CHAMPIONS OF THE FLEET
_BY THE SAME AUTHOR._
FAMOUS FIGHTERS OF THE FLEET.
THE ENEMY AT TRAFALGAR.
THE ROMANCE OF THE KING’S NAVY.
ETC. ETC.
[Illustration: CHAMPIONS THEN AND NOW: THE _VICTORY_ AND THE _DREADNOUGHT_
_Both ships, and the submarine alongside the “Victory,” are shown on
the same scale. The picture is reproduced by kind permission of the
Proprietors of the “Illustrated London News.” Photos by Stephen Cribb,
Southsea._]
CHAMPIONS
OF THE FLEET
CAPTAINS AND MEN-OF-WAR
AND DAYS THAT HELPED TO
MAKE THE EMPIRE
BY EDWARD FRASER
WITH 19 ILLUSTRATIONS
LONDON: JOHN LANE THE BODLEY HEAD
NEW YORK: JOHN LANE COMPANY MCMVIII
WM. BRENDON AND SON, LTD., PRINTERS, PLYMOUTH
PREFACE
These tales of the navy of the fighting days of old are to some extent,
it may seem, cruises in rather out-of-the-way waters. At the same time,
they may claim present-day associations that should render them not out
of place just now. How and why, for instance, the world-famous name
_Dreadnought_ came into the Royal Navy is a story of interest on its
own account that ought to be timely. With that also is told something
of what our _Dreadnoughts_ of old did under fire in the fighting days
of history: with Drake; against the Armada; with Sir Walter Raleigh;
against De Ruyter and the Dutchmen; at La Hogue; how one gave the
_sobriquet_ “Old Dreadnought” to the famous Boscawen; how Nelson’s
uncle and patron Maurice Suckling captained the same ship in battle; of
Collingwood in the _Dreadnought_; and of the _Dreadnought_ at Trafalgar.
We get, too, a passing glance at certain of the “points” of our mighty
battleship the _Dreadnought_ of the present hour. Again, in the year
that has seen the name of Clive recalled to the memory of his countrymen
by an ex-Viceroy of India in connection with the hundred and fiftieth
anniversary of Plassey, what the navy did for Clive at the most critical
moment of his fortunes, how without its active support on the field of
battle Clive would have been powerless, the forgotten, or certainly
little appreciated, part that the navy took in the founding of our
Indian empire—should be of interest to English readers. This year again
sees a new _Téméraire_, one of our “improved _Dreadnoughts_,” added to
the Royal Navy. The fine story of how the never-to-be-forgotten name
_Téméraire_—immortalized alike by Turner and by Trafalgar—first came
to appear on the roll of the British fleet is told here. And it should
be of interest to recall certain incidental matters concerning the old
_Victory_ herself: among others the circumstances in which she came to
be built and was safely sent afloat in spite of expected incendiarism;
where too those who fought on board at Trafalgar came from, and how
many representatives each of our counties had with Nelson in his last
fight. Such are some of the matters dealt with in these pages, which of
themselves should afford entertainment and help also to make this book
useful.
E. F.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. OUR _DREADNOUGHTS_:—THEIR NAME AND BATTLE RECORD 1
II. “KENT CLAIMS THE FIRST BLOW” 52
III. THE AVENGERS OF THE BLACK HOLE:—WHAT THE NAVY DID FOR CLIVE 77
IV. BOSCAWEN’S BATTLE:—THE TAKING OF THE _TÉMÉRAIRE_ 126
V. HAWKE’S FINEST PRIZE:—HOW THE _FORMIDABLE_ CHANGED HER FLAG 141
VI. WHEN THE _VICTORY_ FIRST JOINED THE FLEET:—HOW THEY BUILT
THE _VICTORY_ AT CHATHAM 160
VII. ON VALENTINE’S NIGHT IN FRIGATE BAY 191
VIII. THE PAGEANT OF THE _DONEGAL_:—A MEMORY OF ’98 208
IX. ON BOARD OUR FLAGSHIPS AT TRAFALGAR:—CAPTAIN HARDY AND
THOSE WHO MANNED THE _VICTORY_—UNDER FIRE WITH
COLLINGWOOD—“OLD IRONSIDES” AND THE THIRD IN COMMAND 222
ILLUSTRATIONS
CHAMPIONS THEN AND NOW: THE _VICTORY_ AND THE
_DREADNOUGHT_ _Frontispiece_
Both ships, and the submarine alongside the _Victory_, are
shown on the same scale. The picture is reproduced by kind
permission of the proprietors of the _Illustrated London
News_. Photos by Stephen Cribb, Southsea.
_Facing page_
OUR FIRST _DREADNOUGHT_ 10
From a contemporary print kindly lent by Mr. Wentworth
Huyshe. The _Dreadnought_ is shown as she appeared
when serving in the “Ship Money” Fleet of Charles the
First—_circ._ 1637.
“OLD DREADNOUGHT’S” _DREADNOUGHT_ 28
From the original drawing made in 1740 for the official
dockyard model. Now in the Author’s collection.
THE RED-LETTER DAY OF NELSON’S CALENDAR. HOW THE _DREADNOUGHT_
LED THE ATTACK ON THE 21ST OF OCTOBER, 1757 34
Painted by Swaine. Engraved and Published in 1760.
WHEN GEORGE THE THIRD WAS KING. OFFICERS AT AFTERNOON TEA ASHORE 38
Thomas Rowlandson. 1786.
MANNING THE FLEET IN 1779. A WARM CORNER FOR THE PRESS GANG 38
James Gillray. October 15th, 1779.
THE COUNTY AND ITS SHIP. THE _KENT_ TROPHY CHALLENGE SHIELD 54
From a photograph kindly lent by the designers and
manufacturers of the trophy, Messrs. George Kenning & Son,
Goldsmiths, Little Britain and Aldersgate Street, London.
THE SCENE OF THE OPERATIONS UNDER ADMIRAL WATSON AND CLIVE 76
From Major James Rennell’s “Bengal Atlas,” published in
1781. Reproduced by the courtesy of the Royal Geographical
Society.
ADMIRAL BOSCAWEN’S VICTORY 136
In the foreground to the right is seen the _Warspite_
attacking the _Téméraire_. Boscawen’s flagship, the
_Namur_, is in the centre flying the Admiral’s Blue Flag at
the main, and at the fore the red battle-flag, the “Bloody
Flag” of the Old Navy. Painted by Swaine. Engraved and
published in 1760.
HAWKE’S VICTORY IN QUIBERON BAY 152
The picture shows the _Royal George_ (in the centre)
sinking the _Superbe_, and the _Formidable_ (immediately
beyond the _Superbe_ and in the background) lowering her
colours to the _Resolution_ (the ship coming up astern
of the _Royal George_). Painted by Swaine. Engraved and
published in 1760.
THE EXECUTION OF ADMIRAL BYNG 164
From a contemporary print.
PORTSMOUTH IN THE YEAR THAT THE _VICTORY_ JOINED THE FLEET 170
From a contemporary print.
AT PORTSMOUTH POINT 176
Thomas Rowlandson.
IN PORTSMOUTH HARBOUR 176
Thomas Rowlandson.
THE _VICTORY_ ON HER FIRST CRUISE 186
Drawn by Captain Robert Elliot, R.N. Engraved and Published
in 1780.
THE FIRST FIGHT IN FRIGATE BAY, ST. KITTS 198
Admiral Sir Samuel Hood’s squadron of 22 ships (at anchor)
beating off De Grasse’s opening attack with 28 ships (shown
coming into the bay under full sail) at 2.30 p.m. on
January 25th, 1782. Drawn by N. Pocock, “from a sketch made
by a gentleman who happened at the time to be on a visit at
a friend’s, on a height between Basse Terre and Old Road.”
OUR FIRST _DONEGAL_ 212
The captured French line-of-battle ship _Hoche_, being
towed by the _Doris_, 36, Lord Ranelagh, into Lough Swilly.
Drawn by N. Pocock, from a sketch made from the _Robust_ by
Captain R. Williams of the Marines.
REPRODUCTION OF THE OFFICIAL DRAWING OF THE _VICTORY’S_
FORETOPSAIL AFTER TRAFALGAR AS RETURNED INTO STORE AT
CHATHAM DOCKYARD IN MARCH, 1806 228
TRAFALGAR—12 NOON: AS SKETCHED ON THE SPOT BY A FRENCH OFFICER 252
From a photograph of the original sepia drawing now in
the possession of a descendant of Captain Lucas of the
_Redoutable_.
CHAMPIONS OF THE FLEET
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.
I
OUR _DREADNOUGHTS_:—THEIR NAME AND BATTLE RECORD
A name through all the world renown’d,
A name that rouses as a trumpet sound.
The “Massacre of Saint Bartholomew’s Day”—on the 24th of August,
1572—was directly the cause of the coming into existence of our first
_Dreadnought_.
Startled and horrified at the terrible news, as the details of the
ghastly story crossed the channel, Queen Elizabeth replied by instantly
calling the forces of England to arms. John Hawkins, at the head of
twenty ships of war, was sent to cruise off the Azores. The rest of the
fleet was ordered to mobilize and be ready to concentrate in the Downs.
Instructions were issued for the beacons to be watched. The militia were
ordered to muster and march to the coast. A subsidy was sent over to the
Protestants in Holland, and a rush of volunteers followed to join those
from England already in the field. Huguenot refugees in this country
were given leave to fit out vessels to help their co-religionists at La
Rochelle. Four men-of-war for the Royal Navy were ordered to be laid down
forthwith. They comprised the most important effort in shipbuilding that
England had made for ten years.
To facilitate rapidity of building, the work on the four vessels was
divided between the two chief master-shipwrights—or, as we should say,
naval constructors—of the day: two ships to Matthew Baker, two ships to
Peter Pett. Both men were at the top of their profession. Peter Pett was
a distinguished member of the great family of naval shipwrights, whose
fame has come down to our own times. Baker, who was also of a family of
naval shipwrights of repute, was considered by many of the naval officers
of the day as the better man. “Mr. Baker,” wrote one, “for his skill and
surpassing grounded knowledge in the building of the ships advantageable
to all purposes hath not in any nation his equal.” Pett and Baker were
keen business rivals, and their rivalry came into play on the present
occasion.
The names of the new ships were announced in due course, and represented
Her Majesty’s mood on the occasion. She herself selected and appointed
them with intention. It was Queen Elizabeth’s way to give her ships
“telling” names. “The choice of energetic names for the ships of her
Royal Navy,” it has been said, “was one of the means employed by the
heroic and politic Elizabeth to infuse her own dauntless spirit into
the hearts of her subjects, and to show to Europe at large how little
she dreaded the mightiest armaments of her enemies.” More than that,
however, needs to be said. As a rule, in the cases of her bigger ships,
the Queen chose names that carried, in addition, an underlying meaning,
that bore direct allusion to some national event of the hour. According
to one who lived at the time, writing about the first ship launched by
the Queen, to which, in accordance with old custom, the sovereign’s name
was given: “The great Shipp called the _Elizabeth Jonas_ was so named by
Her Grace in remembrance of her owne delyverance from the furye of her
Enemys, from which in one respect she was no less myraculously preserved
than was the prophet Jonas from the Belly of the whale.” In like manner
our first _Victory_ and our first _Triumph_ were given those ever famous
names, in the first place, of set intention to commemorate the historic
double-event of the year in which they both joined the Queen’s fleet.
The _Aid_, or _Ayde_, another Elizabethan man-of-war, was so called
to commemorate Elizabeth’s first expedition to help the Huguenots of
Normandy in their forlorn hope struggle for liberty of conscience,
which was just setting out when the _Aid_ went off the stocks. Our
first _Revenge_, of immortal renown, did not receive that name at
haphazard in the year of Don John of Austria’s insolent threat to invade
England and depose Elizabeth by force of arms. Our first _Repulse_ was
appointed that name—extant to this day in the Royal Navy for one of our
older battleships—in memory of the defeat of the Spanish Armada:—_Dieu
Repulse_ was the earlier form of the name as the Queen gave it. And to
take at random two other names from the list, it was to commemorate the
same overthrow of the arch-enemy of England in those times that Queen
Elizabeth chose the names _Defiance_ and _Warspite_—in curious reference,
this latter name, to an incident during the fighting with the Armada—for
two others of her men-of-war.
It was of set purpose that Queen Elizabeth, in the year of the Massacre
of Saint Bartholomew, chose the name _Dreadnought_ for one of her ships
of war. The intentions of the Catholic League towards England were
an open secret in every council chamber of Europe. The papal Bull,
excommunicating and deposing Elizabeth, had been nailed on the doors
of Lambeth Palace. It was at their disposal. Alva’s butcheries in the
Netherlands were fresh in the recollection of the world, and the memory
of other dark doings came still more closely home to our own people;
how Englishmen had been “seized in Spain and the New World to linger
amidst the tortures of the Inquisition or to die by its fires.” Burghley
and Walsingham, and others as well, had fully understood the menace for
England and the warning of Lepanto only two years before. Their secret
agents had supplied them with a copy of De Spes’ confidential report to
Alva and King Philip to the effect that the ports of England were poorly
fortified, and that only eleven at most of Queen Elizabeth’s twenty ships
of war were worth taking into account. They had not forgotten what had
happened three years before, when, under the guise of an escort for the
new Queen of Spain from Flanders to the Tagus, an extremely formidable
Spanish fleet, fully equipped for war, had come north and lain for
some weeks in the Scheldt, acting throughout in a very suspicious way.
That was a twelvemonth before Lepanto. Now the situation seemed even
more menacing for England. The Queen’s so-called Agreement with Spain,
lately come to, for practical purposes was hardly worth the paper it was
drafted on. There was Mary Stuart and her partizans to be reckoned with
also; the restless intriguing of the Roman Catholics all over England;
open rebellion in Ireland. What might not the consequences of the Paris
massacre involve in the near future? It was at such a moment that the
name _Dreadnought_ was first appointed to an English man-of-war, and the
Queen’s choice in the circumstances partook of the nature almost of an
Act of State, specially designed to express the temper of the nation.
In the same spirit of exalted patriotism in which, at a later day,
Elizabeth, from Tilbury camp, with proud scorn bade King Philip and the
Prince of Parma and all other enemies of the realm do their worst, the
great Queen, of her own royal will and pleasure, named for the Royal Navy
its first _Dreadnought_.
_Swiftsure_ was the name given to the second ship of the set.
“Swift-suer” was the way the Queen Elizabeth spelled it—“Swift-pursuer,”
that is—not an inappropriate name for the sister ship of a _Dreadnought_.
The pair were intended as ships of the line, to use a later day term.
The other two ships of the group were smaller vessels of the light
cruiser class of the period, intended for service as scouts, as the “eyes
and ears of the fleet” at sea. Their names were the _Achates_ and the
_Handmaid_, expressive names both in their way.
Matthew Baker’s men had the _Dreadnought_ and _Handmaid_ to build; Pett’s
men the _Swiftsure_ and the _Achates_. They all started work within three
weeks, and Pett’s men won the race by just a month. The _Swiftsure_ and
the _Achates_ were both sent afloat on the 11th of October, 1573; the
_Dreadnought_ and the _Handmaid_ on the 10th of the following month.
An Arctic explorer of those times, whose name lives on our maps—the man,
indeed, who named the North Cape for us, Captain Stephen Borough (or
Borogh, as he himself usually wrote it), one of “ye foure Principall
Masters in Ordinarye of ye Queene’s Maᵗⁱᵉˢ Navye Royall,” by special
appointment also the Master of the _Victory_, and a son of North Devon in
her proudest day—had naval charge and supervision over the building of
the _Dreadnought_ and the other ships at Deptford. He lodged meanwhile
at Ratcliffe, across the river, and his “traveylinge chardges,” with the
waterman’s receipt for rowing him to and fro on his weekly visits of
inspection, signed “Richard Williams of Ratcliff, Whyrryman,” is still
in existence.
The marshmen and labourers at the dockyard began their digging, “working
upon ye opening of ye dockhedde for ye launchynge,” during the first days
of November. That was the first of the preliminaries, necessitated by the
primitive arrangements of those times. The dock at Deptford in which the
timbers of the _Dreadnought_ were put together was of the crudest type:
practically an oblong excavation in the river bank, the sides and inner
end of which were shored up and kept from falling in by wooden planks.
The outer end, or river end, was closed and sealed when a ship was inside
by a water-tight dam of brushwood-faggots, clay, and stones filled in and
rammed down between the overlapping double gates of the dock. An “ingyn
to drawe water owte of ye dokke,” worked by relays of labourers, pumped
out the water inside the dock after it was closed. Before the dock could
be re-opened the stones, faggots, etc. of the “tamping” or stopping had
to be dug up and removed. Then at low water the gates would be swung
back, and the water from the river flow in as the tide rose for the
launch or float-out of the ship into the river.
On board the _Dreadnought_, meanwhile, the finishing touches were being
put by the contractors’ workmen—Thomas Hodges, of “Parris Garden,” and
Thomas Wells, of Chatham, and their men seeing to the ironwork fittings,
“ye workmanshipp and making of lockes and boltes, keyes and haidges
[_sic_] for ij newe cabbons, as also for hookes, and stockelockes,
porthaidges [_sic_], revetts and countre-revetts, shuttynges with
rings, greate dufftayles and divers other necessaries”; joiners sent by
“Jullyan Richards of London, widdow,” who had a contract for certain
other fittings; other joiners from Lewys Stocker, also of London, seeing
to “ye sellynges [_sic_] and formysling ye cabbins and makyng casements
for windows, seelings, awmeryes [_sic_], cupboards, settes, bedsteddes,
formes, stools, trisstelles, tables,” etc. “for her Grace’s newe shippe
ye _Dreadnaughte_.” Hard by, alongside Deptford creek, were lying the
masts for the ship, ready to be put in place after she was afloat; with
“toppes greate and small, mayne-tops, ffore-toppe, mizzen-toppe, and
toppe-galantes;” besides barge loads from Richard Pope, of “Ereth,”
of “gravaille for ye ballistynge of hur highness Shipe called ye
_Dreadnaughte_ at iiijᵈ every time.” Prest-master Thomas Woodcot was
meanwhile hard at work elsewhere, “travailling about the presting of
marynnars within the River of Theames for ye Launchynge and Rigging of
Hur highnes’ ij newe shippes at Deptfordstraund [_sic_] by the space of
viii daies at iijs iiijd per diem.”
The future “nucleus crew” of the _Dreadnought_, who were to act as
ship-keepers on board when the ship went round to moor with the rest of
the fleet laid up in the Medway, had been warned to be at Deptford by
the morning of the 10th of November. They were drawn apparently from
the ships lying off Gillingham, just below Chatham, or “Jillingham
Ordinarie”—the “Fleet Reserve,” as we say nowadays—and numbered,
all told, ten men and a boy. These were the names of our original
“Dreadnoughts” of three hundred and thirty-three years ago, and
their quarterly pay, according to “The Accompte as well Ordinarie as
Extraordinarie of Benjamin Gonson, Treasurer of ye Quene’s Majestie’s
Maryn cawses,” 1574, a quaint, bulky, ponderous, parchment covered
volume, of massive proportions, laced with faded green silk, and bound
with leather straps, now well worn and in parts frayed nearly away:
THE “DREADNAUGHTE.”
MARYNERS.
Robarte Baxster, boteson:—xij wekes vj daies xxxvijˢ vjᵈ
Richard Boureman, cooke: xij wekes vj daies xxixˢ vᵈ
John Awsten: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ vᵈ
Nicholas Francton: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ vᵈ
Christofer Parr, gromett: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ jᵈ
Henry Osbourne: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ vᵈ
James Laske: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ vᵈ
Richard Shutt: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ vᵈ
Robartt Woodnaughtt: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ vᵈ
William Appleford: xij wekes vj daies xxjˢ vᵈ
John Huntt, master gonner: xij wekes vj daies xxxijˢ ijᵈ
This is what the _Dreadnought_ looked like as she lay in the dock on the
Tuesday morning that saw the ship take the water. Imagine a solid-looking
heavily-timbered hull, round bowed, with long, raking forward prow
or beak, reaching out some ten or twelve yards ahead of the actual
vessel, and with at the after-end a lofty towering poop with shallow
overhanging balustraded gallery. Amidships the vessel is of a width
equal to nearly a third of her length. From the “greate beaste,” the
figure-head—a dragon—“gilded and laid with fine gold,” representing one
of the supporters of the Queen’s arms, set up on the tip of the beak,
away aft to the stern gallery is a distance of, over all, about a hundred
and twenty feet. The body of the hull itself has a keel length of some
eighty feet—from rudder post to fore-foot. Along the water-line the
bends are all tarred over, with varnished side planking above, tough oak
timber from the Crown lands of the Sussex Weald by Horsham. The topsides
above are varnished to the bulwarks, where a touch of colour shows;
ornamental carved and painted work in royal Tudor green and white, laid
on in “colours of oil” and garnished with Her Majesty’s family badges in
gold, and with here and there, on the balustrades of the quarter-rails
and stern gallery, an additional touch of red. On the stern, “painted in
oils,” are the arms of England, with the Lion and the Dragon, the Queen’s
royal supporters, and below, on a scroll, Her Majesty’s motto, _Semper
Eadem_.
[Illustration: OUR FIRST _DREADNOUGHT_
_From a Contemporary Print kindly lent by Mr. Wentworth Huyshe. (The
“Dreadnought” is shown as she appeared when serving in the “Ship Money”
Fleet of Charles the First:—circ. 1637)._]
These are other things about the ship that would strike the Deptford
visitor of that day. The square-headed forecastle is low and squat in
appearance, compared with the piled-up, narrow poop right aft, looking
over from which a foreign visitor to the Queen’s fleet once declared
that “it made one shudder to look downwards.” The bottom of the ship is
coated with “tallow and rosin mingled with pitch.” The square-cut, wide
portholes, out of which the guns will point when they are on board—the
Tower lighters will bring them down for mounting in a week or two—were
the idea, they say in the yard, of Master Shipwright Baker’s father, old
James Baker, many years ago King Harry’s shipwright, improving on the
original French style. It was old Baker too, they say, who “first adapted
English ships to carry heavy guns.” The Reformers wanted to send the old
man to the stake for “being in the possession of some forbidden books”;
but King Harry could not afford to let them burn England’s best naval
architect even for the benefit of Protestantism.
The _Dreadnought’s_ gun-ports should open some four feet clear of the
water. People have not forgotten the horror of the _Mary Rose_; what
happened to her; how she came to go down one summer’s day at Spithead.
The waist bulwarks of the _Dreadnought_, if she swims as she ought, will
be some twenty feet above the water-line. Nearly four hundred tons in
burden is our new man-of-war—five tons heavier than the _Swiftsure_, than
which ship too she is six feet longer, though the pair reckon as sister
ships. Upwards of six thousand pounds out of Queen Elizabeth’s treasury
(about £30,000 at present day value) will have been the cost of the
_Dreadnought_ when she leaves Deptford dockyard.
We will go on board for a brief look round the _Dreadnought_ within. As
we enter the ship we note how both the half-deck and the fore and aft
castles are loopholed for both arrow-fire and musketry, so as to sweep
the waist should an enemy board and get a footing amidships. Some of
the lighter guns would be able to help. The heavier guns are mostly on
the broadside, and are mounted on the decks below in a double tier. The
_Dreadnought_ altogether carries forty-two guns. Sixteen of them are
heavy guns: two “cannon-periers” of six-inch bore, hard hitters, firing
twenty-four pounder stone shot; four “culverins,” seventeen and a half
pounders, twelve feet long and five and half inches in the bore, firing
iron shot, and able to throw a ball upwards of three miles—“random shot.”
There are also ten “demi-culverins,” nine-pounders, firing four and a
half inch iron shot. The lighter guns are six “sakers,” pieces nine feet
long (five-pounders, of three and a half inch bore) and two “fawcons”
(three-pounders). The heavier guns are all muzzle-loaders. Distributed
over the upper decks are eighteen breech-loading guns, for fighting at
close quarters and rapid firing: “port-pieces,” “fowlers,” and “bases,”
as they are called. They are on swivel mountings, and fire stone and iron
shot.
All told, the _Dreadnought’s_ armament weighs thirty-two tons. The guns
are from Master Ralphe Hogge, “the Queen’s gunstone maker, and gunfounder
to the Council.” They are of Sussex iron, from Master Hogge’s own foundry
at Buxted. At this moment they are waiting at the Tower, together with
the _Dreadnought’s_ supplies of iron shot and cannon balls of Kentish
ragstone from Her Majesty’s quarries at Maidstone, stacked “in ye Bynns
upon ye Tower Wharfe each side Traitor’s Gate.” When the _Dreadnought_
goes into battle she will carry some two hundred officers and men all
told: a hundred and thirty “maryners”—“Able men for topyard, helme and
lead,” and “gromets,” or boys and “Fresh men”; with twenty gunners and
fifty soldiers. To keep her at sea will cost the Queen £303. 6s. 8d. a
month for sea-wages and victualling. Three weeks provisions and water
is the most that the ship can stow, owing to the space wanted for the
ballast, the cables for the four anchors, and the ammunition and sea
stores. That is why victualling ships have to attend Her Majesty’s fleets
on service outside the Narrow Seas. The “cook room,” of bricks and iron
and paving stones, is in the hold over the ballast. Two more notes may
be made as we return on deck and quit the ship. The captain’s cabin,
opening on the gallery aft, is neatly wainscoted and garnished with
green and white chintz, and with curtains of darnix hung at the latticed
cabin windows. There are three boats for the _Dreadnought_: the “great
boat,” which tows astern at all times, the cock-boat and the skiff, both
of which stow inboard. John Clerk, “of Redryffe, Shipwrighte,” built
the “great boat,” being paid £24, in the terms of his bill, “For the
Workmanshipp and makeinge of a new Boate for her Highness’ Shipp, the
_Dreadnought_; conteyninge xi foote Di. in lengthe; ix foote Di. in
Breadthe; and iij foote ij inches in Depthe.—By agrement.”
A brave show should our gallant _Dreadnought_ make when she goes forth
to war, with her varnished sides and rows of frowning guns and painted
top-armours (the handiwork, according to his bill, of Master Coteley, of
Deptford), and all her wide spreading sails set (“John Hawkins, Esquire,
of London,” supplied these), and at the masthead, high above all, her
flag of St. George of white Dowlas canvas with a blood-red cross of cloth
sewn on.
* * * * *
The appointed day has come, and the time for the sending afloat and
formal naming of the _Dreadnought_: Tuesday afternoon, the 10th of
November, 1573.
The ship lies ready for launching at the appointed moment, having been
duly “struck” upon the launching ways a day or two before, under the
supervision of Master Baker himself, in the dock where she has been
building; shored up on either side, and with the lifting screws and
“crabs” prepared to heave her off. The dockhead has been dug out and
finally cleared at low tide on Monday, leaving the double gates free and
in order, ready to be swung back and opened as soon as the tide begins to
make on Tuesday morning.
We will imagine ourselves on the spot at the time and looking on at what
took place. It is possible to do so, thanks to a manuscript left by
Phineas Pett, Peter’s son and successor at Deptford royal yard.
All is ready for the day’s proceedings by a little after noon, when the
important personages taking part at the launch, “by commandement of
ye officers of Her Grace’s Maryn Causys,” and the invited guests and
superior officials of the dockyard assemble for a light refection of
cake and wine in the Master Shipwright’s “lodging,” preliminary to the
ceremony.
Who named the _Dreadnought_ on that day? Unfortunately that one detail
is not mentioned in any existing record, and the Navy Office book for
the year, where the name would certainly have been found, together
with the honorarium or fee, paid according to custom, is missing. Most
probably it was Captain Stephen Borough himself, and we may imagine him
there, apparelled for the day in crimson velvet and gold lace, in the
full uniform of one entitled to wear “Her Maᵗⁱᵉˢ cote of ordinarie.”
His rank and standing as one of the “Principall Masters of the Queen’s
Maᵗⁱᵉˢ Navie in Ordinarie” qualified him for performance of so dignified
a duty. The Principal Masters were often deputed by the Lord High Admiral
to preside on his behalf at the launches of men-of-war and perform the
name-giving ceremony.
While the high officers are having their refreshments in Master
Shipwright Baker’s lodging, Boatswain Baxster and the assistant
shipwrights are stationing the men on board and at the launching tackles.
The customary “musicke” then makes its appearance, “a noyse of trumpetts
and drums,” who post themselves on the poop and the forecastle of the
ship. Next, a “standing cup” of silver-gilt, filled to the brim with
Malmsey of the best, is set up on a pedestal fixed prominently on the
poop, and the Queen’s colours are hoisted on board, together with the
flag of St. George. At the same time pennons and streamers of Tudor green
and white, and decorated with royal emblems and badges, are ranged here
and there along the ship’s sides and on the forecastle.
All is ready ere long, and then, forthwith, word is sent to Master
Shipwright Baker and the gentlemen of the company. Forthwith the
procession forms itself and sets out in stately fashion to go on board.
With his grey hair unbonneted
The old sea-captain comes;
Behind him march the halberdiers,
Before him sound the drums.
So escorted and attended the personage of the hour paces his way forth
and proceeds on board the new ship, passing along the decks and ascending
to the poop where the company group themselves according to precedence,
near by the glittering silver-gilt wine cup. Master Shipwright Baker then
gives the signal, and Boatswain Baxster’s whistle shrills out. At once
the gangs of men standing ready at the crabs and windlasses heave taut,
and a moment later, as the ship begins her first movement outwards, the
trumpets and drums sound forth. So, at a leisurely rate at the outset,
gliding off foot by foot into deeper water, the new man-of-war hauls
gradually out and clears past the dock gates till well into the stream.
The anchor is then let go and she brings up. Now it is for Captain
Borough—allowing it to have been he—to do his part.
Stans procul in prorâ, pateram tenet extaque salsos
Porricit in fluctus ac vina liquentia fundit.
The trumpets and drums cease as the “Principall Master” steps forward
and takes up his position beside the standing cup. He raises the
gleaming cup on high so that all around may see. Then, amid universal
silence, he proclaims, in a clear resonant voice that every one may
hear: “By commandment of Her Grace, whom God preserve, I name this ship
the _Dreadnought_! God save the Queen!” As the Lord High Admiral’s
representative utters the last word, he drinks from the cup, and a moment
after ceremoniously pours out a portion of the wine upon the deck. The
next moment, with a wide sweep of the arm, he heaves the standing cup,
with a little wine left in it, into the river—a sacrifice, as it were,
on behalf of the bride newly-wedded to the sea, or that the Queen’s
cup might never be put to base uses—perhaps, indeed, as a sort of
propitiatory act. So it was done, says Master Phineas Pett, “according
to the ancient custom and ceremony performed at such times.” Again there
is a blare of trumpets and a ruffle from the drums, with cheers afloat
and ashore for Her Grace, and hearty congratulations to Master Matthew
Baker on the occasion. After that the _Dreadnought_ is formally inspected
between decks and below, and the crew’s health is drunk by the high
officers in ship’s beer—sure to be of a good brew on a launching day.
By the time that all is over the ship has been warped back alongside
the shore again, and the company adjourn thereupon to wind up the
day’s proceedings with a good old English dinner, given to the Master
Shipwright and the officials of the yard at the Lord High Admiral’s
expense.
Such is a passing glimpse of the memorable scene—as far as one may
venture to reconstruct it—on “Dreadnought Day” at Deptford Royal
Dockyard, that Tuesday afternoon, in Tudor times, three hundred and
thirty-three years ago. It is hard to fancy such doings, at Deptford
of all places, now. Oxen and sheep for the London meat market nowadays
stand penned in lairs on the site of the filled-in dock whence the
_Dreadnought_ was floated out—the same dock whence the Armada _Victory_
had preceded her, whence Grenville’s _Revenge_ followed her. Master
Shipwright Baker’s lodging is nowadays a cattle drovers’ drinking bar.
The old-time navy buildings—their origin even now easily recognisable, at
any rate externally—serve as slaughterhouses, and so forth, among which
rough butcher lads, reeking of the shambles, jostle daily to and fro. On
every side is bustle and clatter and hustling, the rumbling of Smithfield
meat vans over the old-time cobble stones, the jargon of Yankee
bullock-men, the bleating of sheep under sentence of death. Strange and
hard is the fate that in these material times of ours has overtaken what
was once the premier Royal Dockyard of England, this former temple, so to
speak, of the guardian deity of our sea-girt realm:
This ruined shrine
Whence worship ne’er shall rise again:—
The owl and bat inhabit here
The snake nests in the altar stone,
The sacred vessels moulder near—
The image of the god is gone!
Fallen indeed from its high estate of former days is the ancient royal
establishment of “Navy-building town.” Where bluff King Hal used to walk
and talk with Matthew Baker’s father, “old honest Jem”; where our sixth
Edward paid a long-remembered visit, to be “banketted” (as the royal
spelling has it) and see two men-of-war go off the ways; where Elizabeth
knighted Francis Drake, and James and Charles rode down in state on many
a gala day; where Cromwell paid his second naval visit—his “grandees”
attending him, and escort of clanking Ironsides—to see the vindictively
named _Naseby_ take the water; where our second Charles liked to saunter
on occasion with Rupert at his side, and chattering Pepys and John
Evelyn in his train; where James the Second, dull and morose of mood,
for the sands of his monarchy were already running out, paid his last
historic visit one gloomy autumn afternoon of 1688; where brave old
Benbow liked best to spend the mornings of his half-pay life on shore,
and Captain Cook set out on his last voyage; where George the Third drove
down with Queen Charlotte to do honour to the naming of a _Prince of
Wales_ man-of-war; where, too, Royalty of our own time has more than
once visited—is now “a market for the landing, sale, and slaughtering of
foreign cattle.” The glory has departed—the image of the god is gone!
* * * * *
The _Dreadnought_ and _Swiftsure_ and the two smaller ships were masted
and rigged and completed for service during November and the early days
of December, after which, with the help of a hundred and fifty extra
hands, “prested in ye river of Theames for ye transportyngs about,”
they set off on the twentieth of the month to join the fleet lying
“in ordinary” in the Medway—an eight days’ voyage as it proved, owing
to squally weather and an east wind. The Queen was to have seen the
_Dreadnought_ and her squadron pass the palace at Greenwich and salute
the royal standard with cannon and a display of masthead flags, as was
the Tudor naval usage when the sovereign was in residence, but there
had been a domestic misadventure at Placentia just a few days before.
While talking with her maids of honour one afternoon, one of the Queen’s
ladies—“the Mother of the Maids”—had suddenly dropped dead in the
royal presence, and the Court had hastily removed to Whitehall. So the
_Dreadnought_ had no royal standard to salute. Three days after Christmas
the Deptford squadron took up their moorings in “Jillingham water.”
“Powerful vessels ... with little tophamper and very light, which is a
great advantage for close quarters and with much artillery, the heavy
pieces being close to the water,” reported, in a confidential letter now
in the royal archives at Simancas, one of the King of Spain’s agents in
England who saw the _Dreadnought_ and _Swiftsure_ not long after they had
joined the Medway fleet. So too, indeed, some of King Philip’s sailors
were destined to find out for themselves.
* * * * *
The Dons, indeed, were destined to taste something of the _Dreadnought’s_
quality more than once; beginning with the memorable event of the
“Singeing of the King of Spain’s Beard.” There, Drake’s right-hand man on
many a battle day, commanded the _Dreadnought_, Captain Thomas Fenner, a
sturdy son of Sussex and a seaman who knew his business.
How thoroughly Drake—“fiend incarnate; his name Tartarean, unfit for
Christian lips; Draco—a dragon, a serpent, emblem of Diabolus; Satanas
himself”—did his work among the Spaniards at Cadiz, burning eighteen
of their finest royal galleons, and carrying off six more in spite of
fireships and all the shooting of the Spanish batteries, is history.
The _Dreadnought_, after experiencing a narrow escape from shipwreck
off Cape Finisterre at the outset of her cruise, took her full share of
what fighting there was. She was present, too, at the second act of the
drama, which took place off the Tagus with so fatal a sequel for the
hapless Commander-in-Chief designate of the Armada, the Marquis de Santa
Cruz—the “Iron Marquis,” “Thunderbolt of War,” the real Hero of Lepanto,
by reputation the ablest sea-officer the world had yet seen. First,
the news that his flagship and the finest fighting galleons of his own
picked squadron—all named, too, after the most helpful among the Blessed
Saints of the Calendar—together with his best transports and victuallers,
had been boarded and taken and sacrilegiously set ablaze to, burned
to the water’s edge, one after the other, by those “accursed English
Lutheran dogs.” Worse still. To be then defied to his face, he, Spain’s
“Captain-General of the Ocean”; to be audaciously challenged to come out
and fight and have his revenge then and there—Drake and the _Dreadnought_
and the rest openly waiting for him—in the offing. The shame of the
disaster was enough to kill the haughty Hidalgo, to make him fall sick
and turn his face to the wall and die, without Philip’s espionage and
unworthy insults goading him to the grave. The _Dreadnought_ had a hand
in shaping the destinies of England, for, in the words of the Spanish
popular saying, “to the Iron Marquis succeeded the Golden Duke,” whose
hopeless incompetence gave England every chance in the next year’s
fighting.
In the opening encounter with the Spanish Armada that July Sunday
afternoon of 1588, no ship of all the Queen’s fleet bore herself better
than did the _Dreadnought_. Captain George Beeston, of an ancient Surrey
family, held command on board the _Dreadnought_. He was a veteran officer
of the Queen’s fleet—more than twenty-five years had gone by since he
first trod the quarter-deck as a captain. Leading in among the enemy,
after the first hour of long-range firing between the English van and the
Spanish rear had brought both sides to closer quarters, the _Dreadnought_
with the ships that followed Drake’s flagship the _Revenge_, for nearly
three hours fought first with one and then with another of the most
powerful of the Spanish rear-guard ships. After that, forcing their way
among the Spaniards as they gave back and began to crowd on their main
body, she had a sharp set-to with the big galleons, led by Juan Martinez
de Recalde, perhaps the best seaman in all King Philip’s navy, commander
of the rear-division of the Armada. On the _Santa Ana_ and her consorts
the _Revenge_ and _Dreadnought_ and the rest made a spirited attack,
pushing Recalde so hard that eventually Medina Sidonia himself, the
Spanish Admiral, had to turn back and come to the rescue with every ship
at his disposal. It was enough; Drake and his men had played their part.
Before Medina Sidonia’s advance in force, the _Revenge_ and _Dreadnought_
left the _Santa Ana_, and with the rest of the attacking English van drew
off. They had done an excellent day’s work.
There was harder work for the _Dreadnought_ in the great battle of
Tuesday off Portland Bill. First came the fierce brush in the morning,
when Drake and Lord Howard and the leaders of the English fleet, after a
daring attempt to work in between the Spanish fleet and the Dorset coast,
had to tack at the last moment, baffled for want of sea room, and were
closed with by the enemy in the act of going about. On came the galleons
exultantly, their crews shouting and cheering, amid a blare of trumpets
and ruffle of drums, in full confidence to run down and sink the lighter
built English vessels. It was a moment of extreme peril:—but at the very
last, suddenly, the fortune of the day changed. As the Spaniards seemed
to be upon them the wind shifted, the English sails filled, ship by
ship and all together, and then stretching out with bowsprits pointing
seaward, the _Revenge_, _Victory_, _Ark Royal_, _Dreadnought_, and the
others safely cleared the enemy, pouring in so fierce a fire as they
passed that the Spanish ships had to sheer off. This was the first fight
of the day. Later, when the wind, going round with the sun, shifted again
and gave Drake and Howard the weather gage, came on the most desperate
encounter with the Armada that our ships had yet seen. Lord Howard in
the _Ark Royal_ and Drake in the _Revenge_, with the _Dreadnought_, the
_Lion_, the _Victory_, and the _Mary Rose_ near at hand, driving ahead
before the wind, pushed into the thick of the Spanish main body, and
attacked the enemy, in a long and furious battle that lasted until the
afternoon sun was nearing the horizon.
A third day of battle was yet to come—Thursday’s hot fight off the back
of the Isle Wight, and here again the _Dreadnought_ took her full share
of what was done, until the long summer day drew to its close and the
Armada “gathered in a roundel,” sullenly stood off eastward, proposing to
fight no more until the coast of Flanders had been made.
Next morning the _Dreadnought’s_ captain was summoned on board Lord
Howard’s flagship, the _Ark Royal_. He returned “Sir George,” knighted by
the Lord High Admiral on the quarter-deck, in the presence of the enemy.
Sunday night saw the fireship attack, so disastrous to the Armada, and
next morning followed the crowning victory of the week’s campaign, the
great fight off Gravelines of Monday, the 29th of July, “the great battle
which, more distinctly perhaps than any battle of modern times, has
moulded the history of Europe—the battle which curbed the gigantic power
of Spain, which shattered the Spanish prestige and established the basis
of England’s empire.” Here the _Dreadnought_ distinguished herself again,
fighting in the thick of the fray from eight in the morning to four in
the afternoon, within pistol-shot of the enemy most of the time.
From six till nearly eight the ships of Drake’s squadron had to bear the
brunt of the fight, with, for antagonists, Medina Sidonia himself and his
chief captains, who had gathered to stand by their admiral. Trying to
rally the Armada after the panic of the night, this gallant band had at
first, from before daybreak, anchored in a group, to act as rear-guard
to the Spanish fleet, firing signal guns to stop their flying consorts,
and sending pinnaces to order the fugitives back. Then Hawkins in the
_Victory_, with the _Dreadnought_, the _Mary Rose_, and _Swallow_, and
other ships unnamed, came up and struck in. Now moving ahead through
her own smoke to plunge into the mêlée and come to the rescue of some
hard-pressed consort, now working tack for tack parallel with and firing
salvo after salvo at short range into some towering galleon or huge
water-centipede-like galleass—so the hours of that eventful forenoon
wore through on the _Dreadnought’s_ powder-begrimed decks. “Sir George
Beeston behaved himself valiantly,” records the official _Relation of
Proceedings_, drawn up for the Lord High Admiral. In vain did the most
formidable of the Spanish galleons try to close and board. Ship after
ship was forced back with shattered bulwarks and splintered sides, and
with their scuppers spouting blood, after each English broadside, as the
round shot crashed in among the masses of Spanish soldiery, packed on
board the galleons as closely almost as they could stand.
More Spaniards joined their admiral as Sidonia passed north, the Spanish
rear and centre squadrons forming together a long straggling array,
among the ships of which, from nine to after one o’clock, the _Revenge_,
_Victory_, _Dreadnought_, _Triumph_, _Ark Royal_, and the rest charged
through and through fighting both broadsides. Shortly after two o’clock,
the English ships passed on, pressing forward to overtake the Spanish
van group of galleons. By four o’clock the battle was won, but firing
went on till nearly six, “when every man was weary with labour, and our
cartridges spent and our ammunition wasted” (_i.e._ used up).
Once more the _Dreadnought_ followed the fortunes of Drake’s flag
to battle; again, too, as Captain Fenner’s ship. In the year after
the Armada she had her part in escorting the Corunna expedition, the
“counter-Armada,” designed to beat up the quarters of the enemy at home
and attempt the wresting of Portugal from the Spanish yoke. A landing
party of “Dreadnoughts” fought ashore. Led by Drake and the general of
the soldiers, Sir John Norris, they drove the Spaniards before them.
“Unto every volly flying round their ears,” says old Stow, “the generall,
turning his face towards the enemie would bow and vale his bonnet, saying
‘I thank you, Sir! I thank you, Sir!’ to the great admiration of all
his campe and of Generall Drake.” The wine vaults of Corunna, however,
interposed on behalf of Spain. Soldiers and sailors alike broke in and
got drunk, and all that could be done after that was to reship the men
and write the campaign down a failure.
In the attack on Brest in 1594, when Sir Martin Frobisher met his death,
the _Dreadnought_ had her share. Two years after that she fought with
Essex and Raleigh in the grand attack on Cadiz—this time as one of the
picked ships of Sir Walter Raleigh’s own “inshore squadron.” She sailed
with Sir Walter again after that in the celebrated “Islands Voyage”; and
then the curtain rings down on the memorable days of the story of the
_Dreadnought_ of the Great Queen’s fleet. The old ship lasted afloat
(after an expensive rebuild in James the First’s reign) until the time of
the Civil War. She figured in the interim in the Rochelle Expedition and
also in one of Charles the First’s Ship-money fleets. The _Dreadnought_
of St. Bartholomew’s Day and Matthew Baker made her last cruise of all in
the year of Marston Moor.
* * * * *
Six _Dreadnoughts_ in all have flown the pennant since England’s Armada
_Dreadnought_ passed away.
[Illustration: “OLD DREADNOUGHT’S” _DREADNOUGHT_
_From the original drawing made in 1740 for the official dockyard model.
Now in the Author’s Collection._]