Great Britain to stand to her arms once more in defence on the sea
of her rights and the honour of the flag against a European foe, the
enemy, whosoever he may be, will find the spirit of the Cornwallis's
and Rodneys and Faulknors and the Gardiners of the older day--to name
no other, no more recent names--burning as brightly as of yore in the
breasts of those who in that hour will officer and man the war-ships of
the British Fleet.
No wonder England holds
Dominion o'er the seas--
Still the Red Cross shall face the world,
While she has men like these!
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 121: _Pictures of Many Wars_, pp. 177, etc.]
[Footnote 122: This is very much the way that the late Admiral Sir W.R.
Mends, G.C.B., (then a captain) handled the _Arethusa_ frigate (now a
training-ship in the Thames) under sail at the bombardment of Odessa
on the 22nd of April 1854, to the enthusiastic admiration of the whole
fleet.]
[Footnote 123: The first officer to hoist his flag in the _Alexandra_
was the late Admiral of the Fleet Sir Geoffrey Phipps Hornby, G.C.B.
She was afterwards the flagship, also in the Mediterranean, of the
late Duke of Edinburgh. Sir Geoffrey Hornby hoisted his flag on board
on Monday, the 15th of January 1877, and the _Alexandra_ was his
flagship when in the following year, at the most critical moment for
Europe of the Russo-Turkish War, Sir Geoffrey, with a division of the
Mediterranean Fleet, made the passage of the Dardanelles. Speaking
of the close association between the _Alexandra_ and the royal lady
who so auspiciously sent the splendid battleship afloat, Sir Geoffrey
Hornby's biographer, his daughter, Mrs. Fred. Egerton, says: 'H.R.H.
was recognised, so to speak, as the patron saint of the ship. Her
birthday, December 1, became the fête day of the ship; a Danish cross,
with a garland of oak leaves between the arms of the cross, was adopted
as the crest, and a photograph of the Princess, presented by her to the
officers, received the place of honour in the wardroom.']