A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan - The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2)

A >> A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan >> The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2)

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35

On the 4th of May the squadron was off Tetuan, on the African coast, a
little east of Gibraltar, and, as the wind was too foul for progress,
Nelson, ever watchful over supplies, determined to stop for water and
fresh beef, which the place afforded. There he was joined by the
frigate "Decade" from Gibraltar, and for the first time, apparently,
received a rumor that the allied fleets had gone to the West Indies.
He complains, certainly not unreasonably, and apparently not unjustly,
that Sir John Orde, who had seen the French arrive off Cadiz, had not
dogged their track and ascertained their route; a feat certainly not
beyond British seamanship and daring, under the management of a dozen
men that could be named off-hand. "I believe my ill luck is to go on
for a longer time, and I now much fear that Sir John Orde has not sent
his small ships to watch the enemy's fleet, and ordered them to return
to the Straits mouth, to give me information, that I might know how to
direct my proceedings: for I cannot very properly run to the West
Indies, without something beyond mere surmise; and if I defer my
departure, Jamaica may be lost. Indeed, as they have a month's start
of me, I see no prospect of getting out time enough to prevent much
mischief from being done. However, I shall take all matters into my
most serious consideration, and shall do that which seemeth best under
all circumstances." "I am like to have a West India trip," he wrote to
Keats, one of his favorite captains; "but that I don't mind, if I can
but get at them."

The wind hauling somewhat to the southward on the 5th, allowed the
fleet to lay a course for Gibraltar. The operation of getting bullocks
was stopped at once, and the ships weighed. In this brief stay, the
water of the fleet had been completed and another transport cleared.
Next day Gibraltar was reached. The wind, westerly still, though fair
for this stretch, remained foul for beating out of the Straits against
a current which ever sets to the eastward; and many of the officers,
presuming on a continuance of the weather that had so long baffled
them, hurried their washing ashore. Nelson, however, keenly vigilant
and with long experience, saw indications of a change. "Off went a gun
from the Victory, and up went the Blue Peter,[97] whilst the Admiral
paced the deck in a hurry, with anxious steps, and impatient of a
moment's delay. The officers said, 'Here is one of Nelson's mad
pranks.' But he was right."[98] The wind came fair, a condition with
which the great admiral never trifled. Five hours after the anchors
dropped they were again at the bows, and the fleet at last standing
out of the Mediterranean; the transports in tow of the ships of war.
Nelson's resolve was fast forming to go to the West Indies. In fact,
at Tetuan, acting upon this possibility, he had given conditional
orders to Bickerton to remain in command of the Mediterranean
squadron, assigning to that service half a dozen frigates and double
that number of smaller cruisers, and had transferred to him all
station papers necessary for his guidance,--a promptness of decision
which sufficiently shows one of the chief secrets of his greatness.
"If I fail," said he to Dr. Scott, "if they are not gone to the West
Indies, I shall be blamed: to be burnt in effigy or Westminster Abbey
is my alternative." Evidently he was not unmindful of the fickle
breath of popular favor, whose fluctuations Radstock was noting. Dr.
Scott, who witnessed his chief's bearing at this time, always
considered that he never exhibited greater magnanimity than in this
resolution, which Jurien de la Graviere also has called one of his
finest inspirations.

Great, indeed, was his promptitude, alike in decision and in act; but
he was no less great in his delays, in the curb he placed on his
natural impetuosity. "God only knows, my dear friend," he wrote at
this moment to Davison, "what I have suffered by not getting at the
enemy's fleet;" but, in all his impatience, he would not start on that
long voyage until he had exhausted every possibility of further
enlightenment. "Perseverance _and_ patience," he said, "may do much;"
but he did not separate the one from the other, in deed or in word.
Circumspection was in him as marked a trait as ardor. "I was in great
hopes," he wrote the Admiralty, "that some of Sir John Orde's frigates
would have arrived at Gibraltar, from watching the destination of the
enemy, from whom I should have derived information of the route the
enemy had taken, but none had arrived." Up to April 27th nothing had
been heard of them at Lisbon. "I am now pushing off Cape St. Vincent,
and hope that is the station to which Sir John Orde may have directed
his frigates to return from watching the route of the enemy. If
nothing is heard there, I shall probably think the rumours which are
spread are true, that their destination is the West Indies, and in
that case think it my duty to follow them." "I am as much in the dark
as ever," he wrote on the same date, May 7th, to Nepean, one of the
puisne lords. "If I hear nothing, I shall proceed to the West Indies."

The wind continued fair for nearly forty-eight hours, when it again
became westerly; but the fleet was now in the Atlantic. On the 9th of
May the "Amazon" rejoined, bringing a letter from another ship of war,
which enclosed a report gathered from an American brig that had left
Cadiz on the 2d. According to this, while there were in Cadiz diverse
rumors as to the destination of the allied fleets, the one most
generally accepted was that they were bound to the West Indies. That
night the fleet anchored in Lagos Bay, to the eastward of Cape St.
Vincent, and the unending work of discharging transports was again
resumed. Nelson, shortly before leaving Gibraltar, had received
official notification that a convoy carrying five thousand troops was
on its way to the Mediterranean, and would depend upon him for
protection. He felt it necessary to await this in his present
position, and he utilized the time by preparing for a very long chase.

At Lagos, Rear-Admiral Campbell of the Portuguese Navy, who had served
with the British in the Mediterranean six years before, visited the
"Victory," and certain intelligence that Villeneuve was gone to the
West Indies was by him given to Nelson. The latter had now all the
confirmation needed, by such an one as he, to decide upon his line of
action. "My lot is cast, my dear Ball, and I am going to the West
Indies, where, although I am late, yet chance may have given them a
bad passage, and me a good one: I must hope the best." "Disappointment
has worn me to a skeleton," he writes to his late junior in the
Mediterranean, Campbell, "and I am in good truth, very, very far from
well." "If I had not been in pursuit of the enemy's fleet, I should
have been at this moment in England, but my health, or even my life,
must not come into consideration at this important crisis; for,
however I may be called unfortunate, it never shall be said that I
have been neglectful of my duty, or spared myself." "It will not be
supposed I am on a party of pleasure," he wrote to the Secretary of
the Admiralty, "running after eighteen sail of the line with ten, and
that to the West Indies;" but, he summed up his feelings to Davison,
"Salt beef and the French fleet, is far preferable to roast beef and
champagne without them."

On the 10th of May only was his purpose finally and absolutely formed,
for on that day he sent a sloop to Barbadoes, his intended point of
arrival, to announce his coming; requesting that an embargo might be
laid at once on all vessels in port, to prevent the news reaching the
enemy at Martinique or elsewhere. In the morning of the 11th the fleet
weighed, and at 4 P.M. the expedition from England arrived. It was
accompanied by two ships-of-the-line, to which Nelson joined a third,
the "Royal Sovereign," which sailed so badly, from the state of her
bottom, that she would retard a movement already too long delayed. At
seven that evening the fleet was under full sail for the West Indies.

The voyage across was uneventful; the ships, as customary for this
passage, stood to the southward and westward into the trade winds,
under whose steady impulse they advanced at a daily average speed of
one hundred and thirty-five miles, or between five and six miles an
hour. This rate, however, was a mean between considerable extremes,--a
rate of nine miles being at times attained. The slackest winds, which
brought down the average, are found before reaching the trades, and
Nelson utilized this period to transmit to the fleet his general plan
for action, in case he found the allies at sea. The manner in which
this was conveyed to the individual ships is an interesting incident.
The speed of the fleet is necessarily that of its slowest member; the
faster ships, therefore, have continually a reserve, which they may at
any moment bring into play. The orders being prepared, a frigate
captain was called on board the "Victory" and received them. Returning
to his own vessel, he made all sail until on the bow[99] of one of the
ships-of-the-line. Deadening the way of the frigate, a boat was
dropped in the water and had only to pull alongside the other vessel
as it came up. The frigate remained slowed until passed, and the boat,
having delivered its letter, came easily alongside again,--the whole
operation being thus conducted with the least expenditure of time and
exertion.[100]

There was in the fleet one ship that had been steadily in commission
since 1801, and was now in very shaky condition. This was the
"Superb," seventy-four. She had only been kept out by the extreme
exertions of her commander, Keats, one of the most distinguished
captains of the day, and he had entreated that he should not be sent
away now, when the moment of battle seemed near. By a singular irony
of fate, this zealous insistence caused him to miss Trafalgar, at
which the "Royal Sovereign," that parted at Lagos, was present,
repaired and recoppered,--a new ship. Keats, whose energy and
readiness made him a great favorite with Nelson, obtained permission
not to stop when other ships did, but always to carry a press of sail;
and he lashed his studding-sail booms to the yards, as the constant
direction of the trade-winds allows them to be carried steadily.
Notwithstanding all that could be done, the "Superb" seems to have set
the pace, and slower than could have been wished; which drew from
Nelson's customary kindly thoughtfulness a few lines too
characteristic to be omitted.

MY DEAR KEATS,--I am fearful that you may think that the Superb
does not go so fast as I could wish. However that may be, (for
if we all went ten knots, I should not think it fast enough,)
yet I would have you be assured that I know and feel that the
Superb does all which is possible for a ship to accomplish; and
I desire that you will not fret upon the occasion.... Whatever
may happen, believe me ever, my dear Keats, your most obliged
and sincere friend,

NELSON AND BRONTE.

A week seems to have elapsed before he could get a suitable
opportunity for sending this, and he then, on the 27th of May, added:
"Our passage, although not very quick, has been far from a bad one;"
and he thought that they would gain fourteen days upon the allies. The
actual gain was ten, the latter being thirty-four days from Cadiz to
Martinique, the British twenty-four to Barbadoes. The enemy were
therefore three weeks in the West Indies before Nelson arrived; but in
that time they neither accomplished nor undertook anything but the
recapture of Diamond Rock, a precipitous islet off the south end of
Martinique, which the British had held for some time, to the great
annoyance of the main island.

Reaching Barbadoes on the afternoon of June 4th, Nelson found that the
day before information had been received from General Brereton,
commanding the troops at Santa Lucia, that the allied fleets had
passed there, going south, during the night of May 28-29. The
intelligence was so circumstantial that it compelled respect, coming
from the quarter it did. "There is not a doubt in any of the Admirals'
or Generals' minds," wrote Nelson to the Admiralty, in the despatch
announcing his arrival, "but that Tobago and Trinidada are the enemy's
objects." Nelson himself was sceptical,--the improbability seemed
great to his sound military perceptions; but, confident as he was in
his own conclusions in dilemmas, his mind was too sane and well
balanced to refuse direct and credible evidence. Summing up the
situation with lamentations, six weeks later, he said to Davison:
"When I follow my own head, I am, in general, much more correct in my
judgment, than following the opinion of others. I resisted the opinion
of General Brereton's information till it would have been the height
of presumption to have carried my disbelief further. I could not, in
the face of generals and admirals, go N.W., when it was _apparently_
clear that the enemy had gone south." His purpose had been not to
anchor, but to pick up such ships-of-the-line as he found there,--two
seventy-fours,[101] as it turned out,--and to proceed with them to
Martinique, which he naturally assumed to be the enemy's headquarters.
As it was, receiving a pressing request from the commanding general at
Barbadoes to let him accompany the fleet with two thousand troops, he
anchored in Carlisle Bay at 5 P.M. At half-past nine the next morning
he was again under way for Trinidad. Some curious misunderstandings
maintained this mistaken impression as to the enemy's actions, until
communication with Trinidad was had on the evening of June 7th. It was
found then that no hostile force had appeared, although the British
fleet for a moment had been believed to be such.

Nelson at once started north again. A report reached him that a second
squadron, of fourteen French and Spanish ships from Ferrol, had
arrived at Martinique. He said frankly that he thought this very
doubtful, but added proudly: "Powerful as their force may be, they
shall not with impunity make any great attacks. Mine is compact,
theirs must be unwieldy, and although a very pretty fiddle, I don't
believe that either Gravina or Villeneuve know how to play upon it."
On the 9th he for the first time got accurate information. An official
letter from Dominica[102] announced that eighteen ships-of-the-line,
with smaller vessels, had passed there on the 6th of June. But for the
false tidings which on the 4th had led him, first to pause, and then
to take a wrong direction, Nelson argued, and not unjustly, that he
would have overtaken them at this point, a bare hundred miles from
Barbadoes. "But for wrong information, I should have fought the battle
on June 6th where Rodney fought his." The famous victory of the latter
was immediately north of Dominica, by which name it is known in French
naval history. "There would have been no occasion for opinions," wrote
Nelson wrathfully, as he thought of his long anxieties, and the narrow
margin by which he failed, "had not General Brereton sent his damned
intelligence from St. Lucia; nor would I have received it to have
acted by it, but that I was assured that his information was very
correct. It has almost broke my heart, but I must not despair." It was
hard to have borne so much, and then to miss success from such a
cause. "Brereton's wrong information could not be doubted," he told
his intimates, "and by following it, I lost the opportunity of
fighting the enemy." "What a race I have run after these fellows; but
God is just, and I may be repaid for all my moments of anxiety."

When Villeneuve, with his ill-trained and sickly[103] fleet, left
Martinique on the 4th of June, he had, of course, no knowledge of
Nelson's approach. Nearly up to that date it was not known, even in
London, where the latter had gone. A frigate had reached the French
admiral on the 29th of May, with orders from Napoleon to make some
attempts against the British islands during the time he was awaiting
the Brest squadron. For this reason he sailed, and just outside the
harbor was joined by two ships from France, raising his force to
twenty of the line. He steered north, intending to gain to windward,
and thence return upon Barbadoes, his first proposed conquest. On the
8th of June, off Antigua, were captured fourteen British
merchant-ships, which had imprudently put to sea from that island.
From these Villeneuve got a report that Nelson had arrived with
fourteen ships-of-the-line, to which his imagination added five he
believed to be at Barbadoes. He decided at once to return to Europe,
abandoning all his projects against the British possessions.
Transferring hastily a number of troops to frigates, as garrisons for
the French islands, he sailed the next day for the northward to gain
the westerly winds which prevail in the higher latitudes. Of the forty
days he was to remain in the West Indies--reduced to thirty-five by
subsequent instructions--only twenty-six had passed. Whatever else
might result in the future, Nelson was justified in claiming that his
pursuit, effected under such discouragements, had driven the enemy out
of the West Indies, saved the islands, and, as he added, two hundred
sail of sugar ships. Only extreme imprudence, he fairly maintained,
was responsible for the loss of the fourteen from Antigua.

Nelson himself was off Antigua on the 12th of June, exactly one week
after he left Barbadoes. There he received all the information that
has just been mentioned as to the enemy's movements. A rapid decision
was necessary, if he might hope yet to overtake his fortune, and to
baffle finally the objects of the allies, whatever they might be. "I
must be satisfied they have bent their course for Europe before I push
after them, which will be to the Straits' mouth;" but later in the
same day he has learned that they were standing to the northward when
last seen, and had sent back their troops to Guadaloupe, therefore, "I
hope to sail in the morning after them for the Straits' mouth." That
night the troops were landed, and a brig of war, the "Curieux," was
despatched to England with word of his intentions. At the same time,
while believing the allies were bound back to the Mediterranean, he
recognized that it was possible they might be going farther north, to
one of the Biscay ports, and consequently took measures to notify the
commanding officer off Ferrol to be on his guard. The frigate charged
with this communication was kept with the fleet until the 19th, by
which time he had obtained at sea additional and more precise
knowledge of Villeneuve's direction. This important warning was duly
received, and in advance of the enemy's appearance, by the admiral for
whom it was intended.

In taking this second decision, to abandon the West Indies once more
to themselves, as a month before he had abandoned the Mediterranean,
Nelson had to rely only upon his own natural sagacity and practised
judgment. "I hear all, and even feel obliged, for all is meant as
kindness to me, that I should get at them. In this diversity of
opinions I may as well follow my own, which is, that the Spaniards are
gone to the Havannah, and that the French will either stand for Cadiz
or Toulon--I feel most inclined to the latter place; and then they may
fancy that they will get to Egypt without any interruption." "So far
from being infallible, like the Pope, I believe my opinions to be very
fallible, and therefore I may be mistaken that the enemy's fleet has
gone to Europe; but I cannot bring myself to think otherwise,
notwithstanding the variety of opinions which different people of good
judgment form."

Still, as before, his judgments, if rapid, are not precipitate. Though
characterized by even more of insight than of reasoning, no conditions
are left out of sight, nor, as he declared, was a deaf ear turned to
any suggestion. Upon the whole, one is more struck by the accuracy of
the inferences than by the antecedent processes as summarized by
himself; yet the weight of evidence will be found on the side he
espouses. Erroneous in particulars, the general conclusions upon which
he bases his future course are justified, not only by the results now
known to us, but to impartial review of their probability at the
moment. Most impressive of all, however, is the strength of
conviction, which lifts him from the plane of doubt, where unaided
reason alone would leave him, to that of unhesitating action,
incapable of looking backward. In the most complete presentation of
all his views, the one he wished brought before the Prime Minister, if
his conduct on this momentous occasion were called in question, he
ends thus: "My opinion is firm as a rock, that some cause, _orders_,
or _inability_ to perform any service in these seas, has made them
resolve to proceed direct for Europe, sending the Spanish ships to the
Havannah." It is such conviction, in which opinion rather possesses a
man than is possessed by him, that exalts genius above talent, and
imbues faith with a power which reason has not in her gift.

There were among his conclusions certain ones which placed Nelson's
mind, however fretted by disappointment, at ease concerning any future
harm the enemy might be able to do. Another wreath of laurel, which
seemed almost within his grasp, had indeed evaded him, and no man felt
more keenly such a loss; but he was reasonably sure that, if
Villeneuve were gone to Europe, he could not outstrip pursuit by long
enough to do much harm. The harassing fear, which he had borne through
the long beat down the Mediterranean and the retarded voyage to
Martinique, had now disappeared. Going out he had gained ten days upon
the allies; they had only five days' start of him in the return. He
recognized, moreover, the great significance of their inactivity
during the three weeks they had the Windward Islands, if not all the
West Indies, defenceless before them. "If they were not able to make
an attack for three weeks after their arrival, they could not hope for
greater success after our means of resistance increased, and their
means of offence were diminished." If this consideration, on the one
hand, showed the improbability of their proceeding against Jamaica,
after Nelson's coming, when they had not ventured before, it gave also
an inkling of their probable efficiency for immediate action in
Europe. "They will not give me credit for quitting the West Indies for
a month to come;" therefore it was unlikely that they would think it
necessary to proceed at once upon their next enterprise, after
reaching port. "I must not despair of getting up with them before they
enter the Straits," he writes Elliot. "At least, they will have no
time to carry any of their future plans into execution, and do harm to
any of the countries under my charge." If his thirst for glory was
unslaked, his fears of disaster had disappeared.

Villeneuve, guided by instructions recently received from Napoleon, to
meet the case of the Brest squadron not getting away, had gone
actually for Ferrol, where he was to join a squadron of five French
and nine Spanish ships, which would raise his own force to thirty-four
of the line; but Nelson, unable to know this, argued correctly that,
in the uncertainty, he must leave this chance to the Biscay ships, and
that for himself the Mediterranean possessed the first claim. At noon
of June 13th, nine days after reaching Barbadoes, he got away from
Antigua. The necessity for gaining the westerly winds made his course
for some time the same as that of Villeneuve, and left him not without
hopes that he might yet fall in with the allies, especially if, as he
thought, they were destined to the Straits. On the 17th an American
schooner was spoken, which had seen the combined squadron two days
before, steering also to the northward. This report, wrote Nelson to
the Admiralty, "can leave me no room to doubt but that I am hard upon
the heels of the enemy's fleet. I think we cannot be more than eighty
leagues from them at this moment, and by carrying every sail, and
using my utmost efforts, I shall hope to close with them before they
get to either Cadiz or Toulon." The news was sent ahead by two
vessels, which parted from the fleet on the 19th of June,--one for
Gibraltar, with despatches and letters for the admiral and ministers
in the Mediterranean; one for Lisbon, whence this important
intelligence would be forwarded to England and to the commanding
officer off Ferrol. Still believing them bound for the Straits, Nelson
expressed in the fleet the opinion that they would keep well to the
southward of the Azores, so as not to be seen by British cruisers
centred there. In this he was mistaken, as he was in their final
destination; both fleets sighted the islands,--- the French on the
30th of June to the northward of the group, while the British passed
through it on the 8th of July. He admitted, however, that he was
doubtful in the matter. "It is very uncertain whether they will go to
Ferrol or Cadiz;" and nothing can indicate more clearly his
perplexity, and his sense of the urgency of the case, than his parting
on the same day with two of the four small cruisers he had with him,
in order to insure that Ferrol as well as Gibraltar should have prompt
warning.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35