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J 



NELSON 

AND OTHER NAVAL STUDIES 



> 



i 



NELSON 

AND OTHER NAVAL 

STUDIES 

BY JAMES RrTHURSFIELD, M.A. 

HON. PBLLOW OP JBSVf COLLEGB| OXFORD 



"THtUI IS BUT ONB NBLSON" 






WITH ILLOBTKATIOMS 



NEW YORK 
E. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY 

1920 



, .A 






TO 

- -X THE CHILDREN OF NELSON 

THE OmCERS AND MEN OF HIS MAJESTY'S FLEET 

I DEDICATE THIS BOOK 



«\ 



) 



IN FRIENDLY AND GRATEFUL REMEMBRANCE 

OF MANY HAPPY AND FRUITFUL HOURS 

SPENT IN THEIR COMPANY 

AFLOAT AND ASHORE 

DURING FIVE-AND-THIRTY YEARS 



V 
f 



<. 






AUTHOR'S NOTE 



IT is necessary to state explicitly that this re-issue of 
a book pubUshed in 1909 is in no sense a new and 
revised edition, but merely a reprint in which not a 
syllable nor a comma of the text has been changed. I 
regret that owing to a misunderstanding, for which I am 
at least partly responsible, I was not informed of the 
publisher's intention to issue this reprint until the last 
moment, when it was no longer possible to make any 
changes in the text. I would, therefore, invite such new 
readers as it may attract to bear in mind that it was written 
five years before the outbreak of the Great War which has 
wrought such vast changes in the methods and aspects of 
Naval Warfare. 

As regards the Essay on *' Paul Jones," some further 
explanation is necessary, though it must needs be brief. 
That Essay was, as I stated in the Preface, " very largely 
based on what is now the standard American biography 
of Paul Jones, by Mr. A. C. Buell." The words " standard 
American biography " must now be imequivocally with- 
drawn, and for them must be substituted *' a work on which 
no reliance can be placed." When I wrote the Essay I was 
not aware that Buell 's good faith had ever been impugned 
But shortly after it was published, a letter appeared in 
the New York Times of August 29, 1 909, from the pen of 
Mrs. Anna De Koven. This lady has since published 
what is very justly entitled to be called the standard 
biography of Paul Jones, based as it is on a critical 
and exhaustive study of all the authentic materials, 
printed and manuscript, to be found in public libraries 
and private collections both in the United States and 
abroad. In her letter, Mrs. De Koven stated that on 
June 10, 1906, she had contributed an article to the same 
journal in which she claimed to have " exposed the falsity " 
of Buell's work. As soon as I had read Mrs. De Koven 's 



AUTHOR'S NOTE 

letter of August 29, 1 wrote a letter which appeared in The 
Times of September 13, 1909. In this letter I quoted 
Mrs. De Koven's letter in exienso, and assured the readers of 
my book that when I wrote the Essay on Paul Jones, *' I 
was completely ignorant of the fact that Mr. Buell's 
biography of Paul Jones was r^arded by some critics as ' an 
utterly false and discredited book/ and, in particular, that 
the document regarding the founding of the American Navy 
attributed by Mr. Buell to Paul Jones was regarded by 
them as a ' very palpable forgery.' " The quotations in the 
foregoing extract are taken from the letter of Mrs. De 
Koven which I cited in The Times of September 13, 1909. 
In my covering letter of that date I went on to remark that 
Mrs. de Koven 's all^ations were not, I believed, universally 
accepted in the United States ; but I added that I would 
do my best to get at the truth concerning Mr. Buell's 
delinquencies and Mrs. De Koven 's all^ations, and would 
then take such action as would fully satisfy the require- 
ments of historical accuracy. 

The publication in 191 3 of Mrs. De Koven 's monumental 
and exhaustive work on The Life and Letters of John Paul 
Jones has now vindicated the substantial truth of her 
allegations, and I take this opportunity, the first I 
have had since 1909, of acknowledging that Bueirs 
book, so far from being an authentic narrative, is, in 
very truth, a work of no historical authority. It is not 
now in my power to cancel or even to revise the Essay, 
since the reprint of the volume is too far advanced 
to permit of any such procedure. But I trust this Note 
will suffice to warn all my readers to place no reliance on 
any statement or document in the Essay which rests on 
the sole authority of Buell, and to induce them to give 
Mrs. De Koven full credit for her painstaking elucidation 
of the truth and for her crushing exposure of Buell's 

delinquencies. 

James R. Thursfield. 

May jO| t^ao* 



PREFACE 

WITH one exception the essays here collected have 
appeared previously at different times during the 
last few years in various serial publications. I have to 
thank the conductors of The Titnes, The Quarterly Re^ 
mew 9 The Naval Annual ^ The United Service Magagine, 
and The National Review for permission to reprint them. 
I should add that I do not claim the authorship of the 
first paper in the volume. It originally appeared in The 
Times as a leading article on the hundredth anniversary 
of Trafalgar, and it so well represents the spirit in which, 
as I think, Englishmen should celebrate an anniversary 
of the kind that I have obtained the permission of the 
conductors of The Times to reprint it as a fitting intro- 
duction to a volume which deals so largely with Nekon 
and his crowning victory at Trafalgar. 

The exception is the essay on Paul Jones. This has 
been written specially for the present volume. It is at 
once a duty and a pleasure to acknowledge that it is very 
largely based on what is now the standard American 
biography of Paul Jones by Mr. A. C. Buell. Readers of 
Mr. Buell's work will perceive at once how deeply my 
own essay is indebted to it at almost every point. I have 
'however consulted other authorities, more especially a 
bi(^;raphy published in 1825, and written, as I am assured 
by my friend Mr. John Murray, by no less famous a 
person than Benjamin Disraeli, afterwards Earl of Beacons- 
field. The volume is anonymous, and it is now, I believe, 
very rare. Probably it was never well known, nor was its 
authorship ever avowed in Disraeli's lifetime. But on 
the authority of Mr. Murray I attribute it with confidence 



viu PREFACE 

to Disraeli, if not as the writer of every word, at any rate 
as the responsible and largely contributory editor. I 
have quoted several passages from it. My readers will 
judge for themselves how far these passages betray the 
authorship I have claimed for them. 

Disraeli is the only English biographer of Paul Jones 
known to me who has attempted to do him justice. He 
evidently felt for him a certain affinity of temperament, 
a certain sympathy of soul. His youthful motto, '' Ad- 
ventures are to the adventurous," would have been as . 
congenial to Paul Jones as it was to himself. When he 
says of him, "that to perform extraordinary actions, a 
man must often entertain extraordinary sentiments, and 
that in the busiest scenes of human life, enthusiasm is 
not alwa3rs vain, nor romance always a fable," he is 
anticipating a vein of reflection with which Englishmen 
were afterwards to be made very familiar in the character 
and career of the statesman who made Queen Victoria an 
Empress and realized the dreams of his own " Tancred " 
by annexing Cyprus to her dominions. 

It is because Paul Jones has been so often misjudged 
in this country that I too have sought to bespeak for 
him a rehearing of the whole case. I may have mis- 
taken his character. It may have been as '' detestable " 
as Sir John Laughton says it was. But his acts speak 
for themselves. The man who founded the American 
^avy and showed it how to fight ; who set before it the 
high standard of conduct, attainment, and efficiency 
which still inspires it ; who propounded views of naval 
warfare and its conduct which anticipated the teaching 
of Clerk of Eldin in the eighteenth century, and that of 
Captain Mahan in our own days, and were conceived in 
the very spirit of Nelson himself; who baffled all the 
diplomacy of England at the Texel, and alone achieved 
a diplomatic triumph of which even Franklin had de- 
spaired, is certainly not a man to be dismissed from the 
court of history as a mere adventurer, a person of no im- 
portance^ even if be cannot leave it without a stain 



PREFACE ix 

upon his character. I would hardly go so far as Disraeli 
and say, '' As to his moral conduct » it would seem that 
few characters have been more subject to scrutiny and 
less to condemnation." I do not take Paul Jones to have 
been a Galahad or even a Lancelot. But whatever his 
moral delinquencies may have been, I have discovered 
none to make me ashamed of avowing a profound admira- 
tion for his extraordinary gifts and astonishing achieve- 
ments. 

The papers on " Trafalgar and the Nelson Touch " 
were written in 1905, and published in The Times during 
the early autunm of that year. I had previously enjoyed 
an opportunity of talking the matter over with G>lonel 
Desbri^, of the French General Staff, the distinguished 
author of a monumental work, well known to all students 
of the subject, entitled Profets et Untaiives de dibarquement 
aux lies Britanniqties, 179J-180S. But I found that at 
the time of my visit to G>lonel Desbriftre at the French 
War Office he had not completed those studies and re- 
searches which have since borne such abundant fruit in 
his supplementary volume, entitled Trafalgar^ which was 
only published in 1907. This will explain why no men- 
tion was made of G)lonel Desbriire's work in my articles 
as they originally appeared. The importance of his 
researches and of the conclusions he has drawn irora them 
lies not merely in his profound acquaintance with the 
whole subject, and the singularly acute and detached 
judgment he has brought to its discussion, but in the 
fact that he alone has had access to all the documents 
bearing on the subject which are preserved in the French 
and Spanish archives, the most important of them being 
printed in his volume for the first time. It is for this 
reason extremely gratifyii^ to me to find that working on 
lines in no sense suggested by myself — for the very slight 
assistance I was able to afford him in his study of the 
subject is more than generously acknowledged in his 
preface — and on materials entirely inaccessible to me, he 
has reached conclusions so closely akin to my own* He 



X PREFACE 

and I have reached our respective conclusions by different 
and independent paths. But how closely those conclu- 
sions coincide may be seen from the following sentences 
whidi I quote from his final chapter : 

Quant au dispositif d'attaque des Anglais, il semble 
dtoiontri qu'il diff^ra tout k fait des deux colonnes 
g^n^ralement admises. Pour la division du Sud, celle 
de CoIIingwood, aucun doute ne peut subsister et Tengage- 
ment sur tout le front des allies prouve bien que rorore 
de former la ligne de relftvement fut ex6cut4. Pour la 
division du Nord, celle de Nelson, la ligne de file se trans- 
fonna a\| moment de Tengagement en un ordre semi- 
d<ploy< sur un front de quatre ou cinq vaisseaux. L'amiral 
attaqua bien le premier mais il fut inun^diatement soutenu 
k sa droite et k sa gauche. 

There are a few points of detail concerning which I 
am more or less at variance with Colonel Desbri^, but 
they are none of th^n of primary importance, and there 
are others in respect of which his analysis corroborates 
mine in a very remarkable manner. These I have duly 
indicated in the notes appended at their proper place in 
the present volume. I would here add that the most 
striking corroboration of all is that furnished by three 
pictorial diagrams, representing three successive stages 
of the battle, which are preserved in the archives of the 
Captain-General at Cadiz, and are reproduced in black- 
and-white facsimile by Colonel Desbri&re. Coloured fac- 
similes of these diagrams were presented in 1907 by the 
Spanish Government to the British Admiralty, and now 
hang in the room of the Permanent Secretary of the 
Admiralty. I am informed that the original drawings 
were made by the Chief of the Staff of the Spanish 
Admiral Gravina, who commanded the rear of the allied 
line, his flag flying in the Principe d'Asturias. The first 
of these diagrams represents the moment when CoUing- 
wood, in the Royal Sovereign, had just broken the allied 
line astern of the Santa Ana, and the remaining ships of 



PREFACE zi 

line were about to follow his example. But they we 
not shown in the diagram as ranged in a line astern of 
the Royal Sovereign^ and th«?efore perpendicular to the 
enemy's line. That is the traditional representation in 
this country, but it finds no Countenance whatever from 
the diagram prepared by Gravina's Chief of the Staff. The 
rear ships of Collingwood's line are shown in a position 
which runs in a direction approximately parallel to the 
rear of the allied line, and all engaged simultaneously. 
There may be some pictorial exaggeration in this, though 
it may be noted that the Swiftsure recorded in her log 
" At half-past noon, the whole fleet in action, and Royal 
Sovereign had cut through the enemy's line " ; but, in any 
case, the draughtsman, from his position on board the 
Principe d^Asturias^ must certainly have known as well 
as any one whether the line of the attacking fleet was 
perpendicular or parallel to that of the allied rear during 
the first phase of the onslaught. He represents it as 
parallel, or nearly so ; and his testimony on this point 
seems to me well-nigh conclusive in itself, and at any 
rate quite incontrovertible when taken in connection 
with all the other evidence to the same effect. As to the 
character of Nelson's attack his testimony is of course 
far less weighty, because his position in the line was 
far removed from that of the Bucentaure and the ships 
ahead of her. But it is worthy of note that he represents 
the Victory and two ships astern of her firii^^ their port 
broadsides, as I have shown they must have done when 
they first opened fire, and steering direct for a gap in the 
allied line between the Bucentaure and the RedoutabU. 
No other ships in Nelson's column are shown as having 
opened fire at this period of the action. A rejMxiduction 
of this diagram will be found at page 66. 

I have to thank the authorities of the Admiralty for 
their kindness in allowing me to reproduce, I believe 
for the first time, and to use as a frontispiece to this 
volume, the very remarkable portrait of Nelson which 
hangs in the Board Room at the Admiralty. This por« 



xH PREFACE 

trait was painted at Palermo in 1799 by Leonardo Guz- 
zardi* It is not one of the more attractive portraits of 
Nekon, but, as I have explained on pBge 93, it has a 
special significance in the evidence it seems to afford as 
to Nelson's state of health and of mind at this critical 
period of his career. My best thanks are also due to the 
Earl of Camperdown, for his permission to reproduce, at 
page 1 29, the beautiful portrait of his illustrious ancestor 
by Hoppner, which stands as the frontispiece of his 
valuable biography of that great seaman. 

My readers will bear in mind that the essays collected 
in this volume were originally written at different dates, 
some of them several years ago. They are all of them, 
therefore, necessarily affected by the " psychological 
atmosphere " -which prevailed when they were written. 
I have so far revised them as to correct statistics and other 
statements of fact which the lapse of time has rendered 
obsolete, and even this has proved to be far from easy in 
the case of an essay like that on " The Strategy of Posi- 
tion," where I have attempted, not, I fear, with entire 
success, to describe the strategic disposition of the Fleet 
which was initiated at the end of 1904 in terms of the 
kaleidoscopic developments of more recent years. But 
I have not otherwise attempted to modify the psycho- 
logical atmosphere of their original date. That would 
have been quite impossible without rewriting them alto- 
gether. This remark applies especially to the lecture on 
" The Higher Policy of Defence " with which the volume 
concludes. It now has to reappear in a psychological at- 
mosphere very different from that in which it was originally 
written. For this reason, were I to deliver another 
lecture on the same subject to-day, I daresay I should 
express myself very differently as regards the order, 
stress, and application of the arguments employed. 
Nevertheless, I remain a convinced and wholly unrepentant 
adherent of the doctrines I enunciated in 1902. They 
were not my doctrines. I was merely the unworthy 
mouthpiece of the lessons I learnt many years ago at the 



PREFACE adu 

feet of the late Admiral Colomb and of other naval officerSi 
most of whom are happily still hving, who were asso- 
ciated with him in his life-long endeavour to bring back 
to his countrymen a renewed sense of the things which 
belong to their peace. Even the title which I gave to 
the lecture, " The Higher Policy of Defence," was not 
of my own invention. It was, I beheve, first employed, 
many years ago, by my friend Sir George Clarke, the 
present Governor of Bombay, with whom it was my 
high privilege to be associated, in 1S97, in the publica- 
tion of a volume of collected essays, entitled The Navy 
and the Nation. If I have any claim to speak with 
authority on the matters I have discussed in this present 
volume, I should certainly base it myself mainly on the 
fact that Sir George Clarke did not disdain twelve years 
ago to link his name with mine in the publication of a 
former volunie, which has assuredly owed whatever influ- 
ence it has exercised far more to his contributions than to 
mine. That volume was saturated from its first page to 
its last with the higher poUcy of defence. In the preface 
which Sir George Clarke and I drafted together — ^though 
it is only right to say now that its composition was mainly 
the work of his pen — ^we wrote : 

That the sea communications of the Empire must be 
held in war ; that if they are so held, territorial security 
against serious attack both at home and abroad is, ipso 
facto, provided ; that if they are not so held, no army of 
any assigned magnitude, and no fortifications of any 
imagined technical perfection, can avert national ruin ; 
these are the cardinal principles of Imperial Defence. 

Yet these cardinal principles are now once more being 
impugned on the highest military authority — ^that of the 
great soldier whose long and brilliant career, whose lofty 
and disinterested patriotism, whose splendid achievements 
in India and South Africa, have endeared him to every 
Rnglifthmnn^ and havc invested him with a right to speak 
on all questions of national defence which no one would 



»▼ PREFACE 

presume to disputei least of all a mere civilian student 
like myself. I have said, ''on all questions of national 
d«iimoe«" But the fact remains that, for an insular 
Power like England — a Power which can neither attack 
its enemies nor be attacked by them except across the 
sea-^^o question of national defence can ever be either 
a purely military question or a purely naval question. 
Lord Roberts is a soldier ; one of the greatest of living 
soldiers. On the military issues involved in any large 
question of national defence, I, for one, should never 
dream of disputing his authority ; but on the naval 
issues involved in the same question, I would point out, 
with all/ respect, that, apart from his immense personal 
prestige, his authority is not in kind greater than that of 
any other amateur student of the subject. He is not an 
expert in the theory and practice of naval warfare any 
more than I am myself. In that respect he and I stand 
on the same footing, if I may say so without presumption, 
and on that ground alone do I venture to dispute some 
of the premisses he has lately advanced in respect of 
the naval aq>ects of the question of invasion. 

Now I understand the school of which Lord Roberts 
is the illustrious leader to contend that we cannot rdy 
on naval force alone, however superior to that of the 
supposed enemy, to prevent an invader landing on these 
shores in such force as, in the present condition of our 
military defences, might afford the enemy a reasonable 
prospect of bringing us to submission. The incapacity 
of the Navy to " impeach " the invader on the sea is 
thus represented as due, not to any deficiency of strength 
at any given point or moment, but to some indefeasible 
defect inherent in the nature of naval force as such and 
in the nature of the element on which it operates. If it 
were due to a mere deficiency of naval strength, the 
obvious and infallible remedy would seem to be to make 
good that deficiency at any cost and with as little delay 
as possible. But that is not the remedy recommended 
by Lord Roberts and his school. They would forth- 



PREFACE XV 

with increase, and very lai^ely increase, the military 
forces of the Crown available for the defence of these 
shores. At the risk of seeming presumptuous, I must 
insist once more that, if the sailors are to be trusted in 
a matter which especially concerns their profession, this 
is emphatically the wrong way to go to work. I do not 
here pose as an adherent of what is called, for some reason 
never intelligible to me, the " Blue Water School.'' I 
have never willingly used that phrase, for frankly, I do 
not in the least know what it means. I have learnt from 
the sailors that the function of a naval force adequate 
to prevent invasion is to operate neither in the blue 
waters of the Atlantic or the Mediterranean as such, nor 
in the grey waters of the North Sea as such, but in all 
those waters, whether blue or grey, whether deep or 
shallow, from which any menace of invasion can, on any 
reasonable calculation of contingencies, be expected to 
come. But I am an adherent — ^as I have said, a con- 
vinced and wholly unrepentant adherent— of what I would 
call the *' naval " school, the school, that is, that holds 
as the cardinal principle of its creed, that With a suffix- 
ciency of naval force the invader can and will be im- 
peadied at sea, and that without a sufficiency of naval 
force he cannot be impeached at all. Am I then an 
adherent of what has been called — ^merely pour riff per- 
haps — the " dinghy " school, the school which is supposed 
to hold, though I never met a disciple of it, that not 
a dinghy full of foreign soldiers could ever land on these 
shores so long as our naval defence on the seas is suffi- 
cient? By no manner of means. I hold what is now 
the official doctrine, as quite recently expounded in Parlia- 
ment by the Secretary of State for War, that the military 
foroes of the Crown available for home defence should 
at all times be sufficient in numbers — ^and, of cotu^e, 
efficient enough in training, equipment, and organization 
— to compel any enemy who projects an invasion of this 
country to come in such force that he cannot come by 
Stealth. Of course I presuppose an effective command 



zvi PREFACE 

by this country of the seas to be traversed by the invader ; 
but that is not to b^ the question. It surely must be 
common ground with all disputants in this controversy 
that this country must never surrender the command of 
the sea to its enemies. That is the very meaning of the 
naval supremacy at which we aim, and must always aim, 
as a condition absolutely indispensable to our national 
security and our Imperial integrity. If there b any 
room for doubt, or even for any reasoiiable feeling of 
insecurity, on this vital point, the one and only way to 
remove it b instantly to set about increasing our naval 
forces to any extent that may be necessary to re-establish 
our imperilled supremacy at sea. If I entertained any 
such doubt, I would not add a single man to the Army 
until I had once more brought the Navy to its required 
strength of unchallengeable supremacy at sea. For I 
hold now, as I held with Sir George Clarke twelve years 
ago, that if the sea communications of the Empire are not 
securely held in war, " no army of any assigned magni- 
tude, and no fortifications of any imagined technical 
perfection, can avert national ruin." 

Now I do not attempt to determine either the numberi 
of the military forces that must be available for home 
defence, nor the character of the training, equipment, and 
organization that ought to be given to them if they are to 
discharge the function that I have assigned to them ; 
that I leave entirely to competent military experts, of 
whom assuredly I am not one. Neither am I a naval 
expert, for I hold that none but sailors are entitled to be 
so called ; but I know what the sailors think, for, as I am 
about to show, we have it on official record. Is it too 
much to ask the soldiers to withdraw from the naval 
province, in which they are not experts, and to confine 
themselves to the military province, in which their authority 
is no more to be disputed than that of the sailors is in 
their province? There are, indeed, some sailors whose 
authority I, at least, have no title to dispute, who follow 
the lead oJF Lord Roberts. But I suspect they do so 



PREFACE xvii 

mainly on the ground that they hold *' national service " 
of the character advocated by him to be a good thing in 
itself, rather than on the assumption which his main 
argument presupposes, namely, that no sufficiency of 
naval force can insure this country from invasion. I re- 
peat that his main argument must rest on that assump- 
tion, because, if mere insufficiency of naval force were 
alleged, the plain logic of the situation would imperatively 
insist that any and every such alleged insufficiency should 
be made good before any other form of national defence 
were even so much as attempted. But this will not 
serve the turn of Lord Roberts and his school. Soldiers, 
and the disciples of soldiers themselves, they insist on 
telling the sailor and his disciples that, whatever they 
may think to the contrary, no sufficiency of naval force 
can insure this country against invasion. I, of course, 
am no sailor, and therefore it is not for me to answer 
them. They, on the other hand, albeit experts, and 
experts not to be challenged by me at any rate, in their 
own province, are just as little experts in the sailors' 
province as I am. Fortunately there exists a tribunal, 
composed largely of experts in both provinces, to which 
we can both appeal. That tribunal is the Committee of 
Imperial Defence as constituted by Mr. Balfour. One of 
the first problems to which the Committee of Imperial 
Defence addressed itself was that of invasion, its risks 
and its possibilities, and some four years ago, on May 1 1 , 
1905, Mr. Balfour expounded in the House of Commons the 
conclusions it had then reached. In unfolding his exposi- 
tion he said : 

Though every one must recognize that this is the 
central problem of Imperial and national defence, we see 
year by vear the continuance of a profitless wrangle 
between the advocates of different schools of military and 
naval thought, to which the puzzled civilian gives a per- 
plexed attention, and which leaves in the general mind 
an uneasy sens^ that, in spite of the millions we are spend- 
ing on the Navy and the Army, the country is not, after 



xviii PREFACE 

all, secure against some sudden onslai^ht which might 
shatter the fabric of Empire. This, be it remembered, is 
no new state of thii^^s. It reaches far back into a historic 
past. The same controversy in which we are now en- 
gaged was raging in the time of Drake ; and then, as 
now, it was in the main the soldiers who took one side ; 
in the main, the sailors who took the other. The great 
generals in the sixteenth century beUeved the invasion 
of England possible, the great admirab did not beheve 
it possible. If you go down the stream of time, you 
come to an exactly similar state of things during the 
Napoleonic wars. ... It is certain that Napoleon be- 
heved invasion to be possible ; and it is equally certain 
that Nelson believed it to be impossible. Forty years 
later you find the Duke of Wellington, in a very famous 
letter, expressing, in terms almost pathetic in their in- 
tensity, his fears of invasion — ^fears which naval opinion 
has never shared, provided our fleets be adequate. We 
found, when we took up the subject, that the perennial 
dispute was still unsettled ; and it appeared to us — I do 
not say that full agreement could be come to, but some- 
thing nearer than ever had been reached before — ^if we 
could avoid barren generalities, and devise a concrete 
problem capable of definite solution, yet based on sup- 
positions so unfavourable to this country, that if, in this 
n3rpothetical case, serious invasion was demonstrably im- 
possible, we might rest assured that it need not further enter 
into our practical calculations. Following out this idea, we 
assumed that our regular Army was abroad upon some over- 
sea expedition, and that our organized fleets in permanent 
conunission were absent from home waters. Frankly I do 
not see that we could be expected to go further. 

Mr. Balfour then proceeded to define more precisely 
the suppositions, as unfavourable to this country as 
they could with any show of reason be made, on which 
the conclusions of the Committee were based. He assumed, 
** for the sake of argument, that the Mediterranean, the 
Atlantic, and the Channel Fleets are far away from these 
shores, incapable of taking any part in repelling invasion, 
though of course still constituting a menace to the com- 
munications of any invader fortunate or unfortunate 



PREFACE 

enough to have effected a landing." He assumed further, 
that the military forces at home had been reduced to the 
lowest ebb they had reached during the crisis of the war 
in South Africa. Then he proceeded to inquire 'what 
was the smallest force with which a foreign Power would 
be likely to invade this country. " That," he said, " may 
seem a paradoxical way of putting the question, but it is 
the true way. . . . The difficulty which our hypothetical 
invader has to face is not that of accumulating a 
sufficient force on his side of the water, but the diffi- 
culty of transferring it to ours ; and inasmuch as that 
difficulty increases in an increasing ratio with every 
additional transport required and every augmentation in 
the landing force, it becomes evident that the problem 
which a foreign general has to consider is not, * How many 
men would I like to have in England in order to conquer 
it ? ' but • With* how few men can I attempt its con- 
quest ? ' " To the question so propounded the answer 
given by all the military authorities consulted, including 
Lord Roberts himself, was that it would not be possible to 
make the attempt with less than 70,000 men. ** With a 
force even of this magnitude Lord Roberts was distinctly 
of opinion that for 70,000 men to attempt to take London 
— which is, after all, what would have to be done if the 
operation were in any sense to be conclusive — ^would be 
in the nature of a forlorn hope." Finally, taking France 
to be the invading Power, not in the least because it is at 
all likely that France would be the invading Power, but 
because, being nearer to this country than any other 
Power, France could, if she were so minded, invade this 
country more easily than any other Power, Mr. Balfour 
showed, and declared that it was the conviction of the 
Committee, that even on these extreme assumptions, 
'^ unfavourable as they are, serious invasion of these 
islands is not a possibility which we need consider." 

That was, only four years ago, the considered judg- 
ment of the only tribunal competent to decide between 
soldiers and sailors when they disagree, delivered from 



XX PREFACE 

place in the House of Commons by the Minister who was 
at the time primarily and finally responsible for the 
security of the Empire and the inviolability of these 
shores. Has an3rthing occurred since to disallow the 
judgment then delivered or to show cause why the appeal 
of Lord Roberts and his school against it should be enter- 
tained ? I am not aware that the Committee of Imperial 
Defence has shown any disposition to reverse its judg- 
ment, or even to revise it in any essential respect. It has 
indeed been alleged, I believe, that Mr. Balfour's esti- 
mate of the tonnage required for the transport of a given 
number of troops was excessive, and that the tonnage 
then alleged to be available at any given time for France 
was far below the estimate that would have to be made 
of the tonnage available at any given time for another 
Power, more distant than France from these shores, 
which, if we were at war with it, or if its ambitions 
prompted it to a sudden and unprovoked attack, might 
seek to invade this country. But the revision of these 
factors to the extent required — ^for the sake of precision 
let us say to the extent of enabling the Power in question 
to embark 1 50,000 or even 200,000 men — does not in any 
way impair the capacity claimed by Mr. Balfour and the 
Committee of Imperial Defence for the depleted naval 
force of their fundamental assumption to impeach that 
enlarged embarkation. On the contrary, it enhances 
the capacity to make invasion impossible then claimed 
for the residual naval forces in home waters and not at 
the time disputed in any authoritative quarter ; for, as 
Mr. Balfour insisted, the difficulties of embarkation, tran- 
sit, and landing increase in an increasing ratio with every 
additional transport required, and every augmentation 
in the landing force transported. I would add that the 
hypothesis on which Mr. Balfour and the Committee pro- 
ceeded in 1905, namely, that our organized fleets in per- 
manent commission were absent from home waters, is no 
longer a tenable or even a thinkable one. The Medi- 
terranean Fleet is likely to be absent in any case. The 



PREFACE xxi 

Atlantic Fleet is just as likely, or as unlikely, to be absent 
in the future as it was in the past. But the Channel Fleet 
has now become a detached division of the Home Fleet 
and, as such, it is, for the future, very unlikely to be 
beyond striking distance at the hour of need. These 
were all the fleets in permanent commission which Mr. 
Balfour had to consider in 1905, and he assumed them 
all to be away. Even so he declared, on the authority 
of the Committee of Imperial Defence, that serious in- 
vasion was not a possibility which we need consider. 
But the Home Fleet as we now know it had not then 
been constituted. It is now, or shortly will be, by far the 
strongest single fleet in the world, and it is practically 
inconceivable that it should ever be absent from home 
waters. If the Committee held that without the Home 
Fleet as now constituted, and with all the other fleets in 
permanent commission away, we were safe s^ainst the 
invasion of 70,000 men in 1905, can it conceivably hold 
that with the Home Fleet, as now constituted, always in 
home waters, we are not still more safe in 1909 against 
the invasion of 150,000 or even 200,000 men, than we 
were in 1905 against the invasion of 70,000 men? The 
difficulties and delays involved in the embarkation, trans- 
port, and landing of 200,000 men I shall not attempt to 
estimate, nor shall I ask any soldier to estimate them. 
It is purely a sailor's question, and how a sailor would 
answer it may be seen in a masterly discussion of what 
professional strategists would call the '' logistics " of this 
question contributed to the Contemporary Review for 
February 1909, by a writer who signs himself " Master 
Mariner." The identity of this writer is unknown to me ; 
but he is evidently a sailor, and he is writing on matters 
concerning which soldiers, and indeed all who are not 
sailors, must be content to sit at the feet of the sailors. 
We do not ask sailors to tell the soldiers how to conduct 
military enterprises on land. Why are we to listen to 
soldiers when they insist upon telling us that sailors do 
not know their business afloat, or that the sailors of to- 



PREFACE 

day cannot do what their forefathers have done over and 
over again ? 

But some soldiers are really impayabUs—oi course I 
am here speakingi not of individual soldiers, but of 
soldiers in the sense in which Mr. Balfour spoke of the 
historic antagonism between soldiers and sailors on the 
field of national defence. You have no sooner rebutted one 
of their argumentSi as I hope I have done on the authority 
of Mr. Balfour and the Committee of Defence, than with 
amazing polemical agility they forthwith confront you 
with its exact opposite. We used to be told that you 
cannot rely on the Navy to prevent invasion, because at 
the critical moment your fleets may be away. "Very 
well/' said Mr. Balfour in effect, " I will, for the sake of 
argument, preposterous as the argument really is, send 
all the organized fleets away, and still I am able to show 
you that, in the judgment of the Committee of Defence, 
invasion is nevertheless impossible.'' Stra^htway the 
boot of the soldier is transferred to the other leg. Since 
Mn Balfour spoke, the distribution of the national fleets 
has been adjusted by the Admiralty to that momentous 
change in the strategic situation which has come about 
through the growth of a great naval Power with its bases 
on or adjacent to the North Sea. The effect of this re* 
adjustment has been to render Mr. Balfour's or^;inal 
hypothesis of the total absence of all our organized fleets 
from home waters too preposterous even for hypothetical 
consideration. The Home Fleet never will be away, and 
the Home Fleet is, as I have said, the strongest single 
fleet in the world. Still the soldier is not happy, and, 
to be quite frank, he finds some support from some sailors 
at this point. He has found a sailor of over fifty years' 
service to complain that the British Fleet is now '* man- 
acled " to the shores of the United Kingdom, that the 
proud prerogative which it once enjoyed of roaming at 
large over all the seas of the world is now and for ever 
in abeyance, and that it must henceforth be " cabin'd, 
cribbed, confined '' within the narrow seas. I fancy I 



PREFACE xzui 

have crossed swords with this veteran sailor more than 
once, and if so, I have generally found his polemic rather 
ingenious than convincing, and sometimes a little way- 
ward. His argument seems to me merely to mean this, 
that as a sailor of long standing and of all the authority 
which his long standing implies, he does not approve of 
that strategic distribution of the fleet which now finds 
favour with the Admiralty. Be it so. In this field I am 
no match for him. He is a sailor and I am not. His dis- 
approval of the policy of the Admiralty is, as the French 
say, une idie comme une autre, and I at least am no arbiter 
between his ideas and those he repudiates. But I recol- 
lect a very dbtinguished naval officer, who was at the 
time Director of Naval Intelligence, sajring to me many 
years ago, ** If you have a sufficiency of naval force, 
surely you may trust the Admiralty to distribute it to 
the best advantage from time to time." I have never 
forgotten the admonition, and it is one which I would 
commend to my countrjrmen, whether soldiers or civilians, 
who are no more experts in this matter than I am. It 
is different, of course, with sailors, who are experts in this 
matter. My friend of the '' manacled fleet," with his 
more than fifty years' service — I am sure honourable and 
distinguished — ^is fully entitled to convert the Admiralty 
if he can. But I doubt if he will. 

My own views on this matter, whatever they may be 
worth, are given in an essay in this volume entitled " The 
Strategy of Position." Perhaps I may here supplement 
them by quoting a short extract from a letter I addressed 
to The Times over my own initials shortly after Mr. 
Balfour's speech was delivered in 1905. It had been 
argued that Mr. Balfour had ignored die possibility of our 
having to deal with two or three great Powers at the 
same moment. On this I 



I can discern no foundation whatever for this con- 
tention. It seems to me to be altogether inconsistent 
with the fundamental hypothesis that bur main fleets 



xxiv PREFACE 

are absent. That hypothesis is an extreme, ahnost an 
extravagant, one in any case. It becomes strate^cally 
unthinkable — ^as I cannot doubt that the Prime Minister, 
fresh from the deUberations of the Committee of Defence, 
would acknowledge — ^unless we assume that the fleets are 
absent, not on a wild-goose chase, but solely for the pur- 
pose of meeting to the best advantage the fleets of such 
Powers as may have combined, or are likely to combine, 
against this country. If the enemies' fleets are in adja- 
cent waters, our own main fleets will be there too. If 
the enemies' fleets are in distant waters, our own main 
fleets will be there too. In any case, unless our sailors 
are unworthy of their sires, our own main fleets will 
always be where they can act to the best advantage, 
whether in home or in foreign waters, against the enemies 
of their country ; and, even when they are in foreign 
waters, there will always be a residual naval force in 
home waters to deal with what, by the h}rpothesis, can 
only be the residual naval force of this or that enemy 
who seeks to invade us. That is what every sailor 
instinctively understands, and yet what nearly every 
soldier seeths to be almost incapable of understanding. 
It is only because we have now happily bethought our- 
selves of asking the sailors a question which sailors alone 
are competent to answer that the country at large is 
beginning to understand it at last. It seems to me that 
this is a revolution in the strategic thought and the defen- 
sive policy of the country comparable only to the Coper- 
nican revolution in astronomy. 

But the Copemican sjrstem did not find universal 
acceptance at once. Even Bacon wrote in his hasty youth 
of " these new carmen who drive the earth about." But 
Bacon, as we know, was said by Harvey to *' write phil- 
osophy like a Lord Chancellor." Perhaps, if Harvey had 
written of law. Bacon would have retorted that he wrote 
of law like a ph3rsician. When soldiers try to teach sailors 
their business, or sailors do the same by soldiers, I would 
invite them both to apply the apologue to themselves. 

The truth is that the naval forces of this country are 
now for the most part concentrated in home waters be- 



PREFACE 

cause that is where what I would call the centre of strategic 
moment manifestly lies in existing circumstances. There 
are only two naval Powers in Europe which as matters 
stand at present are capable of trying conclusions with 
this country on the seas. These are Germany and France. 
I am not concerned to inquire whether we are likely to 
be at war with either of them ; I sincerely trust we are 
not. But political issues of this kind are altogether 
outside my present province. In any case it stands to 
reason that if we were at war with either of them or with 
both, and if either or both desired in that contingency 
to invade this country, we should need a naval force 
in home waters sufficient to make certain of impeaching 
them. We want no more than that, however, at any 
time ; and if at any time we maintain a larger force in 
home waters than suffices for that purpose, that is merely 
a matter of administrative convenience, and not in any 
sense a matter of strategic necessity. The ships and 
fleets not required for home defence are just as free to go 
anywhere and do anything as they ever were, and, they 
do go far and wide whenever occasion serves or calls. In 
the course of last year the Atlantic Fleet went to Quebec 
and the Second Cruiser Squadron paid a round of visits, 
first in South Africa and afterwards in South America. 
Not a year passes that the Fourth Cruiser Squadron does 
not visit the West Indies. That is the true way of *' show- 
ing the flag." What " showing the flag " means when 
ships which cannot fight and must not run away are 
employed for the purpose, I have shown in my comments 
on the capture of the Drake by Paul Jones in the Ranger. 
It is, moreover, purely a soldiers' idea and not a sailors' 
at all that a sufficiency of military defence on shore will 
set free the fleet for the discharge of its proper duties. 
What are the proper duties of the fleet ? They are, as 
every sailor knows, ** to keep foreigners from fooling us," 
as Blake, who was soldier and sailor too, is reputed to 
have said in the rough and homely fashion of his age. 
This is done by confronting the foreigner — or, as I should 



PREFACE 

prefer to say, the enemy — ^in superior force in any part 
of the seas where, if we were not there in superior forcei 
he might be able to fool us. He cannot fool us anywhere 
unless he can get there, and if he attempts to get there, 
he will very soon find that a superior force is " upon hb 
jacks/' as Howard said. Since neither ships nor fleets 
can be in two places at once, it is plain that, superiority 
of force in a known proportion being presupposed, 
and guaranteed in that proportion by the two- Power 
standard, it can be maintained in the like proportion in 
any part of the world where the enemy's ships are to be 
found, except in so far as a single ship cannot be split 
up into fractions. I should have thought that any soldier 
could see that, just as well as any sailor, or any civilian, 
for that matter, who can work a sum in simple proportion. 
The soldier very seldom does see it, however ; and even 
when he does begin to see it, as apparently he did in 
190$, he can always find some ingenious sailor to draw 
the feather once more across his eyes. 

In sum, then, my plea is simply this : That the problem 
of home defence being in its very essence partly a 
naval problem and partly a military problem, the soldier 
should leave the solution of the naval problem to the sailor, 
who is an expert in this province, and confine himself 
exclusively to the province in which he is equally an ex- 
pert, namely, the solution of the military problem. Thus, 
the first question which the soldier should address to the 
sailor is, " Can you keep the invader out ? " To this, if 
Mr. Balfour and the Committee of Defence are to be 
trusted, the sailor will answer without hesitation, " Un- 
questionably I can, if only you will have military force 
enough on land, suitably trained, equipped, and oi^^anized, 
to compel him to come, if he comes at all, in such numbers 
that he cannot escape my attentions. If, as Lord Roberts 
told the Committee of Defence, no invader would dream 
of coming with less than 70,000 men, and even then it 
would be a forlorn hope, I can certainly stop him if he 
comes with that number, and a fortiori if he comes with 



PREFACE xxvu 

twice or thrice that number, provided only, and provided 
always, that he has not first cleared the seas of all my 
available force ; and, frankly, I don't see how he is to 
do that so long as the two-Power standard is maintained.'* 
Thus the naval problem is now disengaged altogether from 
the military problem, being solved by the sailor to the 
entire satisfaction of the Committee of Defence, and we 
can now turn with confidence to the soldier for the solu- 
tion of the military problem. I, who am neither soldier 
nor sailor, have offered no solution of either problem. I 
have applied m3rself purely to the method of stating the 
problem and of looking for its solution in the proper 
quarter, and not to its subject-matter at all. That I 
leave entirely to the sailor so far as it lies in his province, 
and to the soldier so far as it lies in his. For the solution 
of the naval problem I have gone to the only authorita- 
tive source known to me, namely, the conclusions of the 
Committee of Defence recorded in 1905 by the Prime 
Minister of the day. Those conclusions hold the field 
until they are either modified or withdrawn on the same 
unimpeachable authority. For the solution of the asso- 
ciated military problem I am quite ready to go to the 
same source ; and, since it is a purely military problem, 
I am equally ready to take its solution from the soldiers 
and not to listen to the sailors at all. The problem may 
now be stated thus : What amount of military force 
is it necessary to maintain at all times in this cotmtry 
in order to make sure that if any enemy seeks to invade 
us he shall be compelled to cross the sea with at least 
70,000 men, and how should this force be trained, equipped, 
and oi^anized for the purpose? It may be that the 
answer is to be found in the Territorial Force, or in such 
modification and development of it as Lord Roberts and 
his followers have advocated. That is not for me, a mere 
civilian, to discuss, still less to decide. I will only record 
my own conviction that, if the problem is solved on these 
terms, the Territorial Force, or any other force which 
may hereafter be found better fitted to discharge the same 



xxviii PREFACE 

function, will never exchange a single shot with an in- 
vader on British soil any more than its predecessors, the 
Volunteers, ever did. The Romans had a proverb, Res 
ad iriarios venit, to signify that when the engagement had 
reached the triarii, the end of the conflict was at hand, 
and that so far it had gone against the legions. The 
Territorial Force, or any future substitute for it, will 
always be the triarii of the British array. If ever they 
are called upon to withstand an invader on British soil, 
the end of the Empire will not be far off. But, so long 
as our naval supremacy is maintained, it is much more 
likely that if they ever meet an enemy in the stricken 
field at all, they will, as many of their predecessors the 
Volunteers did, meet him thousands of miles from the 
shores they were enrolled to defend. Thus will patriotism 
once more be justified of all her children. 

Perhaps at no time in the history of this country since 
the days of the Norman Conquest has the menace of in- 
vasion been so acute as it was in the two years before 
Trafalgar, when, as Captain Mahan says, " Nelson before 
Toulon was wearing away the last two years of his glorious 
but suffering life, fighting the fierce north-westers of the 
Gulf of Lyon and questioning — questioning continually 
with feverish anxiety — ^whether Napoleon's object was 
Egypt again or Great Britain really." The Grand Army, 
130,000 strong, was encamped at Boulogne and along the 
adjacent coasts, whence '* they could, on fine days, as 
they practised the varied manoeuvres which were to per- 
fect the vast host in disembarking with order and rapidity, 
see the white cliffs fringing the only country that to the 
last defied their arms." England was shaken with 
alarms. The Army Estimates, which had stood at 
)£i 2,952,000 in 1803, rose with a bound to £22,889,000 in 
1804, and again advanced to over £23,000,000 in 1805. 
The number of effectives voted for employment in the 
United Kingdom rose from 66,000 in 1803, to 129,000 in 
1804, and 135,000 in 1805, and even then they barely 
exceeded the numbers with which Napoleon, not forty 



PREFACE 

miles away across the Channel, was preparing to invade 
and hoping to conquer England.^ The martial ardour of 
the people rose to an unprecedented height. Every 
county resounded with the drill of patriotic Volunteers 
—over 300,000 in number. Dumouriez, the versatile 
victor of Valmy, pestered the British Ministers with plans 
for their permanent organization. Men wondered from 
day to day when " Buonaparte," or " Boney " as they 
called him, would come, and why he did not come. My 
own grandfather used to tell how false alarms of his com- 
ing would sometimes fetch the Volunteers out of their 
beds and march them off in the middle of the night to the 
nearest rendezvous. I daresay the soldiers of the day 
could demonstrate to their hearts' content that he cer- 
tainly would come, and that there was really nothing, 
except the military array on shore, to prevent his coming ; 
but the sailors never faltered. '' Those far-distant, storm- 
beaten ships, upon which the Grand Army never looked, 
stood between it and the dominion of the world." And 
though the soldiers may have insisted that it was their 
preparations on shore that " set free " the outlying ships 
to occupy their stations far away, yet I cannot find that 
the sailors set much store by these same preparations, and 
it is certain from their own words and deeds that they 
knew, as surely as men can ever be sure about anything 
in war, that however quickly Napoleon's troops m^ht 
embark on one side of the Channel, they would never be 
allowed to disembark on the other until the sea supremacy 
of this country had been overthrown. Nor, again, can 
I find that Napoleon was ever for a moment intimidated 
by the stir of military preparation in England. It was 
not that which stopped him, or ever would have stopped 

> These figures are taken from the Annual Regittmr. FoUer details will 
be loimd in the valuable work on Ths County LUuUnancUs and Th$ Am^, 
180^-18x4, recently published by the Hon. J. W. Fortescne. It is only right 
to acknowledge that Mr. Fortescne puts the total strength of the Regular 
Army at a higher figare than those given above. Bnt his account of the 
oifanisatiott and equipment of some portions of it goes far to explain why 
Napoleon was never intimidated by its numbers. 



PREFACE 

hiixii if the fleets which barred his way could once have been 
put out of being. 

'* Our great reliance," wrote St. Vincent, " is on the 
vigilance and activity of our cruisers at sea." When the 
menace of invasion first became acute in 1801, before 
the Peace of Amiens, Nelson wrote : *' Our first defence 
is close to the enemy's ports " — ^that is, his ports in the 
Channel — ^' and the Admiralty have taken such precau- 
tions, by having such a respectable force under my orders, 
that I venture to express a well-grounded hope that the 
enemy would be annihilated before they get ten miles 
from their own shores." Again, Pellew said in his place 
in Parliament in 1804 : " As to the enemy being able in 
a narrow sea to pass through our blockading and protect- 
ing squadron with all the secrecy and dexterity, and by 
those hidden means that some worthy people expect, I 
really, from anything I have seen in the course of my 
professional experience, am not much disposed to concur 
in it." These words are as pertinent in 1909 as they 
were in 1804, and I would conmiend them to the special 
attention of soldiers in our own day. Finally, I would 
point out that if the Ministers of the day were really rely- 
ing on an Army of 135,000 men, supported by 300,000 
Volunteers, to keep the 130,000 troops of Napoleon out 
of the country, they were guilty of something like treason 
in sending no fewer than 1 1 ,000 regular troops out of the 
country on distant and secret expeditions, as they did 
in 1805, at the very crisis of the Trafalgar campaign* 
One of these expeditions, consisting of some 5,000 men, 
embarked in April 1805, about a fortnight after Villeneuve 
left Toulon for the last time. The troops were destined 
for Gibraltar, Malta, and Naples, where they were to 
co-operate with a contingent of Russian troops, and where 
in the following year they were destined to win the 
victory of Maida. It was the presence of this combined 
force in Southern Italy that determined Napoleon's in- 
structions to Villeneuve to make for the Mediterranean 
when he left Cadiz to encounter Nelson at Trafalgar. The 



PREFACE 

troops were under the command of Sir James Craig, 
and were convoyed by two line-of-battleships under 
the command of Rear-Admiral Knight. Nelson was 
ordered to furnish them, if he deemed it necessary, with 
additional convoy in the Mediterranean, and just before 
he left for the West Indies in pursuit of Villeneuve he 
detached the Royal Sovereign for that purpose. The other 
expedition, consisting of some 6,000 men, under the 
command of Sir David Baird, was despatched in August 
of the same year at a time when Villeneuve was still at 
laige and still undefeated. Its destination was the Cape, 
and in January 1806 it captured Cape Town and put an 
end for ever to the rule of Holland in South Africa. These 
singular episodes have generally been overlooked. They 
seem to show conclusively that the British Government, 
in 1805, was very far from quaking over the insufficiency 
of our military defences at that time. The knee is nearer 
than the shin. You do not send troops abroad when you 
want them to repel the invader at home. The sailors had 
apparently convinced the Government that the manage- 
ment of the invader could safely be left to themselves.^ 

It was left to the sailors, with what results we know. 
There were chances of failure no^doubt, but so there must 
be in any war. Napoleon knew this as well as any man, 
and complained that his admirals had " learned — ^where 
I do not know — that war can be made without running 
risks." But the sailors of England had learned their lesson 

^ It is, moreover, highly important to note that Bfr. Fortescue is of opinion 
that, after tiie rapture of the Peace of Amiens, England could and should 
have taken the military offensive abroad from the very outset. " An attitude 
of passive and inert defence," he says, " is very rarely sound and was never 
more lake than in 1803. . . . Napoleon was not prepared for war. ... It may 
be asserted without hesitation that the British Government could, so far as 
the safety of the sea was concerned, have sent any force that it pleased to 
any point that it pleased, and thirty thousand, or even twenty thousand, 
men despatched to Sicily or to Naples in the summer of 1803 must almost 
certainly have broken up the camp at Boulogne." In other words, if the 
soldiers wanted to share with the sailors the task of keeping Napoleon at 
bay, they could, in the judgment of this high authority, have done so much 
more effectively by organising a counter-stroke abroad than by filling England 
with tumultuary forces which Napoleon never even affected to fear. 



xxxu PREFACE 

better. They ran risks, and they even made mistakes, 
but they never faltered in their conviction that, if the 
fleets of England could not save England, nothing eke 
could. Is it a mere accident, or the mere fortune of war, 
which one day may play us false, that from the Norman 
Conquest, when England was lost by the insufficiency of 
her fleet, to the days of Trafalgar, when she was saved 
by its sufficiency, the sufficiency and prowess of the fleet 
— ^more than once its bare and scarcely adequate suffi- 
ciency — ^have invariably kept the invader at bay, and 
that her defenders on shore have never once met an enemy 
on British soil except in such mere handfuls that his 
discomfiture has left scarcely a trace in the national his- 
tory ? For an answer to this question I have nothing to 
add to what was said, with far higher authority than 
mine, by Sir George Clarke twelve years ago : * 

That naval force is the natural and proper defence of 
a maritime State against over-sea invasion is the indis- 
putable teaching of history. The unbroken consistency 
of the records of hundreds of years cannot possibly be 
the result of accident. No theories incubated in times 
of peace, no speculations as to what might have happened 
if events had shaped themselves differently, can shake 
a law thus irrefragably established. There is only one 
explanation of the fact that of the many projected inva- 
sions of England none has succeeded for eight hundred 
years, notwithstanding that naval superiority has not 
existed at all periods, and that the military forces at home 
have often been utterly inadequate to resist the strength 
that could be brought against them, if the sea had not 
intervened. All the great operations of war are ruled 
by the measure of the risk involved, and, until the defend- 
ing Navy has been crushed, the risk of exposing large 
numbers of transports to attack is too great to be easily 
accepted. 

Is it, or is it not, then, an advantage to be an insular 
State ? The answer is surely given in the fact that there 
is no State in Europe which has not been invaded over 

^ The Navy and the Nation, p. 320. 



PREFACE xxxiii 

and over again in the eight hundred years during which 
England has enjoyed immunity from that unspeakable 
calamity. How long will that immunity last if we once 
begin to transfer the stress of defence from the sea to 
the land ? If the fleet of England, which is her all in 
all, as it always has been, can no longer be trusted to keep 
the invader at bay, it is not '' National Service " that 
will save us. The full model of the citizen-armies of the 
Continent will barely serve our needs. At the same time 
the defence of the Empire and the security of our mari- 
time commerce will need a Navy just as strong as before. 
India cannot be held unless we command the sea, as every 
sailor knows and as every soldier will acknowledge. 
Hence, on these conditions, so far from its being an ad- 
vantage to England to be an island State, it must in time 
become a tremendous and overwhelming disadvantage. 
There is, in very truth, no middle course in the matter. 
Either the fleet, so long as it is maintained in sufficiency, 
can henceforth, as heretofore, be trusted to keep the 
invader at bay, in which case our military defences can 
be strictly adjusted to the measure and the conditions of 
our sea power ; or it cannot, in which case not all the 
adult manhood of the nation in arms will suffice to defend 
our homes. Surely the country cannot hesitate between 
these two alternatives. Nearly five hundred years ago 
the truth was written in nig^d lines that still go to the 
root of the whole matter : 

Keep then the Sea about in special. 

Which of England is the Town-wall. 

As though England were likened to a City 

And the Wall environ weze the Sea. 

Keep then the Sea that is the Wall of England, 

And then is England kept by God's hand ; 

That as lor any Thing that is withont, 

England were at Ease withouten donbt. 



CONTENTS 



THE ANNIVERSARY OF TRAFALGAR 
TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 



THE LIFE OF NELSON 



THE SECRET OF NELSON 



DUNCAN 



PAUL JONES 



THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 



THE STRATEGY OF POSITION • 



THE ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 



THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE • 



INDEX 



7 
80 

117 

129 

165 

249 
270 

331 
365 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



LORD NELSON FfofUisptees 

Fran the oc%hMl paiBtlac far 8lr Wn. HflBfltoa by Lconndo Goandi, tad 
'»A to tlwA4iBinl^>r^ Km. Kobt. Pidte Gicvik In 1848. RcprcH 
by ptmlnni of tnc Aitwlwi^* 



FACDA VAOB 

PIAGRAMS TO ILLUSTRATE THE AUTHOR'S VIEWS • 53 

DIAGRAMS FROM NICOLAS AND MAHAN . . • • 5^ 

THE SPANISH DIAGRAM 66 

ADMIRAL DUNCAN 129 



F rf rtrt 'g Hqgg y *■ ¥7^' RtpwM l— d by jHWl ai nB of the Brt d 




PAUL JONES .1^ 



» 



CHART OF MANOIUVRES OF I906 32$ 



^«^ For an explanaiian of ike deoUe on the cover of this volume 

see note on page 247. 



NELSON, AND OTHER 
NAVAL STUDIES 



PROEM 

THE ANNIVERSARY OF TRAFALGAR » 

THE memory of Trafa^;ar can never fade so long as 
England remains a nation, nor even so long as 
the English tongue is spoken or the history of England 
is remembered in any part of the world. It was so trans- 
cendent an event, so far-reaching in its consequences, 
so heroic in its proportions, so dramatic in its incidents, 
so tragic in its catastrophe, that it is difficult to name 
any single event in all history which quite equals it in 
the opulent assemblage of all those elements and condi- 
tions which excite and sustain the abiding interest of 
mankind. It was the last and greatest fight of the greatest 
seaman of all time. It was consecrated by his death in 
the hour of victory. It delivered this nation once for all 
from the threatened thraldom of Napoleon. It chained 
the face of Europe, and set the world's stage for the 
successive acts of that tremendous drama which ended 
ten years later at Waterloo. It was, moreover, the last 
great fight of the sailing-ship period of naval warfare* It 
was at Trafalgar that the unique genius of Nelson, then 
at its ripest, put the last finishing touch — ^the Nelson touch 
those tactical methods which three centuries of 

* Tks Tim$9, October 2i» 1905. 

I 



2 THE ANNIVERSARY OF TRAFALGAR 

warfare had evolved, and witched the world with noble 
seamanship never to be seen on the field of naval battle 
again. But Trafalgar did even more than all this. When 
Gravelines, the first great battle of the sailing-ship period, 
was fought, England did not possess in effective occupa- 
tion and sovereignty a single rood of territory beyond the 
narrow seas. It was, indeed, Drake and his comrades 
who laid at Gravelines the foundations of that vast 
Empire which sea power has since given us, but it was 
Trafalgar that countersigned its title-deeds with the 
blood of Nelson and of those who died with him, and 
ratified them beyond dispute. It is the thought of all 
these things, and of many others which the name and 
memory of Trafalgar suggest, that should inspire English- 
men whenever they celebrate the anniversary of the battle. 
We are then commemorating the most famous and the 
most decisive victory ever achieved by British arms on 
the seas. We are mourning, as our forefathers mourned 
now more than a hundred years ago, the death in the 
hour of victory of the greatest of all sea-captains, of the 
man whose surpassing gifts of head and heart, whose 
unparalleled achievements in the defence of his country 
and the overthrow of its enemies, have endeared him 
beyond all other sons of Britain to every son of Britain 
who lives and thinks to-day. We may study Nelson's 
personality and character, and still find more and more 
to engage and enthral our love. We may analyse his 
methods, and still find their depths unfathomable. We 
may appeal in his name — as the Poet Laureate has ap- 
pealed—to our modem " Wardens of the Wave " to 
emulate his deeds and yet never to forget his generous 
and loving temper. " May humanity in the hour of 
victory be the predominant feature of the British Fleet," 
was the prayer of his last unclouded hours. We may 
remember — ^as Mr. Henry Newbolt has bidden us remem- 
ber — ^how " the soul of this man cherished Duty's name." 
But perhaps we may sum it all up best with Browning 
in those stirring " Home Thoughts from the Sea " ; 



THE SPIRIT OF THE OCCASION 3 

Nobly, nobly Cape Saint '^^cent to the north-west died away ; 
' Sunset ran, one glorious blood-red. reeking into Cadis Bay ; 
Bluish mid the burning water, full in lace Trafalgar lay ; 
In the dimmest north-east distance, dawned Gibraltar grand and grey ; 
" Here and here did England help me ; how can I help England ? " say 
Whoso turns as I, this evening, turn to God to praise and pray. 
While Jove's planet rises yonder, silent over Africa. 

This is the true spirit in which Englishmen should 
approach the thought and memory of Trafalgar, in no 
" braggart vein " of martial triumphi but in one of solemn 
thanksgiving for mercies which it behoves us still to 
deserve. After more than a hundred years have passed 
— ^for nearly all of which we have happily been at peace 
with the great nation it took a Nelson to beat at Trafalgar 
— after the passions that engendered the conflict have 
long ago died down and passed away, above all now that 
the two nations are at length beginning to understand 
how necessary each is to the other, the last thing that we 
should think of in commemorating Trafalgar is the fact 
that France was worsted in that encounter of heroes. In 
truth it was not so much France that was worsted at 
Trafalgar as Napoleon that was overthrown, and even 
France — the valour of whose seamen was never more 
stoutly displayed than on that memorable day — ^may now 
feel that her true greatness lies in quite other directions 
than those in which Napoleon would have led her ; in 
the peace and contentment of her sons, in her orderly 
emergence from the throes of a necessary revolution, in 
her sustained championship, now happily shared by her 
former foe, of those great ideas, begotten of her revolution 
and ours, which are to make more and more, as both 
nations hope and beUeve, for the peace, prosperity, and 
progress of mankind. It is not then, in any sense, the 
discomfiture of France that we celebrate on Trafalgar 
Day. Still less have we in mind the discomfiture of her 
gallant ally, Spain, the ancient mistress of the seas. Our 
long centuries of struggle with the valiant sons of Spain 
have taught us to value them as highly as friends as 
erstwhile we dreaded them as foes, and to the sincerity 



4 THE ANNIVERSARY OF TRAFALGAR 

of our sentiments the reception always accorded to 
their youthful monarch on the occasion of his visits to 
these shores bears ample testimony. It is the deliver- 
ance of England and of Europe, France and her allies 
indudedi from the scourge of Napoleon's devastating 
sway that we celebrate. '' England/' said Pitt, in what 
Lord Rosebery terms " the noblest, the tersest, and 
the last of all his speeches " — ** England has saved her- 
self by her exertions, and will, as I trust, save Europe by 
her example.'' She did save Europe in the end, though 
even the indomitable spirit of Pitt quailed for a moment, 
and his splendid insight deserted him, when Austerlitz 
followed so quickly on Trafalgar. " Roll up that map," 
he said, as he caught sight of a map of Europe a few days 
before his death ; ** it will not be wanted these ten years." 
It was not wanted for hard upon ten jrears to come. 
** But," as was once said in The Times, '' in spite of all 
that was happening then at Ulm, at Austerlitz, and at 
Vienna, in spite of all that was destined to happen in the 
Peninsula, at Moscow, and at Waterloo before the map 
of Europe could be finally settled at the restoration of 
peace to the world, Pitt, if his faith and insight had been 
those of his own prime, • • . might there and then have 
placed one finger on the site of Napoleon's camp at Bou- 
logne, and another on the scene of Nelson's death at 
Trafalgar, and said * Here and now is Napoleon van- 
qubhed ; here and now is a barrier set to his power and 
designs which, so long as England remains a nation, shall 
never be cast down.' " In truth it was the hand of Nelson, 
dead in the flesh, but still living in the spirit and in the 
might of its deeds, that guided and determined the course 
of events from the day of Austerlitz to the day of Waterloo. 
It was he who compelled Napoleon to abandon for ever 
his plan for invading England. It was those " far-dis- 
tant, storm-beaten ships " of his and those of his com- 
panions in arms that, as Captain Mahan truly says, stood 
between Napoleon and the dominion of the world. That 
is why we celebrate Trafalgar with undying thankfulness 



THE MEANING OF TRAFALGAR s 

for so great a deliverance and for the valour and genius 
of those who wrought it, and yet with none but kindly 
thoughts of the nations which, though vanquishedi there 
fought so well. When during the visit of a French fleet 
to English waters in 1905 the French officers and seamen 
passed through Trafalgar Square, they bared their heads 
in silent reverence before the Nelson Column. Let us all 
imitate that noble and gracious act of homage. We can- 
not, if we would, forget Trafalgar and its incomparable 
hero. We should not, if we could, refrain from cele- 
brating its anniversary with more than ordinary solemnity* 
That we owe to ourselves as heirs of the ages and of the 
conflicts which have made us what we are. But we owe 
it not less to France, as the nation in Europe whose ideals 
come nearest to our own and whose genius best supple- 
ments our own, to forget the causes of our former differ- 
ences and remember only the valour and self-devotion of 
those who fought and died for her at Trafalgar. 

Even if Trafalgar were not one of the greatest events 
in our history, it would still be one of the most memorable, 
because it was there that the incomparable genius of 
Nelson was canonized for all time by the splendour of his 
victory and the tragedy of his glorious death. As Lady 
Londonderry wrote, he then " began his inmtiortal career, 
having nothing to achieve upon earth, and bequeathing 
to the English Fleet a legacy which they alone are able 
to improve.'' Spartam nactus es^ hanc exama, is the 
supreme and undying lesson of that immortal scene. 
** Here and here did England help me ; how can I help 
England ? " is the solemn question which every English- 
man should put to himself while meditatii^, in all sobriety 
and humility of spirit, on what Trafalgar did for him, on 
what the example of Nelson's life and character has in it 
to stir and uplift him. We cannot all be Nelsons. Genius 
such as his, a judgment as of ice, an ardour as of fire, an 
insight as of direct inspiration, *' untiring energy," to 
quote Captain Mahan, " boundless audacity, promptness, 
intrepidity y and endurance beyond all proof," a patriotism 



6 THE ANNIVERSARY OF TRAFALGAR 

of the purest, a sense of duty of th% highest, a superb 
fearlessness of responsibility, generosity, loving-kind- 
ness, and sympathy the most abounding — ^these and other 
great qualities of his are such as nature bestows in all 
their wondrous assemblage on none but the choicest of 
her souls. The genius is unique and inconmiunicable. But 
the moral qualities, the graces of the temper and the spirit, 
which in Nelson did so much to sustain and illuminate 
his genius, are happily just those which every true man 
can strive to emulate, even if he may not hope to rise 
to the full height of Nebon's great exemplar. That is 
the abiding lesson of such a life as that of Nelson. With- 
out a peer in the special range of his activities, he was 
perhaps almost as incomparable in the loving and lovable 
qualities of his heart, in the ardours of his lofty soul. 
There is but one Nelson ; but there is not an Englishman 
alive who may not if he chooses be the better for what 
Nelson did for him. 



TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON 

TOUCH 

INTRODUCTION » 

IN the following exposition I have as far as possible 
avoided technical details ; but as all technical detail 
cannot be avoided in a tactical exposition, it may be as 
well to explain at the outset such technical terms as must 
inevitably be used. The points of the compass may be 
taken first. There are 32 of them in all, so that a right- 
angle contains eight points, and each point consists of 
11^ degrees. Next to explain the relation of these points 
to the course of a ship as determined by the direction of 
the wind. A sailing-ship cannot move in a direction 
opposite to that of the wind, as a steamship can. She 
need not have the wind behind her, but if she is to move 
by its agency, there are alwa3rs a considerable number of 
points of the compass on either side of the wind towards 
which she cannot move at all. A modem yacht will go 
within some four points of the wind. But a sailing-ship 
of the Nelson period could not go within less than six, 
nor generally within less than seven. When a ship is 
going as near the wind as she can she is said to be " close- 
hauled " on the port or the starboard tack according as 
the wind is blowing on the port or the starboard side of 
the ship. So long as the wind remained unchanged, 
therefore, there was always a moving area bounded by 
an angle of 12 points, or 135 degrees, on the windward side 
of the ship within which she could not be propelled for- 
ward by saib. Within the remaining area of 20 points, 
or 225 degrees, she could by a suitable adjustment of her 

^ The Timss, October 19, 1^5. 

7 



8 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

sails move freely in any direction. V^th these explana« 
tions the following table speaks for itself. It gives in the 
middle column the direction of the wind from each point 
of the compass in succession, and on either side the corre- 
sponding courses for a ship supposed to be close-hauled on 
the starboard and port tacks respectively : 



MABBQASD CAGK. 


WIMD. 


QUUBIB, 


W.N.W. 


N. 


E.N.E. 


N.W. by W. 
N.W. 


N.^E, 

N.N.E. 


E.byN. 
E. 


N.W. liy N. 

N.N.W. 


N.E. hy N. 
N.E. 


E. by S. 
E.S.E. 


N.lwW. 


N.E. by E. 
E.N.E. 


S.E. by E. 
S.E. 


N.tyyB. 

N.N.E. 


E.^N. 


S.E. hy S. 
S.S.E. 


N.E. by N. 


E.byS. 


'■f- 


N.E. 


E.S.E. 


N.E.byB. 
E.N.E. 


S.E. by B. 


S.byW. 


S.E. 


S.S.W. 


E.^N. 


S.E. by S. 
S.S.B. 


S.W. by S. 
S.W. 


E.byS. 
E.S.E. 


S.I^E. 


S.W. by W. 
W.S.W. 


S.E. ^ E. 


S. by W. 
S.S.W. 


w.inrs. 


S.E.'by S. 
S.S.B. 


S.W. by a 
S.W. 


W, by N. 


S.byB. 
S. 


S.W. by W, 
W.S.W. 


N.W. by W« 
N.W. 


S.byW. 
S.S.W. 


W.byS. 


N.W. by N» 
N.N.W^. 


S.W. by S. 
S.W. 


W.byN. 


N.lyW. 


S.W. by W, 


N.W, by W, 
N.W. 


N. by E. 
N.N.E. 


W.JJ,8. 


N.W. by N. 
N.N.W, 


N.E. by N. 
N.E. 


W.byN. 


N.byW. 


N.E. by E. 



When a ship passed from one tack to the other she was 
said to '* tack " or to '^ wear '* according as her first move- 
ments effected by the helm and by suitable adjustments 
of the sails was towards the direction of the wind or away 
from it. In tacking, therefore, she would pass through 
12 points, whereas in wearing she would pass through 20. 



TACKING AND WEARING 9 

For the purpose of tacking the hehn was said to be '* put 
down/' and for that of wearing to be '* put up/' Hence 
the phrase to '' bear up " means that the hehn is so 
moved as to cause the ship to assume a course further 
away from the direction of the wind than when she is 
close-hauled on the same tack. She is then said to be 
" sailing large " or " going fr«e/' and when she i^^ain 
resumes a close-hauled position she is said to haul her 
wind on the same tack. Thus if the wind is N.W. and the 
ship is close-hauled on the port tack her course is N.N.E. 
If she tacks she will put down her helm so as to turn to 
port and bring her head successively through 12 points 
to W.S.W., whereas if she wears she will put up her helm 
80 as to turn to starboard and bring her head successively 
through 20 points to the same point as in the former case. 
The difference is that in tacking and turning to port she 
cannot advance in the direction of any one of the 12 points 
between N.N.E. and W.S.W* ; whereas in wearing and 
turning to starboard she could if necessary pursue her 
course in the direction of any one of the 20 points through 
which she would pass if she turned completely to the 
starboard tack. Hence when a ship bears up with the 
wind at N.W. she is free to proceed in any direction 
over an arc of 225 degrees, passing through E. and S. ; 
but she cannot move forward in any direction over the 
complementary arc of 135 d^;reeS| passing through N. 
from N.N.E. to W.S.W. The same conditions apply 
mutatis mutandis to every possible direction of the wind. 
A sailing-ship which cannot lie higher than six points 
from the wind thus always has on her windward side an 
area that moves with her and is bounded by an angle of 
135 degrees within which she cannot advance at all. 
On the other hand, she has on her leeward side an area 
bounded by an angle of 225 degrees within which she can 
move freely in any direction. 

Next to consider the dispositions and movements of 
a number of ships organized as a fleet. I will for sim- 
plicity's sake assume the ships to be disposed in a single 



!o TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

line only, though the same termmology would apply to 
two or more associated lines. There are three possible 
formations in which a line of ships can be disposed — ^the 
'* line ahead " (generally, and perhaps exclusively, called 
a column in the time of Nelson), the '* line abreast," and 
the '' line of bearing." In all these formations the in- 
tervals between the ships would normally be of the same 
length, and in the British Navy this length is, and was, 
commonly two cables or 400 yards, the cable being taken 
at 200 yards or the tenth of a nautical mile. In the line 
ahead the ships are so disposed that their keels are all in 
the same straight line. In a line abreast they are so dis- 
posed that their mainmasts are all in a straight line which 
makes a right angle with their respective lines of keel. 
In a line of bearing their mainmasts are still in a straight 
line, but this line may make any angle from zero, which 
is the line ahead, up to 90 degrees, which is the line abreast, 
with their respective keels. We are now in a position to 
consider the effect on a fleet disposed in line ahead of an 
alteration of course whether together or in succession. If 
course is altered in succession the leading ship assumes 
the new course first, while the following ships continue 
the original course until they successively reach the point 
at which the leading ship turned, and at that point they 
successively assume the new course. Thus the line ahead 
is preserved but its direction is altered. If, on the other 
hand, course is altered togethe)^ all the ships turn to- 
gether, thus converting the line ahead into a line abreast 
or a line of bearing according as the alteration of course 
is one of eight points or less. It will further be observed 
that if a fleet tacks or wears in succession the leading ship 
remains the leading ship and the rear ship the rear ship 
after the operation is concluded, and the order of ships 
in the line is unchanged ; whereas if it tacks or wears 
together the leading ship becomes the rear ship and the 
rear ship the leading ship, while the order of ships in the 
line is completely reversed. 

It only remains to disentangle the several meanings of 



BEARING UP- AND. BEARING DOWN 1 1 

the word '' bear '' in nautical parlance. Three of them, 
and those the most important for my purpose, are to be 
found in close juxtaposition in the following extract from 
Collingwood's Journal : '' Bare up . . . and made all sail 
for the enemy • • . the British Fleet in two colunms 
bearing down on them • • . made the signal for the lee 
division to form the larboard line of bearing.* * Bearing 
up has already been explained. It b to bear up the helm 
so as to cause the ship to sail on a course further from 
the wind than before. To " bear down " is to make for 
a given point, as in this case the enemy's line, by the best 
available coiu^e. Thus in certain cases, as in the case of 
Trafalgar, to bear down might seem to mean exactly the 
same thing as to bear up, though the latter phrase 
properly defines the movement of the helm and the former 
the movement of the ship. To " bear from '^ defines 
relative position, but does not necessarily indicate move- 
ment at all. Thus when the lee division was ordered to 
form the larboard line of bearing the meaning was that 
each ship was to have her next ahead on her larboard, 
or port, bow and bear from it a definite number of points 
of the compass. The common course for all the ships 
would, according to the log of the Victory , be at the time 
£. by N. ; but the next ahead and the next astern of any 
ship in the line would not be disposed on that bearing 
from her. The next ahead would be so many points to 
port of her and the next astern the same number of points 
to starboard. All the ships of the lee division had bort^e 
up to the same point ; all were or should have been then 
bearing doum on the same course ; each was or should 
have been bearing from her consorts at the same angle. 



CHAPTER I» 

THE PROBLEM 

THE controversy concerning " The Tactics of Tra- 
falgar'' which in 1905 was waged so vigorously 
in The Times by various writers of authority and repute 
has at least served to show that, even after the lapse of a 
hundred yesffs, there are many questions still unsettled 
concerning the tactics pursued by Nelson and his sub- 
ordinates on the memorable day which witnessed the 
victory and the death of the greatest of all seamen. I 
venture, however, to express the opinion that the par- 
ticular issue which then formed the staple of the con- 
troversy in The Times is not the main issue to be decided, 
and that it is not a vital, nor even a very important, issue 
in itself. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that, until 
we can get outside and beyond it, we are compelled to 
move in a region of technicalities, and even trivialities, 
which, however interesting in themselves, are very apt 
to obscure and divert attention from the only problem 
which, in the interest of Nelson's fame and of the truth 
of history, it is now worth while to attempt to solve. The 
grounds for this opinion will be made apparent in the 
course of the following discussion. For the present, my 
purpose is to state the problem as I conceive it ought to 
be stated, and to indicate the direction in which I think 
we ought to look for its solution. Such a solution can only 
be tentative, at the best. The only evidence available, 
though copious enough, is very far from being com- 
plete, consentaneous, and conclusive ; indeed, it is extra- 

^ Th9 Timss, September x6, 1903. 

12 



TH£ PROBLEM STATED 13 

ordinarily conflicting, and even contradictory. Any one 
who approaches it with an open mind and handles it in 
a judicial temper must acknowledge that he is face to 
face with one of the most difficult and tangled problems 
to be found in the whole range of naval history ; and, 
however firmly he may be convinced that he has found a 
clue to the labyrinth, he will nevertheless acknowledge, 
if he keeps an open mind, that other students, as fair- 
minded as himself, may draw quite other conclusions from 
evidence which is so conflicting that perhaps no two 
critics will ever be found to reconcile its manifold dis- 
crepancies in exactly the same way. 

I cannot better state the problem, as I conceive it, 
than it was stated in The Times of July 8, 1905, in a 
comment on the address delivered by Admiral Sir Csrprian 
Bridge, at the meeting of the Navy Records Society — an 
address which afterwards became, as The Times antici- 
pated that it would, the fans et arigo of a very acute con- 
troversy : 

If we read the famous Memorandum in which Nelson 
embodied what he called '' the Nelson touch " we can 
only come to the conclusion that he intended to fight 
the battle in one way. If we read the accounts of most 
historians, and still more if we look ■ the plans exhibited 
by them from Ekins, and James, and Nicolas, even down 
to and including Captain Mahan, or again, if we look at 
the great plan or model deposited in the museum of the 
United Service Institution, we are driven to the conclu- 
sion that, so far from fiehting the battle in the way he 
deliberately intended and carefully explained to his cap- 
tains, Nelson actually fought it in quite another way, and 
in^ a way which, according to the late Admiral Colomb, 
*' it is hardlv too much to say was the worst possible 
way." Further, if we look at the contemporary records 
of the battle contained in the logs of the several ships 
engaged, or at the contemporary comments of officers 
who were present • • . we shall find evidence so con- 
fusing and conflicting as almost to make at first sight as 
much for one solution as for the other. This ... is the 



t4 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

great paradox which the twentieth-century commentator 
on Trafialgar must needs attempt to resolve.^ 

It will be seen that the twentieth-century commen- 
tator on Trafalgar has by no means an easy task before 
hhn. Yet, as The Times also remarked, " it does seem 
strange that the country which by conmion consent has 
produced the greatest sea-commander that the world has 
ever seen should have been content for a hundred years 
not to know how his last and greatest battle was fought/' 
Even now I am far from sure that, unless fresh and de- 
dsive evidence should be disclosed, this knowledge is ever 
likely to be elicited in such a form as to satbfy all inquirers 
and to silence all dissentients. It is not, in my judgment, 
likely that the two conflicting theories on the subject 
will ever be completely reconciled. Each of the two 
parties to the controversy will always be able to appeal 
to the evidence which makes for the theory he favours, 
and, as this evidence cannot be reconciled with that which 
makes for the alternative theory — ^though it may be dis- 
counted as of inferior value — ^it would seem that a final 
harmony is unattainable. On the other hand, even if we 
may never know exactly how the battle was fought, we 
can, I think, attain to something like certainty as to 
how it was not fought. It was not fought in strict and 
exact accordance with the letter of Nelson's Memoran- 
dum ; nor was it fought, as I think I shall be able to 
show, in anything like the fashion depicted in any of the 
di^;rams referred to above in the passage quoted from 
The Times. About the first of these propositions there is, 
I think, no serious dispute ; but in saying this I must ask 
leave to emphasize the phraseology I have used above, 
" in strict and exact accordance with the letter." Whether 
the battle was fought in all essential accordance with 
the spirit of the Memorandum or not is the real problem 

> Colonel DeiMtee, in his work on " Trafalgar," has done me the honour 
to dte this passage and to adopt it as the basis of his own examination of 
be problem. 



NELSON AND COLLINGWOOD %$ 

which I am to attempt to solve, and in the course of my 
attempt to solve it I hope to be able to establish the 
latter of the two propositions just formulated. 

It is no concession to the theory that the plan of the 
Memorandum was abandoned altogether to say that the 
battle was not fought in strict and exact accordance vdth 
the letter of that document. Nelson himself wrote, in 
sending the Memorandum to Collingwood, " I send you 
my plan of attack as far as a man dare venture to guess 
at the very uncertain position the enemy may be foimd 
in." Here he obviously points to the probability that 
the plan might be modified in certain details if the cir- 
cumstances of the moment appeared to require it ; and 
his tactical intuition was so instant and so unerring that 
we may be quite sure that if, as the hour of battle ap- 
proached, he saw any good reason for modifying the plan 
in detail he would act upon it-^vithout the slightest hesita- 
tion, and without the slightest regard to the mere letter 
of the Memorandum. But that is by no means to say 
that, without a word of wamii^, and even without the 
knowledge, then or thereafter, of his second-in-com- 
mand, he threw to the winds the plan of action so care- 
fully prepared and so fully explained beforehand to all 
concerned. " No man," says Qtptain Mahan, '' was ever 
better served than Nelson by the inspiration of the moment ; 
no man ever counted on it less." It served him so well 
because he counted on it so little. '* My dear fiiend," 
he continues, in the letter quoted above, ''it is to place 
you at ease respecting my intentions, and to give full 
scope to your judgment for carrying them into effect." 
Surely no man who wrote in this way could ever allow 
himself to abandon intentions so solemnly declared, and 
to abandon them without a word of warning or explana- 
tion to the man in whose readiness to give effect to them 
he was expressing such explicit confidence. And yet this 
is what we must believe, if we are to beUeve that the plan 
of attack was discarded altogether when the battle came 
to be fought, and discarded in favour of a plan whichi by 



i6 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

common consent, was in all respects inferior and alto- 
gether unworthy of Nelson's tactical genius. 

To my mind this hjrpothesis is absolutely untenable, 
and even well-nigh unthinkable. Before I come to close 
quarters with the evidence I will give some general reasons 
in support of this opinion. Nelson, we know, was a life- 
loi^ student of naval tactics. In 1783, when he was 
quite a junior captain, and barely twenty-five years of 
age, Lord Hood had spoken of him as an officer to be 
consulted " on questions of naval tactics." At that 
time he had never even served with a fleet, and yet Lord 
Hood, as his correspondence shows, was by no means the 
man to bestow his praise indiscriminately or unworthily. 
It is certain that, in his grasp of tactical principles and of 
their application in action, Nelson was as far ahead of 
the ideas in vogue at the time as he overtopped all othen 
in his consummate genius for war. He was, as we learn 
from Beatty's narrative, a frequent reader of Gerk of 
Eldin's NawU Tactics, and it is certain that the Memor- 
andum we are considering was not a little indebted to 
that fomous and most illuminating work, though, as I 
shall hope to show hereafter, it greatly improved on 
Clerk's methods and su^estions. Further, it is certain 
that, for months before the battle. Nelson was constantly 
lookli^ forward to it as the crowning effort of his career. 
During his last stay in England it must have occupied 
his thoughts almost n^ht and day. " Depend upon it," 
he said to Blackwood, " I shall yet give Mr. Villeneuve 
a drubbing." On his return to the fleet in September 
he wrote to Lady Hamilton, some days before joining — 
" I am anxious to join, for it would add to my grief if 
any other man were to give them the Nelson touch which 
toe say is warranted never to fail." This is conclusive 
that at Merton " the Nelson touch "—whatever 
-was constantly under discussion between the 
and his friends, and that Lady Hamilton knew 
what was meant by it. Further, we know that 
osed plan of action was propounded and cjqilained 



INCUBATION OF THE MEMORANDUM 17 

separately to Keats, one of his favourite captains, and to 
Lord Sidmouth, who had been Prime Minister before Pitt 
returned to office in 1805. It was only after several years 
that the recollections of Keats and Sidmouth were re* 
corded in writing ; but, though this may throw some 
doubt on their testimony in point of detail, yet their 
evidence is quite conclusive as to the fact that Nelson, 
during his last brief stay in England, was constantly re- 
volving the matter in his mind. We know, too, that as 
soon as he rejoined the fleet he simimoned his captains, 
and then and there explained to them what he had in his 
mind. On October i he writes to Lady Hamilton : 

I joined the fleet late on the evening of the 28th of 
September, but could not communicate with them until 
the next morning. I believe my arrival was most wel- 
come, not only to the commander of the fleet, but also to 
every individual in it ; when I came to explain to them 
the ** Nelson touch '* it was like an electric shock. Some 
shed tears, all approved. *'^ It was new — ^it was singular 
— ^it was simple I " and from Admirals downwards it was 
repeated, ** It must succeed, if ever they will allow us 
to get at them I " 

A few days later, on October 9, he embodied his plan 
in the famous Memorandum, and sent a copy of it to 
G)llingwood, accompanied by the letter already quoted. 
Subsequently copies of it were sent to every captain in 
the fleet. The copy delivered to Captain Hope, of the 
Defence, was endorsed as follows : ** It was agreeable to 
these instructions that Lord Nelson attacked the combined 
fleets of France and Spain, off Cape Trafalgar, on the 
3ist of October, 1805." Thus we can trace the germ of 
the plan and the genesis of the Memorandum, from the 
discussions at Merton and the conversations with Keats 
and Sidmouth, down to the time when it was first ex- 
plained verbally to the assembled flag-officers and cap- 
tains on or before October i, and finally reduced to 
writing and communicated to Collingwood on October 9. 



1 8 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

Is it conceivable that such a plan, so patiently thought 
out| so exhaustively discussed, so carefully explained, so 
enthusiastically received, so simple and withal so pro- 
found as to have seemed to some of the best critics to 
be well-nigh unfathomable in its subtlety, should have 
been suddenly cast aside without a word of notice, warn- 
ing, or explanation, in favour of another which no one, 
except perhaps James, whose tactical insight was beneath 
contempt, has yet been found to explain, defend, or 
account for? Collingwood certainly knew nothing of 
any such radical change of plan. In hb official despatch 
describing the battle — a very cold and matter-of-fact 
document, which certainly does not err on the side of 
generosity towards Nelson — ^he sasrs : "As the mode of 
our attack had been previously determined on and com- 
municated to the flag-officers and captains, few signab 
were necessary and none were made except to direct close 
order as the lines bore down/' It is not strictly true 
that no signals were made ; for Nelson, as we know, 
made several, including that immortal one which, as 
Sou they says, " will be remembered as long as the lan- 
guage, or even the memory, of England shall endure." 
But what Collingwood appears to have meant is that no 
signals were necessary and none were made to give effect 
to the well-known and well-understood intentions of the 
Commander-in-Chief; and it is both characteristic of 
the man and corroborative of this view of his meaning 
that, when Collingwood saw the first flags of the famous 
signal ahoist, he exclaimed with some impatience, " I 
wish Nelson would stop signalling. We all know what 
we have to do." ^ This is certainly not the attitude of a 

^ I cannot concur in Colonel Desbxidre't i n terpretation of this exclamation 

ol Collingwood's. He takes it to signify that Nelson's immortal signal was a - 

" message qni, semble-t-il, loin de sonlever I'entliousiasme, causa une sorte 

d'agacement a oenz anxqnels il s'adressait." Collingwood was impatient. 

not with the signal itself, still less with its purport, but with the fact that any 

rjuX at all was being made at this juncture, because, as he said, " we all 

9w what we have to do." His exclamation thus furnishes very strong 

denoe to show that ha never expected Nelson to make any essential change 



COLLINGWOOD'S TESTIMONY 19 

man who, having been thoroughly seized of one plan, 
suddenly found himself called upon to carry out an en- 
tirely different one, of which no previous inkling had 
been given. 

But I have not yet done with Collingwood's testimony. 
Writing to Blackett on November 2, he said of Nekon, 
*' In this affair he did nothing without my coimseL We 
made our line of battle together, and concerted the mode 
of attack, which was put in execution in the most admir- 
able style." Here he claims his own share in Nelson's 
plan, and declares most explicitly that that plan was 
put in execution. Again, in a letter to Sir Thomas Pasley, 
he writes on December 16, " Lord Nelson determined to 
substitute for exact order " — ^that is, for the regular line 
of battle, a phrase he uses in the next preceding sentence 
— " an impetuous attack in two distinct bodies. ... It 
was executed well and succeeded admirably." Thus, 
whatever other officers may have thought — and some of 
them undoubtedly thought that the plan was " not acted 
upon," as Moorsom wrote — ^it is certain that Collingwood, 
the second in command, the life-long friend of Nelson, the 
man who claimed that nothing was done without his 
counsel, and that he actually concerted the plan with his 
chief, never dreamt that the plan so concerted had been 
abandoned and that a totally different plan had been 
substituted for it at the last moment. It is true that in 
his letter to Pasley he does not describe the plan of the 
Memorandum very accurately. That Memorandum con- 
templated three " distinct bodies," not two. Some critics 
— among them Mr. Henry Newbolt, to whom we are all 
indebted for his masterly handling of the problem in his 

in the dispositions prescribed by the Memonndnm« and that any signal of 
instruction or direction made in pursuance of prescriptions already so weU 
known to all must be superfluous. It is, indeed, well known that as soon as 
the signal was completed, it aroused the utmost enthusiasm throughout the 
fleet and especially on board the Royal Sovereign, Collingwood's flag-ship. 
" When/' says Captain Mahan, " the whole signal was known, and cheers 
resounded along the lines, Collingwood cordially cxpmsed his own satisfac- 
tion." 



30 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

Ymt of Trafalgar — ^have accordingly urged that the words 
in the letter to Pasley do not apply to the plan of the 
Memorandunii but are to be taken as evidence that Col- 
lingwood acknowledged that Nelson '' determined to sub- 
stitute " something else for it at the last moment — ^to wit, 
'' an impetuous attack in two distinct bodies." I do not 
think that this contention can be sustained. It is dis- 
allowed, as it seems to me, by the two other passages 
cited above. It is at variance even with the context of 
the letter to Pasley itself; for Collingwood there says, 
'' The weather line he commanded, and left the lee line 
totally to my direction. He had assigned the points to 
be attacked." These words refer, and can only refer, to 
the Memorandum. Nowhere else was any authority 
given to Collingwood to take the lee line totally under 
his direction. In the Memorandum such authority is 
given three times over, as if especially to emphasize it, and 
in Nelson's covering letter it is repeated once more. No- 
where else is any indication to be found of the points 
which Nelson " assigned to be attacked." On the other 
hand, it may, I think, be argued> from Collingwood's 
words, that he never fully understood the Memor- 
andum. Very few, if any, of those to whom it was 
expounded ever did. Mr. Newbolt tells us that " a dis- 
tingubhed living Admiral has said that ' the simplicity 
and scope of that order have never been fully appre- 
ciated.' " But assuredly Cbllingwood, to whom the 
Memorandum was originally addressed personally, and 
with whom, as his own words show, it was discussed and 
even *' concerted " much more fully than with any other 
officer in the fleet, must have known whether it was 
cancelled at the last moment or not, and whether it was, 
in his judgment, carried out in substance or not. His 
own words, official and unofficial, seem to me to leave no 
room whatever for doubt that he, at least, believed from 
first to last that the battle was fought in substantial 
accord with the plan of the Memorandum. I submit that 
this is evidence of the very first order and weight, only 



ORDER AND WEIGHT OF EVIDENCE 21 

to be rebutted by stronger evidence of like order and of 
equivalent weight. But, according to the scales in which 
I weigh the matter, no such evidence is forthcoming. 
Such as there is — and there is plenty of it so far as mere 
quantity is concerned — ^is of an entirely diflferent order 
and weight, conclusive, perhaps, if it stood alone, but 
little more than a featherweight in scales judicially held. 
For surely in such scales nothing can outweigh the judg- 
ment and testimony of the sedond in command, who 
became conmiander-in-chief at the close of the day. 

It is now time to turn to the Memorandimi itself, to 
consider its genesis and examine its content. But I 
must reserve that great subject for a separate chapter. 



CHAPTER IP 

THE MEMORANDUM, ITS GENESIS 

THE " Nelson touch," as all the world knows, was 
embodied in a secret Memorandum dated Octo- 
ber 9, and communicated to Collingwood on that date. 
It was subsequently communicated to all the captains of 
the fleet, its substance having been explained to them 
orally, amid great enthusiasm, as soon as Nelson took 
over the conmiand. I did not quote it textually in the 
previous chapter, because its details were not necessary 
to that branch of the argument, and also because it de- 
mands, and will repay, full discussion on its own account. 
I here quote its text, as given in Mr. Newbolt's Year of 
Trafalgar. Mr. Newbolt explains that '' the words in 
italics and in round brackets were originally written by 
Lord Nelson, but deleted in favour of those which follow 
them " : 

Secret Memorandum 

VICTORY, off CadiM. 

October 9, 1805. 

Thinking it almost impossible to bring a fleet of forty 
Sail of the Line into a Line of Battle in variable winds, 
thick weather, and other circumstances which must 
occur, without such a loss of time that the opportunity 
would probably be lost of bringing the Enemy to Battle 
in such a manner as to make the business decisive, I have 
therefore made up my mind to keep the fleet in that posi- 
tion of sailine (with the exception of the First and Second 
in Command), that the Order of Sailing is to be the Order 
of Battle, placing the fleet in two Lines of Sixteen Ships 

1 Ths Times, September 19, 1905. 

21 



TEXT OF THE MEMORANDUM 23 

eadi, with an Advanced Squadron of eight of the fastest 
sailing Two-decked Ships, [which] will always make, if 
wanted, a Line of twenty-tour Sail, on whichever Line 
the Commander-in-Chief may direct. 

The Second in Command will {in fact command his 
Line and) after my intentions are made known to him, 
have the entire direction of his Line to make the attack 
upon the Enemy, and to follow up the blow until they 
are capttu*ed or destroyed. 

If the Enemy's fleet should be seen to Windward in 
Line of Battle, and that the two Lines and the Advanced 
Squadron can fetch them (/ shall suppose them forty-six 
Sail in the Line of Battle) they will probably be so ex- 
tended that their Van could not succour their Rear. 

I should therefore probably make (Your) the Second 
in Command's signal to lead through, about their twelfth 
Ship from their Rear, (or wherever ( You) he could fetch, 
if not able to get so far advanced) ; my Line would lead 
through about their Centre, and the Advanced Squadron 
to cut two or three or four Ships ahead of their Centre, so 
as to ensure getting at their Commander-in-Chief, on 
whom every effort must be made to capture. 

The whole impression of the British fleet must be to 
overpower from two or three Ships ahead of their Com- 
mander-in-Chief, supposed to be in the Centre, to the 
Rear of their fleet. I will suppose twenty Sail of the 
Enemy's Line to be untouched, it must be some time be- 
fore they could perform a manoeuvre to bring their force 
compact to attack any part of the British fleet engaged, 
or to succour their own Ships, which indeed would be 
impossible without mixing with the Ships engaged. (Mr. 
Scott here added a reference to the following words 
written by Lord Nelson in the upper margin of the paper : 
" The Enemy's fleet is supposed to consist of 46 Sail of 
the Line, British fleet of 40. If either is less, only a pro- 
portionate number of Enemy's Ships are to be cut off; 
B. to be J superior to the E. cut off.") ^ 

Something must be left to chance ; nothing is sure 
in a Sea fight beyond all others. Shot will carry awav 
the Masts and Yards of friends as well as foes ; but I look 
with confidence to a Victory before the Van of the Enemy 
could succour their {friends') Rear, and then that the 



24 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

British fleet would most of them be ready to receive 
their Twenty Sail of the Line, or to pursue them, should 
they endeavour to make off. 

If the Van of the Enemy tacks, the Captured Ships 
must run to Leeward of the British Fleet ; if the Enemy 
wears, the British must place themselves between the 
Enemv and the Captured, and disabled British Ships ; and 
should the Enemy dose, I have no fears as to the result. 

The Second in Command will in all possible thmgs 
direct the movements of his Line, by keeping them as 
compact as the nature of the circumstances will admit. 
Captains are to look to their particular Line as their 
rallyii^ point. But, in case Signals can neither be seen 
or perfectly understood, no Captain can do very wroi^ 
if he places his Ship alongside that of an Enemv. 

Of the intended attack from to Windward, the Enemy 
in Line of Battle ready to receive an attack : 



B 



The divisions of the British fleet will be brought nearly 
within gunshot of the Enemy's Centre. The signal wiU 
most probably then be made for the Lee Line to bear 
up together, to set all their sails, even steering sails (in 
the upper margii) of the paper, with a reference by 
Lord Nelson to this passage, are the words, ** Vide 
instructions for Signal, Yellow with Blue fly,* Page 17, 

^ Mr. Newbolt gives "flag." but this most, I think, be a clerical error, as 
In the original MS. of the Memorandum, at present deposited in the Gnildhall 
of Tonbridge Wells, the word is " fly." A copy of the Signal Book referred 
to. which is believed to have belonged to Hardy. Nelson's flag-captain, and 
was probably the actnal copy nsed by Nelson at Trafalgar, is now in the 
poasesBon of Hardy's grandson. Commander Sir Malcohn BCacGregor. R.N. 
It appears to be the only known copy which ocmtains the signal indicated 
by Nelson; The signal is entered in MS., and runs : " Cat throngh the 
enemy's line and engage close on the other side. N.B.. this signal to be 
repeated by aU ships." It was probably therefore a signal framed by Nelson 
himself, and ordered by him to be inserted in one of the blank spaces left 
for the purpose in the Signal Book. There is no reference to the Appendix 
in the Hardy copy of the Signal Book. Possibly the r«ference should have 
been to the words following " N.B." in the text of the signal. 



THE MEMORANDUM APPRECIATED 2$ 

Eighth flag, Signal Booki with reference to Appendix "), 
in order to get as quickly as possible to the Enemy's Line, 
and to cut through, beriiming from the 12 Ship from the 
Enemy's rear. Some Ships may not get through their 
exact place, but they wiU always be at hand to assist 
their friends ; and if any are tlu-own round the Rear of 
the Enemy, they will efltectually complete the business of 
twelve Sail of the Enemy. 

Should the Enemy wear together, or bear up and sail 
large, stiU the Twelve Ships composing, in the first posi- 
tion, the Enemy's Rear, are to be [the] object of attack 
of the Lee Line, unless otherwise directed from the Com- 
mander-in-Chief, which is scarcely to be expected, as the 
entire management of the Lee Line, after the intentions 
of the Commander-in-Chief is [are] signified, is intended 
to be left to the Judgement of the Admiral commanding 
that Line. 

The remainder of the Enemy's Fleet, 34 Sail, are to be 
left to the management of the Commander-in-Chief, who 
will endeavour to take care that the movements of the 
Second in Command are as Uttle interrupted as is possible. 

Nelson and Bronte. 

Only those who have paid some attention to the history 
of naval tactics during the century which preceded Tra- 
falgar — so admirably elucidated by Mr. Julian Corbett's 
edition of the Fighting Instructions — are qualified to 
appreciate the height, and the depth, and the breadth of 
this inmiortal Memorandum, the last tactical word of the 
greatest master of sea tactics the world has ever known, 
the final and flawless disposition of sailing-ships marshalled 
for combat. The old method of fighting, which had pre- 
vailed throughout the eighteenth century down to the 
time when Rodney, in 1782, broke the enemy's line in 
the battle off Dominica, was to attack from to wind- 
ward in a long close-hauled line parallel to that of the 
enemy and abreast of it. The French always preferred 
the leeward position, and the English that to wind- 
ward, with the result, as Clerk of Eldin puts it, in the 
opening paragraph of his famous work written in 1781, 



26 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

that " during the last two wars, as well as the present . • • 
when ten, twenty, or thirty great ships have been as- 
sembled and formed in line of battle ... in no one instance 
has ever a proper exertion been made, anything memor- 
able achieved, or even a ship lost or won on either side.'' 
The line of battle had, in fact, become a fetish and the 
windward position a superstition. The English found 
themselves constantly badSled in their attempt to bring 
on a decisive engagement, and the French, who never 
wanted to bring on a decisive engagement, were as con- 
stantly able to haul off with little damage after crippling 
the English van, as it bore down in the vain attempt to 
form a close-hauled line within gunshot to windward. 
Clerk showed clearly how this was, and suggested a 
remedy ; but, as his treatise, although immensely sugges- 
tive, is prolix and somewhat involved, I will, in the 
exposition of his doctrine, avail myself of a very lucid 
summary of it given by Mr. David Hannay in an appendix 
to his edition of Sauthey*s Life of Nelson : 

Qerk had shown that as long as sea-fights were con- 
ducted by one long line, stretching itself parallel to an- 
other line, so that ship was opposed to ship on either 
side, no decisive results were to be expected. He had 
shown that until our admirals took to concentrating 
superior forces on a portion of the enemy and crushing it, 
they could never compel him to fight a serious battle, 
but would find that the French continued to engage to 
leeward with the object of crippling the leading ships of 
the English line as it came down to the attack, and then 
filinff on to a safe distance. To preVent them doing this 
Clerk suggested to the admirals of his time that when 
they found a French fleet in order of battle to leeward of 
them they should arrange their own fleet, not in a single 
line corresponding to his, but in two or more, which 
should be kept parallel to one another, and also to the 
rear of the enemy. Then, if the enemy continued on the 
same course, the English division nearest him was to fall 
on the last ships in the French line, not engaging him 
ship to ship, according to the old rule, but concentrating 



CLERK OF ELDIN'S DOCTRINE 27 

a greater number on a less, with the object of overpower- 
ing the portion attacked. If the enemy did nothing his 
rear ships would be cut off and destroyed. It was to be 
presumed that he would endeavour to help the ships 
assiQled. This he could only do in one of two ways — 
either by tacking and coming back to windward, or by 
wearing and coming back to leeward to the support of the 
vessels which were in danger of being overpowered. In 
eitho: case he must come to a close action, and must give 
up the French device of firing at the masts, and then 
slipping away, unless of course he was prepared to sacri- 
fice the ships cut off. In either case, too, whether the 
ships ahead of those attacked wore or tacked, a break 
would equally appear in the enemy's line. It would then 
be the object of the English admiral to use the weather 
line, not immediately engaged, for the purpose of forcing 
himself in between the ships cut off and others turning to 
their support. There was the possibility that an enemy, 
upon seeing that the rear ships of hb line were menaced, 
niight wear his whole fleet fnmi end to end, thus reversing 
his course and turning what had been his rear into his 
van. In this case the same ships were still to be attacked 
by superior numbers, and it was still to be the object with 
the admiral of the weather line to prevent his opponent 
from relieving them. This would have been by far the 
more difficult task of the two, since the supporting ships 
in this case would not have to turn in <»'der to come to 
the assistance of their friends, but only to press on in the 
direction they were already following, and no gap would 
occur in their formation^ 



The ck)6e resemblance between the principles ^tun- 
dated by Clerk of Eldin and those embodied in the 
Trafalgar Memorandum will here be apparent ; but I 
venture to think that the latter portion of the above 
extract, that dealii^ with the possibility of the enemy's 
wearing his whole fleet before the attack could be de- 
livered, was suggested to Mr. Hannay by the Memorandum 
itself rather than by ansrthing to be foimd in Clerk's own 
exposition. Clerk did take note of the contingency that 
the enemy might wear his whole line, but he seemed to 
5 



28 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

think that this was only likdy to take place after the 
rear had been attacked, so that the ships attacked could 
not themselves wear, and, being in action, would probably 
fall astern of the ships ahead of them before the latter 
began to wear. In that case he showed how the enemy's 
manoeuvre could be foiled. But Nelson's plan, as I 
understand it, differed fundamentally from this. Clerk's 
diagrams all represent the attacking ships as coming up 
from astern and delivering their attack as soon as they 
fetched the ships to be attacked at the rear of the enemy's 
line. He seemed to think that not more than three 
ships, or four at the outside, could be fetched in this 
manner. He assimied that the enemy, having formed 
his line, was " keeping under an easy sail, with the inten- ^ 
tion of receiving the usual attack from another fleet of 
equal number," and he reconunended that three or, if 
possible, four ships should be attacked by superior num- 
bers in the first instance, reljring on subsequent manoeuvres, 
first of the enemy, and secondly of the assailant, to make 
the action a general and decisive one. Nelson, on the 
other hand, proposed to reserve his attack until the three 
divisions in which his fleet was to be organized had been 
'* brought nearly within gunshot of the enemy's centre." 
This is an immense development of Clerk's original con- 
ception, which appears to me to have been overlooked 
not merely by Mr. Hannay, but by so high an authority 
as Sir Reginald Custance, in an article on " Naval Tactics " 
contributed to the Naval Annual for 1905. The classical 
instance of an attack on the rear is, says Admiral Cus- 
tance, Trafalgar, " and is due to Clerk of Eldin, whose 
plan Nelson adopted and made his own." Nelson did 
make it his own, but in so doing he stamped his own 
genius indelibly upon it. The improvement he effected 
was very likely suggested by Rodney's experience in his 
engagement with De Guichen in 1780. There Rodney 
intended to attack De Guichen 's rear, and bore down 
with his whole force for the purpose. But De Guichen, 
divining his intention, inmiediately wore his whole fleet. 



RODNEY AND DE GUICHEN 29 

Rodney then hauled up on the same tack as the enemy, 
but, being now abreast of the new rear of the latter, he 
again ordered what he intended to be a fresh attack of 
his whole force on the rear. This was frustrated by 
some ambiguity in his signals and by the inability of his 
captains to understand that what Rodney wanted was a 
concentrated attack on the rear> and not a dispersed 
attack in the old indecisive fashion on the whole line. 
De Guichen, perceiving what Rodney intended in the 
first instance, exclaimed that six or seven of his ships 
were gone, and afterwards sent Rodney word that, had 
his (Rodney's) signals been obeyed, he himself would have 
b^en his prisoner. If the tactical insight of Rodney's 
captains had been equal to that of the French Commander- 
in-Chief, there seems to be little doubt that this result 
would have ensued. 

It was Rodney's misfortune not to be properly sup- 
ported on this occasion. But it would seem that he gave 
so wary an opponent as De Guichen an opportunity, which 
was promptly seized, by bearing up at too great a dis- 
tance from the enemy's line, so that De Guichen had time 
to wear before the attack could be delivered. Nelson 
sought to avoid this counterstroke partly by adopting 
Clerk's suggestion — which had not yet been propounded 
when Rodney fought De Guichen — of disposing his fleet 
in three divisions, and partly by bringing all his divisions 
abreast of the enemy's centre, " nearly within gunshot/' 
before making the signal for the lee line to bear up. The 
next stage of his plan appears to owe nothing to Clerk, 
who, in his '' Mode of Attack proposed," said nothing 
about breaking the enemy's line and engaging him to 
leeward. This part of Nelson's plan was probably de- 
rived partly from Rodney's famous action off Dominica 
in 1782, and partly from Lord Howe's action of the First 
of June 1794. At the action off Dominica Rodney broke 
the enemy's line — ^thus reviving a manoeuvre which had 
been in vogue in the Dutch wars, but had since fallen into 
disrepute — ^not by or^;inal tactical intention, but by 



30 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

seizing at the nick of time an opportunity afforded him 
by a sudden change in the wind ; and he apparently did 
80, not on his own initiative, but at the suggestion, not 
too readily entertained by him in the first instance, of 
his chief of the staff. The overwhelming effect of this 
manoeuvre in destroying the enemy's cohesion once more 
brought it into tactical repute, and it was repeated — 
though, as Mr. Julian Corbett has shown, with a funda- 
mental difference — ^by Lord Howe in the action of the 
First of June. Even when the latter action was fought 
the line was not yet dethroned in favour of some such 
formation as Clerk had suggested, but it was to be em- 
ployed in a much more deadly and decisive fashion than 
that which Clerk had so vigorously assailed. Rodney,* it 
is true, had discarded the old ship-to-ship engagement of 
the Fighting Instructions. He declared himself that dur- 
ing all his commands " he made it a rule to bring his whole 
force against a part of the enemy's, and never was so 
absurd as to brii^ ship against ship, when the enemy gave 
him an opportunity of acting otherwise/' But he had 
not discarded the line. Neither did Howe,, who formed 
his line on the First of June with characteristic precision. 
Rodney, again, apparently had no thought of breaking 
the line in the action off Dominica in any other place 
than that which opportunity offered him at the moment. 
He seems to have expected that all the ships astern of 
him in the line would follow him through the gap he had 
made and attack the ships of the enemy's rear in succes- 
sion. Five ships did follow him, but the sixth, finding a 
similar opportunity due to the same cause, promptly 
seized it^ and was followed by all the remaining ships 
astern. Thus De Grasse's line was broken in two places 
almost simultaneously and its cohesion totally destroyed. 
But in both cases it was broken by taking adumtage 
of ^the accident of opportunity, and not with any tactical 
intent, formulated and thought out beforehand. Nev«r- 
dieless the accident was full of lessons, and Howe was 
the very man to profit by them, and even to better them. 



TACTICS OF RODNEY AND HOWE 31 

He mast have noted the advantage gained by breaking 
the line in two places instead of one« He must have 
drawn the inference that, if it could be broken in all 
places, the advantage gained by breaking it would be 
raised to its maximum^ and this was what he set himself 
to do on the First of June. Forming his line parallel to 
that of the enemy and abreast of it, he ordered his ships 
to bear up together, to break through the line simultane- 
ously, and then to engage the enemy to leeward, each 
ship taking its appointed adversary in the enemy's line. 
It was, as Mr. Corbett suggests, probably this masterly 
development of the lessons taught by Rodney's famous 
action that was in Nelson's mind when he called Howe 
" the first and the greatest sea-officer the world has ever 
produced . • . our greatest master in naval tactics and 
bravery." 

We can now trace in outline the genesis of Nelson's 
great conception ; its full content I must leave to be 
examined in a third chapter. The attack on the enemy's 
rear was manifestly derived from Clerk of Eldin, as was 
also the proposed disposition of the fleet in three 
divisions. But Nelson aimed higher than Clerks and saw 
his way to attack twelve ships of ithe rear instead of three 
or four, and to attack them in superior force. Next, 
warned, perhaps, by the comparative failure of Rodney's 
attack on De Guichen, he provided that the division 
told off for the first onslaught should be brought " nearly 
within gunshot " of the enemy before bearing up. By 
this means he apparently hoped that, since his fleet was 
still to be kept in the order of sailing and not to assume 
the recognized order of battle, the enemy would hesitate 
to take any steps to frustrate an intention which they 
would not be able to divine, as De Guichen had divined 
and frustrated the intentions of Rodney. '' I think it 
will surprise and confound the enemy," he said to Keats. 
" They won't know what I am about." Lastly, for the 
actual attack to be made by the lee line, he adopted 
Rodney's manoeuvre of breaking the line, as developed 



32 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

and perfected by Howe. Rodney, in fact, had shown, 
more or less accidentally, the immense advantage of 
breaking the line. Howe had shown how it could be 
done with the greatest certainty and effect. Mr. Julian 
Corbett — to whom in this analysis I am indebted at 
every point — ^has pointed out that Rodney's attack could 
always be parried ** by the enemy's standing away to- 
gether on the same tack. By superior gunnery Howe's 
attack might be stopped, but by no possibility could it 
be avoided except by flight." Nelson's express instruc- 
tions to the lee line are " to set all their sails " so as " to 
get as quickly as possible to the enemy's line and to cut 
through, beginning from the twelfth ship from the enemy's 
rear." This is plainly Howe's manoeuvre, not Rodney's ; 
for the lee line would now be in line abreast, and Nelson 
goes on to say ** some ships may not get through their 
exact place " ; whereas in Rodney's manoeuvre the ships 
would be in line ahead and would all pass through at the 
same place. 



w 



CHAPTER IIP 

THE MEMORANDUM, ITS CONTENT 

E have now to examine the content of the Memor- 
andum in detail. It is rather clumsily worded, 
for Nelson was no very skilful penman, and it is not very 
lucidly arranged. But we shall find little difficulty in 
disengaging its leading ideas. In the first place there is 
the great idea, which amounts to nothing less than the 
dethronement of the line of battle — ^the final destruction 
of that fetish, the worship of which, according to Clerk 
of Eldin, had sterilized the tactics of British Fleets during 
three successive wars in the eighteenth century. Nelson, 
as Mr. Julian Corbett has shown, had early abandoned 
this antiquated form of worship. In his final Memoran- 
dum he inaugurated a new ritual, which, had his successors 
in what remained of the sailing-ship period been men of 
his calibre, must have become universal in all its essential 
principles, though it might have been improved and 
developed in some of its details. For cruising purposes 
fleets were not disposed in order or line of battle. They 
were disposed in ** order of sailing," which usually 
consisted of two or more columns or divisions disposed 
abeam of one or another. These divisions were generally 
three, designated respectively the van, the centre, and 
the rear, to indicate the positions they were to assume 
when the line of battle was to be formed. Now, 
the transformation of the order of sailing — ^whether in 
two columns or more — ^into a single line of battle was 
an evolution that necessarily required time for its com- 
pletion — in some cases a very considerable time, and in 
most cases, an amount of time that could ill be spared. 



> The Times, September as, 1905. 

33 



34 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

It was, says Nelson, " almost impossible to bring a Fleet 
. . . into a Line of Battle in variable winds, thick weather, 
and other circumstances which must occur, without such 
a loss of time that the opportunity would probably be 
lost of bringing the Enemy to Battle in such a manner 
as to make the business decisive." This, then, was the 
first reason why Nelson abandoned the line of battle. 
He grudged the time wasted in forming it ; for, as Cap- 
tain Mahan says somewhere, he never trifled with a fair 
wind or with time. But there was a much deeper reason 
than that. He held, with Clerk of Eldin, that the line 
of battle was a very bad formation for fighting " in such 
a manner as to make the business decisive." Hence, 
having abandoned the single line, he determined to dis- 
pose his fleet in such an order of sailing that it might 
become the order of battle without any further change of 
formation. The order of sailing devised for the purpose 
was in form that suggested by Clerk of Eldin, but in sub- 
stance something quite different. Clerk had assigned no 
special functions — beyond that of containing the enemy's 
van as best they might — ^to the two weathermost of the 
three divisions in which he disposed his attacking fleet, 
and his whole conception was that of an attack from to 
windward. Nelson was much more explicit, and his 
disposition provided for the alternative of an attack from 
to leeward as well as for that of an attack from to wind- 
ward. Assuming that his fleet would consist of forty 
ships, he proposed to place it '' in two Lines of Sixteen 
Ships each, with an Advanced Squadron of eight of the 
fastest sailing Two-decked Ships, which will always 
make, if wanted, a Line of twenty-four Sail, on whichever 
Line the Commander-in-Chief may direct." I shall con- 
sider hereafter how far, and why, Nelson modified this 
disposition on the day of battle. It suflices to observe 
here that no independent function was assigned to this 
" advanced squadron." It was to be kept in hand, 
so that, " if wanted," it could at any moment reinforce 
either, or possibly both, of the two other divisions. 



THE SECOND IN COMMAND 35 

Next we have the very pregnant idea of giving the 
second in command '' the entire direction of his Line to 
make the attack upon the Enemy, and to follow up the 
blow until they are captured or destroyed." This was 
to take effect " after my intentions are made known to 
him/' As this idea is repeated no fewer than three times 
in the Memorandum, and forms the keynote of the cover- 
ing letter in which Nelson sent the Memorandum to 
CoUingwood, it is manifest that Nelson attached the 
utmost importance to it. There may be some question 
as to what particular time is meant by the words, " after 
my intentions are made known to him " — whether from 
the date at which CoUingwood received the Memorandum 
or from some time on the morning of the battle, when 
some signal made by Nelson clearly indicated what his 
final intentions were. In the latter alternative, I do not 
think that we can put the time later than that when 
Nelson first made the general signal to " bear up and sail 
large " — ^though whether this signal was an order to bear 
up in succession or to bear up together is, as all students 
of the subject know, a much-debated question, which I 
do not attempt to prejudge here. In any case, if we 
collate the three passages in which this idea is embodied 
in the Memorandum and compare them with Colling- 
wood's words already quoted, both from his ofiicial des- 
patch and from his private letters, we shall, I think, 
conclude that the better opinion is that CoUingwood was 
to have " the entire management of the lee line " from 
the very first moment when the engagement was seen to 
be inevitable. In other words, CoUingwood enjoyed a 
free hand, subject to the general directions of the Memor- 
andum, not merely in the attack, but in the advance as 
well. 

Be this as it may, the principle involved is one of 
supreme importance. The breaking up of the traditional 
line of battle into two or more divisions, to which different 
functions were assigned, seems to involve as a necessary 
consequence the enlargement of the initiative of sub- 



36 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

ordinate leaders of divisions. It was clear to Nelson 
that, having assigned to CoUingwood the task of attacking 
the rear of the enemy's line, and to himself the far more 
important duty of taking care that CoUingwood 's move- 
ments were interfered with as little as possible, he would 
best further the objects of both by not even interfering 
with CoUingwood himself. If, as CoUingwood says, the 
Commander-in-Chief broke through the enemy's line 
" about the tenth ship from the van, and the second in 
command about the twelfth from the rear," and if, as 
the French naval historian Chevalier records, there was 
a gap of a mile, or of anything like a mUe, about the 
centre of the combined fleet, the leading ships of the two 
British divisions must have been at least two miles apart 
at the time when CoUingwood first came into action. At 
this distance it would be far from easy for Nelson, having 
his own business in hand, to keep in close touch with the 
detailed proceedings of CoUingwood's division, or with 
the circumstances which from time to time determined 
them. He foresaw that this would be the case, and made 
provision for it by thrice repeating in the Memorandum 
that the entire management of the lee line would be left 
to the judgment of the admiral commanding that line. 
In like manner, in his conversation with Keats, he ex- 
plained how he then proposed to employ the advanced 
squadron ; but he added, " If circumstances prevent 
their being employed against the enemy where I desire 
I shall feel certain he " — ^that is, the officer in command 
of them: — '* will employ them eflFectually and perhaps in 
a far more advantageous manner than if he could have 
followed my orders." Thus the independent initiative of 
subordinate flag-officers in separate command of divisions 
was something like a fixed idea with Nelson. He himself 
had shown the importance of such independent initiative 
in the Battle of St. Vincent, the great action which laid 
the foundation of his fame. By wearing his own ship at 
the critical moment without waiting for orders, and 
throwing it athwart the Spanish line of advance, he saved 



NELSON AT ST. VINCENT 37 

the situation, redressed what many critics have regarded 
as a grave tactical blunder on the part of Jervis, and, if 
he did not actually win the action himself, he, at any 
rate, made it far more easy for Jervis to win it and to 
make it much more complete than it might otherwise 
have been. He was not, indeed, at that time a flag- 
officer, nor was he, as a commodore, in separate command 
of a division. He had no authority, express or implied, 
to act as he did. But, without waiting for an order 
which he knew ought to be given, and even in defiance 
of the prescribed rules for preserving the line of battle, 
he saw the right thing to do, and did it without a moment's 
hesitation. Calder, Jervis's chief of the staff, could only 
see in such an act an unauthorized departure from the 
method of attack prescribed by the admiral, and he said 
as much to Jervis in the evening. But Jervis, as stem a 
disciplinarian as ever walked a quarter-deck, saw much 
deeper. Recognizing the consunmiate tactical intuition 
displayed by Nelson and the superb fearlessness of re- 
sponsibility which prompted him to act on it instantly 
without waiting for orders, he replied, " It certainly was 
80, and if ever you commit such a breach of your orders, 
I will forgive you also." Was it not the remembrance 
of this famous day that induced Nelson to resolve that 
his subordinates should have the freedom that he then 
took? If there were more Jervises there might even 
be more Nelsons ; but if there were more CSalders there 
would certainly be no Trafalgars. 

The next few paragraphs of the Memorandum need 
not detain us long. They provide for the case in which 
the enemy should be seen to windward in line of battle, 
so that the British attack would have to be* made from 
to leeward ; for Nelson, although he evidently preferred 
the attack from to windward, which he spoke of as " the 
intended attack," was true to his own principle of not 
wasting time in manoeuvring for position — ** a day is soon 
lost in that business," he had said in an earlier memor- 
andum — ^and was prepared to take the situation as he 



38 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

found it. But, as he found the enemy to leeward at 
Trafalgar, this part of the Memorandum is not pertinent 
to the present inquiry, though it is not without a profound 
tactical interest of its own. At the dose of this section of 
the Memorandum, however, there is one paragraph which 
seems to have a more general application. It begins with 
a repetition of the provision that the second in OHnmand 
is in all possible things to direct the movements of his 
line, and then goes on as follows : '' Captains are to 
look to their particular Line as their rallying point. Butj 
in case Signals can neither be seen or perfectly under- 
stood, no Captain can do very wrong if he places his 
Ship alongside that of an Enemy." Here, again, is a 
manifest reminiscence of Nebon's own action at St. 
Vincent — ^for us, at any rate, if not for himself. Signals 
might not be seen or might not be understood. There 
was a memorable instance of a signal not being seen at 
Copenhagen. At St. Vincent no signal was misunder- 
stood, but Nelson could not understand why a certain 
signal was not made, and, as he knew it ought to be 
made, he acted as if it had been made. He resolved that 
at Trafalgar every captain should by his orders enjoy the 
liberty that he took at St. Vincent without order^. 

Lastly we come to the kernel of the whole Memor- 
andum, '* the intended attack from to windward, the 
Enemy in Line of Battle ready to receive an attack." To 
emphasize this, his chosen plan of action if fortune 
* favoured him with the choice. Nelson himself illustrated 
it by a simple diagram. It will be noted in this diagram 
that the so-called *' advanced squadron " is no more 
ahead of the weather line than the latter is of the lee line. 
On the assumption that the enemy's line is close-hauled 
and that the three divisions of the British fleet are, there- 
fore, close-hauled on the same tack also, the wind would 
be about 6 or 7 points on the weather bow of all four 
lines — ^that is, at an angle of 67^ or 78! degrees. In that 
case it would seem that Nelson in his diagram showed 
his three divisions as they would be disposed in the order 



THE ADVANCED SQUADRON 39 

of sailing when " sailii^ by the wind/' because in that 
condition, as Admiral Bridge has explained, the column 
leaders were not abeam of each other, but bore from 
one another in the direction of the wind. This being so, 
it is not very easy to see why the " advanced squadron " 
was so called, but perhaps the explanation is that sug- 
gested by Admiral Bridge — ^namely, that the designation 
was due to the mode in which Nelson intended to employ, 
and actually did employ, the ships composing this squadron 
in '* feeling " for the enemy. They were to be an ad- 
vanced squadron in the days preceding the battle ; on 
the day of battle they were to be a Ught division not 
otherwise disposed than the other two, but to be em- 
I>loyed as circumstances might require. In the conversa- 
tion with Keats Nelson expressed the intention of keeping 
them "always to windward or in a situation of advantage/' 
In the Memorandum they are shown to windward, indeed, 
but not otherwise disposed than they would be if the 
order of sailing were in three divisions. On the day 
of battle, as we shall see, the advanced squadron was 
broken up and distributed between the other two divi- 
sions. Nelson apparently satisfied himself that the time 
had then already come for disposing of them in accordance 
with the intentions indicated in the first paragraph of 
the Memorandum, not indeed in strengthening one divi- 
sion or the other, but in strengthening both, though in 
different proportions. 

As the so-called advanced squadron had thus dis- 
appeared on the day of battle, I heed only consider hence- 
forth the function assigned to the two divisions of the 
fleet. We have seen what the lee line was to do, Nelson^s 
own words having already been quoted. It was to bear 
up together, set all sail, and attack the rear of the enemy 
in superior force, breaking his line as far as might be 
simultaneously, after the method adopted by Howe, so 
that each ship should as far as possible pass through the 
interval in the enemy's line corresponding to its own 
position in its own line. " Some Ships may not get 



40 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

through their exact place, but they will always be at 
hand to assist their friends ; and if any are thrown round 
the Rear of the Enemy they will effectually complete the 
business of twelve Sail of the Enemy." The precise 
function of the lee line is thus clearly defined, and the 
evolutions most likely to conduce to the effective dis- 
charge of that function are exactly, albeit provisionally, 
prescribed. But what was to be the function of the 
weather line ? The answer to this question is contained 
in what is at once the shortest and most pregnant para- 
graph in the whole Memorandum. " The remainder of 
the Enemy's Fleet • • • are to be left to the management 
of the Commander-in-Chief, who will endeavour to take 
care that the movements of the Second in Command 
are as little interrupted as is possible." There is no 
question here of bearing up or not bearing up, or of any 
other specific evolution whatever. Nelson reserved his 
absolute freedom of action, subject to the paramount 
condition that the work of the lee line was to be inmiune 
from interruption until its object — ^the crushing of the 
enemy's rear — ^had been attained. In other words, just 
as the sole fimction of the lee line was to concentrate in 
superior force on the rear, so the primary function of the 
weather line was to contain the centre and the van. But 
not its sole function, though Nelson says not a word about 
its ulterior purpose. Undoubtedly that must have been 
by close fighting to " complete the business " of as many 
ships of the enemy's centre as possible, leaving the van 
to do its worst, which could not be much, since by the 
hypothesis it was to be contained and thrown out of 
action. This being so, it seems idle to consider in M^at 
formation Nelson's line was — whether in line ahead, 
line abreast, or line of bearing — ^when at last he bore 
down to the attack. Whatever it was, we may be quite 
sure that it was the best formation that could be adopted, 
in the circumstances, for securing the primary purpose 
of containing the enemy's van and centre until CoUing- 
wood's ships had done their work, and that, if in adopting 



SUMMARY OF THE MEMORANDUM 41 

it Nelson exposed his ships to greater risk of damage than 
some other formation might have involved, he did so for 
the very good reason that he cared more, in the first 
instance, for the success of Collingwood's attack than for 
the immunity of his own line ; knowing full well that, 
if only he could contain the van and throw it out of 
action — ^as he did — ^the ultimate victory must be in his 
hands. The officer of the Conqueror — ^to whose criticism, 
singularly acute but manifestly influenced by parti pris, 
nearly all the controversy concerning the tactics of Trafal- 
gar is due — ^frankly assumes that, '' if the regulated plan 
of attack had been adhered to, the English fleet should 
have borne up together and have sailed in a line abreast 
in their respective divisions until they arrived up with the 
enemy." It is not for me to say whether this would 
or would not have been a better plan than Nelson's, but 
I think I have shown beyond all manner of doubt that it 
was not Nelson's. 

In sum, then, I think we may concur in the main in 
Mr. Julian Corbett's conclusion, that Nelson's plan of 
attack as expounded in the Memorandum — ^and, though I 
say it with fear and trembling, as carried out substantially 
in action — ^was an exceedingly subtle, and not less original, 
combination of the several ideas of concentration on the 
rear, of complete freedom of action for the second in 
command, of containing the enemy's van and centre 
until the business of twelve sail of the enemy was seen 
to be so far advanced that its interruption was no longer 
to be feared, and, above all, of the concealment of his 
own intentions until the last possible moment, so as to 
confuse the enemy's mind by not letting him know where 
and how the attack of the weather line was to be delivered. 
No one of these ideas is, perhaps, entirely new except the 
last. I have shown that the genesis of some of them can 
be traced a long way back in the tactical history of the 
eighteenth century. Their combination was, no doubt. 
Nelson's own, but what was far more his own was the 
moral and psychological idea which binds them all 



42 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

together and displays Nelson's genius at its highest. The 
plan outlined in conversation with Keats differs in several 
important respects from that expounded in the Memo- 
randum, either because Keats misunderstood it to some 
extent, or because Nelson's great conception had matured 
before the Memorandum was composed. But the inner- 
most thought in Nelson's mind is, perhaps, better dis- 
played than an3rwhere else in what he said to Keats : 
" I will tell you what I think of it. I think it will surprise 
and confound the enemy. They won't know what I 
am about. It will bring forward a pell-mell battle, and 
that is what I want." That is the true " Nelson touch." 
Yet perhaps the most astounding thing in the whole 
story is the fact that, as Mr. Julian Corbett has pointed 
out, Villeneuve had divined almost exactly the kind of 
attack that Nelson was most likely to make. In his 
General Instructions, issued in anticipation of the battle, 
he had written : " The enemy will not confine themselves 
to forming a line paraUel to ours. They will try to 
envelop our rear, to break our line, and to throw upon 
those of our ships that they cut off groups of their own 
to suiTOund and crush them." That he could devise no 
better mode of parrying such an attack than a single 
and iU-fonned line of battle is perhaps the chief reason 
why Villeneuve, in spite of the gallantry of his fleet, was 
so thoroughly " drubbed " at Trafalgar. 



CHAPTER IV ^ 

THE ADVANCE 

HAVING now analysed the Memorandum, traced its 
genesis, and examined its content, we have next 
to consider its application. In the first place we have 
to bear in mind that, as Admiral Bridge has said, " ad- 
vancing to the attack and the attack itself are not the 
same operations." The two are, however, continuous, 
and there is no one point in the series of events to be 
considered at which we can say that the advance ended 
and the attack began — ^more especially as, in the case 
before us, the attack of the lee line was, and was intended 
to be, anterior to the attack of the weather line. Perhaps 
the best point of distinction is that which is indicated 
in the Memorandum itself. " The divisions of the British 
Fleet will be brought nearly within gunshot of the Enemy's 
Centre " — this is the advance. " The signal will most 
probably then be made for the Lee Line to bear up 
together, to set all their sails, even steering sails, in order 
to get as quickly as possible to the Enemy's Line, and to 
cut through " — this is the opening of the attack. It is 
with the advance alone that I shall deal in the present 
chapter. 

The first point to be noted is that, in the final order 
of sailing, which was also, as prescribed by the Memo«» 
randum, the order of battle, the so-called advanced 
squadron had disappeared. It had indeed been formed 
and had been employed as an advanced squadron proper 
—that is, as Admiral Bridge puts it, "in feeling for the 
enemy "—during the da3rs and nights immediately pre- 

* The Tinus, September 26, 1905. 
6 43 



44 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

ceding the battle* Mr. G>rbett| in his invaluable edition 
of the Fighting Instructions, traces at length the foiv 
mation and proceedings of this advanced squadron, but 
for my purpose it is sufficient to quote the concise state- 
ment of Admiral Bridge : 

On October 19 six ships were ordered ''to go ahead 
during the night '* ; and besides the frigates two more 
ships were so stationed as to keep up the communication 
between the six and the Commander-in-Chief's flagship. 
Thus eight ships in effect composed an " advanced squad- 
ron/' and did not join either of the main divisions at first. 

The majority of them were recalled on October 20, 
but three still remained detached, to form a chain between 
the Admiral and his frigates. Throughout the night of 
the 20th Nelson was thus kept fully informed of every 
movement of the enemy, and regulated the movements 
of his own fleet accordingly. When, however, the de- 
tached ships were recalled, they did not, as prescribed 
by the Memorandum, re-form into a separate division, 
but took their respective stations — ^no doubt as pre- 
viously determined, though there appears to be no record 
of an order or signal to that effect — ^in one or other of 
the two main divisions. Codrington, of the Orion, which 
was one of the advanced squadron, seems to have thought 
that, although that squadron had been merged in the 
two main divisions, yet it might, at a later stage of the 
advance, be ordered to haul out of line again and re-form 
as a separate division for the purpose of checking the 
enemy's van. But this intention, if it existed, was 
never carried out, Nelson himself making a feint at the 
van, apparently with his whole division, before he finally 
hauled to starboard and broke the enemy's line astern 
of the Bucentaure. 

Why Nelson thus abandoned his original idea of a 
separate advanced squadron it seems impossible now to 
say. But it is worth while to reflect that, when he drew 
up the Memorandum, he assumed that his fleet would 



THE ADVANCED SQUADRON 45 

consist of " forty Sail of the Line/' and the enemy's of 
forty-six. The actual numbers were twenty-seven to 
thirty-three. With forty ships, he proposed to have 
two divisions of sixteen ships each, and a third of eight 
ships. With twenty-seven ships, the nearest correspond- 
ing proportions would be two divisions of ten and eleven 
ships respectively, and a third of six. Now, he had pre- 
scribed that " if either is less, only a proportionate number 
of Enemy's Ships is to be cut off ; B. to be i superior to 
the E. cut off." In this case the lee division, even if it 
consisted of eleven ships, would only be able to cut 
off eight of the enemy— or nine at the outside, if the 
prescribed superiority of one-quarter were fractionally 
reduced. Nelson may have considered that, in these 
circumstances, it was better to strengthen the lee line 
from the outside to such an extent that it would still 
be able to ** complete the business of twelve Sail of the 
Enemy." He accordingly gave it fifteen ships, thus 
reducing the third division to two only, and these he 
attached to his own division, since they were insufficient 
to form a separate one. In point of fact, having regard 
to the reduced numbers of both fleets and the reduced 
proportion between his own numbers and those of the 
enemy, he found that he had not ships enough to form a 
third division without so reducing the weight of the 
attack of the lee line as to upset the balance of his plan. 
The advanced squadron, if it had been retained, was to 
have been under the orders of the Commander-in-Chief, 
and to be so employed as to " make, if wanted, a Line 
of twenty-four Sail, on whichever Line the Commander^ 
in-Chief may direct.'* What he did actually direct, not 
in the course of the advance but beforehand, was, for the 
major part of it, to make a line of fifteen sail under Col- 
lingwood's orders. I am the more inclined to adopt this 
explanation of the matter, because, whereas Nelson 
told Keats that he should put the proposed third division 
'' under an officer who, I am sure, will employ them in 
the manner I wish," he does not seem ever to have told 



46 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

off any officer for what Keats called '' this distingubhed 
service." He dischai^ed that function himself, by putting 
the bulk of the advanced squadron into CoUingwood's 
iline, before the action, or even the advance, began, and 
the residue into his own. 

Be this as it may, at 6.30 on the morning of October 2 1 
the signal was made, according to Collingwood's Journal, 
'' to form the order of sailing in two columns, and at 
7 to prepare for battle." Taken tc^ether, these two 
signals form the first stage of the advance, since the 
order of sailing was to be the order of battle. It is clear 
from the logs that the order of sailing had been much 
deranged during the night, and the signal would have 
the effect, not only of correcting this derangement so far 
as time and circumstances allowed, but recalling to their 
appointed stations such ships of the line as were still 
detached for lookout purposes.* What the precise order 
of sailing was, however, it is exceedingly difficult to 
determine. CoUingwood, in his official despatch, gives it 
as follows : 

Van. Rear. 

1. Victory, 1,1,1 i. Royal Sovereign, 1,1,1 

2. Timiraire, 2, 2, 2 2. Mars, 4, 3, 3 

3. Neptune, 3, 3, 3 3. Belleisle, 2, 2, 2 

4. Conqueror, 4, 5, 6 4. Tonnant, 3, 4, S 

5. Leviathan, 5, 4, 5 5* Bellerophon, 5, 5, 6 

6. Ajax, 7, 8, 8 6. Colossus, 6, 6, 4 

7. Orion, 8, 9, 9 7. Achilles, 7,7, 7 

8. Agamemnon, 9, 7, 7 8. Polyphemus, 14, 9, 8 

9. Minotaur, 10, 10, 10 9. Revenge, 8, 10, 11 
10. Spartiate, 11, 11, 11 10. Swiftsure, 10, 11, 11 

^ Colonel Desbridre adduces abundant proof from the French and Spanish 
archives examined by him that the British fleet, when first sighted by the 
allies, was in no very regular order. The expression used to describe it by 
•everal observers in the allied line is that it appeared to be in two " pelotons," 
that is, in two more or less irregular groups. 



THE ORDER OF SAILING 47 

Van. Rear. 

11. Britannia, 6, 6, 4 11. Defence, 12, 15, 13 

12. Africa, 12, 12 12. Thunderer, 11, 13, 14 

13. Defiance, 9, 12, 15 

14. Prince, 15, 14, 12 

15. Dreadnought, 13, 8, 10 

It is certain, however, that Collingwood's order is not 
strictly correct. The journal of the Britannia, describ- 
ing the attack of the weather line, led by Nelson in the 
Victory, states that " he was close followed up by the 
TSnUraire, Neptune, Conqueror, Leviathan, and this ship " ; 
and there is evidence to show that some of the other 
ships are misplaced. In the log of the Britannia, which 
was the flagship of Rear-Admiral Lord Northesk, a list 
of the ships, with the amount of loss in killed and wounded 
sustained by each, is given, and the order in that list 
differs materially from that given by Collingwood, especi- 
ally in respect of the lee line. I have indicated this order 
in the first of the series of figures placed after the names 
of the ships in Collingwood 's list. The second series of 
figures indicates the order given by Sir John Laughton 
in his Nelson, and the third that given by Mr. Newbolt 
in his Year of Trafalgar. The truth is that, the ships 
having been ordered to make all sail, the order of the rear 
ships in both lines was very irregular, being dependent 
on their rate of sailing. '* All our ships were carrying 
studding sails," says Moorsom, '' and many bad sailers 
were a long way astern, but little or no stop was made 
for them." Hence the order may have changed from 
time to time, as the faster ships got ahead and the slower 
ships fell astern of their stations. The Africa never took 
her proper station. She had got away to the northward 
during the night, and only rejoined the weather line just 
as the action began, having in so doing run down the 
whole of the enemy's van within gunshot. The Prince 
also was a very slow ship, and never reached the lee line. 



48 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

After having recorded the signal for dose action, which 
was the very last that Nelson made, she logs herself as 
** steering down between the lines with all sail set." She 
was the last ship into action, opening fire after 3 p.m. and 
losing neither killed nor wounded throughout the day. 

Thus, however the lines were formed, whether in 
line ahead or line of bearing, there is, I think, no doubt 
that they were very irregularly formed, and that the 
slower ships straggled greatly. '' Admiral CoUingwood 
dashed directly down," says Moorsom, " supported by 
such ships as could get up, and went directly through 
their line ; Lord Nelson the same, and the rest as fast 
as they could." It may be argued, and has been argued, 
from this that Nelson was in too great a hurry. That he 
was in a great hurry is not to be disputed. But the 
Memorandum is founded on the necessity of not losing 
a moment, if the enemy was to be brought to battle " in 
such a manner as to make the business decisive." The 
allied fleet was heading for Cadiz. Though the wind was 
light and variable throughout the day, a gale was immi- 
nent, as Nelson well knew. The days were shortening, 
and even in those latitudes the sun would set on October 
21 very soon after five o'clock. " No day could be long 
enough," he had told Keats, '' to arrange a couple of 
fleets and fight a decisive battle according to the old 
system." He was determined to make a short October 
day long enough to give Mr. Villeneuve his " drubbing." 
Was there any time to spare? Was he in too great a 
hurry ? The answer is given in that quaint, but pathetic, 
entry in the Victory* s own log which records the triumphant 
close of the day in all its tragedy. " Partial firing con- 
tinued until 4.30, when a victory having been reported 
to the Right Honourable Lord Viscount Nelson, K.B. 
and Commander-in-Chief, he then died of his wound." 
" Thank Crod, I have done my duty," were his last words, 
oftentimes repeated. Would he have done his duty if he 
had wasted in manoeuvring a single moment that could 
be saved for beating the enemy before the day was gone ? 



THE WIND AND THE COURSE 49 

A very few minutes — ^not more than five, according 
to the log of the Jl/ors^-after the signal was made to 
form the order of sailing in two columns. Nelson made 
another signal, which has been more hotly debated than 
any other point in his long and tangled history. Accord- 
ing to the log of the Mars, this signal was '' 76, with 
compass signal E.N.E. (bear up and steer E.N.E.)." 
By the log of the Victory the wind, which was N.W. by 
W. at 6 a.m., had become N.W. at 7, and so remained 
until it became W.N.W. at i p.m. Moorsom records 
that " the wind all the morning was light from the N.W./' 
thus confirming the log of the Victory ; but Collingwood 
in his despatch speaks of the wind as '* about west." 
The log of the Victory is attested by the master of the 
ship, and I think we may regard this testimony as being 
of the first order and weight. The master of a man-of- 
war was not responsible for fighting the ship, but he was 
responsible for navigating her. If there was one thing that 
he was less likely to be mistaken about than any other, 
it was the direction of the wind and the* corresponding 
course of the ship. Thomas Atkinson, the master of 
the Victory, was working under Nelson's own eye, and, 
as the tactical situation was governed entirely by these 
two factors, any misconception in this regard on his part 
would seem to be extremely improbable. He may have 
been inaccurate in his record, but he can hardly have 
been mistaken in his original observation, and that, at 
any rate, affords some presumption that his record also 
was trustworthy. Hence we may assume, in default of 
evidence of the same order and of equivident weight to 
the contrary, that the log of the Victory is correct, so far 
as it goes, in giving the direction of the wind and the 
course steered by that ship. The entries are only made 
at intervals of an hour, so that any temporary alteration 
of course made and completed between one hour and the 
next would not be recorded. 

Now the question b whether the alteration of course 
prescribed by signal 76 was to be executed in succession. 



42 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

together and displays Nelson's genius at its highest. The 
plan outlined in conversation with Keats differs in several 
important respects from that expounded in the Memo- 
randumi either because Keats misunderstood it to some 
extent, or because Nelson's great conception had matured 
before the Memorandum was composed. But the inner- 
most thought in Nelson's mind is, perhaps, better dis- 
played than anywhere else in what he said to Keats : 
" I will tell you what I think of it. I think it will surprise 
and confound the enemy. They won't know what I 
am about. It will bring forward a pell-mell battle, and 
that is what I want." That is the true '* Nelson touch." 
Yet perhaps the most astounding thing in the whole 
story is the fact that, as Mr. Julian Corbett has pointed 
out, ViUeneuve had divined almost exactly the kind of 
attack that Nelson was most likely to make. In his 
General Instructions, issued in anticipation of the battle, 
he had written : " The enemy will not confine themselves 
to forming a line parallel to ours. They will try to 
envelop our rear, to break our line, and to throw upon 
those of our ships that they cut oif groups of their own 
to surround and crush them." That he could devise no 
better mode of panying such an attack than a single 
and ill-formed line of battle is perhaps the chief reason 
why ViUeneuve, in spite of the gallantry of his fleet, was 
so thoroughly '' drubbed " at Trafalgar. 



CHAPTER IV » 

THE ADVANCE 

HAVING now analysed the Memorandum, traced its 
genesis, and examined its content, we have next 
to consider its application. In the first place we have 
to bear in mind that, as Admiral Bridge has said, " ad- 
vancing to the attack and the attack itself are not the 
same operations." The two are, however, continuous, 
and there is no one point in the series of events to be 
considered at which we can say that the advance ended 
and the attack began — ^more especially as, in the case 
before us, the attack of the lee line was, and was intended 
to be, anterior to the attack of the weather line. Perhaps 
the best point of distinction is that which is indicated 
in the Memorandum itself. " The divisions of the British 
Fleet will be brought nearly within gunshot of the Enemy's 
Centre " — ^this is the advance. " The signal will most 
probably then be made for the Lee Line to bear up 
together, to set all their sails, even steering sails, in order 
to get as quickly as possible to the Enemy's Line, and to 
cut through " — this is the opening of the attack. It is 
with the advance alone that I shall deal in the present 
chapter. 

The first point to be noted is that, in the final order 
of sailing, which was also, as prescribed by the Memo- 
randum, the order of battle, the so-called advanced 
squadron had disappeared. It had indeed been formed 
and had been employed as an advanced squadron proper 
— ^that is, as Admiral Bridge puts it, '' in feeling for the 
enemy "—during the days and nights immediately pre- 

1 7A# Tim$s, September 26, 1905. 
6 43 



44 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

ceding the battle. Mr. G)rbett, in his invaluable edition 
of the Fighting Instructions, traces at length the for- 
mation and proceedings of this advanced squadron, but 
for my purpose it is sufficient to quote the concise state- 
ment of Admiral Bridge : 

On October 19 six ships were ordered *' to go ahead 
during the night " ; and besides the frigates two more 
ships were so stationed as to keep up the communication 
between the six and the G>mmander-in-Chief's flagship. 
Thus eight ships in effect composed an " advanced squad- 
ron/' and did not join either of the main divisions at first. 

The majority of them were recalled on October 20, 
but three still remained detached, to form a chain between 
the Admiral and his frigates. Throughout the night of 
the 20th Nelson was thus kept fully informed of every 
movement of the enemy, and regulated the movements 
of his own fleet accordingly. When, however, the de- 
tached ships were recalled, they did not, as prescribed 
by the Memorandum, re-form into a separate division, 
but took their respective stations — ^no doubt as pre- 
viously determined, though there appears to be no record 
of an order or signal to that effect — ^in one or other of 
the two main divisions. Codrington, of the Orion, which 
was one of the advanced squadron, seems to have thought 
that, although that squadron had been merged in the 
two main divisions, yet it might, at a later stage of the 
advance, be ordered to haul out of line again and re-form 
as a separate division for the purpose of checking the 
enemy's van. But this intention, if it existed, was 
never carried out. Nelson himself making a feint at the 
van, apparently with his whole division, before he finally 
hauled to starboard and broke the enemy's line astern 
of the Bucentaure. 

Why Nelson thus abandoned his original idea of a 

separate advanced squadron it seems impossible now to 

say. But it is worth while to reflect that, when he drew 

Memorandum, he assumed that his fleet would 



THE ADVANCED SQUADRON 45 

consist of " forty Sail of the Line/' and the enemy's of 
forty-six. The actual numbers were twenty-seven to 
thirty-three. With forty ships, he proposed to have 
two divisions of sixteen ships each, and a third of eight 
ships. With twenty-seven ships, the nearest correspond- 
ing proportions would be two divisions of ten and eleven 
ships respectively, and a third of six. Now, he had pre- 
scribed that '' if either is less, only a proportionate number 
of Enemy's Ships is to be cut off ; B. to be ^ superior to 
the E. cut off." In this case the lee division, even if it 
consisted of eleven ships, would only be able to cut 
oflf eight of the enemy— or nine at the outside, if the 
prescribed superiority of one-quarter were fractionally 
reduced. Nekon may have considered that, in these 
circumstances, it M^as better to strengthen the lee line 
from the outside to such an extent that it would still 
be able to '' complete the business of twelve Sail of the 
Enemy." He accordingly gave it fifteen ships, thus 
reducing the third division to two only, and these he 
attached to his own division, since they were insufiicient 
to form a separate one. In point of fact, having regard 
to the reduced numbers of both fleets and the reduced 
proportion between his own numbers and those of the 
enemy, he found that he had not ships enough to form a 
third division without so reducing the weight of the 
attack of the lee line as to upset the balance of his plan. 
The advanced squadron, if it had been retained, was to 
have been under the orders of the Commander-in-Chief, 
and to be so employed as to '' make, if wanted, a Line 
of twenty-four Sail, on whichever Line the Commander^ 
in-Chief may direct.** What he did actually direct, not 
in the course of the advance but beforehand, was, for the 
major part of it, to make a line of fifteen sail under Col- 
lingwood's orders. I am the more inclined to adopt this 
explanation of the matter, because, whereas Nelson 
told Keats that he should put the proposed third division 
** under an officer who, I am sure, will employ them in 
the manner I wish," he does not seem ever to have told 



44 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

ceding the battle. Mr. G)rbett, in his invaluable edition 
of the Fighting Instructions ^ traces at length the fon- 
mation and proceedings of this advanced squadron, but 
for my purpose it is sufficient to quote the concise state- 
ment of Admiral Bridge : 

On October 19 six ships were ordered '' to go ahead 
during the night " ; and besides the frigates two more 
ships were so stationed as to keep up the communication 
between the six and the Conmiander*in-Chief's flagship. 
Thus eight ships in effect composed an " advanced squad- 
ron/' and did not join either of the main divisions at first. 

The majority of them were recalled on October 20, 
but three still remained detached, to form a chain between 
the Admiral and his frigates. Throughout the night of 
the 20th Nelson was thus kept fully informed of every 
movement of the enemy, and regulated the movements 
of his own fleet accordingly. When, however, the de- 
tached ships were recalled, they did not, as prescribed 
by the Memorandum, re-form into a separate division, 
but took their respective stations — ^no doubt as pre- 
viously determined, though there appears to be no record 
of an order or signal to that effect — ^in one or other of 
the two main divisions. Codrington, of the Orion, which 
was one of the advanced squadron, seems to have thought 
that, although that squadron had been merged in the 
two main divisions, yet it might, at a later stage of the 
advance, be ordered to haul out of line again and re-form 
as a separate division for the purpose of checking the 
enemy's van. But this intention, if it existed, was 
never carried out, Nelson himself making a feint at the 
van, apparently with his whole division, before he finally 
hauled to starboard and broke the enemy's line astern 
of the Bucentaure. 

Why Nebon thus abandoned his original idea of a 
separate advanced squadron it seems impossible now to 
My, But it is worth while to reflect that, when he drew 
UP the Memorandum, he assumed that his fleet would 



THE ADVANCED SQUADRON 45 

consist of " forty Sail of the Line/' and the enemy's of 
forty-six. The actual numbers were twenty-seven to 
thirty-three. With forty ships, he proposed to have 
two divisions of sixteen ships each, and a third of eight 
ships. With twenty-seven ships, the nearest correspond- 
ing proportions would be two divisions of ten and eleven 
ships respectively, and a third of six. Now, he had pre- 
scribed that " if either is less, only a proportionate number 
of Enemy's Ships is to be cut off ; B. to be ^ superior to 
the £. cut off." In this case the lee division, even if it 
consisted of eleven ships, would only be able to cut 
off eight of the enemy-— or nine at the outside, if the 
prescribed superiority of one-quarter were fractionally 
reduced. Nekon may have considered that, in these 
circumstances, it was better to strengthen the lee line 
from the outside to such an extent that it would still 
be able to " complete the business of twelve Sail of the 
Enemy." He accordingly gave it fifteen ships, thus 
reducing the third division to two only, and these he 
attached to his own division, since they were insufficient 
to form a separate one. In point of fact, having regard 
to the reduced numbers of both fleets and the reduced 
proportion between his own numbers and those of the 
enemy, he found that he had not ships enough to form a 
third division without so reducing the weight of the 
attack of the lee line as to upset the balance of his plan. 
The advanced squadron, if it had been retained, was to 
have been under the orders of the Conmiander-in-Chief, 
and to be so employed as to " make, if wanted, a Line 
of twenty-four Sail, on whichever Line the Commander^ 
in-Chief may direct.'^ What he did actually direct, not 
in the course of the advance but beforehand, was, for the 
major part of it, to make a line of fifteen sail under Col- 
lingwood's orders. I am the more inclined to adopt this 
explanation of the matter, because, whereas Nelson 
told Keats that he should put the proposed third division 
" under an officer who, I am sure, wiUl employ them in 
the manner I wish," he does not seem ever to have told 



42 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

together and displays Nelson's genius at its highest. The 
plan outlined in conversation with Keats differs in several 
important respects from that expounded in the Memo- 
randum, either because Keats misunderstood it to some 
extent, or because Nelson's great conception had matured 
before the Monorandum was composed. But the inner- 
most thought in Nelson's mind is, perhaps, better dis- 
played than anywhere else in what he said to Keats : 
" I will tell you what I think of it. I think it will surprise 
and confound the enemy. They won't know what I 
am about. It will bring forward a pell-mell battle, and 
that is what I want." That is the true '' Nelson touch." 
Yet perhaps the most astounding thing in the whole 
story is the fact that, as Mr. Julian Corbett has pointed 
out, ViUeneuve had divined almost exactly the kind of 
attack that Nelson was most likely to make. In his 
General Instructions, issued in anticipation of the battle, 
he had written : ** The enemy will not confine themselves 
to forming a line parallel to ours. They will try to 
envelop our rear, to break our line, and to throw upon 
those of our ships that they cut off groups of their own 
to surround and crush them." That he could devise no 
better mode of panying such an attack than a single 
and ill-formed line of battle is perhaps the chief reason 
why Villeneuve, in spite of the gallantry of his fleet, was 
so thoroughly " drubbed " at Trafalgar. 



CHAPTER IV » 

THE ADVANCE 

HAVING now analysed the Memorandum, traced its 
genesis, and examined its content, we have next 
to consider its application. In the first place we have 
to bear in mind that, as Admiral Bridge has said, " ad- 
vancing to the attack and the attack itself are not the 
same operations." The two are, however, continuous, 
and there is no one point in the series of events to be 
considered at which we can say that the advance ended 
and the attack began — ^more especially as, in the case 
before us, the attack of the lee line was, and was intended 
to be, anterior to the attack of the weather line. Perhaps 
the best point of distinction is that which is indicated 
in the Memorandum itself. " The divisions of the British 
Fleet will be brought nearly within gunshot of the Enemy's 
Centre " — ^this is the advance. '* The signal will most 
probably then be made for the Lee Line to bear up 
together, to set all their sails, even steering sails, in order 
to get as quickly as possible to the Enemy's Line, and to 
cut through " — ^this is the opening of the attack. It is 
with the advance alone that I shall deal in the present 
chapter. 

The first point to be noted is that, in the final order 
of sailing, which was also, as prescribed by the Memo- 
randum, the order of battle, the so-called advanced 
squadron had disappeared. It had indeed been formed 
and had been employed as an advanced squadron proper 
— ^that is, as Admiral Bridge puts it, " in feeling for the 
enemy "—during the da3rs and nights immediately pre- 

1 Thg Times, September a6, 1905. 
6 43 



44 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

ceding the battle. Mr. G)rbett, in his invaluable edition 
of the Fighting Instructions, traces at length the for- 
mation and proceedings of this advanced squadron, but 
for my purpose it is sufficient to quote the concise state- 
ment of Admiral Bridge : 

On October 19 six ships were ordered ''to go ahead 
during the night " ; and besides the frigates two more 
ships were so stationed as to keep up the communication 
between the six and the Commander-in-Chief's flagship. 
Thus eight ships in effect composed an ** advanced squad- 
ron/' and did not join either of the main divisions at first. 

< 

The majority of them were recalled on October 20, 

' but three still remained detached, to form a chain between 
the Admiral and his frigates. Throughout the night of 
the 20th Nelson was thus kept fully informed of every 
movement of the enemy, and regulated the movements 
of his own fleet accordingly. When, however, the de- 
tached ships were recalled, they did not, as prescribed 
by the Memorandum, re-form into a separate division, 
but took their respective stations — ^no doubt as pre- 
viously determined, though there appears to be no record 
of an order or signal to that effect — ^in one or other of 
the two main divisions. Codrington, of the Orion, which 
was one of the advanced squadron, seems to have thought 
that, although that squadron had been merged in the 
two main divisions, yet it might, at a later stage of the 
advance, be ordered to haul out of line again and re-form 
as a separate division for the purpose of checking the 
enemy's van. But this intention, if it existed, was 
never carried out. Nelson himself making a feint at the 
van, apparently with his whole division, before he finally 
hauled, to starboard and broke the enemy's line astern 
of the Bucentaure. 

Why Nelson thus abandoned his original idea of a 
separate advanced squadron it seems impossible now to 
say. But it is worth while to reflect that, when he drew 
up the Memorandum, he assumed that his fleet would 



THE ADVANCED SQUADRON 45 

consist of " forty Sail of the Line," and the enemy's of 
forty-six. The actual numbers were twenty-seven to 
thirty-three. With forty ships, he proposed to have 
two divisions of sixteen ships each, and a third of eight 
ships. With twenty-seven ships, the nearest correspond- 
ing proportions would be two divisions of ten and eleven 
ships respectively, and a third of six. Now, he had pre- 
scribed that ** if either is less, only a proportionate number 
of Enemy's Ships is to be cut off ; B. to be ^ superior to 
the E. cut off." In this case the lee division, even if it 
consisted of eleven ships, would only be able to cut 
off eight of the enemy— or nine at the outside, if the 
prescribed superiority of one-quarter were fractionally 
reduced. Nelson may have considered that, in these 
circumstances, it was better to strengthen the lee line 
from the outside to such an extent that it would still 
be able to '' complete the business of twelve Sail of the 
Enemy." He accordingly gave it fifteen ships, thus 
reducing the third division to two only, and these he 
attached to his own division, since they were insufficient 
to form a separate one. In point of fact, having regard 
to the reduced numbers of both fleets and the reduced 
proportion between his own numbers and those of the 
enemy, he found that he had not ships enough to form a 
third division without so reducing the weight of the 
attack of the lee line as to upset the balance of his plan. 
The advanced squadron, if it had been retained, was to 
have been under the orders of the Commander-in-Chief, 
and to be so employed as to " make, if wanted, a Line 
of twenty-four Sail, on whichever Line the Commander- 
in-Chief may direct.^* What he did actually direct, not 
in the course of the advance but beforehand, was, for the 
major part of it, to make a line of fifteen sail under Col- 
lingwood's orders. I am the more inclined to adopt this 
explanation of the matter, because, whereas Nelson 
told Keats that he should put the proposed third division 
" under an officer who, I am sure, will employ them in 
the manner I wish," he does not seem ever to have told 



5« TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

point some two and a half miles ahead of the enemy's 
leading ship. But the enemy's leading ships were not 
stationary, any more than Nelson's ships were stationary. 
They could not be stationary, or the operation of wearing 
would have been impossible. They were moving slowly 
ahead towards the N.N.E., being dose-hauled and obliged 
to go slowly in order to give the rear ships time to recover 
their stations after wearing. Nelson's ships were moving 
faster, since they were going free, with all sail set, and he 
¥ras determined not to wait for the lags;ards in either line. 
Even if they fell astern, they would still be able to operate 
independently, as he had designed the advanced squadron 
to operate, and it is important to note that, just before 
the action began, he provided for this very contingency, 
by telling Blackwood to " make any use I pleased of his 
name in ordering any of the stemmost line-of-battle 
ships to do what struck me as best." Hence he had no 
need to wait, and would push on as fast as he could, 
knowii^ well that the course he was steering, though 
pointing well ahead of the enemy's line at first, would 
bring him just about where he wanted to be at the moment 
of contact. In the lower diagram facing page 53, V is 
the Victory and the dotted line shows her course. B is 
the " body " of the enemy's fleet bearing E. by S. from 
the Victory distant nine miles. E is the head of the 
enemy's line steering N.N.E. It will thus be seen that 
Nelson did by eye and instinct exactly what an instrument 
devised by Prince Louis of Battenberg now enables the 
modem naval officer to do by mechanism. It is the 
n^lect of this dynamical aspect of Nelson's dispositions, 
and the too exclusive study of their statical aspect, 
as exhibited in diagrams scarcely ever correctly drawn, 
that has in my judgment led so many commentators 
astray. Two of such diagrams are reproduced from Mr. 
Newbolt's volume on the opposite page. One is that 
given by Captain Mahan, the other is from Nicolas's 
Dispatches and Letters of Lord Nelson. It will be seen at 
once that Captain Mahan's diagram is, as Mr. Newbolt 



..«a '-O-O'-o* 



o; / 



o: o 



»• 



o o 






From 

mahan's 
"nelson" 







i 



« 




\ 






\ 






From 
Sm H NICOLAS 



To /««« p, 58] 



EFFECT OF THE ADVANCE 59 

says, '' frankly conventional/' and that it *' bears about 
as much resemblance to the actual attack as the letter 
A does to a bull's head/' Of Nicolas 's diagram it suffices 
to say that it represents the leading ships of the enemy's 
line as steering well to the west of north, the wind being 
N.W.I 

From this point onwards it is necessary to deal sepa- 
rately with the proceedings of the two British divisions. 
We are to imagine them as steering on parallel courses, 
in lines very irregularly formed longitudinally, and per- 
haps also laterally — I waive the question whether they 
were nominally in line ahead or in a line of bearing, since 
it cannot matter much in any case — ^and both heading 
for points well ahead of the enemy's line, as it stood when, 
and for some time after, the advance began. As time 
passed, however, and as the distance between the two 
fleets lessened, the enemy's line began to draw athwart 
the heads of the two British colunms. Had it been a 
regularly formed line, bearing uniformly throughout its 
length from N.N.E. to S.S.W., it seems probable that 
Nelson, having stood on at E. by N. as long as he could, 
so as to secure the advantage of speed by going free, 
would then have ordered both his divisions to haul their 
wind, so as to put them in the positions assigned to them 
in the Memorandum. But, observing, as he must have 
done, that, so far from being regularly formed, the enemy^s 
line was " a crescent convexing to leeward," he must 
have perceived that the course he was steering would 
bring the lee line approximately parallel to the rear of 
the enemy's line, so that no time need be lost in altering 
course again. He never trifled with a fair wind, nor with 
time. Having both now in his favour, he was the last 
man to throw either advantage away. Without further 
manoeuvring, without even so much as a fresh alteration 
of course, the lee line could, when the time came, do 
exactly what the Memorandum required it to do ; and 
the weather line, though not so well-disposed as it might 
have been had the enemy's line been regularly formed — 

7 



6o TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

and would have been if the Memorandum had in that 
case been followed exactly — ^was, nevertheless, not so 
ill-disposed as to induce Nelson to waste any time in 
disposing it better for the due discharge of the function 
he had assigned to it» of taking care " that the movements 
of the Second in Command are as little interrupted as is 
possible." ThiSi so far as I can see» was the sole risk 
that Nelson ran outside the four comers of the Memor- 
andum, the sole change that he made in the dispositions 
foreshadowed in that document. Who shall say that the 
risk was an unnecessary risk, that the change was not 
a well-advised change in the circumstances ? " Some- 
thing must be left to chance," he had said in the Memor- 
andum ; " nothing is sure in a Sea Fight beyond aU 
others." Though I do aot entirely concur — with all 
respect, be it said — ^in Admiral Bridge's reading of the 
situation, yet I think he touches the matter with a needle 
when he says that " adherence to a plan which presup- 
poses the enemy's fleet to be in a particular formation 
after he is found in another is not to be expected in a con- 
summate tactician." 

CoUingwood, it will be remembered, was given *' the 
entire direction of his Line." In the exercise of this 
discretion he made, as he tells us himself, a " signal 
for the lee division to form the larboard line of bearing 
and to make more sail." The purpose of this signal, 
which appears to have been made shortly before eleven 
o'clock, is no doubt justly stated by Admiral St urges 
Jackson in Logs of the Great Sea-Fights to have been ' * to 
enable the faster ships to get more quickly into action," 
and the same authority adds that '' it is certain that the 
line of bearing was never correctly formed." That, I 
think, is very probably the case. But Admiral Jackson 
does not seem to have seen that Collingwood's signal 
was strictly congruous with the prescriptions of the 
Memorandum, and was probably made for that reason. 
There is some trace in the logs of Collingwood's having at 
a later stage made the signal to alter course one point to 



THE MOMENT OF ATTACK 6i 

port, but the entry is open to some suspicion, and in any 
case it does not materially affect the situation. It is 
to be noted, however, that this signal, if made, would 
have had the effect of bringing the lee line exactly, or 
almost exactly, parallel to the rear of the enemy's line. 
What is certain is that, though the Royal Sovereign^ 
being a fast sailer and newly coppered, did get into action 
somewhat in advance of the rear ships of her division, yet 
the logs of these ships show conclusively that many of 
them got into action much earlier than they possibly 
could have done if they had been disposed in a line ahead, 
astern of the Royal Sovereign and perpendicular, or any- 
thing like perpendicular, to the enemy's line. Even 
James, the stanchest advocate of the perpendicular 
attack in line ahead, is fain to admit that the British lee 
column was obliged to advance in " a slanting direction '' ; 
but he does not on that account abandon a theory which 
has done as much as anjrthing else to befog the mind 
of nearly every conmientator on the whole subject of the 
battle. Anyhow, it can be shown by simple and irrefrag- 
able arithmetic that CoUing^ood's attack must have been 
approximately such as Nelson designed it to be. For 
this purpose I cannot do better than quote Mr. Newbolt, 
who seems to me to have grasped the situation at this 
point far more clearly than any other writer : 

The times at which the several ships claim to have 
commenced action or engaged the enemy show clearly 
that they cannot all have been following one another in 
line ahead. • • . Though we cannot hope to find the 
absolute time at which anything occurred, we can, by 
taking some marked event as a starting point or stan- 
dard, obtain a series of fairly correct relative times for 
the performances of the individual ships. If, for ex- 
ample, we select as our starting point the moment eagerly 
awaited and marked by all without any kind of inter- 
ruption, when the Royal Sovereign opened fire, we can 
find the nimiber of minutes which each ship estimates 
to have passed between that moment and her own first 
entry into action. Thus the Belleisle claims to have 



61 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

engaged 8 minutes after the Royal Sovereign ; the Mars 
13 minutes ; the Tonnant 33 ; the BeUerophon 15 ; the 
Colossus 20 ; the Achilles 15 ; the Revenge 10 ; the Poly- 
phemus about 50 ; the Defiance 75 ; the Dreadnought 73 ; 
the Defence 128. The Prince was undoubtedly last, 
nearly three hours behind. Swiftsure and Thunderer 
name no time. Further, these entries are often signifi* 
cantly expressed. The Colossus, ten minutes after open- 
ing fire, " passed our opponent in the enemy's line " ; the 
Defiance began by engaging " the third from the enemy's 
rear " ; the Revenge . , . ** got through between the fifth 
and sixth from the rear " ; the Stviftsure roundly notes 
" by half-past noon the whole fleet in action, and Royal 
Sovereign had cut through the enemy's line." • • • It will 
be seen at once that of the ships in the lee division, no 
less than nine were engaged within thirty-three minutes 
of the first British gun being fired. 

There is much more evidence to the same effect, and a 
very lucid and cogent summary of it will be found in Mr. 
Newbolt's pages. But I need not detail.it here. My 
purpose is satisfied by the foregoing extract, which shows 
conclusively that CoUingwood's attack cannot have been 
delivered in line ahead, and was, as a matter of fact, de- 
livered in substantial accordance with the prescriptions 
of the Memorandum. It is true that the diagram given 
with my last chapter does not, as drawn, fully represent 
the situation as Collingwood described it in the following 
passage in his despatch : ''In leading down to their 
centre I had both their van and rear abaft the beam." 
But as I have before observed, the diagram is not a plan ; 
it is rather a rough geometrical outline of the situation as 
it was determined by wind, course, and the tactical dis- 
positions of the moment. CoUingwood's words must be 
taken to show that the " crescent con vexing to leeward " 
of his description was rendered more convex than the 
mere geometrical conditions implied by the lightness of 
the wind and the tactical unhandiness of many of the 
enemy's ships. The dotted line in the dis^;ram annexed 
to the preceding chapter shows his probable course at the 



THE WEATHER LINE 63 

moment of onslaught. I have only to add that CoUing- 
wood tells us himself that he broke the line ** about 
the twelfth ship from the rear." He certainly broke it 
astern of the Santa Ana, and most of the lists of the allied 
fleet, together with nearly all the diagrams, including 
the Spanish diagram reproduced in this volume, make 
the Santa Ana the sixteenth ship from the rear of the 
enemy's line. If CoUingwood, in spite of his own words, 
really did bring the fifteen ships of his own column against 
an equal number of the enemy, he certainly violated most 
flagrantly the plain letter, and the still plainer spirit, of 
Nelson's instructions, and for such violation he must be 
held solely responsible.^ But his own words are against 
this, and it is important to note that James declines 
entirely to specify the exact order of the allied fleet. " As 
the ships of the combined fleet," he says, " were con- 
stantly changing their positions, we shall not attempt to 
point out the stations of any others than the ships of 
the four principal flag-ofiicers." He then goes on to say 
that the Bucentaure was directly in front of the Victory, 
and the Santa Ana in the same direction from the Royal 
Sovereign. How many ships were ahead of the one or 
astern of the other he does not attempt to determine. 

I now return to the weather line, having brought the 
whole of the lee line to the point of attack. Nelson's 
primary purpose was to contain and cut off the van. 
After that had been done he would make the action as 
close and decisive as he could. But if, in containing the 
van, he found it necessary to expose the Victory and the 
ships immediately astern of her to a more destructive 
fire than might have been incurred in other circumstances, 
we may be quite sure that he would not hesitate for a 
moment. He never did hesitate, as he showed at St. 
Vincent, when a distinct and paramount object was to be 

* It may be that owing to the irregular foimation of the allied line, some 
tiixee or lour of the ships in its rear were well to leeward, and that their fire 
was thereby masked. Collingwood observing this Slight very well be entitled 
to leave these ships oat of his reckoning. 



N 



64 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

obtained even by apparent reddessness. He might have 
oontinaed on the course he had dioaen, and made his 
attack at the point he had chosen, without eirpnsing the 
leading ships of his column to any more destructive fire 
than the relative position of the two lines involved. Or 
he might, by altering course to the northward, have 
placed his own line parallel, or approximately parallel^ 
to the van of the enemy and thereby eflfectually have con- 
tained, by engagii^, the latter. He did neither of these 
things. What he did was to make a feint at the van by 
temporarily altering course to the northward, and theui 
as soon as he saw that G)lIii^;wood was in a fair way to 
engage and " complete the business of twelve Sail of the 
Enemy," he turned again to starboard and, according to 
the Victory's log, *' opened fire on the enemy's van in 
passing down their line " — ^that is, unless I am mistaken, 
the Victory first opened fire with her port guns on two or 
three ships ahead of the Bucentaure and then turned sharp 
under the stem of the latter, raked her as she passed, and 
immediately fell aboard the Redouiabk. This manoeuvre 
is roughly indicated in the dotted line drawn ahead of 
the Victory on the diagram annexed to my last chapter. 
There is no question of a " mad perpendicular attack " 
— ^the phrase is Mr. Corbett's — ^nor of a perpendicular 
attack at all. The advance was a slanting one, makii^ 
an angle, according to the Victory's log, of 5 points or 
56^ degrees with the line of the enemy's van. But 
before coming within gunfire Nekon turned to port, on a 
course nearly parallel with the van, and then almost 
reversed his course, so as to steer, now within gunfire, 
parallel to the enemy's van, but in the opposite direction. 
The Ic^ of the Orion says " the Victory^ after making a 
feint as of attacking the enemy's van, hauled to star- 
board so as to reach their centre." Codrington, the 
captain of the Orion^ corroborates and amplifies this 
contemporary record, in reminiscences committed to 
paper some years afterwards. Dumanoir, the French 
admiral in command of the van, excused himself to 



NELSON'S OBJECT 65 

Decrto for his failure to tack sooner to Villeneuve's relief 
by saying, *' Au commencement du combat la colonne 
du Nord se dir^ea sur I'avant garde, qui engagea avec 
elle pendant quarante minutes." The log of the Timiraire, 
which was next astern of the Victory, says : " At 25 
minutes past noon the Victory opened her fire. Im- 
mediately put our helm aport to steer clear of the 
Victory and opened our fire on the Santisima Trinidad 
and two ships ahead of her, when the action became 
general." The context shows that all this was before the 
Victory broke the line astern of the Bucentaure, so that 
it seems impossible to doubt that both Victory and Temi' 
raire were at this time firing their port broadsides.^ If 
Mr. Corbett, who cites all these passages and comments 
on them, had realised their true bearing and formed in his 
mind a correct picture of the situation they represent, 
he would, I feel sure, have thought twice, or even thrice, 
before inditing his unhappy phrase, '' a mad perpendicular 
attack." It is true that, as he sajrs, ** the risk was, indeed, 
enormous, perhaps the greatest ever taken at sea." But 
Nelson never measured risks when he saw his way straight 
to his object. Could he have attained the object with- 
out taking the risk ? 

That object was, as Nelson said to Keats, " to Surprise 
and confound the enemy," to leave him in doubt until 
the last moment as to whether his own intention was to 
attack the centre or the van, because, as Mr. Corbett 
himself acutely observes, until that doubt was resolved 
" it was impossible for the enemy to take any step to con- 
centrate with either division, and thus Nelson held them 
both inmiobile while Collingwood flung himself on his 
declared objective." If, as the same writer adds, " no- 

^ These movements ol the leading ships may not have been followed, and 
probably were not followed, by all the ships astern of them. There is, as I 
have indicated, gcpd reason to think that the line was never very exactly 
formed, and this is probably the reason why, as Colonel Desbritoe puts it, 
" la ligne de file se transforma au moment de Tengagement en un ordre semi* 
ddploy^e sur un front de quatre k dnq vaisseanz." In that reading of the 
situation I concur. 



66 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

thing could be finer as a piece of subtle tactics, nothing 
could be more daring as a well-judged risk/' why should 
it be called, after all, " a mad perpendicular attack '' ? 
It was not, as I have shown, perpendicular at any period 
of the advance, neither in fact, spirit, nor intention. In 
spirit and intention it was as near a parallel attack as the 
formation of the enemy's line permitted. As a matter 
of fact. Nelson's line of advance made with that of the 
enemy's an angle of 56} degrees at the outside, and 
possibly not more than 45 degrees. As Nelson closed 
and made his feint to the northward this angle approached 
very nearly to zero, while his head pointed to the north- 
ward, and very nearly to zero again, after he had turned 
sharp to starboard and '* opened fire on the enemy's van 
in passing down their line." It was probably this turn 
to starboard — which brought the Victory, as we learn from 
the TSmSraire^s log, under the fire successively of three 
ships ahead of the Bucentaure as well as the Bucentaure 
herself — ^that accounts for the heavy losses of the Victory. 
But these losses were due not so much to the mode of 
attack as to Nelson's loyal and devoted redemption of 
his solemn pledge to Collingwood, that he would " en- 
deavour to take care that the movements of the Second in 
Command are as little interrupted as is possible." There 
was, indeed, a moment when Nelson seemed inclined 
to turn his feint against the van into a real attack, since 
the Euryalus reports that he signalled to CoUingwoodi 
at a very late stage of the advance, " I intend to go 
through the end of the enemy's line to prevent them from 
getting into Cadiz." But this inclination, if ever seriously 
entertained, was very promptly repressed. It might 
have vindicated Nelson against the charge of making a 
perpendicular attack, and it would, no doubt, have re- 
sulted in crushing the van. But it would have left the 
centre untouched and free to turn upon Collingwood with 
much greater expedition and effect than the van could 
ever have done. It would, moreover, have thrown to the 
winds the whole plan of the Memorandum^ the fundamental 



c^ 



4 
"I 

yi 

y; 




CI 




t* k""' * 



JUSTIFICATION OF TACTICS 67 

idea of which was that the van should be contaiQed, cut 
oS, and thrown out of action, while the centre was first 
contained and then crushed. All this was accomplished 
to the letter. I can see no madness in a mode of attack 
which produced such stupendous results. I can see 
nothing but as fine a piece of subtle tactics as was ever 
exhibited in a sea-fight, a combination of psychological 
insight with tactical dexterity and rapidity such as no 
man but Nelson ever displayed ; and I can see no greater 
risk incurred than Nelson was always ready to take, even 
at the cost of his own life, for the sake of his country's 
security. 



CHAPTER VI » 

CONCLUSION 

1HAVE now brought this long inquiry to a point at 
which it seems clear that, if my data are correct, the 
plan of the Memorandum was carried out in the battle 
as closely as was possible in a state of things not exactly 
identical with that which Nelson anticipated when he 
drew the diagram contained in the Memorandimi. He 
anticipated that the enemy's fleet would consist of forty- 
six sail of the line and his own of forty. When he found 
that the numbers were thirty-three to twenty-seven, he 
seems to have thought that the advance squadron of 
eight ships would be better employed in making the lee 
line still strong enough to cut off twelve ships of the 
enemy's rear than in the prosecution of the somewhat 
indefinite purpose originally assigned to it. He antici-^ 
pated that the enemy's fleet, if found in a line of battle 
on a certain course, would accept action in that formation 
and on that course without further alteration ; and for 
this reason his first move wjas so to dispose the course 
and formation of his own fleet as ultimately to bring 
about the exact situation prescribed in the Memorandum. 
When, however, the enemy began to wear, he made no 
essential alteration in his plan. It was an unexpected 
move and an unwelcome one ; but, since it resulted in a 
dislocation and derangement of the enemy's line, it was 
not, perhaps, altogether disadvantageous to him in the 
end. He adapted his dispositions to the altered situation 
with as little modification as possible, not, I would sug- 
gest, in any blind adherence to a preconceived plan, but 

> Tks Tint4$, September 30» 1905. 

63 



THE TRUE NELSON TOUCH , 69 

because he saw, with that instant and sure glance of his, 
that the original plan might still be made to serve in all 
its essential features, and that any attempt to readjust 
it must lose precious time on a day that was all too short, 
and in weather which was only too likely to play him 
fabe, if he once let the opportunity slip. Hence, so far 
as I can judge, the original plan was carried out as exactly 
and as completely as the altered situation permitted^ 
The rear was attacked and crushed almost exactly as 
Nelson had intended. While this was being done, the 
van and centre were contained, both being rendered 
immobile during the first critical moments of the on« 
slaught, not so much by the indecision or incapacity of 
the enemy as by the surprise and confusion which Nelson 
intended to instil, and did instil, into his mind. Ville- 
neuve said, as Blackwood records, " that he never saw 
anything like the irresistible line of our ships ; but that 
of the Victory supported by the Neptune and Thntraire 
was what he could not have formed any conception oV* 
That is the exact note of stupefaction which Nelson de- 
signed to evoke, and from the mention of these particular 
ships I infer that the moment indicated is that at which 
these ships first opened fire from their port broadsides, 
while " passing down the enemy's line." Finally, a pell- 
mell battle was certainly brought about, and that, as we 
know, was precisely what Nelson wanted. The result 
was exactly what he had prescribed for himself in the 
Memorandum. He never said how or where he meant 
to deliver his attack, and probably never thought about 
it beforehand at all. His primary and paramount pur- 
pose was to '' manage " the whole of the enemy's centre 
and van until Collingwood was in a fair way to " com- 
plete the business of twelve Sail " of the enemy's rear. 
He did so manage them, paralysing both at the critical 
moment and throwing the van out of action before he 
closed with the centre. He did exactly what he said 
he would do, and Collingwood did exactly what he was 
told to do. That is how Trafalgar was fought and why 



70 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

it was so great a victory — because it was designed by the 
greatest master of sea tactics the world has ever known, 
and carried out in his own spirit by men who loved and 
trusted their heroic leader and were not unworthy to 
be led by him. In this sense and in this alone was the 
*' Nelson touch/' as Mr. David Hannay says, " the touch 
of fire with which he lit up the souls of other men." In 
every other sense it was the finest and most subtle touch 
of tactical genius that has ever gone to the winning of a 
great battle on the seas. 

I have thus shown how the attack was made. The 
remainder of the story, at once the greatest triumph 
and the greatest tragedy of the seas, is so well known 
that I need hardly go on to describe how the victory was 
won or how Nelson died. The attack was Nelson's. 
The rest is the mllde, and this was mainly the work of his 
captains. Neither he nor they ever had any doubt that 
if the attack could be delivered as he designed it the result 
was foreordained. " Should the enemy close," he wrote, 
" I have no fear as to the result." He had so ordered 
matters that they could not help closing, or ratha: being 
closed upon and compelled to fight the battle out. " It 
must succeed," said his captains when first the '' Nekon 
touch " was explained to them, " if ever they allow us 
to get at them." They knew, as he did, that ship for 
ship, or even one ship to many ships, they were more than 
a match for the enemy, and their words, " if only they 
allow us to get at them," show very significantly how 
completely they had assimilated their chief's conviction 
that the traditional line of battle never did allow them to 
get at their adversaries. For this phase of the battle, 
therefore, he gave no specific directions. Nelson had done 
his part in enabling his captains to '' get at them " ; the 
rest he left to them. " Captains are to look to their par-^ 
ticular Line as their rallying point. But, in case Signals 
can neither be seen or perfectly understood, no Captain 
can do very wrong if he places his Ship alongside that 
of an Enemy." It has indeed been said that the day 



HOW TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM 7» 

I 

would have been equally well won, perhaps even better 
won, if Nelson had been less eager to " get at them.'' 
'^ Had he given Villeneuve time for forming his line 
properly," writes Mr. Corbett, " the enemy's battle order 
would have been only the Weaker. Had he taken time 
to form his own order the mass of the attack would have 
been delivered little later than it was, its impact would 
have been intensified, and the victory might well have 
been more decisive than it was, while the sacrifice it cost 
would certainly have been less, incalculably less, if we 
think that the sacrifice included Nelson himself/' I 
cannot adopt this view. I have shown above that there 
was not a moment to be lost if the business was to be 
made decisive, and I think we owe it to Nelson to believe 
that for this reason alone did he hurry on as he did. 
Nor can we for a moment attribute his own death to his 
haste. He was slain in the milie, not in the attack. It 
was after he had broken the line and when several of the 
ships which followed him were already engaged that the 
fatal bullet from the mizentop of the RedoutabU laid him 
low on the quarter-^leck of the Victory. 

I am well aware that these conclusions are not at all 
likely to be accepted without challenge. I shall have 
to face the broadsides of all those who hold that the 
accepted version of the battle caimot be overthrown after 
the lapse of a hundred years, and apparently that the 
attempt to overthrow it is paradoxical, and even pre- 
sumptuous, especially in a civilian. I shall perhaps also 
draw the fire of those who, like Admiral Bridge and other 
followers of the late Admiral Colomb, or like Mr. Corbett 
and Mr. Newbolt, have presumed, like mjrself, to criticize 
the accepted version but have reached conclusions more 
or less different from my own on some of the points in 
dispute. This, however, is the inevitable consequence of 
independent critical inquiry, and as such I shall welcome 
it. I do not pretend to have solved the problem finally 
and absolutely. All that I can claim to have done is 
to have advanced certain considerations, founded on 



72 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

authentic data, which must be taken into acoount before a 
final conclusion can be reached. If the inferences I have 
drawn from these data are unsound, my professional 
critics will very soon set me right, and no one will be 
more grateful than I shall for their correction. I will only 
ask them, in applsring it, to deal with my aiguments 
solely on their merits, and not to disparage or dismiss 
them merely because I have not enjoyed their advantages 
in the study of signals and the handling of fleets. A very 
high tactical authority once told me that, when officially 
engaged in the study of tactical problems, he systemati- 
cally declined to consider any plans or diagrams submitted 
to him for the solution of this or that problem unless they 
were drawn to scale, wherever necessary, and with strict 
regard to compass bearings and other critical conditions 
of the supposed situation. I have not forgotten that 
admonition in the preparation of my own diagrams, and 
I would invite my prospective critics to follow the same 
salutary rule. Only by this method shall we reach the 
truth at last. The only way to find out how the battle 
was fought is to start entirely afresh, to take nothing for 
granted, to eschew all preconceived theories and opinions^ 
to examine and we^h all the accessible evidence, and 
then to draw from it only such conclusions, whether 
vague or precise, as it may be found legitimately to 
warrant. Of such a process the result must point to one 
of only three possible conclusions. Either the evidence 
may prove to be so conflicting as to warrant no definite 
conclusion at all. In that case we must all acknowledge 
that the problem is insoluble. Or it may prove that the 
plan of the Memorandum was, after all, substantially 
carried out so far as the conditions of the situation per- 
mitted. In that case we must all rejoice that Nelson's 
fame remained unsullied to the last. Or it may prove 
that, at the last moment, he threw the famous plan to the 
winds, as so many of his critics have affirmed, and adopted 
another, of which no inkling whatever was given to the 
flag-officers and captains whom he had taken so gtaer^ 



THE EVIDENCE CONSIDERED 73 

ously and so fully into his tactical confidence and trusted 
so implicitly to carry out his declared intentions. In 
that case we must acknowledg;e, with infinite sorrow, 
that in the last hours of his glorious life the balance of 
his mind was overthrown, the moral foundation of his 
incomparable ascendency over men was destroyed, and 
that, in his hurry to attack, in his eagerness to " surprise 
and confound the enemy,'' he did not scruple to surprise 
and confound far more effectually the very men whose 
loyal and intelligent co-operation was taken for granted 
in every line of the Memorandum. 

If that is, indeed, to be the final conclusion, we must, 
I think, further acknowledge that it destroys, once and 
for all, every notion that the world has hitherto formed 
of Nelson's character and career. I do not know how it 
may strike a seaman ; but it certainly seems to me that 
an admiral who did what, if this conclusion were estab* 
lished. Nelson would be proved to have done, would 
deserve something very different from the unbounded 
honour which the whole world has accorded him — ^and 
this in spite of the triumph of the victory and the tragedy 
of the hero's death. If there was one thing that Nelson 
prided himself on more than any other, it was the cordi- 
ality and confidence that always existed between himself 
and his captains. " I had the happiness to conmiand a 
band of brothers," he said of the captains who fought 
under him at the Nile. A band of brothers is not to be 
commanded by a man who, having taken his captains into 
his confidence as fully as any admiral ever did, could not 
be trusted not to make fook of them by changing his 
mind without saying a single word to any one of them. 
I do not say that Nelson was bound not to change his 
plan. On the contrary, I think he was bouh^h to change 
it, if circumstances so required. But then, surely, he 
was equally bound to tell his subordinates that he had 
changed it. A single signal would have sufficed — such 
a signal as I make bold to afiirm no admiral would in 
these days omit to make — ^to the effect that the Memor- 



74 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

andum of October 9 was to be disregarded. Yet no 
scrap of evidence has ever yet been adduced to show 
that any such signal was made, or that any information 
of like purport was conveyed to the fleet in any manner 
whatever. It is this total omission to make bis change 
of mind known to his followers that, if it could be 
estabUshedi would, in my judgment, inflict a lasting 
stain on Nelson's honour and fame. Surely, before we 
admit even the possibility of such dishonour, we must 
scrutinize the evidence that points to it with the utmost 
jealousy. 

After all, what does this evidence amount to ? There 
are certain entries in the logs, which, if they stood alone, 
might seem to be more or less inconsistent with the view 
of the situation which I have endeavoured to delineate in 
the preceding chapters ; but, when they come to be 
weighed against other evidence derived from the same 
source, I doubt if any fair-minded critic could accept 
them as either decisive or preponderant. Then there is 
the obiter dictum of Moorsom, the captain of the Revenge, 
who says, in a private letter to his father written some 
weeks after the battle, " A regular plan was laid down 
by Lord Nekon some time before the action, but not 
acted upon.'' Against this may be set in the balance 
another private letter from Eliab Harvey, captain of the 
TinUraire, written two da3rs aft«r the battle, in which 
the man who followed Nelson into the fight, and was to 
have led the weather line if Nelson had not led it himself, 
sa3rs, " It was noon before the action commenced, which 
was done according to the instructions given to us by 
Lord Nelson." I dare say there was much discussion of 
the point between the captains who survived, and that 
two schools of opinion existed from the very outset. I 
feel sure that very few, if any, of them fully understood 
the whole content of the Memorandum, and I should 
myself measure their tactical insight by their adhesion to 
the school of Harvey rather than to that of Moorsom. 
I am aware that one officer belonging to the latter school 



FRENCH EVIDENCE 75 

is the author of a criticism of the battle which has been 
pronounced by Admiral Bridge to be " one of the most 
important contributioas to the investigation of tactical 
questions ever published in the English tongue." I 
concur in that judgment so far as regards the ability of 
the critic and the lucidity of his criticism. But the 
anonymous officer of the Conqueror was avowedly defend- 
ing a thesis, and I have shown already that, in describing 
the plan of the Memorandum, he attributed to Nelson 
an intention which Nelson nowhere avows, and which is, 
in fact, directly at variance with the text of the Memor- 
andum itself. On this criticism, thus shown to be un- 
sound at its very foundation, are, as Admiral Bridge sa3rs, 
'• based nearly or quite all the unfavourable views ex- 
pressed against the British tactics at Trafalgar." I do 
not know whether I need treat as serious, or worthy of 
serious attention, the views of the battle propounded by 
James in his Naval History. As James was a civilian, 
like m3rself, perhaps I may be permitted to say without 
presumption that his tactical insight was, as I have 
already remarked, beneath contempt. Alone, so far as 
I know, among all commentators on the battle, he defends 
the perpendicular attack in line ahead as perhaps the 
best form of attack that could be devised, and in support 
of this amazing thesis he advances the still more amazing 
hypothesis that the most important passage in the whole 
Memorandum contains a clerical error which distorts 
its entire purpose and scope. On such evidence as 
this no one would hang a dog. Of the several plans 
of the battle to which appeal is so often made, it 
suffices to say that their evidence cannot be of the 
first order, in any case, and that, so far as they are in- 
consistent with the evidence supplied by the logs con- 
cerning wind, course, and formation, they are not evidence 
at all. 

Lastly, there is the evidence of certain French witnesses 
of the battle. Of this I have to say that it cannot, in any 
case, be decisive, and that it is for the most part of no 
8 



76 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

very high order and weight.* Magendiei flag-captain of 
the Bucentimre, is known to have certified a plan which 
was probably the first ever drawn ; and a copy of this 
plan, bearing the signature of Magendie, is preserved 
among the papers of Lord Barham, who was First Lord 
of the Admiralty when Trafalgar was fought. This is 
the plan which was pronounced by the late Admiral 
Colomb— who knew that the authority of Villeneuve him- 
self had been claimed for it, but did not apparently know 
that Magendie's attestation was in existence—" to have 
been drawn by some one who had no notion of the facts, 
and who could not have used them if he had known 
them." It seems to be thought that the subsequent dis- 
covery of Magendie's attestation is peculiarly unfortunate 
for Colomb's reputation as a tactical critic. I cannot 
so regard it. I should accept the plan as good prima facie 
evidence for the formation of the allied fleet, with which 
Magendie must of necessity have been better acquainted 
than any observer on the British side, but as scarcely any 
evidence at all for the formation of the British fleet — 
certainly no such evidence as could be set in the balance 
against evidence derived either from the narratives, ofiicial 
or other, of British eye-witnesses, or from the logs of 
the ships under their command. Nothing is more diffi- 
cult, even to a practised naval eye, than to determine the 
exact formation in which a fleet is disposed at a distance 
of several miles. It is true that this ailment cuts both 
ways, but it has to be considered that Nelson's tactical 
discernment was altogether exceptional, and that the 
allied fleet was in a normal formation, while the British 
fleet was in a very unusual one. If, then, I rate the 
tactical discernment of Magendie, and of other French 
eye-witnesses who have been quoted, as much lower than 

^ Since the above was originally written a very great deal of fresh coUatersl 
evidence has been coUected from the French and Spanish archives and pnb- 
Uahed by Colonel Desbridre. Bat inasmuch as the solution of the problem 
propounded by that distinguished writer is, as I have pointed out in the 
Preface, substantially identical with my own, I am content to leave the 
passage in the text as it originally stood. 



DIFFICULTIES OF OBSERVATION jt 

that of Nelson, corroborated as he is by a cloud of other 
witnesses, I am only making legitimate allowance for the 
difference between the observers and between the things 
observed. " It is not easy/' as Admiral Bridge has said, 
" to decide the order or formation even of a fleet at anchor 
without prolonged observation or frequent changes of the 
observer's position " ; and, a fortiori ^ it must be much 
more difficult to decide the order or formation of a fleet 
in motion, viewed from a great distance and in a changing 
perspective — especially when, as at Trafalgar, the forma- 
tion of the British divisions was, by common consent, a 
very irregular one. I can corroborate this proposition 
from a somewhat exceptional personal experience. I do 
not profess to view things afloat with the practised eye of 
a seaman ; but, as a landsman, I have probably seen 
more fleets in motion and evolution than any other civilian, 
and certainly more fleets in action during manoeuvres than 
the majority of naval officers. If, inmiediately after the 
event, I had been cross-examined by an expert as to 
the evolutions executed and the formations adopted by 
the opposing fleet on any of these occasions, I should 
certainly have cut a very sorry figure indeed. It is well 
known that, when tactical exercises are being practised 
by modem fleets, no conclusions are formulated concern- 
ing their character and effects until the course and speed 
of each ship engaged and its bearings from at least two 
other ships, recorded at short intervals by trained observers 
told off for the purpose, have been collated with similar 
observations concerning all the other ships, and accu- 
rately plotted down on a diagram. Admirals themselves 
have told me that, when this has been done, they have 
often found not only that the effect of what they did 
themselves was quite other than what they had intended, 
but that they had attributed movements and dispositions 
to their opponents which the opponents themselves were 
shown never to have executed. In the action off the 
Azores, during the manoeuvres of 1903, the X Fleet at a 
certain period of its advance seemed to every observer 



78 TRAFALGAR AND THE NELSON TOUCH 

on the deck of the Majestic to be disposed in a huddled 
mass, in which no definite formation could be discerned 
and no determinate evolution detected. I am quite sure 
that no officer on board the Majestic could explain or 
understand what the X Fleet was doing at that moment ; 
and in the detailed official narrative of the manoeuvres 
there is not a single word to account for the appearance 
it presented. Such an experience, which is no isolated 
one, certainly makes me, at least, exceedingly sceptical 
as to the evidence derived from French sources concern- 
ing the British dispositions at Trafalgar. What they 
may attest is the dispositions of the allied fleet, and in 
that order of evidence I have found nothing to disallow, 
or even appreciably weaken, the conclusions I have 
reached in the course of this inquiry^ 

Lastly, I must repeat that almost the only evidence 
that ought to convince any one to whom Nelson's reputa- 
tion and honour are dear would be the proof of a direct 
avowal on Nelson's part that he had changed his plan at 
the last moment. No such proof is forthcoming. The 
evidence is all the other way. It is all very well for 
Captain Mahan to say, as he does, '' Thus, as Ivanhoe at 
the instant of the encounter in the lists shifted his lance 
from the shield to the casque of the Templar, so Nelson, 
at the moment of engaging, changed the detaib of his 
plan," and then, by diagram and description, to attribute 
dispositions to Nelson which point to no mere modifi- 
cation of detail, but to a fundamental change of principle. 
That is a very pretty gloss to put on a very ugly situation. 
Ivanhoe was fighting in single combat. He had no one 
to consider but himself. Nelson had in hb keeping the 
fate of his country, the confidence, the loyalty, the devoted 
affection of officers who knew his plans and were ready to 
die in executing them. How could he be said not to 
have betrayed that trust, if he jeopardized his country's 
fate by deceiving those who had so trusted him, and 
impaired even their tried efficiency by expecting them, 

thout a word of notice or warning, to execute a plan 



NELSON VINDICATED 79 

of which they had never even heard ? We have no right 
to judge by results in this case. If this is a true account 
of the battle, it was indeed a pell-mell battle with a ven- 
geance — a mere gambler's throw, which success might 
condone but could never justify. Few admirals have 
ever taken their officers so fully into their confidence as 
Nelson did. He gave them what he could of his own 
strength, and in return gathered all theirs into himself. 
Others have kept their own counsel and taught their 
officers, when in action, merely to look for their signals 
and obey them. Each method has its merits, but there 
can be no compromise between the two. To abandon a 
plan of action carefully explained beforehand, and well 
understood by every one concerned, and to substitute for 
it another which has never been explained at all, is to 
combine the disadvantages of both methods in the most 
disastrous fashion, and virtually to proclaim that tactics 
are of no account at all, that one way of fighting a battle 
is just as good as another way, especially if those who 
are to fight it do not know in the least how it is going to 
be fought. Surely the moral evidence against a Nelson 
doing this is far more overwhelming than the most cogent 
of circumstantial evidence to the contrary ever could be. 
Those who hold this belief must reconcile it, if they can, 
with his last noble signal, ** England expects that every 
man will do his duty " — with his last dying words, " Thank 
God, I have done my duty.'' For myself, I cannot. 



THE LIFE OF NELSON, 

UNIVERSAL acclaim on this side of the Atlantic has 
declared The Life of Nelson to be a masterpiece 
eminently worthy of the author of The Influence of Sea 
Power on History. The task undertaken by a modem 
biographer of Nelson must needs be a supremely difficult 
one. He has to sustain comparison with a great writer 
who was never more happily inspired than when he ex- 
panded an article originally contributed to The Quarterly 
Review into a classic. He has to do what Southey never 
attempted — ^to justify to a generation which has happily 
never known naval war on a grand scale, the convic- 
tion of his contemporaries that Nelson was the greatest 
seaman that ever lived. He has to grapple with mani- 
fold difficulties which are inherent in all forms of biography, 
and never more baffling than when the canvas on which 
he paints presents a great historic crisis in the affairs of 
men largely determined in its issues by the character and 
achievements of his subject. Moreover, Captain Mahan 
in particular is confronted with a rivalry which few but 
himself could sustain. In the far more difficult field of 
biography he has to maintain a reputation already achieved 
in another field, in which, by common consent, he stands 
pre-eminent. It is a mere truism nowadays to say that 
Captain Mahan has taught all serious students of naval 
warfare in two worlds how to think rightly on the problems 
it presents. The phrase " sea power," as applied, though 
not invented, by him, is one of those happy inspirations 
of genius which flash the light of philosophy on a whole 
department of human action. Its analysis in his pre- 

' Qumiierfy RtvUm, Januaiy 1698. 

to 



SOUTHEY AND MAHAN 8i 

vious works is a contribution to human thought of which 
many of the larger issues and consequences are perhaps 
even yet unexplored. In ^his direction, however, he has 
aheady done his work so well that he has no new lessons 
to teach us, though he has many old ones to enforce, when 
he undertakes to show us Nelson as " the embodiment of 
the sea power of Great Britain/' But he has to justify 
the title and to convince us that it is not unworthily 
bestowed. I need waste no time in proving that in this 
he has triumphantly succeeded. Secums judicat orbis 
terrarum. 

Though purely as a piece of literature the new Life 
of Nelson is worthy of high praise, yet Captain Mahan 
has not directly essayed to rival Southey in his own field. 
Of Nelson, the hero and the idol of his countrymen, 
Southey still remains the classical biographer. But of 
Nelson the seaman, " the embodiment of the sea power '' 
of his country, the man who, better than any other that 
ever lived, understood the eternal principles of sea-war- 
fare, and illustrated them more splendidly, Captain Mahan 
stands now and henceforth as the one incomparable ex- 
ponent. It was no part of Southey's purpose to make 
his Life of Nelson an analysis of Nelson's strategic genius 
or a commentary on the principles of naval warfare as 
illustrated by his career. " There is but one Nelson,'' 
said the greatest of Nebon's naval contemporaries, the 
seaman who best understood him. All his countrymen 
fdt the same, and Southey, who wrote only a few years 
after the hero's death, never attempted to expound Nel- 
son's genius, because he never could have imagined that 
it would be dispifted. It is true that a recent editor of 
Southey explains the matter quite differently. If we do 
not find intellectual power in Nelson, the real reason is, 
we are asked to believe, that intellectual power was by no 
means one of his conspicuous endowments. In his writ* 
ings there is no thoUghti we are told, or at least none '' in 
any higher form than a quite measurable sagacity " ; 
and even in action " it was his misfortune never to have 

• 



82 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

the highest to do." Manifestly, unless we accept 
view of the matter, it was high time for a new Life of 
Nelson to be written — a biography at once critical and 
sympathetic, which, accepting St. Vincent's dictum, 
** There is but one Nelson," might serve ,to show, as 
Southey hardly needed to show, and was perhaps scarcely 
qualified to show, why Nelson was unique, and in what 
special gifts and aptitudes the unique quality of his genius 
consisted. 

This (Captain Mahan has done once for all. It may 
be that in so rare a character and so vivid a personality 
as Nelson's, the moral force which sustained him in all 
emergencies, and communicated itself, by that con- 
tagious inspiration which is the surest sign of genius, 
to all who came in contact with him, was more directly 
conspicuous than the intellectual power which accom- 
panied and sustained it. But it was the complement 
of the latter, not a substitute for it. Intellectual power 
is not displayed merely in the written word or the recorded 
thought. In the man of action it takes the form of sure 
insight and rapid intuition, which seize at once on the 
essential featurte of a situation and shape action accord- 
ingly. Intellectual power of this kind, implicit rather 
than explicit, displayed in action rather than in the 
written word, and always associated with an unquench- 
able fervour of moral impuke, was among Nelson's pre- 
eminent gifts. No one has ever shown this so well as 
Captain Mahan, and the following passage must surely 
settle the whole question. It refers to the moment when 
Nelson sailed for the Mediterranean in 1798, when he 
was already an admiral, and after the world had learnt 
at St. Vincent what manner of man he was : 

Before him was now about to open a field of possi- 
bilities hitherto unexampled in naval warfare ; and for 
the appreciation of them was needed just those percep- 
tions, intuitive in origin, yet resting firmly on well-ordered 
rational processes, which, on the intellectual side, dis- 
tinguished him above all other British seamen. He had 



NELSON'S UNIQUE GIFTS 83 

already, in casual comment upon the military conditions 
surrounding the former Mediterranean campaigns, given 
indications of these perceptions, which it has been the 
aim of previous chapters to elicit from his correspondence, 
and to marshal in such order as may illustrate his mental 
characteristics. But, for success in war, the indispensable 
complement of intellectual grasp and insight is a moral 
power, which enables a man to trust the inner light, — to 
have faith — a power which dominates hesitation, and 
sustains action, in the most tremendous emergencies, and 
which, from the formidable character of the difficulties 
it is called to confront, is in no men so conspicuously 
prominent as in those who are entitled to rank among 
great captains. The two elements — omental and moral 
power — ^are often found separately, rarely in due com- 
bination. In Nelson they met, and their coincidence 
with the exceptional opportunities afforded him consti- 
tuted his good fortune and his greatness. 

The intellectual endowment of genius was Nelson's 
from the first ; but from the circumstances of his life it 
was denied the privilege of early manifestation, such as 
was permitted to Napoleon. It is, consequently, not so 
much this as the constant exhibition of moral power, 
force of character, which gives continuity to his pro- 
fessional career, and brings the successive stages of his 
advance, in achievement and reputation, from first to 
last, into the close relation of steady development, subject 
to no variation save that of healthy and vigorous growth, 
till he stood unique — ^above all competition. This it was 
— ^not, doubtless, to the exclusion of that reputation for 
having a head, upon which he justly prided himself — 
which had already fixed the eyes of his superiors upon 
him as the one officer, not yet indeed fully tested, most 
likely to cope with the difficulties of any emei^ency. In 
the display of this, in its many self-revelations — ^in con- 
centration of purpose, untiring energy, fearlessness of 
responsibility, judgment sound and instant, boundless 
audacity, promptness, intrepidity, and endurance beyond 
all proof — ^the restricted field of Corsica and the Riviera, 
the subordinate position at Cape St. Vincent, the failure 
of Teneriife, had in their measure been as fruitful as the 
Nile was soon to be, and fell naught beUnd the bloody 
harvests of Copenhagen and Trafalgar. Men have been 



84 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

disposed, therefore, to reckon this moral energy — call it 
courage, dash, resolution, what you will — as Nelson's one 
and only great quality. It was the greatest, as it is in 
all successful men of action ; but to ignore that this 
mighty motive force was guided by singularly clear and 
accurate perceptions, upon which also it consciously 
rested with a firmness of faith that constituted much of 
its power, is to rob him of a great part of his due renown. 

It is thus that Captain Mahan conceives of Nelson and 
his work, as the finely tempered instrument fashioned by 
a rare combination of genius with opportunity, and des- 
tined thereby to beat back the Napoleonic spirit of aggres- 
sion and to save England and Europe by the overthrow 
of the " ablest of historic men." It will be seen at once 
that the method appropriate to such an undertaking 
differs largely and fundamentally from that pursued by 
Captain Mahan in his ^previous works. In his historical 
works the facts are grouped round a central idea — ^that 
of sea power. In The Life of Nelson the same facts, so far 
as they are relevant, are grouped round and dominated 
by a central personality, that of Nelson himself. Never- 
theless, the organic relation between the two is per- 
sistently and most instructively kept in view. If The Life 
of Nelson, regarded as a biography, is the best and most 
finished portrait of the hero of Trafalgar ever drawn, it 
is so because Captain Mahan has eclipsed all his pre- 
decessors in his grasp of that philosophy of naval warfare 
which Nelson was destined so superbly to illustrate in 
practice. Indeed, it may be said that no one who has not, 
like Captain Mahan, steadily conceived and profoundly 
studied '' the influence of sea power upon history," is 
qualified in these days to write the life of Nelson at all. 
But this qualification, rare as it is, is not sufficient in itself. 
History is abstract, biography is concrete. On the his- 
torical page the elements of human personality, character, 
motive, passion, and even prejudice are, for the most 
part, subordinated to the larger issues of circumstance and 
event. In biography they are factors never to be over- 



HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY 85 

looked. The historian studies character from the outside, 
the biographer from the inside. No man will ever be a 
great biographer who does not see the personality of his 
subject as an ordered and coherent whole, fashioned to 
the likeness and consistency of an individual man, who 
is not endowed with sufficient imagination to reconstruct 
the living figure out of the scattered and lifeless records 
of action, thought, and speech. 

With this rare gift Captain Mahan shows himself to be 
endowed in no ordinary measure. He has saturated his 
mind with Nelson's despatches and correspondence, so 
that each critical moment of the great seaman's career 
derives appropriate and convincing illustration, not so 
much from the biographer's independent reflection as 
from the power he has thus acquired of shedding on it the 
light furnished by Nelson's own unconscious revelation 
of his thought and character. But such a method has its 
snares for all but the most fastidious of writers, and 
Captain Mahan has not entirely escaped them. Unless 
employed with vigilant self-restraint it encourages itera- 
tion and prolixity. It would be too much to say that 
Captain Mahan repeats himself unduly, but a severe critic 
will, nevertheless, detect certain passages in which the 
same ideas, and more or less the same illustrative material, 
are applied more than once to the elucidation of different 
incidents and circumstances. Each of such passages 
may be, and generally is, admirable in itself ; but classical 
severity of form would have been more fully attained by 
the excision of some of them and the transposition and 
fusion of others. The strategic exposition is nearly 
always cogent, lucid, and terse. The historical analjrsis 
displays Captain MsJian at his best. If here and there 
the portrait ^eems to be a little over-laboured, the fault, 
such as it is, at any rate attests the conscientiousness of 
the artist without seriously discrediting his skill. 

The skill of the artist is, in fact, the main difficulty of 
the critic. Mere eulogy is tiresome, and for anything 
but eulogy there is not much occasion in dealing with so 



86 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

masterly a production. Nevertheless, there are one or 
two features in the portrait drawn by Captain Mahan 
which seem to me to be somewhat less happily touched 
than the rest, and to these attention will in the main be 
directed. No biographer of Nelson can overlook his 
relations with Lady Hamilton or shrink from the task of 
considering how far they affected his character and career. 
Nelson's attitude towards women was that of a man 
little versed in the ways of society, and endowed by 
nature with an eager, inflammable, and even volatile 
temperament. He married in 1787, at the age of twenty- 
eight, but his biographers record at least two previous 
attachments. The first occasion was in 1782, when he 
was on the point of sailing from Quebec, and was only 
prevented by his friend Davison from offering his hand 
to a lady, presumably of no very exalted station, for 
whom he had conceived an ardent attachment. Again, 
in the next year. Nelson, while staying in France, fell in 
love at St. Omer with a Miss Andrews, the daughter of an 
English clergyman, and the sister of a naval officer who 
afterwards served with him, and is frequently mentioned 
in his correspondence. On this occasion he wrote with 
rapture of Miss Andrews' beauty and accomplishments, 
and applied to his uncle William Suckling for an allow- 
ance of 100/. a year to enable him to marry. The request 
was granted, but immediately afterwards Nelson re- 
turned hastily and unexpectedly to England, and the 
name of Miss Andrews appears no more in his letters. 
It seems certain, therefore, that he proposed to her and 
was refused. Less than two years after this disappoint- 
ment, in November 1785, he became engaged to Mrs. 
Nisbet, describing his new attachment in a letter to his 
uncle as already " of pretty long standing." But from 
first to last it lacked the ardour of his former loves. It 
may be that such love-making as there was was rather on 
Mrs. Nisbet's side than on Nelson's, for she is described 
in the letter of a friend, who had failed to penetrate 
Nelson's silence and reserve, as being " in the habit of 



NELSON'S LOVES AND MARRIAGE 87 

attending to these odd sort of people." This was ;n 
April or May 1785, and at the end of June Nelson writes 
to his brother, " Do not be surprised to hear I am a 
Benedict, for, if at all, it will be within a month.'' But 
his attachment for Mrs. Nisbet was never a passion ; for 
though he was quick in his affections, and told his uncle, 
in announcing his ' engagement, that he would smile and 
say, " This Horatio is ever in love," he seldom, perhaps 
never, used the language of passion in speaking of her or 
even in writing to her. To his uncle he wrote nine months 
after he became engaged, " My affection for her is fixed 
upon that solid basis of esteem and regard that, I trust, 
can only increase by a longer knowledge of her " ; and 
to herself he wrote some two months before their mar- 
riage, '' My love is founded on esteem, the only founda- 
tion that can make the passion last." 

This is not the language of a Nelson in love, of the 
man who could write many years afterwards to Lady 
Hamilton, " I am ever, for ever, with all my might, with 
all my strength yours, only yours. My soul is God's, 
let Him dbpose of it as it seemeth fit to His infinite 
wisdom ; my body is Emma's." It is rather the lan- 
guage of a man who has 3rielded easily, as was his nature, 
and willingly enough, but certainly not passionately, to 
the innocent artifices of a lady who had " the habit of 
attending to these odd sort of people." His wedded life 
was founded only on esteem, and the foundation endured, 
as it was certain to endure in a man of his loyal temper 
and chivalrous honour, until the volcanic depths of his 
nature were stirred by the shock of a mighty passion ; 
then it crumbled into dust, as might also have been 
anticipated in a man of his titanic impulses. He was, in 
fact, wedded to his profession rather than to his wife, 
who in truth was little fitted to respond to the heroic 
impulses of his soul. At last he met his fate in Lady 
Hamilton, and the quick passions of his youth were once 
more aflame when the most fascinating woman in Europe 
threw herself into the arms of the great seaman whose 



88 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

glorious victory of the Nile had filled the worid with his 
fame. He idealized her as he idealized everything except 
his relations with his wife, as Captain Mahan shrewdly 
observes. But there was that in her which, though only 
" coarsely akin to much that was best in himself/' was 
more akin than anything that Lady Nebon had to give. 
Probably such affection as she ever felt for him was little 
more than the flattered vanity and reflected sense of 
importance which her unfortunate experience of men had 
forced her to accept in lieu of a genuine and ennobling 
passion. But she was not without impulses responsive 
to phases of his nature which his wife had never under- 
stood. " It never could have occurred to the enei^etic, 
courageous, brilliant Lady Hamilton, after the lofty deeds 
and stirring dramatic scenes of St. Vincent, to beg him, 
as Lady Nelson did, ' to leave boarding to captains.' 
Sympathy, not good taste, would have withheld her." 

It was in September 1798 that Nelson first fell under 
the spell of Lady Hamilton's enchantments. A year 
later, but more than a year before his final rupture with 
his wife, he wrote thus coldly of the latter in his brief 
fragment of autobiography : "In March of this year — 
1787 — I married Frances Herbert Nisbet, widow of Dr. 
Nisbet, of the Island of Nevis, by whom I have no chil- 
dren." When 1^ wrote these words, in 1799, he must 
have been conscious of estrangement, though he had as 
yet no thought of separation. Before he returned to 
England, rather more than a year afterwards, he must 
have known that Lady Hamilton was shortly to become 
a mother, and that, unless he afterw^ds deceived himself, 
her child would be his. That he could reconcile it with 
his honour still to keep up the appearance of conjugal 
fidelity, and, with his sense of conunon propriety, to 
expect his wife to associate with his mistress, is a paradox 
much more startling than his subsequent relations with 
Sir William Hamilton himself. Lady Nekon was the last 
woman alive to accept a situation such as even Harriet 
Shelley rejected, although she might not know, as we 



LADY NELSON AND LADY HAMILTON 89 

know, that her husband's relations with Lady Hamilton 
were an outrage on her wifely dignity. But the point to 
be observed and insisted on is that the whole of this pitiful 
tragedy belongs only to the last seven years of Nebon's 
life. Captain Mahan allows its shadow to overhang his 
whole career. From first to last throughout hb pages 
we are shown the fatal passion for Lady Hamilton rising 
up like an avenging Nemesis to besmirch the radiant 
fame of a man who for nearly forty years of a noble 
life had been chivalrous as a Lancelot and loyal as an 
Arthur. 

I can discern no sufficient reason in morals, and there- 
fore none in literary art, for this method of treatment It 
is often possible, and where possible it is always becom- 
ing, for a biographer to draw a veil over the sexual irregu- 
larities of great men. Nebon's own conduct dballows 
such a proceeding in hb case. But the biographer b not 
a censor. It is rather hb business, in such a matter, to 
record than to judge ; and so far as judgment b required 
of him, he b bound to temper it with that charity which 
" hopeth all things " and " thinketh no evil." There arc 
some men whose riotous and unbridled passions infect 
and defile the whole tenor of their lives. Nebon was not 
one of these men. " Doctor, I have not been a gr$ai 
sinner." '* Thank God, I have done my duty." " God 
and my country." These were hb last words — ^the 
passionate but surely irresbtible pleading of a dying 
man at the bar of posterity and eternity. For forty years 
Nebon had done hb duty to all men. To hb dying day 
he did hb duty to hb country. For less than seven 
years he failed to do hb duty to hb wife and to himself. 
Why should the seven years of private lapse be allowed 
to overshadow the splendid devotion of a lifetime to 
public duty? I can only suppose that by way of pro- 
test against the ill-judged efforts of some writers, not of 
the first rank, to throw a halo of false romance over what 
was really a very commonplace, and, in some of its aspects, 
a very ignoble stoty, Captain Mahan has rightly resolved 



90 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

to tell it in all its nakedness as it appears in those amaz- 
ing letters preserved in the Morrison Collection, but has 
wrongly allowed the natural repulsion so engendered 
unduly to enlarge the scope of his moral judgment, and 
to project its condemnation retrospectively over the long 
period of Nekon's life which really was nobly free from 
the taint of illicit passion. 'V 

Of course, if it could be shown that Nelson's profes- 
sional judgment was warped, and his sense of public duty 
distoited, by his passion for Lady Hamilton, the attitude 
assumed by Captain Mahan would be to some extent 
justified. But on this point I shall endeavour to show 
that judgment must, on the whole, be given in Nelson's 
favour. The battle of Copenhagen is represented by 
Captain Mahan as Nelson's most arduous achievement, 
and in the Trafalgar campaign the whole world has recog- 
nized the sign and seal of his genius. On the other hand, 
no one would deny that during the two years after the 
battle of the Nile that genius suffered some eclipse. These, 
of course, were the two years when his passion for Lady 
Hamilton was in its first transports, when he seemed 
tied to the Court of the Two Sicilies by other bonds than 
those of duty, when he annulled the capitulation at 
Naples and insisted on the trial and execution of Carac- 
ciolo, and when he repeatedly disobeyed the orders of 
Lord Keith. But they were also the years during which 
his mental balance was more or less disturbed by the 
wound he had received at the Nile, and his amour-propre 
was deeply and justly mortified by the deplorable blunder 
of the Admiralty in appointing Lord Keith to the chief 

^ In a later essay on " Subordination in Historical Treatment/' republished 
in his work on Naoai Administration and Warfare, Captain Mahan refers, 
very good-hnmouredly, to this or to some similar criticism, and avows that 
he regards it as a compliment paid to the artistic success he has unwittingly 
achieved. Nevertheless his apologia seems to me to imply a theory of 
biographical method which belongs rather to the domain of art than to that 
of history proper. It is the method of the Greek tragedians and of the 
painter who gave us " The Shadow of the Cross " ; but it does not seem to 
me to be the function of biography to let coming events cast their shadows 
before in this way. 



NELSON AND LADY HAMILTON 91 

command in succession to Lord St. Vincent. " Cessante 
causa cessat et eflfectus " is not a maxim of universal 
application ; but combined with what logicians call 
" the method of difference/' it may reasonably be held 
to sustain the contention that the influence of Lady 
Hamilton, which ceased only with Nelson's life, cannot 
have been the sole cause, even if it was a contributory 
cause, of an attitude and temper of mind which lasted 
only while other causes were in operation and disappeared 
with their cessation. The evil spirit which beset him, 
whatever it may have been, had been exorcised for ever 
by the time that he entered the Sound. Never in his 
whole career did his rare combination of gifts, profes- 
sional and personal — '* concentration of purpose, untiring 
energy, fearlessness of responsibility, judgment sound 
and instant, boundless audacity, promptness, intrepidity, 
and endurance beyond all proof" — shine forth more 
brilliantly than it did at Copenhagen. Yet the influence 
of Lady Hamilton was not less potent then and after- 
wards than it was during the period of eclipse. There 
are no letters in the Morrison Collection more passionate 
than those which Nelson wrote to Lady Hamilton at this 
time, none which show more clearly that, as regards Lady 
Hamilton, and yet only in that relation, his mental balance 
was still more than infirm, his moral fibre utterly dis- 
organized. 

It was during this period of moral hallucination that 
Nelson wrote his last heartless letter to his wife, in which 
he says of her son, that " he may again, as he has often 
done before, wish me to break my neck, and be abetted 
in it by his friends, who are likewise my enemies " ; and 
concludes, with amazing self-deception and a brutality 
utterly foreign to his real nature, " I have done my duty 
as an honest, generous man, and I neither want nor wish 
for anybody to care what becomes of me, whether I 
return, or am left in the Baltic. Living, I have done all 
in my power for you, and if dead, you will find I have 
done the same ; therefore, my only wish is, to be left 

9 



92 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

to myself; and wishing you every happiness, believe 
that I am your affectionate Nelson and Bronte." Two 
da3rs later he was writing to Lady Hamilton : " I wor- 
ship — ^nay, adore you, and if you was single and I found 
you under a hedge, I would instantly marry you " ; and 
over and over again he assures her that he has never 
loved any other woman. But he wilfully deceived him- 
self when he wrote of his wife to Lady Hamilton, a few 
days after the battle of Copenhagen : "He does not, 
nor cannot, care about her ; he believes she has a most 
unfeeling heart." For conduct and language such as this 
there can be no excuse, unless indeed passion and genius 
are held to be a law to themselves. 

On the other hand, I find it hard to follow Captain 
Mahan in holding his conduct towards Sir William Hamil- 
ton to be equally inexcusable. It seems to be more than 
probable that Sir William Hamilton never deceived him- 
self, and that if Lady Hamilton and Nelson ever pretended 
to deceive him, it was only as part of a comedy played 
by all three of them with their eyes open, for the purpose 
of deceiving others. It is certain that, during his absence 
at sea in the early part of 1801, Nelson believed, and was 
tortured by the belief, that Sir William Hamilton was 
scheming to sell his wife to the Prince of Wales, and was 
only waiting for the latter to be proclaimed Prince Regent 
in order to sell her at a higher figure. He could hardly 
be expected to be very careful of the honour of a man 
whom he thought capable of such baseness ; and so 
complete was his moral hallucination that he was 
probably quite capable of thinking that the obligation of 
friendship really rested, not upon himself, but on the 
complaisant husband and friend, who, having assigned 
his conjugal rights to another, was not at liberty to 
traffic in them further without the consent of the assignee. 
It is true that in his will Sir William Hamilton called 
Nelson his dearest friend, and described him as "the 
most virtuous, loyal, and truly brave character I have 
ever met with." But this can only have been the final 



NELSON AT NAPLES 93 

touch given by a master-hand to the comedy he deliber^ 
ately chose to play when he consented to share with his 
friend the affections of the " fine woman/' as he called 
her, who had been his mistress before she became his wife. 
Qui trompe-t-on id? 

Now all this moral confusion in Nelson's personal 
sentiments and conduct was contemporary with one of 
the most brilliant of his public achievements. Nelson was 
never more himself than during the Baltic campaign. 
He was least like himself during the two years which 
preceded it. The influence of Lady Hamilton was com- 
mon to both periods, and, as I have shown, the latter 
period was marked by circumstances peculiarly trying to 
a man of Nelson's passionate and eager temperament. 
Yet in this case the needle did not swerve by a hair's 
breadth from the pole of duty, endeavour, and achieve- 
ment. If it seemed to swerve for a time in the Mediter- 
ranean, surely the cause of deflection must be sought 
elsewhere than in an influence which, though still opera- 
tive with not less intensity at Copenhagen, was there 
powerless to effect the slightest adverse disturbance. 
Now we have seen that there were other disturbing ele- 
ments at work in the Mediterranean. It is true that a 
few days after his arrival at Naples from the Nile Nelson 
wrote to hb father, " My head is quite healed." But 
though the acute symptoms which troubled him for 
some weeks had subsided, it seems likely enough that 
some more or less permanent effects remained of a wound 
so severe that at first he thought it mortal, and dowed 
then^elves at intervals for the rest of his life in a peevish, 
despondent, and quasi-hysterical temper.^ But even this 

^ I would instaace, as collateral evidence on this point, the portrait of 
Nelson which appears as a frontispiece to this TOlume. It was painted at 
Palermo, for Sir William Hamilton, in 1799, by Leonardo Gozzaxdi, a Nea« 
pdlitan artist who also painted two other portraits of Nelson about tiie same 
time. One of these was presented to the Sultan of Turkey, and the other is, 
or was, in the possession of llrs. Alfred Morrison. The portrait reproduced 
in this volume now hangs in the Board Room at the Admiralty, and a tablet 
affixed to it states that it was painted just after Nelson's recovery from a 



94 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

h3rpothesis is not necessary to explain Nelson's conduct 
at this period. It is urged that he allowed the influence 
of Lady Hamilton, the blandishments of her friend the 
Queen, and the flatteries of the Court, to imbue him 
with an undue sense of the particular interests of the 
Two Sicilies, and to persuade him that they were really 
the paramount factor in the general trust placed in his 
hands. It is doubtful, however, whether he needed any 
such persuasion. A student of naval history, Nelson 
was not likely to forget the battle of Cape Passaro and 
the instructions issued to Bsoig. Loi^ before the battle 
of the Nile he had persuaded himself of the importance 
of Naples and its kingdom. In the critical letter of 
October 3, 1798, apparently the first he ever wrote to 
Lady Hamilton, he says : " The anxiety which you and 
Sir William Hamilton have always had for the happiness 
of their Sicilian Majesties was also planted in me five 
years past." When Jervis was ordered to withdraw from 
the Mediterranean in 1796, it was for the desertion of 
Naples that Nelson's regrets were most poignant ; and 
Captain Mahan himself admits that, '' in the impression 
now made upon hitn, may perhaps be seen one cause of 
Nelson's somewhat extravagant affection in after dajrs for 
the royal family of Naples, independent of any influence 
exerted upon him by Lady Hamilton." It is true that 
when he first returned from the Levant he took a larger 
and juster view of the general situation] and seemed to 
recognize that the main object of his efforts should be 
tHe destruction of the French army in the East and the 

severe fever. It is very nnlike most of the other portraits of Nelson known 
to me, and its expression is that of a man who is not at ease with himself* 
This may be due to Nelson's passion for Lady Hamilton, which was at the 
time in its first transports ; but there are at least two other vera causa to bo 
taken into account. One is the wound received by Nelson at the Nile, the 
traces of which are very visible in the portrait, and the other is the severe 
fever from which he suffered at Palermo just before the portrait was painted. 
I claim this portrait, therefore, as collateral evidence for the view I have 
advanced in the text, and it is for that reason that I have sought and obtained 
the permission of the Board of Admiralty to reproduce it, although it is not 
in itself a very pleasing presentation of the hero of the Nile. 



NELSON AND THE TWO SICILIES 9S 

recovery of the Mediterranean positions captured by 
Napoleon. But apart from any influence of Lady Hamil- 
ton or of the Neapolitan Court, his change of view was 
subsequently justified, as Captain Mahan allows, by the 
instructions sent to St. Vincent after the victory of the 
Nile. Long before he received these instructions Nelson 
had anticipated their purport, and lai^ely by his influence 
and advice Naples was precipitated into war. As the 
event showed, it was a very ill-judged proceeding ; but 
it may well have commended itself to Nekon for reasons 
quite independent of anjrthing that Lady Hamilton or the 
Queen might say or do. He had rightly, or wrongly, come 
to the conclusion that, as he wrote to St. Vincent on 
October 4, " War at this moment can alone save these 
kingdoms.'' There is no doubt that Lady Hamilton was 
the medium of conmiunication with the Queen and Court, 
and that Nelson's advice was rather forced upon the 
Neapolitan Ministers than sought for by them. But 
Nelson assures St. Vincent in the same letter that he has 
not " said or done an}rthing without the approbation of Sir 
William Hamilton " ; adding, however, " His Excellency 
is too good to them, and the strong language of an English 
Admiral telling them plain truths of their miserable system 
may do good." He had previously said in the same 
letter, '' This country by its system of procrastination 
will ruin itself; the Queen sees this, and thinks as we 
do." On this Captain Mahan observes, " That Lady 
Hamilton was one of the ' we ' is very plain." It b 
very far from plain from the context of the letter itself. 
Lady Hamilton had only once been mentioned in his 
letters to St. Vincent written after his arrival at Naples, 
and then only in the following terms, on September 29 : 
** This being my birthday. Lady Hamilton gives a 
f4te." The next day he wrote, " I trust my Lord in a 
week we shall all be at sea. I am very unwell, and the 
miserable conduct of this Court is not likely to cool my 
irritable temper. It is a country of fiddlers and poets, 
w h ■ and scoundrels" — an opinion which it would 



96 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

certainly have been well for Nebon's fiame and happiness 
if he had continued to entertain. It was five days before 
thisi on September 25, that he wrote to his father '' If it 
were necessary, I could not at present leave Italy/' so 
that this expression cannot be pressed as showing that 
Lady Hamilton had already cast her spells around him. 
In these circumstances it is almost incredible that the 
" we " of the letter of October 4 to St. Vincent should 
have been intended by the writer to include Lady Hamil- 
ton, and very unlikely that St. Vincent should so have 
understood it. It is far more probable that it merely 
indicates Nelson's conviction that St. Vincent would 
think as he did — as in fact he did, for he wrote to Nelson 
on October 28, apparently in answer to the letter under 
discussion, '' You're great in the Cabinet as on the Ocean, 
and your whole conduct fills me with admiration and 
confidence " ; nor would his suspicions be aroused any 
more than his confidence was shaken by the condudii^ 
words of Nelson's letter : ** 1 am writing opposite Lady 
Hamilton, therefore you will not be surprised at the 
glorious jumble of this letter. . • . Naples is a dangerous 
place, and we must keep clear of it." 

Yet it must be acknowledged that Nelson's judgment 
was gravely at fault when he urged the Neapolitan Govern- 
ment to make war at once. But even when Mack was 
defeated, and the King's army routed, he never seems 
to have repented of the advice he had given — ^which had, 
as we have seen, the concurrence of St. Vincent — ^and still 
held that he had judged the situation correctly. His 
real mistake was that he took Mack to be a man like 
himself, and failed to realize, as he should have done, 
that the Neapolitan army was worthless as a fighting 
force. But he was not without grave misgivings when 
he came to understand what manner of man Mack was. 
On October 9 he wrote to Lord Spencer, " I have formed 
my opinion ; I heartily pray I may be mistaken." All 
his other errors followed almost inevitably from the 
initial mistake of not acting on the opinion here recorded. 



NELSON'S INFATUATION 97 

When he left Naples, after refitting his fleet, he wrote 
to Lord Spencer, " Naples sees this squadron no more, 
except the King calls for our help." Far sooner than 
he expected, the King did call for his help. He was 
back at Naples before the end of the year, and with the 
efiicient aid of Lady Hamilton — ^in this crisis indispensable» 
and certainly given with rare address and devotion^he 
succeeded in carrying off the Royal Family to Palermo. 

Here for several months his personal conduct was 
deplorably wanting in discretion and dignity, and pro-* 
vocative of much open scandal ; but there is little or no 
evidence to show that his growing infatuation affected 
in any material degree his sense of professional duty or 
his discharge of the obligations it imposed on him. It 
is true that Syracuse had originally been selected by him 
as his intended base of operations, and that his abandon- 
ment of this intention, as Captain Mahan remarks, '' sug- 
gests the idea, which he himself avows, that his own pre- 
sence with the Court was political rather than military 
in its utility." But Captain Mahan also points out that 
the preference for Palermo rests upon sound strategic con- 
siderations, which may very well have been present to 
Nelson's mind, though he does not specifically mention 
them. Again, though he seemed to tarry at Palermo 
when he might have been better employed elsewhere, there 
was for the moment no urgent call to take him elsewhere. 
When the call came, with the entry of Bruix into the 
Mediterranean, he responded to it with a promptitude 
and decision all his own. " An emei^ency so great and 
so imminent," writes Captain Mahan, " drew out all his 
latent strength, acute judgment, and promptitude." 
Measures were instantly taken for the concentration of 
his forces in a position best calculated to intercept the 
enemy and to frustrate his designs, and even when Duck- 
worth refused to join him he never faltered for a moment : 

*' I am under no apprehension for the safety of His 
Majesty's squadron," he said in a circular letter to his 



98 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

scattered vessels, designed to heighten their ardour. " On 
the contrary, from the very high state of discipline of the 
ships, I am confident, should the enemy force us to battle, 
that we shall cut a very respectable figure ; and if Admiral 
Duckworth joins, not one moment shall be lost in my 
attacking the enemy." To St. Vincent he expressed him- 
self with the sober, dauntless resolution of a consummate 
warrior, who recognized that opportunities must be 
seized, and detachments, if need be, sacrificed, for the 
furtherance of a great common object. " Your Lordship 
may depend that the squadron under my command shall 
never fall into the hands of the enemy ; and before we 
are destroyed, I have little doubt but the enemy will have 
their wings so completely clipped that they may be easily 
overtaken " — ^by you. In this temper he waited. It is 
this clear perception of the utility of his contemplated 
grapple with superior numbers, and not the headlong 
valour and instinct for fighting that unquestionably dis- 
tinguished him, which constitutes the excellence of Nelson's 
genius. 

This is not the portrait of a man who has allowed the 
wiles of a woman to lure him from the path of duty and to 
silence the promptings of his own matchless genius for war. 

I need not consider in detail the two most controverted 
episodes in Nelson's career, the capitulation of Naples 
and the execution of Caracciolo, which occurred in im- 
mediate sequence to his vigorous but fruitless efforts to 
intercept Bruix. Captain Mahan holds that Nelson was 
within his rights in disallowing the capitulation. He 
does not doubt that " Nelson had been given full power 
by the King of the two Sicilies to act as his representative," 
though there exists no documentary evidence of the fact. 
But he comments with some severity on the epithet 
" infamous," applied by Nelson to the instrument he 
set aside in a letter written a fortnight afterwards to 
Lord Spencer. " Such an adjective, deliberately applied 
after the first heat of the moment had passed, is, in its 
injustice, a clear indication of the frame of mind under 
the domination of which he was," The domination of 



NELSON AND CARACCIOLO 99 

this frame of mind must be admitted, and need not be 
defended ; but its seeds were sown long before Nelson 
ever saw Lady Hamilton, and there is no direct evidence 
that its growth was unduly fostered by her influence. 

Similar reasoning applies to the execution of Caracciolo. 
This, Captain Mahan regards as, like the treatment of the 
capitulation, technically unimpeachable, but morally repre- 
hensible, and here his opinion is, in my judgment, not 
only unassailable in substance, but expressed with sin- 
gular felicity : 

Nelson himself failed to sustain the dispassionate and 
magnanimous attitude that befitted the admiral of a 
great squadron, so placed as to have the happy chance to 
moderate the excesses which commonly follow the tri- 
umph of parties in intestine strife. But, however he then 
or afterwards may have justified his course to his own 
conscience, his great offence was against his own people. 
To his secondary and factitious position of delegate from 
the King of Naples, he virtually sacrificed the considera- 
tion due to his inalienable character of representative of 
the King and State of Great Britain. He should have 
remembered that the act would appear to the world, not 
as that of the Neapolitan plenipotentiary, but of the 
British officer ; and that his nation, while liable like 
others to bursts of unreasoning savagery, in its normal 
moods delights to see justice clothed in orderly forms, 
unstained by precipitation or suspicion of perversion, 
advancing to its ends with the majesty of law, without 
unseemly haste, providing things honest in the sight of all 
men. That he did not do so, when he could have done so, 
has been intuitively felt ; and to the instinctive resent- 
ment thus aroused among his countr3rmen has been due 
the facility with which the worst has been too easily 
believed. 

Nevertheless the biographer himself acquits Nelson in 
this case of the suspicion which long rested on him of 
having yielded his better judgment to sinister and secret 
Influences. 

There remains the cj^uestioi) pf Nelspn's subsequent 



loo THE LIFE OF NELSON 

disobedience of Lord Keith. Now there is no disguisii^ 
the fact that Nelson's genius was splendidly impatient 
of mediocrity, and never submitted tamely to its authority. 
He chafed under Hotham as he chafed under Hyde Parker, 
and he disobeyed both. In fact his whole career is per- 
haps more remarkable for the light it throws on the con- 
ditions and limits of military obedience than for any 
other single characteristic. " You did as you pleased in 
Lord Hood's time/' said some one to him in 1796, '' the 
same in Admiral Hotham's, and now again with Sir 
John Jervis ; it makes no difference to you who is com- 
mander-in-chief.'' With men like Lord Hood and Sir 
John Jervis — men whose genius and impukes were akin 
to his own, and from whom he certainly derived no small 
share of inspiration — ^he could do as he liked, without 
fear of disciplinary collision, because between him and 
them there existed perfect confidence and complete under- 
standing. Even Parker, for whom Nelson entertained 
no great respect, had the good sense and magnanimity 
to approve, or at any rate not to censure, an act of dis- 
obedience more direct but not less splendid, which the 
popular imagination has ever since seized upon as one of 
the most glorious episodes in Nelson's career. Hotham, 
too, sanctioned by acquiescence an act of disobedience 
which Nelson acknowledged and defended. " The orders 
I have given," he said, '* are strong, and I know not how 
my admiral will approve of them, for they are, in a great 
measure, contrary to those he gave me ; but the service 
requires strong and vigorous measures to bring the war 
to a conclusion.'' Hotham subsequently approved, recog- 
nizing no doubt that, as Nelson said, " political courage 
in an officer abroad is as highly necessary as military 
courage " ; and in this connection Captain Mahan takes 
occasion to expound what seems to be unimpeachable 
doctrine : — 

It is possible to recognize the sound policy, the moral 
courage, and the correctness of such a step in the particu- 



NELSON'S DISOBEDIENCE loi 

lar instance, without at all sanctioning the idea that an 
officer may be justified in violating orders, because he 
thinks it right. The justification rests not upon what he 
thinks, but upon the attendant circumstances which 
prove that he is right ; and, if he is mistaken, if the con- 
ditions have not warranted the infraction of the funda- 
mental principle of military efficiency,— obedience, — ^he 
must take the full consequences of his error, however 
honest he may have been. Nor can the justification of 
disobedience fairly rest upon any happy consequences 
that follow upon it, though it is a commonplace to say 
that the result is very apt to determine the question of 
reward or blame. There is a certain confusion of thought 
prevalent on this matter, most holding the rule of obedi- 
ence too absolutely, others tending to the disorganizing 
view that the integrity of the intention is sufficient ; the 
practical result, and for the average man the better 
result, being to shun the grave responsibility of departing 
from the letter of the order. But all this only shows 
more clearly the great professional courage and profes- 
sional sagacity of Nelson, that he so often assumed 
such a responsibility, and so generally — with, perhaps, 
but a single exception — ^was demonstrably correct in nis 
action. 

Now it may be conceded at once that none of the tests 
here applied to Nelson's previous acts of disobedience — 
acts which were really among the most cogent proofs of 
his transcendent genius for war — ^will apply to the *' single 
exception " indicated by Captain Mahan, — the case, namely, 
of his persistent disobedience to the orders of Lord Keith. 
As before, he felt he was right, and never could be brought 
to admit that he was wrong. But as Captain Mahan 
pointedly observes, " no military tribunal can possibly 
accept a man's conscience as the test of obedience." On 
former occasions he had acted contrary to orders, it is 
true, but fairly within the limits of his own responsibility 
and discretion, and in the assured confidence, justified by 
the event, that his superior would have acted as he did 
had he known the circumstances — in other words, that 
his estimate of the situation was a sound one, and that his 



loa THE LIFE OF NELSON 

action was in accordance with right reason, taking a just 
view of all the conditions of the case. This is not to 
plead the ex past jado justification of success, but to insbt 
on the antecedent justification of an appeal to right 
reason sanctioned in the event by the concurrent judg- 
ment of those authorized by their position or entitled 
by their experience to decide. But a far wider issue is 
raised by his refusal to obey Lord Keith ; and though 
little exception need be taken to Captain Mahan's treat- 
ment of it, it is worth while to point out, first, that Keith 
manifestly rated the strategic value of Minorca far too 
highly, since its security must in all cases have depended 
on the general situation in the Mediterranean and on 
the supremacy of the British flag in that sea ; and secondly, 
that only a few months before Keith himself had afforded 
a precedent, technically unimpeachable though strat^c- 
ally quite indefensible, when, neglecting St. Vincent's 
instructions, he finally lost the opportunity of intercepting 
Bruix by going direct to Minorca instead of taking a posi- 
tion off the Bay of Rosas. " Although a military tribunal 
may think me criminal,'' said Nelson, '' the world will 
approve my conduct." The world has done nothing of 
the kind. It has felt, rightly in the main, that for this 
once Nelson allowed his self-esteem, even if no less worthy 
motive were at work, to get the better of his sense of 
military duty. No great harm came of it in the end ; 
but if we cannot allow mere success to justify disobedience 
as such, still less can we allow lack of evil consequences 
to be pleaded as the justification of disobedience not 
otherwise defensible. 

Nevertheless, extenuating circumstances may, and in- 
deed in justice ought to be, pleaded. Such a man as 
Nelson never should have been placed under the orders 
of such a man as Lord Keith. When St. Vincent resigned 
the command-in-chief, none but Nelson should have suc- 
ceeded him. The appointment of Lord Keith was little 
short of grotesque, and Nelson was the last man not to 
feel it bitterly. He knew his own value, and perhaps 



NELSON AND KEITH 103 

self-esteem was only saved from degenerating into vanity 
by his real greatness of ^ soul. The great-souled man, 
sa3rs Aristotle, is one who, being worthy of great things, 
deems himself to be so. The definition applies pre- 
eminently to Nelson. Not to deem himself the fittest 
man to succeed St. Vincent would have been unworthy 
of the victor of the Nile. Not to resent the preference 
given to Lord Keith would have been a submissiveness 
quite foreign to Nelson's nature and altogether incom- 
patible with his genius. " It is not every one,'' says 
Captain Mahan, ** that can handle an instrument of such 
trenchant power, yet delicate temper, as Nelson's sensi- 
tive genius." St. Vincent had done it| because he was 
himself a man of Nelson's mould. Lord Keith, on the 
other hand, '' was an accomplished and gallant officer, 
methodical, attentive, and correct, but otherwise he rose 
Uttle above the commonplace ; and while he could not 
ignore Nelson's great achievements, he does not seem to 
have had the insight which could appreciate the rare 
merit underl3dng them, nor the sympathetic temperament 
which could allow for his foibles." Herein, I am con- 
vinced, lies the real and only secret of Nelson's disobedi- 
ence in this case. Nelson was not a Samson caught in 
Delilah's toils, but the piteous victim of that bitterest 
of pangs, the sense of thwarted genius, as the father of 
hbtory calls it in one of the saddest sentences ever penned : 

^Ej^larff iStfPff iroXKiL ^poviomd irep fAtfi^vo^ icparieiv. His 

position may be illustrated by two well-known anecdotes. 
** My Lord," said the great Lord Chatham to the Duke of 
Devonshire, " I am sure that I can save this country, 
and that no one else can." This was Nelson's feeling; 
and assuredly, if he could not save his country, it was 
not at all likely that Lord Keith would. Again, when 
the younger Pitt was invited to join Addington's ministry, 
he was informed that his brother, the Earl of Chatham, 
was to be Prime Minister. Here the negotiation ended. 
" Really," said Pitt, " I had not the curiosity to ask 
what I was to be." Nelson, who, without being consulted 



104 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

in the matter, had had to serve under Keith, would 
certainly have sympathized with his old friend. 

The consideration of Nelson's relations vdth Lady 
Hamilton and of their influence on his professional conduct 
has carried me far in the analysis of his character and the 
survey of his career. I have dwelt on it at length for that 
reason, and also because it is now almost the only ques- 
tion regarding Nelson which still remains open to con- 
troversy. There are three questions which must naturally 
suggest themselves to the critic of any new biography of 
Nelson : — ^Does the biographer draw a convincing portrait 
of Nelson as a man ? Does he explain his pre-eminence 
as a seaman in terms of his character and career ? Does 
he take a just view of the moral catastrophe of his life ? 
To two of these questions the answer must be an affirma- 
tive so emphatic as almost to supersede detailed criticism. 
To the third, as we have seen, the answer must be more 
hesitating, though even here the faithful biographer may 
be more easily excused for leaning to the side of severity 
than for yielding to the maudlin sentiment which allows 
the glamour of a rather tawdry romance to silence the 
moral judgment altogether, and to obscure the pitiful 
tragedy of a hero dragged by his senses into the mire 
of an unworthy passion.' If it be further asked whether 
Captain Mahan is a better exponent than his predecessors 
of Nelson's unparalleled genius for war and of the historic 
import of his campaigns, it suffices to answer once for all 
that he is the author of the Influence of Sea Power upon 
History. In this domain he is without a rival. 

There is one other point, however, on which I am 
constrained with no little reluctance, and with profound 
respect for a judgment and authority which I cannot 
pretend to rival, in some measure to join issue with Cap- 
tain Mahan. The doctrine of the '' fleet in being," as 

> There are letters in the Morrison Collection, too coarse to quote, which 
show plainly enough that Nelson's infatuation for Lady Hamilton was es- 
sentially and passionately ph3rBical, and neyer rose to the level of an ennobling 
and redeeming inspiration. 



THE FLEET IN BEING 105 

originally formulated by Torrington after the battle of 
Beachy Head, and expounded i^^^his comments on that 
action by Admiral Colomb, has more than once been 
advanced in former writings of my own as pregnant with 
instruction and worthy of all acceptance. It is, says 
Captain Mahan, a doctrine or opinion which ** has received 
extreme expression • . . and apparently undei^one equally 
extreme misconception/' To the latter proposition I can 
assent without reserve ; whether the former applies to 
myself I am not greatly concerned to inquire. It will 
suffice to recall my own definition of the doctrine, and to 
show, as I think I can, that it is little, if at all, at variance 
with the opinions repeatedly advanced by Captain Mahan 
and illustrated in the most brilliant and convincing fashion 
by Nelson's practice from first to last. Indeed, if I were 
to say that Nelson's strategic practice and his biographer's 
luminous exposition of it are both alike saturated with 
the doctrine of the ** fleet in b^ing," I should, in my own 
judgmwt, only be insisting on the characteristic merit 
of both. 

He who contemplates a military enterprise of any 
moment across the sea, must first secure freedom of 
transit for his troops. To do this he must either defeat, 
mask, or keep at a distance, any hostile force which is 
strong enough, if left to itself, to interfere with his move* 
ments. In default of one or other of these alternatives 
it is safe to say, either that his enterprise will not be 
undertaken, or that it will fail. This is the true doctrine 
of the fleet in being — ^which is a fleet strategically at 
large, not itself in assured command of the sea, but strong 
enough to deny that command to its adversary by strategic 
and tactical dispositions adapted to the circumstances of 
the case. 

So I wrote some years ago in discussing " The Armada." • 
The fact is that the doctrine of the fleet in being is merely 
a definition of the conditions which, so long as they exist, 

> Tks Navy tmd ih§ Nation, p. 158. 



io6 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

are incompatible with an established command of the sea. 
*' I consider," said the late Sir Geoffrey Hornby, " that 
I have command of the sea when I am able to tell my 
Government that they can move an expedition to any 
point without fear of interference from an enemy's fleet." 
In other words, a fleet in being, as defined above, is, in the 
judgment of that great seaman, incompatible with an 
established command of the sea ; and to any one who is 
prepared to maintain that Sir Geoffrey Hornby would 
ever have undertaken to conduct a military enterprise of 
any moment across the sea without having first estab- 
lished his command of the sea to be crossed, it must 
suffice to say, Naviget Anttcyram. 

Now let us see how far Captain Mahan really traverses 
the propositions advanced above. After the siege and 
reduction of Bastia, the British troops in Corsica were 
placed in transports which assembled in the bay of San 
Fiorenzo, under the convoy of Nelson in the Agamenmon, 
with a view to the immediate prosecution of the siege 
of Calvi. Just previously a French fleet of seven sail 
of the line put to sea from Toulon unresisted by Hotham, 
who was watching off that port. Hotham, having failed 
to intercept them, fell back upon Calvi, which he regarded 
as their objective, and was there joined by Hood with 
the main body of the British fleet. Having obtained in- 
formation of the enemy's whereabouts, Hood at once made 
sail in pursuit, and, as Captain Mahan relates, '^ in the 
afternoon of June loth, caught sight of the enemy, but 
so close in with the shore that they succeeded in towing 
their ships under the protection of the batteries in Golfe 
Jouan " — generally called Gourjean by Nelson — *' where 
for lack of wind, he was unable to follow them for some 
days, during which they had time to strengthen their 
position beyond his powers of offence. Hotham's error 
was irreparable." In other words, the French fleet had 
been allowed by Hotham to escape, and therefore still to 
remain a formidable strategic menace. Baffled by an 
enemy whom he could not reach, Hood remained to 



THE FLEET IN BEING 107 

watch him, and sent Nelson back in the Agamemnon^ to 
resume the work of embarking the troops from Bastia. 
In a few days the whole force, consisting of the Agamemnon^ 
two smaller ships of war, and twenty-two transports, was 
anchored at San Fiorenzo. 

Here he met General Stuart. The latter was anxious 
to proceed at once with the siege of Calvi, but asked 
Nelson whether he thought it proper to take the shipping 
to that exposed position ; alluding to the French fleet 
that had left Toulon, and which Hood was then seeking. 
Nebon's reply is interesting, as reflecting the judgment 
of a warrior at once prudent and enterprising, concerning 
the influence of a hostile " fleet in being " upon a con- 
templated detached operation. ** I certainly thought it 
right," he said, *' placing the firmest reliance that we 
should be perfectly safe under Lord Hood's protection, 
who would take care that the French fleet at Gourjean 
should not molest us." To Hood he wrote a week later : 
" I believed ourselves safe under your Lordship's wing." 
At this moment he thought the French to be nine sail of 
the line to the British thirteen, — ^no contemptible inferior 
force. Yet that he recognized the possible danger from 
such a detachment is also clear ; for, writing two days 
earlier, under the same belief as to the enemy's strength, 
and speaking of the expected approach of an important 
convoy, he says : "I hope they will not venture up till 
Lord Hood can get off Toulon, or wherever the French 
fleet are got to." When a particular opinion has received 
the extreme expression now given to that concerning the 
" fleet in being," and apparently has undergone equally 
extreme misconception, it is instructive to recur to the 
actual effect of such a force, upon the practice of a man 
with whom moral effect was never in excess of the facts 
of the case, whose imagination produced to him no para- 
Ijrsing picture of remote contingencies. Is it probable 
that, with the great issues of 1690 at stake. Nelson, had he 
been in Tourville's place, would have deemed the crossing 
of the Channel by French troops impossible, because of 
Torrington's " fleet in being " ? 

Certainly Nelson, had he been in Tourville's place, 
could not have deemed the crossing of the Channel by 
10 



108 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

French troops impossible so long as he " could place the 
firmest reliance that he would be perfectly safe under some 
Lord Hood's protection, who would take care that Tor- 
rington's fleet, whether at the Gunfleet or elsewhere, 
should not molest him." But in order to establish any- 
thing like a parallel to Torrington's case, it would be 
necessary to suppose that Nekon would have sanctioned 
the descent on Calvi and the prosecution of the si^e if 
Lord Hood's force had not been in a position to protect 
him. He neglected the menace of the French fleet only 
because he believed that force to be effectually masked, 
and himself to be perfectly safe " under Lord Hood's 
wing." Even the justly high authority of Captain Mahan 
cannot persuade me that this incident affords a proof or 
even a presumption that Nelson would have thought it 
prudent to transport the troops from San Fiorenzo to 
Calvi, and to prosecute the siege of the latter, if the 
French fleet had not been, as he believed, masked by 
Hood. On the contrary, the whole subsequent story, so 
well told and so admirably appreciated in all its strategic 
implications by Captain Mahan, of the proceedings of 
this fleet, of Hotham's failure to destroy it on two occa- 
sions, when, in Nelson's judgment at any rate, he had 
the opportunity, of its potent and even its disastrous 
influence on the campaign until it was finally destroyed 
by Nelson himself at the Nile, is to my mind a most 
pregnant and conclusive proof that the doctrine of the 
fleet in being was one which Nelson uniformly illustrated 
in practice, even if he did not always fully grasp it in 
theory. 

That the doctrine has two distinct aspects is a pro- 
position so obvious as scarcely to need stating. For an 
admiral who seeks to command the sea it means that the 
only way to secure that end is to dispose of, that is, to 
destroy, mask, or otherwise neutralize, any and every 
organized force capable of interfering with his movements. 
This is what Nelson meant when he wrote to Lord St. 
Vincent, " Not one moment shall be lost in bringing the 



NELSON AND HOTHAM lo^ 

6nemy to battle ; for I consider the best defence for his 
Sicilian Majesty's dominions is to place myself alongside 
the French." This ako is the basis and justification of 
his criticism of Hotham, and of his own dogged pursuit 
in later days of Villeneuve to the West Indies and back 
again. The Toulon fleet was alwajrs '* my fleet," as he 
called it, the fleet which it was his business, whatever 
happened, to watch, pursue, and destroy. As it was at 
the Nile and at Trafalgar, so it was at Copenhagen. The 
organized naval force of the enemy was the one objective 
which Nelson ever placed before himself. He implored 
Hotham on March 14 to pursue the enemy and destroy 
him there and then. '' Sure I am," he said, '' had I 
conunanded our fleet on the 14th, that either the whole 
French fleet would have graced my triumph, or I should 
have been in a confounded scrape." But Hotham, 
'' much cooler than myself, said, ' We must be contented^ 
we have done very well.' Nqw had we taken ten sail, 
and had allowed the eleventh to escape, when it had 
been possible to have got at her, I could never have 
called it well done." And surely the doctrine of the fleet 
in being as it applies to the dispositions of an admiral who 
seeks to command *the sea, could not be better stated 
than it is stated by Captain Mahan in his comment on 
this engagement : 

The fact is, neither Hotham nor his opponent, Martin, 
was willing to hazard a decisive naval action, but wished 
merely to obtain a temporary advantage, — the moment's 
safety, no risks. " I have good reason," wrote Hotham 
in his despatch, " to hope, from the enemy's steering to 
the westward after having passed our fleet, that whatever 
might have been their design, their intentions are far the 
present frustrated." It is scarcely necessary to say that 
a man who looks no further ahead than this, who fails to 
realize that the destruction of the enemy's fleet is the one 
condition of permanent safety to his cause, will not rise 
to the conception presented to him on his quarter-deck by 
Nelson. The latter, whether by the sheer intuition of 
genius, which is most probable, or by the result of well- 



no THE L1F£ OF NELSON 

ordered reasoning, which is less likely, realized fully that 
to destroy the French fleet was the one thing for which 
the British fleet was there, and the one thing by doing 
which it could decisively affect the war. 

On the other hand, an admiral who is not for the 
moment strong enough to seize the command of the sea, 
must endeavour so to use his own fleet in being as to 
prevent that command passing to his enemy. This was 
what Torrington did ; and this, too, was what Nelson, 
after Hotham had twice failed to destroy the French 
fleet, found himself compelled to do. It is not to be 
supposed that Torrington imagined for a moment that 
the fleet which, in spite of the disastrous orders of Mary 
and Nottingham, he had saved from destruction, would 
by its mere existence prevent a French invasion. He 
had kept it in being in order that he might use it offen- 
sively whenever the occasion should arise. His own 
words are decisive on this point : " Whilst we observe 
the French, they cannot make any attempt on ships or 
shore, without running a great hazard ; and if we are 
beaten, all is exposed to their mercy." These words, it 
is true, were written before the battle of Beachy Head ; 
but they enunciate the principle which governed his con- 
duct in that action, and was afterwards to be stated in 
language which, in spite of all that has been said, I, for 
one, must still regard as embodjring the quintessence of 
naval strategy, " I alwa3rs said that whilst we had a 
fleet in being they would not dare to make an attempt." 
It is no doubt quite true, as Mr. David Hannay says 
in his introduction to the Letters of Sir Samuel Hood, 
that " the fleet in being must be strong enough for its 
work, and that the admiral in command of it must not 
merely trust to his presence to deter the enemy " ; but 
when the same writer adds that an admiral in such a case 
" must strike at once and hard," he seems to me entirely 
to miss the point. Strike hard such an admiral must 
when he does strike, even if his stroke involves the loss 
of his whole fleet ; but the time at which he should strike 



NELSON AND VILLENEUVE in 

thus must be determined by circumstances and oppor* 
tunity. To sacrifice his whole fleet, as Nottingham and 
Mary would have had Torrington do, without frustrating 
the enemy's purpose, may be magnificent, but it is not 
war. Nelson, as Captain Mahan tells us, " expressed 
with the utmost decision his clear appreciation that even 
a lost battle, if delivered at the right point or cU the right 
moment, would frustrate the ulterior objects of the enemy, 
by crippling the force on which they depended." But 
though he was thus prepared to strike hard when the 
time came, he was certainly by no means eager to strike 
at once and before the time came. On this point, at any 
rate, there is no room for doubt, either as to his own views 
or as to those of his biographer. In his vivid narrative 
of the final pursuit of Villeneuve, Captain Mahan pauses 
to interpolate the following impressive comment : 

It was about this time that Nelson expressed to one 
or more of his captains his views as to what he had so far 
effected, what he had proposed to do if h^ had met the 
hostile fleets, and what his future course would be if they 
were yet found. " I am thankful that the enemy have 
been driven from the West India Islands with so little 
loss to our Country. I had made up my mind to great 
sacrifices ; for I had determined, notwithstanding his 
vast superiority, to stop his career, and to put it out of 
his power to do any further mischief. Yet do not imagine 
I am one of those hot-brained people, who fight at an 
immense disadvantage, without an adequate object. My 
object is partly gained," that is, the ^lies had been forced 
out of the West Indies. " If we meet them, we shall find 
them not less than eighteen, I jather think twenty sail 
of the line, and therefore do not be sin-prised if I do not 
fall on them immediately : we won't part without a battle. 
I think they will be glad to leave me alone, if I will let 
them alone ; which I will do, either till we approach the 
shores of Europe, or they give me an advantage too 
tempting to be resisted." 

It is rare to find so much sagacious appreciation of 
conditions, combined with so much exalted resolution 
and sound discretion, as in this compact utterance. 



113 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

Among the external interests of Great Britain, the West 
Indies were the greatest. They were critically threa- 
tened by the force he was pursuing ; therefore at all 
costs that force should be so disabl^, that it could do 
nothing effective against the defences vdth which the 
scattered islands were provided. For this end he was 
prepared to risk the destruction of his squadron. The 
West Indies were now delivered ; but the enemy's force 
remained, and other British interests. Three months 
bdbre, he had said, '' I had rather see half my squadron 
burnt than risk what the French fleet may do in the 
Mediterranean." In the same spirit he now repeats : 
" Though we are but eleven to eighteen or twenty, we 
won't part without a battle." Why fight such odds ? 
He himself has told us a little later. " By the time the 
enemy has beat our fleet soimdly, they will do us no 
harm this year." Granting this conclusion, — ^the reason- 
ableness of which was substantiated at Trafalgar, — it 
cannot be denied that the sacrifice would be justified, the 
enemy's combination being disconcerted. Yet there shall 
be no headlong, reckless attack. '' I will leave them 
alone till they offer me an opportunity too tempting to 
be resisted," — ^that speaks for itself,— or, " until we 
approach the shores of Europe," when the matter can 
no loiter be deferred, and the twenty ships must be taken 
out of Napoleon's hosts, even though eleven be destroyed 
to effect this. The preparedness of mind is to be noted, 
and yet more the firmness of the conviction, in the strength 
of which alone such deeds are done. It is the man of 
faith who is ever the man of works. 

Singularly enough, his plans were quickly to receive 
the b^t of illustrations by the failm-e of contrary methods. 
Scarcelv a month later fifteen British ships, under another 
admiral, met these twenty, which Nelson with eleven now 
sought in vain. They did not part without a battle, but 
they did part without a decisive battle ; they were not 
kept in sight afterwards ; they joined and were incor- 
porated with Napoleon's great armada ; they had further 
wide opportunities of mischief ; and there followed for 
the people of Great Britain a period of bitter suspense 
and wide-spread panic. 

Now it may be that Torrington was rather a Calder 



NELSON AND TORRINGTON 113 

than a Nelson ; but even if so much be granted, all that 
the admission proves is that Torrington, though he enun- 
ciated a sound doctrine and gave it expression in very 
memorable words, did not apply it as Nelson would have 
done. That is a matter of opinion about which it is not 
very profitable to dispute. But the doctrine itself is a 
matter of principle about which, so far as I can see, Nel- 
son's own practice affords no solid ground for dispute. 
In any case, it is important to note that on one occasion, 
at any rate, Nelson acted exactly as Torrington did ; 
that is, he declined to '^ strike at once and strike hard," 
at a time when he saw clearly that by so doing he would 
play his enemy's game, and not his own. Singularly 
enough, Captain Mahan, in his comment on this incident, 
appears to recognize and insist on the doctrine of the fleet 
in being as emphatically as any of its supporters could 
desire : 

With this unsatisfactory affair, Nekon's direct con- 
nection with the main body of the fleet came to an end 
for the remainder of Hotham's command. It is scarcely 
necessary to add that the prime object of the British fleet 
at all times, and not least in the Mediterranean in 1795^ 
— ^the control of the sea,— continued as doubtful as it had 
been at the beginning of the year. The dead weight of 
the admiral's having upon his mind the Toulon fleet, ^un« 
diminished in force despite two occasfons for decisive 
action, was to be clearly seen in the ensuing operations. 
On this, also. Nelson did much thinking, as passing events 
threw Ught upon the consequences of missing opportunities. 
" The British fleet," he wrote, five years later, and no 
man better knew the facts, " could have prevented the 
invasion of Italy ; and, if our friend Hotham had kept 
his fleet on that coast, I assert, and you will agree with 
me, no army^ from France coald have been furnished with 
stwes or provisions ; even men could not have marched." 
But how keep the fleet on the Italian coast, while the 
French fleet in full vigour remained in Toulon ? What a 
curb it was appeared again in the next campaign, and 
even more cleany, because the British were then com- 
manded by Sir John JerviSj a man not to be checked by 



114 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

ordinary obstacles. From the decks of his flagship Nel* 
son, in the following April, watched a convoy passing dose 
in shore. " To get at them was impossible before they 
anchored under such batteries as would have crippled our 
fleet ; and, had such an event happened, in the preseni 
state of the enemy*s fleet, Tuscany, Naples, Rome, Sicily, 
&c., would have fallen as fast as their ships could have 
sailed along the coast. Our fleet is the only saviour at 
present for those countries." 

Here I must make an end. But I cannot mkke a 
better end than by insisting that the one broad lesson of 
Nelson's life is his unfailing perception and splendid illus- 
tration of the doctrine . that the paramount object of a 
sea-captain in war must alwajrs be to destroy, disable, or 
otherwise neutralize the organized naval force of his 
enemy or such portion of it as represents his immediate 
adversary. If exception be taken to calling this doctrine 
the doctrine of the fleet in being, I am not concerned to 
insist on a phrase which has certainly, as Captain Mahan 
says, undergone extreme misconception. But on the 
doctrine itself I still insist as the beginning and the end 
of all sound thinking on naval warfare and its principles. 
It was because Napoleon never understood it, and Nelson 
never lost sight of it, that Napoleon's schemes for the in- 
vasion of England were brought to naught. Napoleon 
seems to have thought that if he could get his fleets into 
the Channel without an action, the invasion could take 
place. Nelson knew better. He knew that whatever 
combinations Napoleon might make, however successfully 
his Villeneuves, his Ganteaumes, his Missiessys, might 
evade the watch of the British admirals for a time, how- 
ever adroitly they might strive to " decoy " them away, 
they could never attain such a command of the Channel 
as would enable the Army of Boulogne to cross until 
they had fought those same admirals on no very unequal 
terms, and beaten them as thoroughly as he himself 
beat Villeneuve at Trafalgar. " They should not have 
stirred," wrote Howard of the Armada, " but we would 



THE GREAT LESSON 115 

have been upon their jacks." Nelson was ever " upon 
the jacks " of Villeneuve. Comwallis held Ganteaume 
in a vice. Calder, if he had been a man like Nelson, 
and not a man like Hotham, would have anticipated 
Trafalgar. Napoleon's whole combination was in truth 
vitiated throughout by the colossal blunder of supposing, 
if he ever did suppose, that even if his fleets had succeeded 
in escaping, combining, and reaching the Channel they 
could have availed him anything so long as Nelson, 
G>mwallis, and Calder, to say nothing of ample forces 
nearer home, were behind, before, and around them, re- 
solved, as Nelson said, " not to part without a battle," 
or as Drake had said, two hundred years before, ** to 
wrestle a pull " with them. But Napoleon never grasped 
the lessons of the Armada. He did not know that evasion 
cannot secure the command of the sea except as a pre- 
liminary to fighting for it, and that all his combinations 
were vain unless or until they could enable his admirals 
to sweep the sea of his foes. This is the open secret of 
the sea, which whoso divines is its master and whoso 
ignores is its victim. The Sphinx of history has pro- 
pounded its riddle to nation after nation, and each, as it 
failed to guess it, has paid the inexorable penalty. At 
Gravelines the sceptre of the world's sea power passed 
from Spain to England. At Trafalgar " it was not Ville- 
neuve that failed, but Napoleon that was vanquished ; 
not Nelson that won, but England that was saved." Yet 
Napoleon, in his defeat, dealt the nation he never could 
subdue an insidious blow which smote her as with the 
blindness of G£dipus. More than a hundred years after 
Trafalgar was fought we are still wrangling over those 
eternal principles of sea-defence which Nelson illustrated 
so splendidly in his life, and consecrated so gloriously in 
his death. The blunders of Napoleon have for long been 
far more potent to guide and inspire our defensive policy 
than the genius and teaching of Nelson ; and the conqueror 
of Europe might have found a sinister consolation in his 
final discomfiture could he have foreseen that, for more 



ii6 THE LIFE OF NELSON 

than a century after the campaign whidi undid him, the 
mistress of the seas, whose supremacy he never could 
shake, would bury the secret of her victory fathoms deep 
in the blue waters of Trafalgar, and dose her eyes, as 
they wept for Nelson, to the things which belong to her 
peace. 



/ 



EPILOGUE 

THE SECRET OF NELSON ^ 

" T^HERE is but one Nebon," said Lord St. Vincent. 

J- All Englishmen know that Nelson is the most 
beloved of national heroes. All the world acknowledges 
thatf as Lord Rosebery has said, " there is no figure like 
his among those who have ploughed the weary seas." 
To Captain Mahan he is " the embodiment of the sea 
power of Great Britain/' the symbol, the t3rpe, the unique 
and towering incarnation of that spirit of the sea which 
has made of a little island a great Empire, which has 
carried the British flag and the' British race to the utter- 
most parts of the earth. More than a hundred years 
after his death he still holds a place in the national imagina- 
tion which we give to no other of those whom none of 
us have ever seen. To all of us whose outlook on national 
life and history has any scope at all his personality is still 
almost as vivid and as winning, as powerful to inspire all 
the love and all the pity that are due to the poignancy 
of human things, as it was to those who knew him in the 
flesh, and first heard with stricken hearts the tidings of 
his glorious death. There is no other man in our history 
of whom this can be said ; and it is worth while to con- 
sider why it is that his name and memory thus stand 
alone in our hearts. 

It is not merely that he was, as Sir Cyprian Bridge 
has said, " the only man who has ever lived who by 
universal consent is without a peer.'' Vixere fortes ante 
Agamemnana, and the nation which had known men like 

^ Tks TimsSt October 2i« 1905. 

117 



II 8 THE SECRET OF NELSON 

Drake, and Blake, and Hawke, and Rodney, and Howe, 
and St. Vincent, not to mention Hood, who was perhaps 
the peer of all of them except in opportunity, would 
hardly have put Nelson on his solitary pinnacle merely 
because he transcended them all. Nor is it merely be- 
cause he is the last of a great line, because the warfare of 
the sailing-ship period culminated and ended with him. 
Nor, again, is it merely because Irafalgar was a great 
deliverance from a great and imminent national peril. 
Napoleon's naval combinations might have been over- 
thrown even if Nelson had had no hand in their undoing, 
though the task would have been infinitely harder for any 
other man ; and it would be unjust to the memory of 
men like Comwallis and CoUingwood to say that it is 
impossible to think of a Trafalgar without a Nelson. In 
truth, it was not by Trafalgar alone that Napoleon's 
naval combinations were overthrown, nor even by Nel- 
son's own transcendent share in the dispositions which 
overthrew them. Long before Trafalgar was fought 
Napoleon had abandoned all his schemes for the invasion 
of England, had broken up his camps at Boulogne, and 
marched the Grand Army to the overthrow of Austria. 
Ulm had capitulated on the day before Nelson died at 
Trafalgar, and Austerlitz had been fought and won more 
than a month before his body was carried to its last rest- 
ing-place in St. Paul's. Napoleon knew nothing of the 
final destruction of his hopes at Trafalgar when he said 
to the generals who capitulated at Ulm, " I want nothing 
further upon the Continent ; I want ships, colonies, and 
commerce." That was what Nelson and his companions 
in arms — Comwallis and CoUingwood afloat, and Barham 
at the Admiralty — ^had denied him, and he knew full well 
that he had lost it when he broke up his camps at Boulogne. 
Trafalgar was thus in a sense only the tactical consum- 
mation of a strategic conflict which had been finally 
decided against Napoleon when Villeneuve, hunted un- 
ceasingly from east to west and back again from west to 
east by Nelson, foiled even by Calder, and intimidated 



WHY NELSON IS UNtQUfi no 

by the matchless tenacity of Comwallis, had lost heart 
and turned southward to Cadiz, instead of keeping the 
sea and putting his fate to the touch. In that tremen- 
dous drama, the greatest ever acted on the seas, Nelson 
was assuredly the first and the greatest of the actors, 
but not the only occupant of the stage. In truth, his 
transcendent personality distorts in some measure the 
proper perspective of history, for neither was Trafalgar 
the real crisis of the conflict nor was Nelson the sole agent 
by whom its issue was determined. " I had their huzzas 
before, I have their hearts now," he said to Hardy as he 
quitted the shore of England for the last time. It was 
Nelson, the great incomparable warrior, the victor of the 
Nile and Copenhagen, that attracted their huzzas ; it 
was Nelson, the man with that large, loving, eager, wist- 
ful, and infinitely lovable soul of his, that even before 
Trafalgar had found an abiding-place in his country- 
men's hearts. The fame of the warrior is fleeting ; it 
remains a tradition, it may be, but not an active memory, 
" The tumult and the shouting dies " in time. But the 
love of men is not so fleeting. The rare souls that inspire 
it possess a passport to immortality far more durable 
than any^ that their greatest deeds can confer. In the 
case of Nelson, as in that of Wolfe, this love was conse- 
crated and confirmed for ever by the death of the hero 
in the hour of victory. No man was ever more blessed 
in the opportunity of his death than Nelson was. There 
were no more battles for him to fight for his country. 
The battle of his own guilty love must have been decided 
in the end against him. If Emma Hamilton was not 
altogether the " vulgar adventuress " that Lord Rosebery 
calls her, she was, at any rate, not the woman to share 
without tarnishing the laurels of his unparalleled feats 
of arms. Nelson's life's work was done, he had achieved 
imperishable renown, and, happily for him and for all of 
us, the rest is silence. It must have been some such 
feeling as this that inspired the noble words of Lady 
Londonderry — Camden's daughter, Castlereagh's step- 



126 THE SECRET OF NELSON 

mother, and the mother of that other Stewart who wad 
the friend of WeUington^ — ^in the letter which she wrote 
on hearing of Nelson's death : 

The sentiment of lamenting the individual more than 
rejoicing in the victory, shows the humanity and affection 
of the people of England. ... He now begins his im- 
mortal career, having nothing to achieve upon earth, and 
bequeathing to the English Fleet a legacy which they 
alone are able to improve. Had I been his wife or his 
mother, I would rather have wept him dead than seen 
him languish on a less splendid day. In such a death 
there is no sting, in such a grave there is everlasting vic- 
tory. 

We might i well take that for his epitaph if Southey 
had not written it in even more memorable words : 

He cannot be said to have fallen prematurely whose 
work was done ; nor ought he to be lamented who died 
so full of honours and at the height of human fame. The 
most triumphant death is that of the mart3rr ; the most 
awful that of the martyred patriot ; the most splendid 
that of the hero in the hour of victory : and if the chariot 
and horses had been vouchsafed for Nelson's translation 
he could scarcely have departed in a brighter blaze of 
glory. He has left us, not indeed his mantle of inspira- 
tion, but a name and an example which are at this moment 
inspiring hundreds of the youth of England — a name 
which b our pride, and an example which will continue 
to be our shield and our strength. Thus it is that the 
spirits of the great and the wise continue to live and 
to act after them ; verifying in this sense the language 
of the old mythologist : 

Tol fiep SaljAOvi^ eUn, Ato^ fieydKov Biii fiovki/^ 
*Ea$koiy iirtx^ovioi, ^vXatce^ Ovfjr&v iofOpmrtav^ 

Toi fjL€p iaifAovh Mw. It is this daemonic element in 
Nelson's personality that has given him his imperishable 
hold on the hearts and imaginations of his countrsrmen. 
Few among us are fully competent to understand, and not 



NELSON'S CHARACTER «i 



many of us have ever tried to understand, how and why 
he was the greatest seaman the world has ever known. 
The popular conception of his qualities as a sea-officer is 
still largely a misconception ; it obscures his real merits 
and attributes to him a mere bull-dog impetuosity and 
tenacity which is supposed to embody the national ideal 
and certainly flatters the national prejudice in favour of 
the rule of thumb as superior to the rule of thought*. 
'' His recent biographers/' says Sir Cyprian Bridge, " Cap- 
tain Mahan and Professor Laughton, feel constrained to 
tell us over and over again that Nelson's predominant 
characteristic was not ' mere headlong valour and in- 
stinct for fighting ' ; that he was not the man ' to run 
needless and useless risks ' in battle. ' T^he breadth and 
acuteness of Nelson's intellect/ says Mahan, ' have been 
too much overlooked in the admiration excited by his 
unusually grand moral endowments of {resolution, dash, 
and fearlessness of responsibility/ " These latter are, no 
doubt, the qualities which his countrymen saw first and 
admired most in their favourite hero ; but they are only 
half the qualities which gave him his supreme position 
above all the fighting seamen of history. There were 
really two men in Nelson, even in Nelson the seaman. 
In Nelson the man there were many more than two. 
Wellington saw two of them in the one brief interview 
he ever had with him. There was the vain, garrulous 
braggart whose conversation, " if it could be called con- 
versation, was almost all on his side, and all about him- 
self, and in, really, a style so vain and so silly as to surprise 
and almost disgust me." There was also the man who 
'' talked of the state of this country and of the aspect and 
probabilities of affairs on the Continent with a good sense, 
and a knowledge of subjects both at home and abroad, 
that surprised me equally and more agreeably than the 
first part of our interview had done ; in fact, he talked 
like an officer and a statesman." A third will be seen, 
happily in only a few fleeting and forbidding glimpses, 
in some of the letters to Lady Hamilton, contained in 



145 THE SECRET OF NELSON 

the Morrison Collection — ^letters in which it is only chant* 
able to suppose that his mental balance was for the 
moment overthrown, in which the incomparable Nelson 
of the Victory's quarter-deck and cockpit is as completely 
degraded into the sensual, erotic, and frantically jealous 
paramour of Lady Hamilton as the Dr. Jekjdl of Steven- 
son's story was ever transformed into Mr. Hyde. But 
even in Nelson the seaman there were at least two men. 
There was the wary, thoughtful, studious tactician full 
of reflection and circumspection, the man whom Hood 
had singled out when he was quite a young cap^in and 
had never served with a fleet as an officer to be consulted 
on questions of naval tactics, who had studied Clerk of 
Eldin and bettered the instruction of the landsman with 
the insight of a great seaman, who had meditated on the 
tactical methods of Rodney and Hood and Howe and 
many others, and had combined and improved on them 
all ; and there was also the man who when he came into 
action never faltered for a moment, alwa}rs saw the right 
thing to be done, and did it, even, as at St. Vincent, with- 
out waiting for orders, alwa}rs kept the signal for close 
action flying, trusted absolutely in himself and in his 
comrades because he had inspired them, and never 
thought that all was done that ought to have been done 
unless all that was possible had been accomplished — nil 
auAum reputans dum quid superesset agendum. It is the 
rare combination of these two different tjqpes in one per- 
sonality that explains and justifies Captain Mahan's preg- 
nant remark, " No man was ever better served than 
Nelson by the inspiration of the moment ; no man ever 
counted on it less." He was one of those consummate 
men of action in whom the native hue of resolution is 
never allowed to be sicklied o'er with the pale cast of 
thought. For this reason men of a different mould were 
too prone to believe that the thought was not there. In 
truth, it was ever-present and all-pervading, but it was 
so completely assimilated into a resolution alike unfalter- 
ing and unerring that it acted with the precision and 



THE MANY SIDES OF NELSON 123 

rapidity of an instinct. As the late Admiral Colomb 
finely said in one of the most suggestive and most sym- 
pathetic appreciations of Nelson ever penned, " The 
courage of Nelson, not only the facing of the most immi- 
nent personal danger, but the acceptance of the most 
tremendous responsibiUties, was a combination of fire 
and ice. His excitement never carried him away, his 
judgment let his excitement share alike with itself, and 
the two worked together in producing acts which the 
coolest criticism of after years only succeeds in commend- 
ing as at once the simplest and the wisest. Nelson in 
action with an opposing fleet stands more nearly as a 
specially inspired being than any great man of modem 
times ; and we cannot contrast him with any of his 
contemporary admirals, great souls though they bore, 
without seeing how immeasurably above them all he was 
when drawing in contact with the enemy." 

This is the secret of Nelson's incomparable greatdtess 
as a seaman. But this secret was not fully grasped by 
his contemporaries, nor is it yet perhaps thoroughly 
understood by the nation which still so justly adores him. 
If it had been we should not have had to ¥^t for a hun- 
dred years to find out whether his last battle was fought 
as he proposed to fight it in a Memorandum which dis- 
plays his tactical genius at its very highest, or whether, 
on the other hand, it was fought on no principle at all 
and by a method which no critic has yet been able to 
explain, still less to defend — ^for so it must have been if 
the hitherto accepted plans, diagrams, and models are 
even approximately correct. It is not there, then, that 
we must look for ^ the explanation of Nelson's abiding 
hold on the afi^ections of his countrymen. Nor is it in 
his victories alone, many and transcendent as they were. 
Mere victory is no passport to the immortality of personal 
affection. If it were, ^e. names of Marlborough and 
Wellington should stand side by side with that pf Nelsoui 
whereas it is idle to pretend that they do. Lord Rose- 
bery finds a partial explanation in the fact that the sea 
II 



124 THE SECRET OF NELSON 

is the British element, that our sailors have generally 
been more popular than our soldiers. That was true, no 
doubt, in the time of the Great War, especially the earUer 
periods of it, when men could not but understand what 
their navy was doing for them and could not but realize 
how ill-fitted the organizers and leaders of Walcheren 
Expeditions and the like were to emulate the great deeds 
of their sailors and naval administrators. But it can 
hardly be true of the greater part of the last century 
when Englishmen well-nigh forgot for a time all that the 
sea had done for them and all that it must still do for 
them. We must look beyond the naval genius of Nelson, 
beyond even the splendid tale of his victories, if we would 
find a complete explanation. " There are," as Lord 
Rosebery has said, '' other reasons. There was perhaps 
the fascinating incongruity of so great a warrior's soul 
being encased in so shrivelled a shell. Then there was 
his chivalrous devotion to his officers and men. There 
was the manifest and surpassing patriotism. There was 
the easy confidence of victory. In him the pugnacious 
British instinct was incarnate ; with Nelson to see the 
foe was to fight him ; he only found himself in the fury of 
battle. . . . His unwearied pertinacity was not less re- 
markable. . . • Again, he was brilliantly single-minded, 
unselfish, and unsordid. • « • All these qualities appealed 
irresistibly to mankind. But the main cause of his popu- 
larity, splendour of victory apart, is broader and simpler. 
Nelson was eminently human.'' Other reasons might 
perhaps be assigned, but the last includes them all. Not 
only was Nelson eminently human, he was also eminently, 
even pre-6minently lovable. He had no social advantages. 
He was not versed in the ways of society. Even in 
his profession his early experience of the sea was obtained 
in a merchantman, and as a young officer he served 
mostly in small ships and isolated commands. '' It is 
dear," says Colomb, '* that neither society nor its superiors 
were ever quite sure of Nelson. He was liable to be called 
* an odd sort of person.' He was not altogether sure of 



NELSON EMINENTLY HUMAN 125 

himself/' He had, too, the restless, yearning, melancholy 
temperament of genius, and, like Wolfe, he had his 
moments, as we see from Wellington's anecdote, of vanity 
and gasconade. Thus neither education, nor society, nor 
even the training and traditions of his profession did 
much to make Nelson what he was. His rare gifts of 
human sympathy and fellowship were bom of his person- 
ality, not of his environment, just as those higher qualities 
of hottest courage mated with coolest judgment, of that 
incomparable instinct for victory which seemed only to 
be quickened by the fury of battle, were his nature and 
his alone. Anyhow, to all his great qualities as a fighter 
and leader he added that rarest and most precious of all, 
the quality of loving and being loved. " The most bril- 
liant leader," to quote Colomb again, " that the British 
Navy ever produced veiled his leadership and sank its 
functions in his followers. They were his companions 
and colleagues in all advances to the front, and they 
scarcely knew that it was his spirit that animated them 
all and made them ' a band of brothers,' " as he called 
those who fought under him at the Nile. Yet though they 
did not know all that they owed to him, they must have 
known and felt that they owed to him more than to any 
other man. 

Moreover, it was not merely in the hour of battle that 
his presence and his influence were supreme. There was 
never an occasion when generosity, loving-kindness, and 
tender consideration were needed that Nelson did not 
display them to a degree that might put all other men to 
shame. The story is well-known how, when he was has- 
tening in the Minerve to join Jervis just before the battle 
of St. Vincent and hotly chased in the Straits by several 
Spanish men-of-war, a man fell overboard, and Hardy, 
then a lieutenant, was lowered in a boat to pick him up. 
The man, however, could not be found, nor could the 
boat be recovered unless the way of the frigate was checked. 
The nearest Spaniard was almost within gun-shot, and 
perhaps any other man than Nelson would have felt that 



ia6 THE SECRET OF NELSON 



the boat, even with Hardy in it, must be sacrificed to the 
safety of the frigate and all that it meant to Jervis. But 
Nelson was not made in that mould. " By God, Til not 
lose Hardy 1 " he exclaimed, " back the mizen-topsail." 
The boat was picked up and Hardy was saved to give that 
last kiss to his dying chief in one of the great historic 
moments of the world. In the light of this anecdote are 
not the words of the d3ring hero, " Kiss me, Hardy," 
invested with a sublimer pathos than ever ? Again, when 
returning from the one great failure of his life, at Teneri£Fe, 
baffled, disheartened, weak from the loss of blood, with 
his shattered arm hanging helpless in his sleeve, Nekon 
refused to be taken on board the Seahorse, the nearest 
ship to the shore, his own ship, the Theseus, lying much 
further out to sea. The Seahorse was commanded by 
Fremantle, who had been left on shore, whether dead or 
a prisoner no one knew, and Mrs* Fremantle was on 
board, Nebon was told that it might be death to him to 
refuse : '' Then I will die," he exclaimed. " I would 
rather suffer death than alarm Mrs. Fremantle by her 
seeing me in this state and when I can give her no tidings 
whatever of her husband." He was then taken on board 
his own ship and there climbed up the side by one 
man-rope, calling for the surgeon as he reached the 
quarter-deck to come and take his arm oflF. None but 
a Nelson could have acted thus — so mighty and so in- 
domitable and withal so truly gentle was the spirit that 
found its tenement in that puny and weakling frame. 

Incidents such as these might be cited largely from the 
story of Nelson's life. But two more must suffice. We 
know how eager he always was in pursuit, how covetous 
he was of victory, and how jealous in husbanding the 
resoiurces needed to seciure it. Yet on two occasions dur- 
ing his last campaign he restrained those noble impulses 
altogether, out of consideration for two men, Keats and 
Calder, one of whom he loved and trusted, while the other 
he neither liked -nor even greatly respected. Keats com- 
manded the Superb, which was so rotten that, during the 



NELSON'S LOVING-KINDNESS 127 

blockade of Toulon, Nelson declared that no one but 
Keats could have kept her afloat. The Superb, in spite 
of her rotten condition, accompanied Nelson in his pursuit 
of Villeneuve to the West Indies, but she was the slowest 
ship in the squadron, though Keats had lashed his stud- 
ding-sail booms to the masts, and obtained permission not 
to stop when other ships did, but always to carry a press 
of sail. Nelson feared that Keats might fret at this, for 
we may be very sure that he fretted at it himself, and it 
was just this that made him so S3rmpathetic and con- 
siderate. " My dear Keats," he wrote, " I am fearful 
that you may think that the Superb does not go as fast 
as I could wish. However that may be (for if we all 
went ten knots I should not think we went 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." For Calder, whom he disliked, his con- 
sideration was even more magnanimous. Calder, who 
had failed to brin^ Villeneuve to a decisive action when 
he had an opportunity which Nelson would assuredly have 
seized and improved, was ordered home, and left the 
fleet about a week before Trafalgar was fought. Nelson 
had been ordered to remove him from his own flagship 
and to send him home in another vessel which could better 
be spared. But though he neither liked Calder nor 
thought him a good officer, he was so touched by Calder's 
humiliation and distress that in defiance of orders he 
allowed him to take his flagship home. " Sir Robert felt 
so much," he wrote to the First Lord, " even at the idea 
of being removed from his own ship which he conunanded, 
in the face of the fleet, that I much fear that I shall incur 
the censure of the Board of Admiralty. ... I may be 
thought wrong, as an officer, to disobey the orders of the 
Admiralty, by not insisting on Sir Robert Calder's quit- 
ting the Prince of Wales for the Dreadnought, and for 
parting with a 90-gun ship before the force arrives which 
their lordships have judged necessary ; but I trust that 



128 THE SECRET OF NELSON 

I shall be considered to have done right as a man and to 
a brother officer in affliction. My heart could not stand 
it, and so the thing must rest/' Accordingly Calder 
was allowed to take the Prince of Wales home, and 
Nelson, covetous as he was of victory, and convinced as 
he was that " numbers only can aimihilate," parted with 
a 90-gun ship when he knew that the enemy's force was 
superior to his own. Such an act of intrepid gener- 
osity, generous even to the verge of quixotism, was 
characteristic of Nelson alone. No other man would 
have dared to do it. No other man would have been 
forgiven for doing it. Nor did it end in spirit even there* 
As the Victory was going into action, Nekon still thought 
kindly of the man whose only function in history is to 
afford a contrast to himself. " Hardy," he said, " what 
would poor Sir Robert Calder give to be with us now I " 
This, his ruling passion of loving-kindness and tender- 
ness of heart, was strong even in death. Just as he 
would not go on board the Seahorse at TenerifFe lest Mrs. 
Fremantle should be alarmed, so, as he was carried below 
at Trafalgar after receiving his death wound, he covered 
his face and stars with his handkerchief in order that, as 
Beatty, who tells the story, says, " he might be conveyed 
to the cock-pit at this crisis unnoticed by the crew.'' There 
at this supreme moment, still thinking of others and not of 
himself, and with " Thank God, I have done my duty " 
on his lips, let us leave him in all the majesty of a great 
hero's death. There is but one Nebon. 



41 



DUNCAN^ 

IN the middle of the eighteenth century a Member of 
Parliament became known to his contemporaries as 

Single Speech Hamilton." On the memorable occasion 
which gave an opposition to the House of Commons, and 
the seals of a Secretary of State to the elder Fox, while 
it drew from Pitt one of the most famous of his speeches 
and quite the most celebrated of his metaphors, William 
Gerard Hamilton deUvered his first and only speech. 
" He spoke for the first time," says Horace Walpole, who 
heard him, " and was at once perfection." He never 
spoke in the House of Commons again. ** Yet a volume 
he has left of maxims for debating in the House of Com- 
mons proves," says Lord Stanhope, " how deeply and 
carefully he had made that subject his study." The 
unique effort of the debate on the Address in 1755 — ^which 
placed Hamilton for the moment almost on a level with 
Pitt — was at once the fruit and the proof of the speaker's 
mastery of Parliamentary Logic. He spoke well because 
he had studied the whole art of parliamentary fence and 
fathomed all its secrets. He seemed to flash across the 
parUamentary sky like a sudden and brilliant meteor 
glowing only for a moment. But the Parliamentary Logic 
reveals the source from which the meteor derived its 
lustre, and proves that its fuel was not exhausted, though 
it never glowed again. 

As Gerard Hamilton was called " Single Speech Hamil- 
ton," so Admiral Duncan, the victor of Oamperdown, 
might well be called " Single Action Duncan." But the 
parallel must not be pressed too closely. The parlia- 

1 QuofUrfy RsoUw, Jaavmry 1899. 

139 



I30 DUNCAN 

mentary combatant well equipped for the fray need never 
wait long for his opportunity. As a rule, he is prompt 
and even importunate to seize it. The naval commander, 
on the other hand, cannot make his opportunities. He 
can only take them when they come. '' His object," as 
Nelson said in a pregnant sentence, " is to embrace the 
happy moment which now and then offers — it may be 
this day, not for a month, and perhaps never." For this 
his whole life must be a preparation. With an instant 
readiness to perceive, seize, and improve the happy 
moment when it comes, he must be content even if it never 
does Qome. To many a mute, inglorious Nelson it may 
never come. To Duncan it came at the battle of Camper- 
down. But it only came when he had been more than 
fifty years in the service. In this he at once resembles 
and differs from Hamilton. Each was master of his art. 
But Hamilton found his opportunity early in life and 
never sought another, though he might have found them 
by the score. Opportunity constantly passed Duncan 
by, and only found him at last when his course was well- 
nigh run. The two were alike in readiness of preparation, 
but unlike in felicity of opportunity. Hamilton was 
*' Single Speech Hamilton " by choice ; Duncan was 
" Single Action Duncan " by necessity. Hamilton lives 
only in a nickname ; Duncan lives in the memory of a 
splendid victory. 

And yet he does not all live. No contemporary bio- 
grapher thought his life worthy of detailed record, and 
naval historians have for the most part treated his great 
victory as an insignificant episode in the vast drama of 
Napoleonic war — ^an episode which raised no strategic 
issues of more than subordinate moment. At last, just 
a hundred years after the battle of Camperdown was 
fought and won, the present Earl of Camperdown, the 
great-grandson of the victor who never himself bore the 
title which commemorates his victory, has laudably 
sought to place on record sudi memoriak of his great 
ancestor as may still be salvaged from the wreck of time. 



DUNCAN'S GREATNESS 131 

Writing on the hundredth anniversary of the battle 
which Duncan won^ Lord Camperdown sa3rs : 

Just one hundred years have passed since the sea-fight 
off Camperdown on October 1 1 , 1 797, which decided the 
fate of the Dutch Navy ; and a Centenary seems a not 
inopportune moment to place on record some incidents 
in the life and naval career of Admiral Duncan which have 
hitherto remained unpublished. 

He had the honour to be one of the great Sea Com- 
manders whom the perils of Great Britain in the eighteenth 
century called into existence. Boscawen, Hawke, Keppel, 
Howe, Rodney, Hood, St. Vincent, Nelson, CoUingwood, 
were of the number. Of all these famous sailors there are 
written memorials, which will keep their memory green 
as long as there is a British Empire, and which tell how, 
in the eighteenth century, superior seamanship and daring 
time after time warded off and finally brought to naught 
combinations of Great Britain's enemies which seemed 
irresistible. 

It is no longer possible to write such a life of Duncan 
as Southey, still quivering with the emotions of a great 
national struggle, wrote of Nelson at the beginning of 
the last century, or as Captain Mahan has written at its 
close, availing himself of all the materiak which an abid- 
ing interest in the most romantic and most brilliant of 
naval careers has amassed in such profusion. Nor does 
the subject demand a treatment either so classical or so 
exhaustive. Duncan was not a Nekon. He lacked that 
daemonic force of genius, that magnetic charm of person- 
ality which made Nelson unique. But he was a great 
seaman, and he lived in an age of great seamen. He 
entered the Navy in the year of Culloden and died the 
year before Trafalgar. He was Keppel's pupil and after- 
wards his favourite captain. " He may truly be said to 
have received his professional education in Keppel's 
school, having served under him in the several ranks of 
midshipman, third, second, and first lieutenant, flag and 
post captain ; indeed, with the exception of a short time 



isa DUNCAN 

with Captain Barrington, he had no other commander 
during the Seven Years' War." 

At different times he served under Boscawen, Hawke, 
Rodneyi and Howe. Jervis was his oontemporaiy and 
friend. Nelson himself wrote after the battle of the Nile 
that he had *' profited by his example/' and a dose re- 
semblance may be traced between the mode of attack 
adopted by Duncan at Camperdown and that adopted 
by Nelson at Trafalgar. But though he lived in an age 
of war and fought in many a famous fight, his career 
reached no heroic level until his opportunity came at last 
after fifty years of service. Yet, Uttle as we now can 
know of the details of his youthful years, it is plain from 
that little that whenever his opportunity had come he 
would have been equal to it* It is certain that quite 
early in his career he acquired a reputation for courage and 
coolness ; and " there is a tradition," says hb biographer, 
" that he was alwajrs first to volunteer for the boats or to 
lead the boarders." After Camperdown a blue-jacket 
wrote home to his father : " They say as how they are 
going to make a Lord of our Admiral. They can't make 
too much of him. He is heart of oak ; he is a seaman 
every inch of him, and as to a bit of a broadside, it only 
makes the old cock young again." Many anecdotes attest 
his skill as a seaman, and one in particular deserves to be 
quoted as showing what seamanship meant in those da]rs : 

The Monarch was a notoriously indifferent sailer, and 
uncoppered when Duncan commanded her ; and yet he 
was able in sailing to hold his own with ships far superior 
to her, in Rodney's action with Langara off Cape St. Vin- 
cent in 1780, and on other occasions. As an instance of 
her smartness, his nephew, Mr. Haldane, has narrated how 
on one occasion, when pursuing some French men-of- 
war, " the Monarch, outsailing the rest of the Squadron, 
got into the midst of a Convoy, and her discipline was 
such that boats were let down on each side without 
8wami>ing, filled with armed crews to take possession of 
the prizes, whilst the Monarch never slackened her speed, 



D'ORVILLIERS IN THE CHANNEL 133 

but with studding sails set, bore down on the flying ships 
of war." 

There is evidence, too, to show that, like all great 
sea-captains, from Drake to Nelson, Duncan possessed 
that rare instinct for war which never lets an opportunity 
slip, is never daunted by mere numbers, and knows when 
to yield to what Captain Mahan calls " an inspired blind- 
ness which at the moment of decisive action sees not the 
risks but the one only road to possible victory." Perhaps 
no campaign in whidi a British fleet has ever engaged is 
a finer touchstone of thb instinct than that which ended 
so ingloriously when Sir Charles Hardy retreated up the 
Channel before D'Orvilliers in 1779. Lord Camperdown 
briefly describes it and Duncan's share in it as follows : 

During the sunmier of 1779 the Monarch was attached 
to the Channel Fleet, now under the command of Sir 
Charles Hardy owing to the resignation of Admiral Keppel. 

Spain had declared war in the month of June, and on 
July 9 it was announced by Royal Proclamation that an 
invasion by a combined French and Spanish force was to 
be apprehended. 

The French fleet sailing from Brest under Count D'Or- 
villiers was permitted without opposition to unite with 
the Spanish fleet under Don Luis de Cordova, and on 
August 16 sixty-six sail of the line were off Plsrmouth. 
The Channel Fleet had missed them, and was to the 
south-west of Scilly. 

In the Channel Fleet were men who were burning to 
engage the enemy. Captain Jervis in the Faudroyant 
wrote to his sister : 

" Augusi 34, twenty leagues south-weet of Scilly. 

" A long easterly wind has prevented our gettii^ into 
the Channel, to measure with the combined fleets. What 
a humiliating state is our country reduced to 1 Not that 
I have the smallest doubt of clearing the coast of these 
proud invaders. The first westerly wind will carry us 
into the combined fleets. . • ^ I and all around me nave 
the fullest confidence of success and of acquiring im* 
mortal reputation." 



134 DUNCAN 

On August 29 a strong easterly wind forced the com- 
bined fleets down the Channel, and on September i they 
found themselves in presence of the British Fleet a few 
miles from the Eddystone. 

Sir Charles Hardy had only thirty-eight ships, and 
deciding that it would be imprudent to risk an engage- 
ment, he retreated up the Channel, and on September 3 
anchored at Spithead, much to the disgust of some of his 
officers. Captain Jervis, who in the Faudroyant was 
second astern of Sir Charles Hardy in the Victory, wrote : 
** I am in the most humbled state of mind I ever experi- 
enced, from the retreat we have made before the combined 
fleets all yesterday and all this momii^/' 

Captain Duncan told his nephew of his own impotent 
indignation and shame, and how he could " only stand 
loolang over the stem gallery of the Monarch.'* 

This was probably the only occasion on which either 
of those officers retreated before an enemy. The funda- 
mental article of their nautical creed was that an enemy 
when once encountered must not be permitted to part 
company without an action. From tins line of conduct 
neither of them willingly ever deviated one hair's-breadth. 
It is safe to assert that if either had on that day been in a 
position to give orders to the Channel Fleet a larger 
Cape St. Vincent or a larger Camperdown would have 
been fought off Scilly, though not impossibly with a 
different result. If, however, the Foudroyant and the 
Monarch had been sunk, it is certain from their record that 
French and Spanish ships would have gone down as well, 
and that even if the combined fleets had come off vic- 
torious, their condition would have been such as to give 
England no cause for apprehension on the score of in- 
vasion. 

As events happened, the combined fleets held for some 
weeks undisputed command of the Channel, but, happily 
for Great Britain, neglected to make any use of their 
advantage. The Spaniards wished to eflfect a landing ; 
the French wished before landing to defeat the British 
fleet. The crews became sickly ; the ships were defec- 
tive, and the season for equinoctial gales was at hand. 
The Spanish commander declared to Count D'Orvilliers 
that he must relinquish the present enterprise and return 
to the ports of his own country ; and the French admiral 



HARDY'S INCAPACITY 135 

had no other course open to hun but to acquiesce and to 
retire to Brest. 

This critical episode in our naval history has perhaps 
never been quite adequately ajpfpreciated. The odds 
were tremendous — ^thirty-eight British ships of the line 
against sixty-six in the combined French and Spanish 
fleets — ^far greater odds than Nelson encountered when 
he attacked thirty-three ships of the line with twenty- 
seven at Trafalgar. The late Admiral Colomb thought 
that " the only reasonable strategy for Sir Charles Hardy 
was that adopted so long before by Lord Torrington, a 
policy of observation and threatening ; and such a policy 
would have left the British fleet at St. Helen's with abun- 
dant scouts ... to give the earhest information of the 
enemy's approach." But Hardy adopted neither Tor- 
rington's strategy nor that of his critics. For nearly the 
whole of the month of August he cruised aimlessly in the 
Soundings — as the region between Ushant and Cape 
Clear, known as " the Sleeve " to Elizabethan seamen, 
was then called — Cleaving D'OrviUiers to the eastward 
with the whole of the Channel open to him, though he 
was by no means in " undisputed command " of it. More 
by good luck than by any skill in tactics or the pursuit of 
any strat^c purpose that can now be discerned, Hardy 
managed, towards the end of the month, to get to the 
eastward of an antagonist apparently as supine or else 
as incapable as himself ; and, though the fleets were now 
in contact, his one thought was retreat. On the evening 
of September 3, he anchored in comparative safety at 
Spithead. 

These proceedings are quite unintelligible. If Hardy 
did not intend to risk an action except on his own terms, 
he never should have been in the Soundings at all. On 
the other hand, D'OrviUiers' proceedii^ seem to have 
been equally inept, and can only be explained by sup- 
posing that his fleet was paralysed by sickness, by ill- 
equipment, and by divided counsels. Now what would 



136 DUNCAN 

Nelson have done in such a case ? He was, ssys Captain 
Mahan, " a man with whom moral effect was never in 
excess of the facts of the case, whose imagination pro- 
duced in him no paralysing picture of remote contin- 
gencies." Shortly before Trafalgar '' he expressed with 
the utmost decision his clear appreciation that even a lost 
battle would frustrate the ulterior objects of the enemy, 
by crippling the force upon which they depended." Tor- 
rington, we know, would have temporized. He would 
never have gone to the Soundings. Before all things he 
would have striven to keep his fleet " in being." '* Whilst 
we observe the French," he said, " they cannot make any 
attempt on ships or shore without running a great hazard ; 
and if we are beaten all is exposed to their mercy." To 
have gone to the Soundings would have been to put 
himselfi as Howard of Effingham said on a like occasion, 
" clean out of the way of any service against " the enemy. 
He would rather have placed himself where he could best 
observe the enemy's movements, and would at any rate 
have taken care never to lose touch of them. This is no 
doubt the correct strategy of the situation, and had Hardy - 
adopted it none could have blamed him. But it is not 
necessarily the strategy that would have commended itself 
to a consummate master of naval war. Nelson would not 
have been daunted by the mere disparity of numbers. 
When with eleven ships of the line only he was following 
Villeneuve back from the West Indies, he said to his cap- 
tains : 

I am thankful that the enemy has been driven from 
the West India islands with so little loss to our country. 
I had made up my mind to great sacrifices ; for I had 
determined, notwithstanding his vast superiority, to stop 
his career, and to put it out of his power to do further 
mischief. Yet do not imagine that I am one of those 
hot-brained people who fight at immense disadvantage 
without an adequate object. My object is partly gained. 
If we meet them we shall find them not less than eigh- 
teen, I rather think twenty sail of the line, and therefore 



WHAT NELSON WOULD HAVE DONE 137 

do not be surprised if I should not fall on them immedi- 
ately : we won't part without a battle. I think thev 
will be glad to let me alone, if I will let them alone ; which 
I will do, either till we approach the shores of Europe, 
or they give me an advantage too tempting to be 
resisted. 

In these memorable words the strategy of Torrington 
is transfigured, but not superseded, by the genius of Nel- 
son. Had he been in Hardy's place, Nelson, we may 
be sure, would never have gone to the Soundings ; he 
would have observed and threatened, as Admiral Colomb 
said ; he would not Jiave " fought at a great disadvan- 
tage without an adequate object," as Nottingham insisted 
on Torringtoh's doing ; but he would not have parted 
without a battle. Had he found D'Orvilliers inclined to 
'* let him alone," that would have been his reason for 
not letting D'OrvilUers alone. He would have seen at 
once that D'Orvilliers' obvious reluctance to risk a deci- 
sive engagement, notwithstanding his vast superiority, 
was just the reason why he on his side should seize an 
advantage too tempting to be resisted. He might not 
know what D'Orvilliers' precise reasons were for not risk- 
ing an engagement ; but his unerring instinct for war 
and its opportunities would have told him that this was 
just one of the occasions on which he might make great 
sacrifices in order to stop his adversary's career, and " put 
it out of his power to do any further mischief." 

It is, indeed, hardly possible to doubt that had Nelson 
been in Hardy's place the defeat of D'Orvilliers would 
have been as crushing as that of the Armada. So much 
is dear from the general character of the situation viewed 
in the light of Nelson's recorded opinions. The con- 
clusion is confirmed and rendered practically certain by 
the known attitude of Jervis and Duncan. Both were 
prepared to fight against the odds that had daunted their 
chief, and both were confident of victory. Both must 
have satisfied themselves that D'Orvilliers had no stomach 
for fighting, and each must have felt that that was the 



138 DUNCAN 

best reason for attempting^ at all hazards, out of the nettle 
danger to pluck the flower safety. Lord North* said 
afterwards in the House of Commons that '' had Sir 
Charles Hardy known then, as he did afterwards, the 
internal state of the combined fleet, he would have wished 
and earnestly sought an engagement notwithstanding his 
inferiority of force/' Hardy knew this only when it was 
too late. Jervis and Duncan knew it or divined it at the 
timie. Nelson's spirit was theirs, and they had not served 
under Hawke for nothing. The man who wins in battle, 
said Napoleon, is the man who is last afraid. Bew ausus 
vana cantemnere, as Livy says of Alexander's conquest of 
Darius, is the eternal secret of triumphant war. This 
is the temper that wins great victories, and may even 
defy overwhelming odds. Jervis had it, and it won him 
his famous victory at St. Vincent, where he fearlessly 
attacked and vanquished twenty-seven Spanish ships 
with fifteen British, because, as he said, '' a victory is 
very essential to England at this moment." Duncan 
showed it at the Texel when, as Mr. Newbolt sings : 

Fifteen sail wece the Dutchmen bold, 

Duncan he had hot two ; 
But he anchored them iaat where the Tezel thoaled. 

And his oolonn aloft he flew. 

I've taken the depth to a fathom/' he cried» 
And 111 sink with a tight good will : 
For I know when we're all of ns nnder the tide. 

My flag will be fluttering stiU." 

Such a man was Duncan in those earlier days of which 
no full i£cord can now be recovered. We see how skil- 
fully he could handle his ship as a captain, how soundly 
he could estimate a situation as critical as British naval 
history presents. In person '' he was of size and strength 
almost gigantic. He is described as six feet four in 
heighti and of corresponding breadth. When a young 
lieutenant walking through the streets of Chatham his 
grand figure and handsome face attracted crowds of 
admirersi and to the last he is spoken of as a singularly 






DUNCAN'S GREAT QUALITIES 139 

handsome man." His bodily strength was effectively 
displayed on a memorable occasion during the mutiny : 

On May 13 there was a serious rising on board the 
Adamant. The Admiral proceeded on board, hoisted his 
flag, and mustered the ship's company, ** My lads/' he 
said, '' I am not in the smallest degree apprehensive of 
any violent measures you may have in contemplation ; 
and though I assure you I would much rather acquire 
yoiu: love than inciu: your fear, I will with my own hand 
put to death the first man who shall display the slightest 
signs of rebellious conduct." He then demanded to 
know if there was any individual who presumed to dis- 
pute his authority or that of the officers. A man came 
forward and said insolently, " I do." The Admiral imme- 
diately seized him by the collar and thrust him over the 
side of the ship, where he held him suspended by one 
arm, and said, " My lads, look at this fellow, he who dares 

to deprive me of the command of the fleet." 

• 

But in spite of these great qualities, well known to his 
comrades and superiors and not unknown to his country- 
men at large, Duncan never came to the front until the 
close of his career. He became a captain in 1761, when 
he was only thirty years of age, and was promoted to flag 
rank twenty-six years later, in 1787. Of these twenty- 
six years more than half were spent upon half-pay. Even 
after he became an admiral he had to endure another 
period of inactivity, lasting for eight years, until his ap- 
pointment in 1 795 to the command of the North Sea 
fleet. Political sympathies and antipathies may have 
had something to do with this, for in those days a man 
often obtained emplo3rment in the Navy, not on account 
of his professional fitness, but in virtue of his political 
influence and complexion. But though Duncan belonged 
to a Whig family and inclined to Whig principles, he 
" never at any time in his life took any active part in 
politics," and his close association with Keppel's fortunes 
does not seem to have injured his professional prospects. 
The truth seems to be, as Lord Camperdown acknow- 
12 



1 

i 



140 DUNCAN 

ledges, that the altematioiis of peace and war, of 
and slow promotion, of frequent and infirequent empl 
ment, occurred in Duncan's career not favourably for 
advancement : 

It was his ill-luck to be bom at the wrong time for 
advancement as a captain. As a Ueutenant he came in 
for the Seven Years' War, and took every advant^e of 
his opportunities, but he became a captain just before 
the peace of 1763, and had only had time for the expedi- 
tion to Belle-isle and the Havannah. 

The years which followed his promotion to flag rank — 

were likewise years of peace ; and a junior rear-admiral 
could hardly expect a command under such circum- 
stances. Nor does it seem that he would have fared 
better if he had been bom ten or fifteen years sooner or 
later. If he had been a captain early in the Seven Years' 
War, he would have had nothing to do as an admiral. 
If he had entered the service at the end of the Seven 
Years' War he would have had no opportunity of making 
his name as a lieutenant. 

Thus the early promotions of the last century, which 
naval officers of these days sometimes regard with envy, 
were no guarantee of a distingubhed career. Duncan was 
a captain at thirty, but he became an admiral only at fifty- 
six, and he never commanded a fleet at sea until he was 
sixty-four. The only advantage he had over officers of 
the present day is that ** the blind Fury " of compulsory 
retirement never came " with th' abhorred shears and 
sUt the thin-spun life " of his active service. In these 
days Duncan would have been retired as a captain a year 
before he was promoted to flag-rank. As a rear-admiral 
or as a flag-officer who had not hoisted his flag he would 
again have been retired four years before he took com- 
mand of the North Sea fleet. Even as a vice-admiral 
in command of that fleet he would have been retired a 
year before the battle of Camperdqwn was fought. Com- 



\ 

\ 



DUNCAN AND SPENCER 141 

pulsory retirement is no doubt a necessity, but it is not 
always an advantage. The promotion of. a dozen men 
of the stamp of Sir Charles Hardy would be dearly pur- 
chased by the retirement of a single Jervis or a single 
Dimcan. 

Duncan has been called, not without reason, one of the 
" suppressed characters " of naval history. There is 
another " suppressed character " with whom his name 
is closely and most honourably associated. Perhaps no 
man's share in the overthrow of Napoleon and the triumph 
of British naval arms has been less adequately appre- 
ciated by historians in general than that of the second 
Earl Spencer, Pitt's First Lord of the Admiralty from 
1794 to 1 80 1. Assuming office shortly after Howe's vic- 
tory of the First of June, Lord Spencer remained First 
Lord of the Admiralty until Pitt resigned at the beginning 
of the first year of the century. In this period the mutinies 
at Spithead and the Nore were encountered and composed 
— ^we can hardly call them suppressed — ^and the victories 
of St. Vincent, Camperdown, and the Nile were won. 
But this was perhaps as much Spencer's fortune as his 
merit. His true glory consists in his admirable devotion 
to the affairs of the navy, in the insight, judgment, and 
tact with which he selected and supported such men as 
St. Vincent, Duncan, and Nelson. Some of his own letters 
are preserved in the correspondence of Nelson and some 
in the papers of Duncan. But unfortunately the bulk 
of his private correspondence with these and other great 
naval heroes was destroyed by accident at Althorp, 
and thus the world has been deprived of an authentic 
and detailed record of his administration, though stu« 
dents of naval history will find in the materials we have 
indicated abundant evidence of its quality. Nor will 
they fail to appreciate the part played by his gifted wife 
in furthering the triumphs of his administration. A 
leader and queen of society, fascinating, generous, and 
nobly impulsive, Lady Spencer knew how to second her 
husband's labours by her rare gift of sympathy without 



142 DUNCAN 

ever attempting to usurp his responsibilities. Her ecstatic 
letter to Nelson congratulating him on his triumph at 
the Nile is well known. It has passed into the literature 
of the battle. Lord Camperdown enables us to compare 
it with the letter she wrote to Duncan after the battle of 
Camperdown, and from the comparison to draw the 
inference, sustained by other letters from the same pen, 
that no First Lord of the Admiralty was ever happier 
in the generous sympathies of a wife who knew so well 
how to touch a sailor's heart : 



What shall I say to you, my dear and victorious Ad- 
miral? Where shall I find words to convey to you the 
slightest idea of the enthusiasm created by your glorious, 
splendid, and memorable achievements ^ Not in the 
English Language ; and no other is worthy of being used 
upon so truly British an exploit. As an EngUsh woman, 
as an Irish woman, as Lord Spencer's wife, I cannot ex- 
press to you my grateful feelings. But amongst the 
number of delightful sensations which crowd upon me 
since Friday last, surprise is not included. The man who 
has struggled tlu-o' all the difficulties of everlasting N. 
Sea Cruizes, of hardships of every kind, of storms, of cold, 
of perpetual disappointments, without a murmur, with- 
out a regret, and lastly who most unprecedently braved 
an enemy's fleet of sixteen or twenty sail of the line, with 
only two Men of War in a state of mutiny to oppose 
them : That Man, acquiring the honour and glory you 
have done on the nth of October did not surprize me. 
But greatly have you been rewarded for your past suffer- 
ings. Never will a fairer fame descend to posterity than 
yours, and the gratitude of a great nation must give you 
feelings which will thaw away all that remains of your 
Northern mists and miseries. God, who allowed you to 
reap so glorious an harvest of honour and glory, who 
rewarded your well borne toils by such extraordinary 
success, keep you safe and well to enjoy for many years 
the fame He enabled you to acquire on this most dis- 
tinguished occasion. 

Ever yours with gratitude and esteem, 

Lavinia Spencer. 



LORD SPENGER'S SERVICES 143 

If we except Sir John Laughton, whose notice of Lord 
Spencer in the Dictionary of National Biography only 
anticipated by a few weeks the publication of Lord Cam- 
perdown's volume, Lord Camperdown is perhaps the first 
writer to recognize the full splendour of Lord Spencer's 
services and to do tardy justice to his memory. It is due 
to both to extract the following just and graceful tribute : 

It is not possible to allow Lord Spencer to pass off the 
scene without a word of tribute to his administration. 
When he became First Lord of the Admiralty he found 
the Navy sunk in disorder and neglect, and among the 
Ofiicers a want of confidence in tne Administration at 
home. He succeeded in selecting capable Admirals for 
every a>mmand, with all of whom he by incessant labour 
maintained intimate and constant relations. He was full 
of energy and ideas. If he did not alwaj^ appreciate 
and reaUze so fully as they did through their experience 
the defects of the ships under their command, both in 
number and quality, he did the best that he could in the 
way of apportioning and manipulating the forces which 
were at his disposal, while he never ceased to urge the 
necessity of an energetic and vigorous policy, and to 
express his conviction that the British Fleets would prove 
victorious. All the Admirals felt confidence in him, as 
their memoirs and letters show, and at the time of his 
resignation the Navy was animated by a splendid spirit, 
and contained a laige number of Officers whose names 
afterwards became household words. He performed a 
great service to his country, which ought always to be 
kept in remembrance. To use Lady Spencer's eloquent 
words, " England, Ireland, and India were all sav^ by 
victories won during Im term of office," and in no incon- 
siderable degree through his means. Taking his adminis- 
tration and policy as a whole he did as much as any man 
— ^perhaps more than any one man — ^to ruin the fortunes 
of Napoleon upon the ocean. 

It was to Lord Spencer's sagacity that the country 
owed Duncan's appointment to the command in the 
North Sea. It is recorded that " in going over the list 



144 DUNCAN 

of Admirals with Mr. Henry Dimdas, Lord Spencer said, 
' What can be the reason that '' Keppd's Duncan " has 
never been brought forward ? ' Upon this Mr. Dundas 
said that he thought he would like employment, and 
added that he had married his niece. The same night he 
was appointed Commander-in-Chief in the North Sea." 

The story is characteristic. Very likely Dundas's re- 
commendation of his niece's husband turned the scale ; 
but he owed at least that much to his kinsman, for before 
the marriage he had pledged his niece never, directly or 
indirectly, to use any influence to induce Duncan to give 
up his profession, and she had faithfully kept the pledge 
— ^no difficult task perhaps in the case of a husband so 
wedded to the sea. In any case it is clear, however, that 
Spencer had his eye on Duncan before he was made aware 
of Dundas's interest in him, and certainly no appoint- 
ment did greater credit to his insight. 

Duncan's position was a very difficult one from first 
to last. The North Sea was no established station for a 
British fleet. It was improvised for the occasion when 
Holland fell under the sway of Napoleon and the Dutch 
fleet became an important factor in the European con- 
flict. As was the station so was the fleet. It was neces- 
sary to blockade the Texel, but it was not possible to tell 
off a fully organized and well equipped fleet for the pur- 
pose. Duncan had to take such ships as he could get, 
and such as he had were constantly ordered about by the 
Admiralty on detached or independent service without 
so much as consulting him beforehand. A letter from Sir 
Charles Middleton — afterwards that Lord Barham who 
fortunately for his own fame and his country's welfare was 
First Lord of the Admiralty at the close of the Trafalgar 
campaign— wen serves to illustrate the situation. In 
August 1795 he wrote : 

My own wbh is to have your force very strong, but I 
plainly perceive firom the many irons we have in the fire 
that I shall be overruled. The same cause obliges us to 



DUNCAN AND THE RUSSIANS 14s 

employ your frigates on many extra services, and which 
I have charged the secretary to acquaint you with as 
often as it happens j but necessary as this information 
is for your guidance I am afraid it is often forgot. 

Several letters from Lord Spencer himself are to the 
same effect, and though very few of Duncan's own letters 
are preserved it is plain that the difficulties of the situa- 
tion weighed heavily upon him. At various times during 
his command he had a large Russian squadron under his 
orders. The Russian ships were, however, unfit for 
winter cruising, and therefore, during the worst season of 
the year, the brunt of the blockade often fell upon Dun- 
can's attenuated and overworked squadron. Moreover, 
the presence of the Russian ships was not without its 
embarrassments. He had no very high opinion of their 
quality, and on two occasions at least he went so ifar as 
to protest against his being expected to go to sea with 
Russian ships alone under his command, his own ships 
being employed on various detached services. In Novem- 
ber 1 795 he wrote to Lord Spencer : 

I never could see any reason for the Russian fleet being 
detained through Uie winter, but to be ready early in the 
spring, and it always was my opinion that they were 
unfit for winter cruising. Now, as to myself, I will say 
what I once did before : I am the first British Admiral 
that ever was ordered on service with foreigners only, and 
I must b^ further to say that I shall look upon it as an 
indignity § some British ships are not directed to attend 
me. 

It is significant of much that a man of Duncan's self- 
possession and sense of discipline should write in this 
strain. He was not the man to complain needlessly, and 
his tact, patience, and good sense had reduced to a mini-^ 
mum the friction that inevitably attends the co-operation 
of allied fleets ; but he felt that a great charge hzA been 
entrusted to him, and that the means with which he was 
furnished were inadequate to enable him to satisfy the 



146 DUNCAN 

country's expectations. But in spite of an occasional 
complaint, which was assuredly not ill-founded, his whole 
attitude was that which Torrington long ago expressed 
in words which the British Navy has often so splendidly 
justified : ** My Lord, I know my business and will do 
the best with what I have." On the other hand, it may 
fairly be held that had a Byng, a Hardy, or a Calder been 
in Duncan's place the country might have had to rue a 
very different issue from the campaign in the North Sea. 
Opinions may differ as to the quality and temper of 
the Dutch fleet. But the quality of any fleet which is 
preparing to take the sea cannot prudently be taken 
by its enemy at any estimate but a high one. The war 
was in its early stages, its area was widening, the con- 
tagion of the French Revolution was fast spreading 
beyond the borders of France, and in the spring of 1795 
an alliance was concluded between ,the French and 
Batavian Republics, by which it was agreed that Holland 
should aid France with twelve ships of the line and eigh- 
teen frigates, as well as with half the Dutch troops under 
arms. This was no insignificant addition to the naval 
forces of a Power which, since the beginning of the war, 
had only once crossed swords with England in a fleet 
action at sea, and then, though defeated, had not been 
overpowered. The " glorious victory " of the First of 
June acquired that honourable epithet partly from the 
brilliant results immediately attained by it — the two 
sides were fairly matched at the outset and Lord Howe 
captured six French ships of the line — ^but still more 
perhaps from the fact that it was the first naval victory 
of a war which had then lasted more than a year. Though 
a decisive tactical victory, it was, in a strategic sense, of 
little moment. Villaret's fleet was not destroyed — ^as it 
might have been had not Montagu's squadron been 
injudiciously detached from Lord Howe's flag — and the 
great convoy which was coming across the Atlantic to 
the relief of Brest was not intercepted. In a strategic 
sense, in fact, Villaret had outmanceuvred his adversary. 



DUNCAN, BRIDPORT, AND HOTHAM 147 

Robespierre had told him that if the convoy was captured 
his head should pay the penalty. He lost the battle, but 
he saved the convoy and saved his head. Lord Howe 
missed the main object for which he had manoeuvred and 
fought. 

This was in 1794. A year later the French obtained 
strategic control of twelve Dutch ships of the line, twice 
the number they had lost in Lord Howe's action, and 
the theatre of war was enlarged by the inclusion of the 
North Sea. The scenes were now setting for the great 
drama which ended at Trafalgar, but no one could tell as 
yet where its main episodes would be enacted, nor who 
were the actors cast for its leading parts. Near at hand, 
in the north, Duncan was establishing that firm grip on 
the Texel which, notwithstanding his slender and fortuitous 
forces, in spite of the mutiny, and through all the vicis- 
situdes of season, wind, and storm, was never relaxed 
until the Dutch fleet was defeated off Camperdown, and 
the Texel itself, together with all that remained of the 
Dutch fleet, was surrendered in 1799. Far away in the 
south Hotham was vainly striving to vanquish the fleet 
which Hood had failed to destroy at Toulon, and Nelson, 
still a captain, was chafing bitterly at his chief's repeated 
failure to do what he knew he could have done himself. 
Midway in the Atlantic Bridport was showing by his 
action with Villaret off lie Groix that he, at least, was 
not the coming man. 

Such was the situation in 1795. There were three 
fleets of the enemy, at the Texel, at Brest, and at Toulon, 
to be watched, encountered, and if possible destroyed, 
and Duncan, Bridport, and Hotham were the three men 
on whom, for the time, the fate of England depended. 
Bridport and Hotham each had his opportunity and 
missed it. Duncan alone remained steadfast to the end, 
waited for his opportunity, and seized it. Historians, 
wise after the event, have chosen to assume that Duncan's 
position was the least important of the three, but at the 
time no man could have foretold at which point the stress 



148 DUNCAN 

of conflict was likely to be felt most urgently. From the 
Texel a fleet and an expedition might have issued, and 
could they have evaded Duncan's watch they might have 
gained the open either for a descent on Ireland, or for 
some combination with the other forces of the enemy. 
From Brest, as we know, a year after Bridport had failed 
to destroy Villaret at He Groix, a fleet and expedition did 
issue, and, evading Bridport's watch, effected a descent 
upon Ireland, which might have succeeded for anything 
that Bridport did to prevent it. From Toulon, as we 
also know, long after Hotham had failed to destroy 
Martin in the Gulf of Lions, a fleet and expedition also 
issued, which a greater than Hotham finally shattered at 
the Nile. It needed the untoward fortunes of a Hoch 
and a Morard (le Galles to undo the neglect of Bridport. 
It needed the splendid genius of Nelson to repair the 
blunders of Hotham. Duncan n^lected no opportunities 
and made no blunders. He watched the Dutch fleet, 
fought and defeated it as soon as it put to sea, and com* 
pelled its final surrender as soon as troops were sent for a 
military occupation of the Helder. Yet historians, view- 
ing the whole situation in the light of its final outcome^ 
persist in regarding Duncan's achievement as a mere 
episode devoid of strategic moment, and in concentrating 
their whole attention on the more central theatre of war. 
It is true that no fleet of the enemy, whether at the Texel, 
at Brest, or at Toulon, could compass any of the larger 
ends of naval war except by defeating the British fleet 
immediately confronting it. Hoche's expedition failed 
chiefly through defiance of this inexorable principle. It 
was an attempt to do by evasion what can only be done 
with safety and certainty by sea supremacy established 
beforehand. Napoleon's expedition failed for the same 
reason. The projected expedition from the Texel must 
also have failed for the same reason in the end, could it 
ever have succeeded in setting out. But of the three 
men charged in 1 795 with the safety and fate of England, 
Duncan alone proved equal to his trust ; Bridport and 



DUNCAN'S CHARACTER 149 

Hotham failed. His name should stand in naval history^ 
not merely as the hero of an isolated and barren victory, 
but as a seaman of like quality with Jervis and Nelson 
themselves — ^rather a Hood than a Howe, and far above 
the level of the Bridports, the Hothams, the Manns, the 
Ordes, the Keiths, and the Calders. 

He had dogged persistency of purpose and a stem sense 
of discipline, without that inflexible austerity which 
made the discipline of Jervis' squadron a terror to sea- 
men and a byword to captains trained in a laser school. 
With Nelson he shared the rare gift of tempering firmness 
with kindness, of seeking to do by love what men of the 
mould of Jervis must fain compass by fear. With both 
he shared that grasp of the situation before him and its 
requirements which more than anything else is the note 
of a native genius for war. He would make no terms 
with mutiny. Had he commanded at the Nore the rule 
of Parker would assuredly have been a brief one. " I 
hear," he wrote, '' that people from the ships at Sheer- 
ness go ashore in numbers and play the devil. Why are 
there not troops to lay hold of them and secure all the 
boats that come from them? As to the Sandwich, you 
should get her cast adrift in the night and let her go on 
the sands, that the scoundrels may drown ; for until 
some example is made this will not stop." 

This was his attitude towards open mutiny ; but he 
never allowed it to blind him to the fact that the griev- 
ances of the seamen were real and serious, and the short- 
comings of the Admiralty deplorable. Pitt said that the 
best service Duncan ever performed for his country was 
in respect of the mutiny, and no one who reads Lord 
Camperdown's chapter on the subject can doubt that 
Pitt was right. The mutiny occurred at the very crisis 
of the blockade of the Texel, when the Dutch fleet was 
ready to sail accompanied by troops, and when, if ever, 
it might have sailed with some prospect of success. Dun- 
can was fully informed of what was happening at Spithead 
and the Nore. He knew very weU that the spirit of dis- 



ISO DUNCAN 

content there displayed was rife throughout the whole 
navy, that it rested on solid grounds of grievance, and 
that it might at any moment break out in his own fleet. 
It did break out, and for some days only two ships of the 
line recognized the authority of his flag, the remainder 
going off to join their revolted comrades at the Nore. 
Yet he never allowed his own flag to be hauled down, 
and so quickly and thoroughly did he re-establish his 
personal ascendency, that although his own ship the 
Venerable had at the outset shown some alarming signs of 
dbaffection, he was ready, if called upon, to lead it against 
the mutineers at the Nore, and was assured by his ship's 
company that they would obey his orders even in that 
emergency. " It is with the utmost regret," they wrote, 
" we hear of the proceedings of different ships in the 
squadron, but sincerely hope their present agrievances 
will be redressed as soon as possible, as it would appear 
unnatural for us to unsii^ath the sword against our 
brethren, notwithstanding we would wish to show our- 
selves like men in behalf of our Commander should neces- 
sity require." 

A few days later, when Duncan set sail for the Texel, 
all his ships deserted him but two, his own flagship and 
the Adamant, both of which, as we have seen, had pre- 
viously been reduced to obedience by his own personal 
prowess. Nevertheless, he held on for the Texel without 
a moment's hesitation, for he knew that the Dutch fleet 
was ready to sail, that the wind was fair, and that the 
paralysis which had smitten the British Navy was well 
known to the enemy. Two or three smaller ships accom- 
panied him, and at least one of these, the Circe, was only 
kept from open mutiny before the enemy by the splendid 
fortitude of her captain, who for six days and nights sat 
back to back on deck with his first lieutenant, '' with a 
loaded carbine in hand and cocked pistols in their belts, 
issuing orders to the officers and the few men who re- 
mained dutiful." How Duncan bore himself in this crisis 
has already been told in Mr. Newbolt's stirring lines. 



DUNCAN AT THE TEXEL 151 

which are really only a metrical paraphrase of the original 
narrative : 

When the Admiral found himself off the Texel with 
only one ship of fifty guns besides his own, he quickly made 
up his mind what to do. " Vice-Admiral Onslow came on 
board the Venerable and suggested Leith Roads as a 
retreat of securi^ against either an attack from the Texel 
or, what was infinitely more to be dreaded, the return of 
a detachment of the rebel fleet from the Nore. Admiral 
Duncan instantly declined entering into any measure of 
this kind, and laughingly said they would suppose he 
wanted to see his wife and family and would chaise 
him with being home-sick/' His plan was of a different 
kind. The great duty with which he was charged was to 
keep the Texel closed ; and, with ships or without ships, 
that he intended to do. He sent for Captain Hotham 
of the Adamant and ordered him to fight her until she 
sank, as he intended to do with the Venerable. He then 
mustered the VenerabWs ship's company and told them 
plainly what lay before them, in an address of which only 
the substance is preserved ; that the Venerable was to 
block the Texel, and that " the soundings were such that 
his flag would continue to fly above the shoal water after 
the ship and company had disappeared " ; and that if 
she should survive this performance of hier duty in Dutch 
waters, she was then to sail to the Nore and to reduce 
" those misguided men " to obedience. The ship's com- 
pany replied, as was their custom : they said that they 
understood him and would obey his commands. 

Those misguided men were reduced, however, before 
Duncan's task at the Texel was accomplished, and his 
splendid audacity and fortitude were rewarded by the 
complete success with which the Dutch were hoodwinked 
and prevented from sailing until the crisis was past. 
He reached the Texel on June i. For three days and 
three nights the wind remained in the eastward, and the 
two ships ^ crews were kept at their quarters day and 
night. Then the wind changed, and reinforcements 
began to come in. It was not until the crisis was over 



1 52 DUNCAN 

that the Dutch learnt that two ships alone, the 
but not dislo3ral remnant of a Navy in open mutiny, 
had been so handled as to make them believe that a 
superior force of the enemy had been at hand during the 
whole time that the wind had remained favourable to 
their enterprise. 

The signals and manoeuvres of the Admiral's two ships 
were recalled to him afterwards by Lieutenant Brodie, 
who had been present in the Rose cutteri in a letter written 
on February 26, 1798. " You passed the Texel in sight 
of the Dutch Fleet with a Red Flag, Rear Admiral at 
the Mizen, this was your First Squadron of two sail of the 
line : next day you appeared off the Texel with two 
private ships, the Venerable and Adamant with pendants 
only. This was two English Squadrons by the Dutch 
account. A few days after we were joined by the Russel 
and Sanspareil, when the wind came Easterly. Then the 
third Squadron of British ships came under their proper 
Admiral with Blue at the Main, and anchored in the 
mouth of the Texel, with four sail of the line, to block up 
sixteen or eighteen sail of the line. Frigates, etc., in all 
thirty-seven sail. It was then, my Lord, you confirmed 
your former manoeuvres by throwing out pendants to 
your ships or imaginary ships in the offing, for the Dutch 
believed all your Fleet to be there. The next day, my 
Lord, all was confirmed by an American Brig which I 
was sent to board, coming out of the Texel. The Master 
informed me that the Dutchmen positively asserted that 
the four ships were only come in there for a decoy, and 
that there was a large fleet in the offing, as they saw the 
English Admiral making signals to them the evening he 
came to an anchor." 

Assuredly the victory of Camperdown itself is no juster 
title to undying fame than the whole of Duncan's pro- 
ceedings from the beginning of the mutiny to its 
close. 

" The advantage of time and place," said Drake, '* in 
all martial actions is half a victory ; which being lost is 
irrecoverable." The Dutch were soon to realize the truth 



THE DUTCH DILATORY 153 

of thiar pregnant saying. The wind was fair during the 
crisis of the mutinyi but the troops, though at hand, had 
not been embarked. By the time they were embarked, 
early in July, it became foul again, and Wolfe Tone, that 
stormy petrel of Irish disaffection and French aggression, 
was on board waiting in vain for a favourable turn. But 
" foul, dead foul " — ^as Nelson bitterly wrote after Ville- 
neuve's escape from Toulon — ^it remained. On July 19 
Tone writes, ** Wind foul still " ; and on July 26, " I am 
to-day eighteen days on board, and we have not had 
eighteen minutes of fair wind." Unlike Nelson, who, as 
Captain Mahan tells us, " never trifled with a fair wind 
or with time,'' the Dutch had lost their opportunity. 
Perhaps they had not been over keen to seize it ; for 
though the Batavian Republic ruled in Holland, and 
France guided its counsels, the monarchical party was 
by no means extinct, and its cause had many supporters 
in the Dutch fleet. On June 10 a British officer was sent 
into the Texel under a flag of truce. He was very cour- 
teously received and entertained, and reported on his 
return that the officers whom he had seen '^ expressed 
their hopes of a speedy peace, and by their conversation 
appeared very adverse to the war. They, however," he 
added, " speak very confidently of their force, and they 
have great confidence in it." The wind remained foul, 
however, and time wore on. Towards the middle of 
August the Dutch admiral, De Winter, pointed out to 
Tone that '' Duncan's fleet had increased to seventeen 
sail of the Une, and that the Dutch troops, so long pent 
up on shipboard, had consumed nearly all the provisions. 
It would be necessary to relinquish the expedition to 
Ireland." 

The game in fact was up, but Duncan's task was not 
accomplished. So long as the Dutch fleet lay at the 
Texel ready for sea it was his duty to watch it, and to 
fight it, if it ventured out. From the ist of June, when 
he appeared before the Texel with his two ships and out- 
witted the Dutch by " setting on a brag countenance/' 



IS4 DUNCAN 

as Howard of Effingham said, until Sq>tember 20, when 
he was directed by the Admiralty to retwn to Yarmouth 
to refiti fill up with stores and provisions, and again pro- 
ceed with all despatch to his station, he never relaxed 
his hold, and never gave the Dutchmen a chance. At 
times reinforced from home, only to be weakened again 
by the withdrawal of ships required by the Admiralty to 
strengthen Jervis in the Mediterranean, harassed by 
winds which, though they kept the Dutch in port, con- 
stantly drove him to leeward of his station, shattered by 
violent gales which sorely tried Us none too seaworthy 
ships and constantly interrupted his supply of stores, he 
held on with a tenacity not unworthy of Nelson off Toulon, 
or of Comwallis off Brest. 

But like Nelson at Toulon, Duncan was destined by 
an untoward fate to be away from his station when the 
moment of crisis came at last. Shortly aft^ he was 
recalled to Yarmouth by the Admiralty, De Winter was 
ordered to take the Dutch fleet to sea. All thought of a 
military expedition to be covered by it had now been 
abandoned. But the Naval Committee at the Hague 
appear to have thought that the time had come for at- 
tempting to destroy or at least to cripple the hostile fleet 
which had so long blockaded their ports. De Winter's 
instructions were dated July 10, a time when Wolfe Tone 
was daily expecting a military expedition to set out, under 
cover of the fleet, for the invasion of Ireland ; but their 
terms would seem to imply that the Dutch plan was the 
far sounder one of striving to dispose of Duncan before 
allowing the troops to start. De Winter was instructed 
to destroy the enemy's fleet if possible; carefully to 
avoid a battle "in the case of the enemy's forces being 
far superior to his own " : but at the same time to bear 
in mind " how frequently the Dutch Admirals had main- 
tained the honour of the Dutch flag, even when the 
enemy's forces were sometimes superior to theirs " ; and 
*' in the case of an approaching engagement, as far as 
circumstances permit, to try and draw the enemy as near 



DE WINTER PUTS TO SEA 155 

to the harbours of the Republic as will be found possible 
in conformity with the rules of prudence and strategy." 
On October 5 he was ordered to put to sea " as soon as 
the wind should be faroiurable/' and to act in accordance 
with these instructions. 

Admiral Colomb held that the battle of Camperdown 
was '' wasteful of naval force, and unmeaning as to any 
possible advantage to be gained. The Dutch fleet had 
landed all the troops and abandoned the idea of invasion, 
so that when it was determined to put to sea in the face 
of a known superior fleet of British ships, the enterprise 
was objectless." The fact of the troops having been landed 
can hardly be held to have militated against the success 
of De Winter's enterprise, since it is difficult to see how 
the presence of troops either on board or under the wing 
of the fighting force could in any way have added to its 
naval strength. So long as Duncan was, in Elizabethan 
phrase, " on the jacks " of De Winter the latter could 
^<fo nothing, with or without troops, until he had disposed 
^ of his adversary. This was what he was sent out to do. 
He was instructed to " try and cause as much damage to 
the enemy as possible," to fifjht him if he found him not 
so superior in strength as U destroy all hope of victory, 
but in the opposite alternative " carefully to avoid a 
battle." These instructions were, in my judgment, well 
conceived. They were foiled, not by Duncan's superior 
force, for on the day of battle the two fleets were approxi- 
mately equal, but by his superior energy and his brilliant 
tactical intuition. The issue was by no means fore- 
ordained. The forces were equal and the Dutch enjoyed 
the advantage of position wldch had been contemplated 
in De Winter's instructions. The object to be attained, 
the " possible advantage to be gained," was the destruc- 
tion of the fleet which for months had paralysed all his 
undertakings. Could he have compassed that end it might 
have been cheaply purchased by almost any sacrifice of 
naval force which left him master of the field. In war, 
as in love — 
13 



156 DUNCAN 

He etthar Itan hit fate too madi. 

Or his desert is small, 
Who dares not put it to the touch 

And win or lose it all. 

But it was not to be. The long conflict between the 
Dutch and the English at sea was destined to end at 
Camperdown in the final overthrow of the Dutch. De 
Winter put to sea on October 7. Duncan with the naain 
body of his fleet was still at Yarmouth. But some of his 
ships were on the watch, and by the morning of the 9th 
he was informed that the Dutch fleet was at sea. At 
II a.m. on that day he wrote to the Admiralty : *' The 
squadron under my command are unmoored, and I shall 
put to sea immediately." The next day he was off the 
Tezel with eleven ships of the line, and found that De 
Winter had not returned. What followed is best told in 
his own words : 

At Nine o'clock in the Morning of the nth I got Sight 
of Captain TroUope's Squadron, with Signab flying for 
an Enemy to Leeward ; I immediately bore up, and made 
the Signal for a general Chace, and so got Sight of them, 
forming in a Line on the Larboard Tack to receive us, 
the wind at N.W. As yre approadied near I made the 
Signal for the Squadron to shorten sail, in order to con- 
nect them ; soon after I saw the land between Cmnper- 
down and Egmont, about Nine Miles to Leeward of the 
Enemy, and finding there was no Time to be lost in 
making the Attack, I made the Signal to bear up, break 
the Enemy's Line, and engage them to Leeward, each 
Ship her Opponent, by which I got between them and the 
Land, whither they were fast approaching. My Signals 
were obeyed with great Promptitude, and Vice-Admiral 
Onslow, in the Monarch, bore down on the Enemy's Rear 
in the most gallant Manner, his Division following his 
Example ; and the Action commenced about Forty 
Minutes past Twelve o'Clock. The Venerable soon got 
through the Enemy's Line, and I began a close action, 
with my Division on their Van, which lasted near Two 
Hours and a Half, when I observed all the Masts of the 
Dutch Admiral's Ship to go by the Board ; she was^ 



THE BATTLE 157 

however, defended for some Time in a most gallant 
Manner ; but being overpressed by Numbers, her Colours 
were struck, and Admiral De Winter was soon brought 
on Board the Venerable. On looking around me I observed 
the Ship bearing the Vice-Admiral's Flae was also dis- 
masted, and had surrendered to Vice-Admiral Onslow ; 
and that many others had likewise struck. Finding we 
were in Nine Fathoms Water, and not farther than Five 
Miles from the Land, my Attention was so much taken 
up in getting the Heads of the disabled Ships off Shore, 
that I was not able to distinguish the Number of Ships 
captured ; and the Wind having been constantly on the 
Land sincCi we have unavoidably been much dispersed, 
so that I have not been able to gain an exact Account of 
them, but we have taken Possession of Eight or Nine ; 
more of them had struck, but taking Advantage of the 
Night, and being so near their own Coast, they succeeded 
in getting off, and some of them were seen going into the 
Tezel the next Momii^. 



Trollope's squadron, together with other 
ments which joined before the action, brought the two 
fleets to an equality ; but De Winter still had, on the 
whole, the advantage of position. He was nearing his 
port and drawing fast inshore, so that any attempt of 
Duncan to get between him and the land must prove 
a very hazardous undertaking. To do him justice he 
made no attempt to escape, but leisurely forming his 
line as soon as Duncan was s^hted, he ordered his ships^ 
to square their mainyards and awaited the enemy's 
onslaught. Duncan's ships, on the Other hand, were in 
a very loose and scattered formation, caused by his bold 
but judicious order for a general chase at an early stage 
of the proceedings. A general chase signifies that the 
ships of a squadron no longer preserve their appointed 
stations but proceed individually to the attack or pursuit 
of the enemy, the fastest sailers going to the front. It 
b a very hazardous proceeding, because it exposes the 
assailant to the risk of being overpowered in detail, but 
in certain circumstances it offers the only means of bring* 



IS8 DUNCAN 

ing a fl3ring enemy to actioiii and for this reason its 
judicious employment is a sure criterion of the tactical 
capacity of an admiral who resorts to it. Duncan em- 
ployed it, but countermanded it as soon as he saw that 
De Winter was awaiting his onslaught. Then he " made 
the signal for the squadron to shorten sail in order to 
connect them " — ^that is, to recover the order disturbed 
by the general chase. But while he was re-forming his 
Une with the evident intention of attacking in the orthodox 
fashion, " each ship," as he said in his signal, " to engage 
her opponent in the enemy's line," he saw that De Winter 
was gradually drawing closer and closer to the land, so 
that unless he acted promptly, and without waiting for 
his line to be accurately formed, he would lose the oppor- 
tunity of getting inshore of the enemy and cutting off his 
retreat by forcing him out to sea. Accordingly, as Sir 
John Laughton puts it, '^ without waiting for the ships 
astern to come up, without waiting to form line of battle, 
and with the fleet in very irregular order of sailing • . • 
he made the signal to pass through the enemy's line and 
engage to leeward." Some of his captains were not a 
little perplexed by the rapid succession of apparently in- 
consistent signals. One of them threw the signal-book 

on the deck, and '* exclaimed in broad Scotch : ' D ^," 

&c. &c. ' Up wi' the hel-lem and gang into the middle 
o't.' " This was exactly what Duncan meant and wanted. 
With such followers, a leader so bold, so prompt, and so 
sagacious might make certain of victory. De Winter 
afterwards acknowledged to Duncan himself that he was 
undone by his adversaries' finely calculated but wholly 
unconventional impetuosity. " Your not waiting to form 
line ruined me : if I had got nearer to the shore and you 
had attacked I should probably have drawn both fleets 
on it, and it would have been a victory to me, being on 
my own coast." 

The Dutch fought gallantly, but all in vain. Duncan's 
onslaught was irresistible, and its method was an inspira- 
tion which places him in the front rank of naval com- 



DUNCAN'S TACTICAL INSPIRATION 159 

manders. Had he waited to form his line with precision, 
De Winter might have given him the slip. Had he fought 
in the orthodox fashion, not yet abandoned in principle, 
though discarded with signal effect by Rodney at the 
battle of the Saints, he might have fought a brilliant 
action, but could hardly have achieved a decisive victory. 
De Winter, like Brue3rs at the Nile, never dreamt that his 
assailant would venture into the narrow and treacherous 
waters between his own line and the land. Like Ville- 
neuve at Trafalgar, he had a safe port under his lee, and, 
more fortunate than Villeneuve, he had a lee shore close 
at hand. Manifestly his purpose was to make a running 
fight of it, without surrendering either of these advan- 
tages. The only way to defeat this purpose was to break 
through his line and to attack him from to leeward. 
There was no time to be lost, and at best the operation 
was full of hazard, for at the close of the action the British 
ships were in nine fathoms of water, and not more than 
five miles from the shore. Even with ample sea room 
the operation would have been novel, opposed to the 
tradition of the service, disallowed by the prescription of 
the Fighting Instructions, and sanctioned by no recent 
precedent save that of Rodney at the Saints. In the 
actual conditions of wind, land, and soundings it was 
bold beyond example. But its boldness was reasoned 
and calculated, based on a clear grasp of the situation. 
The manifold disadvantages of the attack from to wind- 
ward, especially when associated with the traditional 
British respect for the formal line of battle, had been 
forcibly pointed out by John Clerk of Eldin, " that cele- 
brated apple of naval discord," as Lord Camperdown aptly 
calls him. Duncan possessed a copy of Clerk's famous 
work, and to all appearance had studied it carefully. 
Yet the naval tradition was still so strong that, in spite of 
Clerk's teaching, it would seem that, had time permitted, 
he would have formed his line to windward and attacked 
in the orthodox fashion. But as soon as he saw that this 
enable the enemy to escape he resolved at once 



i«o DUNCAN 



to thipw tradition to the winds and to attack in the 
only way that could make the action decisive. His 
intuition was as rapid, as unerring, and as triumphant 
as was that of Nelson a few months before at St. Vincent 
— a kindred stroke of genius, or a like touch of that ** in- 
spired blindness which at the moment of decisive action 
sees not the risks but the one only road to possible vic- 
tory." It is instructive to note and contrast the com- 
ments of Jervis on the two cases. Of the battle of St. 
Vincent and Nelson's share in it, I have already^ told 
how Calder spoke of Nelson's wearing out of the line as 
an unauthorized departure from the method of attack 
prescribed by the admiral. " It certainly was so," re- 
plied Jervis, " and if ever you commit such a breach of 
your orders, I will foi^give you also." But of Duncan's 
action and its method St. Vincent wrote, " Lord Duncan's 
action was fought pell-mell * (without plan or system) ; 
he was a gallant officer (but had no idea of tactics, and 
being soon puzzled by them), and attacked without atten- 
tion to form or order, trusting that the brave example he 
set would achieve his object, which it did completely." 

Thus was the sure judgment of the quarter-deck supw- 
seded by the formalism of the desk. There is a touch of 
littleness about this criticism of Duncan by his old com- 
rade-in-arms which contrasts painfully with the large 
generosity of the rebuke to Calder. Duncan's inattention 
to form and order was the calculated means to an end 
clearly perceived, instantly pursued, and triumphantly 
attained. It was not the puzzle-headed impetuosity of 
the captain who shouted, " Up wi' the hel-lem and gang 
into the middle o't I " It was the sure insight and splen- 
did intrepidity of a commander who sees the only way to 
victory and takes it at all risks. 

Such a man was Duncan, and such was his one victory, 

> See p. 37. 

• Even if Duncan's action was " fought pell-mell," that was, as we have 
seen, exactly the way in which Nelson, by his own avowal, intended to fight, 
and did fight, the battle of Trafalgar. 



A DESPERATE BATTLE i6i 

• 

and it ill becomes even a St* Vincent to belittle either. 
At any rate, those who were there held, with one accord, 
that the mode of attack adopted, confused and disorderly 
as it was, was the only one which offered any prospect of 
a decisive victory. Captain Hotham of the Adamant 
wrote : " There was no time for tactique or manoeuvre : 
the day was advanced, the wind on shore, the water shoal ; 
and hence the charge against the Admiral of going down 
in some confusion on the enemy's fleet. Had he done 
anything else but what he did the day would not have 
been so decided.'* 

The action was desperately fought on both sides. *' I 
have assured Admiral De Winter, and with justice, no- 
thing could exceed his gallantry," wrote Duncan of his 
vanqubhed foe. An officer of the flagship, in his evidence 
^ven at a court-martial which arose out of the action, 
stated that " from the time we beat the States General out 
of the line until Admiral De Winter's ship was dismasted, 
the Venerable had seldom less than two and sometimes 
three line of battle ships upon her, besides a Dutch frigate 
and a brig who fired as opportunity offered." The Ardent, 
whose captain was killed, had two ships of the enemy 
upon her at the beginning of the action, " and about a p.m. 
she had four line of battle ships and a frigate." " Our 
enemies," wrote De Winter, " respect us on account of 
the obstinacy of our defence. No action could have been 
so bloody." Story, another of the Dutch admirals, de- 
scribed the action as " one of the most obstinate engage- 
ments, perhaps, that ever took place on the ocean." 

The appearance of the British ships at the dose of the 
action [says James] was very unlike what it generally is, 
when the French or Spaniards have been the opponent of 
the former. Not a single lower mast, not even a top- 
mast was shot away ; nor were the rigging and sails of 
the ships in their usual tattered state. It was at the hulls 
of their adversaries that the Dutchmen had directed their 
shot ; and this, not until the former were so near that 
no aim could well miss. 



i62 DUNCAN 



Eleven ships of the enemy surrendered to the victors, 
but of these two were lost at sea and a third was driven 
on shore and recaptured. The remainder, with the whole 
of Duncan's fleet, notwithstanding the serious damage 
the ships had sustained in their hulls, were brought safely 
into port, although for several days the wind continued 
to blow on to the Dutch coast, and the lee shore was only 
avoided with great difficulty. On October 15, Duncan, 
in the Venerable, anchored off Orfordness, the ship *' being 
so leaky that with all her pumps going we could just keep 
her free.'' On the same day he effectively, though quite 
undesignedly, disposed of St. Vincent's criticism before- 
hand in a letter to his kinsman, the Lord Advocate : 

We were obliged, from being so near the land, to be 
rather rash in our attack, by which we suffered more. 
Had we been ten leagues at sea none would have escaped. 
Many, I am sure, had surrendered, that got off in the 
night, being so near shore. We were much galled by 
their frigates where we could not act. In short, I feel per- 
fectly satisfied. All was done that could be done. None 
have any fault to find. 

I have said that Hotham in the Mediterranean and 
Bridport in the Channel were chained with exactly the 
same duty as was imposed on Duncan in the North Sea. 
Perhaps the best way to appreciate the brilliancy of his 
performance is to compare it with theirs. Hotham might 
have anticipated the Nile. Bridport ought to have de- 
stroyed Villaret and saved Ireland from Hoche. Duncan 
waited more than two years for his opportunity, he never 
relaxed his grip even at the height of the mutiny, and 
when at last the enemy ventured to sea, he pounced upon 
him at once and destroyed him. Well might Lady Spencer 
write as she did a year later to St. Vincent after the 
battle of the Nile : 

I am sure it must be needless to attempt expressing to 
your Lordship my delight at the recollection of the last 
eighteen moQthSt I^ora Spencer's nav^ administration 



DUNCAN'S ACHIEVEMENT 163 

has witnessed during that period three victories, which, 
since naval records have been kept in this or any other 
country, are not to be equalled. Your magnificent 
achievement saved this Country ; Lord Duncan's saved 
Ireland ; and I must hope Lord Nelson's saves India. 

In that illustrious but not unmerit^ association I may 
well leave Duncan's name and fame to the tardy appre- 
ciation of his countrjrmen and of history. Nor can I part 
more impressively with a personality remarkable alike for 
nobility of presence and for splendour of. achievement 
than by quoting a contemporary account of Duncan's 
conversation and demeanour at a banquet given on the 
first anniversary of Camperdown to celebrate the victory 
of the Nile : 

I used the opportunity his affability afforded me, to 
inquire some particulars of his own state of feeling before 
and after the action. He said he went upon deck about 
six o'clock, having had as sound a night's rest as ever he 
enjoyed in the whole course of his life. The morning was 
brilliant, with a brisk gale ; and he added that he never 
remembered to have been exalted by so exhilarating a 
sensation as the sight of the two fleets afforded him. He 
said, however, that the cares of hb duties were too onerous 
to allow him to think of himself; his whole mind was 
absorbed in observing and in meeting the occasion by 
orders ; all other feelings were lost in the necessity of 
action. 

The night after the battle he never closed his eyes — 
his thoughts were still tossing in the turmoil through 
which he had passed ; but his most constant reflection 
was a profound thankfulness to God for the event qf the 
engagement. 

All this was said in so perfectly natural a tone, and 
with a manner so simple, that its truth was impressed 
at once, together with veneration for a man who could 
regard thus humbly an event in which much of human 
life had been sacrificed, so much of personal honour and 
so much of national glory and advantage attained. . . . 

When the moment arrived for the departure of Lord 



164 DUNCAN 



Duncan he rose slowly from his seat^ drew himself up 
to his full height, and in a few simple words announced 
that he must take his leave. A dead silence ensued. 
He turned to the Russian admiral, and foldii^ his vast 
arms round him, expressed his farewell in this solemn 
embrace. It was then that the voices of his companions 
in arms broke forth, and he was saluted with three such 
cheers, so hearty, so regular, so true, that they vibrated 
through every fibre of my frame. The venerable man 
bent his head upon his breast for a moment, and seemed 
deeply impressed : he then bowed low and majestically, 
tucked his triangular gold-laced hat under his huge arm, 
and walked gravely down the room to the door amid a 
silence so intense that his measured tread sounded like 
minute-drops. He stopped ; he turned ; he again reared 
himself to his noble height, took his hat from under his 
arm, waved it over his head, gave three loud, articulate, 
and distinct hurrahs in return for the former salutation, 
placed his hat upon his brow, and closed the door. It 
was the last time I ever beheld him, but the vision still 
remains with me. 



n m n 



. '. 












I. Chotla Sctlbdet'* So05] 



PAUL JONES ^ 
I 

IN the United States Paul Jones is universally regarded 
as the father of the American Navy. His spirit still 
dominates the great Naval Coll^^e at Annapolis. His 
remains were^ in 1905, disinterred in Paris, transported 
to the sea amid the respectful homage of the French 
nation, embarked on board an American man-of-war 
with all the honours of the French Navy, and, having once 
more crossed the Atlantic, were solemnly reinterred with 
great pomp at Annapolis, the President of the United 
States himself pronouncing the funeral oration. In this 
country the estimate generally entertained of hb character 
and achievements has been a very different one. In 1835 
a writer of whom I shall have more to say presently spoke 
of him as follows : '' Paul Jones is known as a rebel and 
a pirate. Five and twenty years have not elapsed since 
the nurses of Scotland hushed their crying infants by the 
whisper of his name, and chap-books are even now to be 
purchased in which he b depicted in aU the plenitude 
of terrific glory, the rival of Blackbeard and the worthy 
successor of the Buccaneers.'' It was, moreover, not 

^ I have to thank the pablishen ci Mr. BoeU's Paul J<m$$ for their per- 
miasion. coarteoiuljr accorded, to reproduce the portrait of Paul Jones which 
faces this page. It forms the frontispiece to Mr. BneH's second volume. It 
is the work of Charles ^^^llson Peale and is stated by Mr. BneU to be one e( 
the only two portraits of Jones which are known to have been painted ivsm 
sittings. It was painted in America in 1787. A reproduction ol the othM* 
portrait known to have been painted from sittings stands as a frontispieca 
to Mr. Baell's first volume. The original is a miniature painted in 1780 by 
a Dutch artist named Van der Huydt. and now preserved in the Hemutage 
at St. Petersburg. It is more attractive as a picture, perhaps, but as it bears 
very little resemblance to the portrait by Psale, here repnxluoed, I should 
infer that it is a less faithful presentation of the man as he actually 

165 



166 PAUL JONES 

merely in Scotland, nor only at the beginning of the last 

century, that the name of Paul Jones was still potent 
in the nurseries. A friend of my own, bom at Hull 

twenty years after the words just quoted were written, 
tells me that even in his childhood the name of the captor 
of the Serapis was still one to conjure with on the east 
coast of England. By the British Government of his day 
Paul Jones was, of course, denounced as a rebel, and his 
extradition as a pirate was demanded by its diplomatic 
representative at the Hague. There is no greater livii^ 
authority on naval biography than Sir John Knox Laugh- 
ton. In the Dictionary of Ndtumal Biography the pro* 
fessor cannot bring himself to describe Paul Jones as 
anything better than a " naval adventurer," and his final 
estimate of his character is exceedingly unfavourable. 
" Jones was a man of distinguished talent and originality, 
a thorough seaman, and of the most determined and 
tenacious courage. His faults were due to defective 
training. Excessive vanity and a desire for ' glory,' 
which was, as he wrote, ' infinite ' and recognised no 
obstacles, made him a traitor to his country, as it made 
him quarrelsome, mean, and selfish." This was written 
in 1892. In an earlier and fuller biographical essay, first 
published in 1878 and reprinted in 1887 in the professor's 
Studies in Naval History, the estimate is still more un- 
favourable : " His moral character may be summed up 
in one word — detestable. I do not here speak only of 
the damning fact that, without sense of injury on the 
one side or of affection on the other, but merely as a 
matter of vulgar self-interest, he waged war against his 
native country. ... I speak equally of his character in 
its more personal relations. The same selfish vanity 
which made him a renegade made him a calculating liar, 
incapable of friendship or love. . . . Whenever his pri- 
vate actions can be examined, they must be pronounced 
to be discreditable ; and as to many others that appear 
to be so, there is no evidence in his favour, except his own 
unsubstantiated and worthless testimony." 



AMERICAN APPRECIATION OF JONES 167 

No evidence in hi? favour I X^^^^^ loved him as a 
son ; and though Franklin may have been no saint, he 
did not consort with scoundrels. After Franklin's death 
his daughter wrote to this despicable and unscrupulous 
adventurer, assuring him that almost the last utterances 
of the doctor were expressions of unimpaired confidence 
in the int^;rity and of undiminished admiration for the 
courage of Paul Jones. Lafayette loved him as a brother. 
In a letter written in 1781, he said, " You so well know 
my affectionate sentiments and my very great regard 
for you that I need not add anything on that subject." 
The rugged Suwaroff addressed him as " my good brother." 
In England he was respected and entertained by Lord 
Shelbume, by Fox, by Horace Walpole, and by Sheridan. 
He won and retained the friendship of Pearson, whom 
he had vanquished in the Serapis. He was the honoured 
guest of Lord Barham when the latter was Commander- 
in-Chief at Portsmouth, and there he met many of the 
young officers who were afterwards to share the glories of 
Nelson and his comrades in arms — ^men such as Troubridge, 
Foley, Ball, Hood, Harvey, Saumarez, and others. Louis 
Philippe wrote of him : " One of my proudest memories 
b that, when a little boy, I enjoyed the society of that 
wonderful man, to promote whose success was my 
mother's most ardent ambition." The parents of Louis 
Philippe, the Due and Duchesse de Chartres, were his 
earliest and staunchest friends in France. Louis XVL 
decorated him, and treated him with high confidence and 
respect. He was the darling of that monarch's proud 
fastidious Court. He was held in high respect by Wash- 
ington, Jefferson, Madison^ Morris, and other leaders of 
the American Revolution. When his conduct in France 
and his charges against Arthur Lee were investigated 
by Congress in 1781, that assembly unanimously resolved 
'' that the thanks of the United States, in Congress as- 
sembled, be given to Captain Paul Jones for the zeal, 
prudence, and intrepidity with which he has supported 
the honour of the American flag ; for his bold and sue- 



t«B PAUL JONES 

cessful enterprises to redeem from captivity the citizens 
of these States who had fallen ander the power of the 
enemy ; and in general, for the good conduct and eminent 
services by which he has added lustre to his character 
and to the American arms/' When this resolution was 
reported to Washington, he wrote to Paul Jones a highly 
complimentary letter expressing his concurrence, and 
concludii^ with his " sincere wish '' that he might long 
enjoy the reputation he had so justly acquired. All this, 
to which much more might be added, must surely be 
taken as at least prima facie evidence that Jones's personal 
character was by no means regarded as '' detestable '' 
by some of the most eminent and distinguished of his 
contemporaries. I am not concerned to present Paul 
Jones as a paragon of all the virtues. His vanity was 
excessive, his self-esteem was inordinate, some of his 
actions were questionable, and much of what he wrote 
about them is turgid, bombastic, and even ridiculous. 
But I have found little or nothing in the story of his ife 
to sustain the scathing depreciation of Sir John Laughton, 
nor can I pay so poor a compliment to the perspicacity 
and good faith of those who loved, respected, and honoured 
him in his lifetime as to believe either that they were one 
and all deceived, or that they gave their outward con* 
fidence and esteem to a man whom they knew to be of 
no moral worth at all. 

" His faults," says Sir John Laughton, " were due to 
defective training." In this judgment I concur. But I 
cannot reconcile it with the rest of the professor's esti- 
mate. Defective training, associated with a native habit 
of self-assertion, with a vanity never corrected in early 
yean by contact with good society, may explain and 
excuse many errors of taste, manners, and expression. 
But it cannot account for sustained moral obliquity such 
as renders a man's diaracter detestable and turns him 
into '' a calculating liar, incapable of friendship or love." 
A double dose of original sin is required for such a develop- 
ment as that. And the paradox of it all is that those 



EARLY YEARS AND VOYAGES 169 

who knew Paul Jones best never detected or suspected 
in him these abysmal profundities of wickedness. But 
without pursuing this question further at present, I will 
try to show what manner of man Paul Jones really was ; 
what his origin, circumstances, and early training were ; 
how he rose far above them by sheer force of character 
and will ; how in genius for naval warfare and in sure 
grasp of the essential conditions of its successful conduct 
he transcended nearly all his contemporaries, and might, 
had his opportunities been worthy of his conceptions, 
have taken high rank among the great sea-captains of all 
time. It is from this point of view that his title to be 
regarded as the father of the American Navy is at once 
unimpeachable and fraught with the loftiest and most 
endurii^ inspiration. 

II 

John Paul, to give him his true patronymic, was of 
Scottish birth and origin. His father was gardener, 
fisherman, and perhaps factor to a laird who tived at 
Arbigland, a seaside hamlet of the parish of Kirkbean in 
the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright. Here John Paul was 
bom in 1 747, the youngest of five sons, and here he spent 
his childhood, being educated at the parish school, and 
early taking to the sea in the fishing-boats of his native 
hamlet. At the age of twelve he was bound apprentice 
to a shipowner of Whitehaven, and embarked on his first 
voyage in the brig Friendship, bound for Virginia. Thither 
his eldest brother, William Paul, had already migrated, 
and, having married the daughter of a planter named 
William Jones, had assumed the name of his father-in-law 
and undertaken the management of his business. John 
Paul first saw his elder brother, his senior by many years, 
when the Friendship anchored in the Rappahannock at 
no great distance from the landing-stage of William 
Jones's plantation. William Jones was then alive, and 
desired to adopt John Paul as he had previously adopted 
his elder brother. But John was still wedded to the sea 



170 PAUL JONES 

and stuck to his ship, returning in her to Whitehaven early 
in 1760. He appears to have remained in the service of 
his original employer for several years, making a succes- 
sion of voyages and rapidly rising to the positions of 
second and first mate. In 1766 he took service as first 
mate in a ship trading to the West Indies, and obtained 
a sixth share in her ownership. In this ship he subse- 
quently engaged with her captain, who was also part 
owner, in the slave trade, making at least two voyages 
between the African G>ast and the West Indies. But at 
the end of the second voyage he sold his share in the ship 
to her captain, and quitting her in Jamaica he took pas- 
sage home in a brig bound for Whitehaven. In this brig 
the captain, mate, and all but five of the crew died of 
yellow fever during the voyage, and Paul, with the sur- 
vivors, brought the vessel safely into port. She was 
owned by the principal shipowners of Whitehaven, and 
as a reward for his services they gave him the command 
of one of their newest and finest ships, in which he made 
three more voyages to the West Indies and the American 
coasts, visiting his brother William on two occasions. In 
the course of these voyages he established business rela- 
tions on his own account with a firm in Tobago, but to 
judge from a letter written by him some years later, these 
relations brought him little advants^ and much trouble 
and embarrassment. During one of these voyages, the 
crew having been reduced by fever to five or six hands, 
one of the survivors — a powerful mulatto named Max- 
well — ^became mutinous, and Paul, being at the time the 
only officer able to keep the deck, struck Maxwell with a 
belasdng pin. Maxwell died shortly after the ship reached 
Tobago, and Paul at once reported the circumstances to 
the authorities and demanded an immediate trial. He 
was acquitted in the G)lonial Court, the sentence being 
confirmed by the Governor of Tobago ; but on his return 
to Whitehaven he was again placed on his trial for murder 
on the high seas. He was again acquitted, and so little 
did his trial injure his character with his owners — who 



JONES SETTLES IN VIRGINIA 171 

bore the now historic name of Donald Currie, Beck 8l Co. 
— ^that they forthwith gave him the command oi a new 
ship, the GrantuUy Castle — ^another historic name — ^the 
lai^t vessel then trading from Whitehaven. Originally 
destined for the West Indian trade, like the other ships 
in which he had served, the GrantuUy Castle was tak^ 
up as a transport by the East India Company, and sailed 
for her eastern destination in 1771* Retumii^; from this 
voyage in 1 772, Paul again took the command of a vessel^ 
once more bound for the West Indian and American 
ports. This proved to be his last mercantile voyage, for 
on arriving in the Rappahannock in April 1773, he found 
his brother William at the point of death, and himself the 
next heir to the whole of the property which William 
Jones had bequeathed to his brother in 1760. It has been 
stated that at one period during his early career Paul 
had engaged for a year or two in the smuggling trade 
between the Isle of Man and the Solway Firth. The 
foregoing record of his almost continuous emplosrment at 
sea from 1759 to 1773 would seem to disallow this story ; 
but if it were true, it would argue little or no discredit 
according to the ethical standard of the time. He was 
certainly engs^ed for a time in the slave trade, and prob« 
ably no one in those days thought any the worse of him 
for it. In like manner no one was likely to think any the 
worse of him for having been a smuggler. 

So far there is little or nothing to show that the career 
of John Paul differed in any essential respect from that 
of many a master-mariner of his time. Had he never 
been heard of again after he settled in Virginia he would 
have seemed to be no more than a man of energy, resource, 
and determination, of undaunted courage, of wide mari- 
time experience, and of consummate nautical skiU, who, 
having risen early by his merits to independent command, 
was nevertheless content to settle down at the age of six 
and twenty to a modest Colonial competence almost 
fortuitously bequeathed to him. That would probably 
have been his obscure history and his 

14 



172 PAUL JONES 

fate had Geoif;e III. been less obstinate and his Ministers 
wiser men. But Dfs aliUr visum. With John Paul's 
arrival in the Rappahannock in the spring of 1773 the 
scene changes altogether, and with it the character and 
even the name of the actor. Much speculation has been 
wasted on the reasons for his change of name. There is, 
however, no sort of mystery about it. His elder brother 
William had already assumed the surname of his father- 
in-law, William Jones, when John Paul saw him for the 
first time in 1759* Even then the old man wanted to 
adopt the younger brother, and offered to provide for 
him. But John Paul preferred the sea, and apparently 
never saw William Jones again. For the latter died in 
1760, and by his will he gave John Paul the reversion of 
the estate he had bequeathed to the elder brother in 
the event of the latter djring without issue. He had 
also made it a condition of the bequest that John Paul 
should follow his brother's example and take the name 
of Jones in his turn. During one of his visits to his 
brother, in 1769, John Paul recorded in due legal form 
his assent to the provisions of the will of William Jones, 
and thus automatically acquired the surname of Jones on 
the death of his brother without issue in 1773. 

Henceforth, then, until he took service in the new 
American Navy, we have to deal not with John Paul, 
master-mariner, of Scottish origin and British nation- 
ality, but with John Paul Jones, Esq., planter, of Virginia. 
On the death of his brother, which occurred within a 
few hours of his arrival in the Rappahannock, he turned 
over the command of his ship to his first mate and settled 
on the estate which had now become his own. It was a 
small estate as Colonial plantations were then measured, 
consisting of about three thousand acres, with the usual 
equipments and buildings and the usual complement of 
negro slaves. Jones was not ill fitted to enjoy and adorn 
the society in which he now found himself — ^the society 
so graphically depicted in the opening chapters of Thac- 
keray's Virginians, His early education had only been 



JONES'S EDUCATION 173 

that of a Scottish parish school, which he quitted at the 
age of twelve. But the scanty leisure of his fourteen years 
of seafaring life was sedulously employed in supplying 
the deficiencies of his training at school. He was emi- 
nently Social in his tastes, but select in the society he 
frequented. Mariner, skipper, slaver, trader, perhaps 
smuggler, he devoted himself steadily all through his 
Wanderjahre to the cultivation of his mind, the extension 
of his knowledge, and the refinement of his manners. All 
this is perhaps rather matter of inference than of direct 
knowledge, but the inference is confirmed by the fact that 
when he settled in Virginia he had already made many 
friends among the leading men of the American Colonies, 
from New York to Charleston ; had made himself master 
of French and acquired a passable knowledge of Spanish ; 
had studied public affairs with keen intelligence and 
insight ; had learnt to express himself on general topics 
with propriety, vigour, and point ; and had thought more 
deeply and more profitably than most naval officers of 
his time on the organisation of navies and the principles 
of naval warfare. This is a truly marvellous achievement 
for a man of his years, training, and opportunities, but his 
subsequent history shows that the picture I have drawn 
is in no sense exaggerated. It may be that the finishing 
touch to these varied accomplishments was given during 
the two years he spent in Virginia, of which little or no 
record is preserved. He gave little attention to the 
affairs of his plantation, leaving them, as he had found 
them, in the hands of the faithful and capable Scottish 
steward who, with his master, William Paul Jones, had 
served in Braddock's ill-fated expedition and survived its 
disastrous rout. This enabled him to enjoy such leisure 
and such social and intellectual converse as life in Vir- 
ginia then afforded. But books and their study were not 
greatly to the taste of Virginian planters in those days 
— 'Washington himself was probably a rare exception — 
and it is likely enough that Paul Jones sported and idled 
with the rest. It is true that he afterwards told Lady 



174 PAUL J0N5S 

Selkirk in a famous letter that he had ** withdrawn from 
the sea-service in favour of ' calm contemplation and 
poetic ease/ *' But the facts and dates seem to show that 
Paul Jones owed the greater part of his intellectual cul- 
ture to the solitude of a merchantman's cabin and not 
to the more stirring and distracting atmosphere of a 
plantation in tidewater Virginia. 

His espousal of the American side in the great conflict 
which gave birth to the United States, needs, in my 
judgment, neither apology nor defence. His adoption 
of a seafaring life at a very tender age must have cut 
him adrift from the political passions and even weakened 
his sympathy with the patriotic sentiments of his native 
land. During the years of hb maritime wanderings he 
must have seen quite as much of Virginia and the Ameri- 
can seaboard as he ever did of the shores of Great Britain. 
From 1769 onwards he must have regarded his brother's 
estate in Virginia as hb own future home, and, knowing 
America as he did and its bitter resentment at the pass- 
ing of the Stamp Act in 1765^ it is hardly possible that, 
when he elected to settle in Virginia in 1773, ^^ ^^^ 
not already taken the side on which were found many 
of the most upright and honourable of the subjects of 
the Britbh Crown, both British and Colonial bom. To 
say that he took it '' without sense of injury on the one 
side or of affection on the other, but merely as a matter 
of vulgar self-interest," is, in my judgment, to go far 
beyond all warrant of the facts^ and to deny to Paul 
Jones even the criminal's benefit of the doubt. His friends 
were among the leaders of the American Revolution. 
He settled in Virginia only a few months before the 
•' Boston Tea Party," and little more than a year before 
the assembling of the first Congress at Philadelphia. In 
those days it was hardly possible for any man living in 
the American Colonies not to take one side or the other. 
It needed no sense of personal injury on the one hand, 
and very little of local affection on the other, to compel 
any and every man who thought for himself to decide 



JONES NO RENEGADE 175 

once for all on which side his sympathies lay. If self* 
interest was the motive, it must have rested on an ex«> 
tremely hazardous calculation of chances, for the pros- 
pects of distinction or even of employment in an American 
Navy, still to be created, must have seemed extremely 
remote to any man who knew as Paul Jones did the 
overwhefaning might of England on the seas. If Wash- 
ington, who had fought under the British flag, could 
take up arms against it, if three of his major-generak were 
men of British origin and birth and had served in the 
British Army, if Chatham, who had conquered Canada, 
would not allow his son to unsheath his sword for the 
coercion of the American Colonies, why should it be 
denied to Paul Jones to share the sympathies of men 
such as these ? To call him a rebel is altogether beside 
the point. They were all rebels in one sense, and all 
patriots in another. To call him a traitor is absurd. 
As Captain Mahan pithily puts it, ** If Paul Jones be a 
traitor, what epithet is left for Benedict Arnold ? " It 
is true that in his more expansive and bombastic moments 
he disavowed all narrow and exclusive patriotism. 
*' Though I have drawn my sword in the present generous 
struggle for the rights of men,'' he wrote to Lady Sel- 
kirk, '' yet I am not in arms as an American. I profess 
myself a citizen of the world, totally unfettered by the 
little mean distinctions which diminish the benevc^nce 
of the heart and set bounds to philanthropy." He sub- 
sequently used the same language to the French Minister 
of Marine. But this is merely the philosophic jargon of 
the eighteenth century. All it means is that, since he 
could not be neutral in the conflict, Paul Jones had 
espoused the cause which he deemed to be that of liberty, 
justice, and humanity. Hbtory has at any rate decisively 
ratified his choice. 

" On the Ubrary wall of one of the most famous writers 
of America, there hang two crossed swords, which his 
relatives wore in the great War of Independence. The 
one was gallantly worn in the servioe of the King, the 



176 PAUL JONES 

other was the weapon of a brave and honoured Republi- 
can soldier." So writes Thackeray in the opening chapter 
of the Virginians. The apologue serves to explain the 
attitude of Paul Jones towards the American conflict. 
Virginia was divided in sentiment. The planters were 
mainly Tories and Royalists, yet Washington himself was 
a Virginian planter. Paul Jones followed Washington. 
The two years between 1773 and 1775 were apparently 
spent by him for the most part in the study and observa- 
tion of public affairs. Yet his sympathies were never 
disguised. He openly sought the society of the leaders 
of what was then known as the Continental party. By 
the end of 1774 it was plain that the issue between the 
American Colonies and the Crown could only be decided 
by force, and every man in America was compelled to 
make his choice for one side or the other. The choice of 
Paul Jones was already made. E^ly in 1775, Philip 
Livingstone of New York visited Virginia for the purpose 
of conferring with Washington and the other leaders of 
the Continental party in that State. Jones was present 
at many of these conferences, a sufficient proof that he 
already enjoyed the confidence of the Continental leaders. 
In one of his journals, written in 1782, he says : 

Mr. Livingstone had recently been at Boston, and his 
reports of conferences he had with the Adamses, Mr. 
Otis, Dr. Warren, and others, were of the utmost gravity. 
. . . Colonel Washington, Mr. JeflFerson, and in fact all 
the Virginians of note, agreed that whatever the Boston 
people might do, or whenever they should act, they 
must be sustained at all hazards. I availed myself of 
these occasions to assure Colonel Washington, Mr. Jeffer- 
son, and all the others, that my services would be at the 
dbposal of the Colonies whenever their cause should 
require service on my own element, which would, of 
course, be coincident with the outbreak of regular hos- 
tilities on the land. 

It was not to grave and serious men such as these that 



BIRTH OF THE AMERICAN NAVY 177 

Paul Jones appeared to be a traitor, a ren^ade, or a 
mere self-seeking adventurer. 



' III 

Events were now to move rapidly. The battle of 
Lexington was fought on April 19, i775i and that of 
Bunker's Hill on June 17. Jones was in New York 
when he heard of the former, and at once vnrote to his 
friends to renew the offer of his services, inviting the 
Congress to call upon him '' in any capacity which your 
knowledge of my seafaring capacities and your opinion 
of my qualifications may dictate." The Congress met 
for its second session on May 10. On June 14 it appointed 
a Naval Committee to '' consider, inquire, and report 
with respect to the organisation of a naval force." On 
June 24 thb Conmiittee authorised its chairman, Robert 
Morris, " to invite John Paul Jones, Esquire, gent., of 
Virginia, Master-Mariner, to lay before the Committee such 
information and advice as may seem to him useful in 
assisting the said Conunittee to discharge its labours." 
Jones had by this time returned to his plantation, where 
he had cordially entertained the officers of two French 
frigates which had put into Hampton Roads under the 
command of Commodore de Kersaint, with the Due de 
Chartres as his second-in-conmiand. This was the be- 
ginning of a close friendship with these two famous 
Frenchmen, which ended only with Jones's life, and 
exercised no slight influence on his career. It was laif^ely 
the goodwill of the Due de Chartres which secured for 
Paul Jones his footing in French society, and largely the 
fortune of the Duchesse which enabled him to prosecute 
many of his undertakings. On receipt of the invitation 
of the Committee above quoted, Jones at once repaired 
to Philadelphia and placed himself at the disposal of the 
Congress. The first task entrusted to him was to serve 
on a Commission appointed " to survey and report upon 



178 PAUL JONES 

the condition^ availability, and the expediency of pur- 
chasing certain vessels then in the Ddaware at the dis- 
posal of the Congress/' At the same time he was invited 
to advise the Committee on two more general questions, 
namely " The proper qualifications of naval officers/' and 
'' The kind or kinds of armed vessels most desirable for 
the service of the United Colonies, keeping in view the 
limited resources of the Colonies.^ The work of the 
Commission, in which he at once took the leading part, 
absorbed all Jones's eneigies for many weeks, and it was 
not until the middle of September that he was able to 
lay before the Committee a deeply considered answer to 
the first of the more general questions addressed to him. 
This masterly document is still, if I may so call it, the 
moral and intellectual charter of Annapolis, and the sure 
and everlasting warrant of Jones's title to be called the 
Father of the American Navy« I need o£fer no apology 
for quoting it almost in fiill : 

As this is to be the foundation— or I may say the first 
keel-timber — of a new navy, which all patriots must hope 
shall become amonest the foremost in the world, it should 
be well begun in the selection of the first list of officers. 
You will pardon me, I know, if I say that I have enjoyed 
much opportunity during my sea-life to observe the 
duties and responsibilities that are put upon naval officers. 

It is by no means enough that an officer of the navy 
should be a capable mariner. He must be that, of course, 
but also a great deal more. He should be as well a gentle* 
man of liberal education, refined manners, punctilious 
courtesy, and the nicest sense of personal honour. 

He should not only be able to express himself clearly 
and with force in his own language both with tongue and 
pen, but he should also be versed in French and Spanish 
— ^for an American officer particularly the former — ^for 
our relations with France must necessarily soon become 
exceedingly close in view of the mutual hostility of the 
two countries toward Great Britain. 

The naval officer should be familiar with the principles 
of international law^ and the general practice oi admiralty 



THE NAVAL OFFICER AFLOAT 179 

jurisprudence, because such knowledge may often, when 
crubmg at a aistance from home, be necessary to protect 
his flag from insult or his crew £rom imposition or injury 
in foreign ports. 

He should also be conversant with the usages of diplo- 
macy, and capable of maintaining, if called upon, a 
dignified and judicious diplomatic correspondence ; be- 
cause it often happens that sudden emergencies in foreign 
waters make him the diplomatic as well as military repre- 
sentative of his country, and in such cases he may have 
to act without opportunity of consulting his civic or 
ministerial superiors at home, and such action may easily 
involve the portentous issue of peace or war between great 
powers. These are general qualifications, and the nearer 
the officer approaches the full possession of them the more 
likely he will be to serve his country well and win fame 
and honors for himself. 

Coming now to view the naval officer aboard ship 
and in relation to those under his command, he should 
be the soul of tact, patience, justice, firmness, and charity. 
No meritorious act of a subordinate should escape his 
attention or be left to pass without its reward, if even 
the reward be only one word of approval. Conversely 
he should not be blind to a single fault in any subordinate, 
though, at the same time, he should be quick and unfail- 
ing to distinguish error from malice, thoughtlessness 
from incompetency, and well-meant shortcoming from 
heedless or stupid blunder. As he should be universal 
and impartial in his rewards and approval of merit, so 
should he be judicial and unbending m his punishment or 
reproof of misconduct. 

In his intercourse with subordinates he should ever 
maintain the attitude of the commander, but that need 
by no means prevent him from the amenities of cordiality 
or the cultivation of good cheer within proper limits. 
Every commanding officer should hold with his sub- 
ordinates such relations as will make them constantly 
anxious to receive invitations to sit at his mess-table, 
and his bearing toward them should be such as to encour- 
age them to express their feelings to him with freedom 
and to ask his views without reserve. 

It is always for the best interests of the service that 
a cordial interchange of sentiments and civilities should 



i8o PAUL JONES 

subsist between superior and subordinate officers aboard 
ship. Therefore it is the worst of policy in superiors to 
behave toward their subordinates with indiscriminate 
hauteur, as if the latter were of a lower species. Men of 
liberal minds, themselves accustomed to command, can 
ill brook .being thus set at naught by others who, from 
temporary authority, may claim a monopoly of power and 
sense for the time being. If such men experience rude, 
ungentle treatment from their superiors, it will create 
sudi heart-burnings and resentments as are nowise con- 
sonant with that dieerful ardor and ambitious spirit that 
ought ever to be characteristic of officers of all grades. 
In one word, every commander should keep constantly 
before him the great truth, that to be well obeyed he 
must be perfectly esteemed. 

But it is not alone with subordinate officers that a 
conmiander has to deal. Behind them, and the founda- 
tion of all, is the crew. To his men the commanding 
officer should be Prophet, Priest, and King I His authority 
when o£f shore being necessarily absolute, the crew should 
be as one man impressed that the Captain, like the Sove- 
reign, " can do no wrong 1 " 

This is the most deUcate of all the commanding officer's 
obligations. No rule can be set for meeting it. It must 
ever be a question of tact and perception of human nature 
on the spot and to suit the occasion. If an officer fails 
in this, he cannot make up for such failure by severity, 
austerity, or cruelty. Use force and apply restraint or 
punishment as he may, he will always have a sullen crew 
and an unhappy ship. But force must be used sometimes 
for the ends of discipline. On such occasions the quaJity 
of the commander will be most sorely tried. . . . 

When a commander has, by tact, patience, justice, and 
firmness, each exercised in its proper turn, produced 
such an impression upon those under his orders in a ship 
of war, he has only to await the appearance of his enemy's 
top-sails upon the horizon. He can never tell when that 
moment may come. But when it does come he may be 
sure of victory over an equal or somewhat superior force, 
or honorable defeat by one greatly superior. Or, in rare 
cases, sometimes justifiable, he may challenge the devo- 
tion of his followers to sink with him alongside the more 
powerful foe, and all go down together with the unstricken 



NAVAL SERVICE A DESPOTISM i8i 

flag of their country still waving defiantly over them in 
their ocean sepulchre 1 

No such achievements are possible to an unhappy ship 
with a sullen crew. 

All these considerations pertain to the naval officer 
afloat. But part, and often an important part, of his 
career must be in port or on duty ashore. Here he must 
be of affable temper and a master of civilities. He must 
meet and mix with his inferiors of rank in society ashore, 
and on such occasions he must have tact to be easy and 
gracious with them, particularly when ladies are present ; 
at the same time without the least air of patronage or 
affected condescension, though constantly preserving the 
distinction of rank. . . . 

In old established navies like, for example, those of 
Britain and France, generations are bred and specially 
educated to the duties and responsibilities of officers. 
In land forces generals may and sometimes do rise from 
the ranks. But I have not yet heard of an Admiral com- 
ing aft from a forecastle. 

Even in the merchant service, master-mariners almost 
invariably start as cabin apprentices. In all my wide 
acquaintance vdth the merchant service I can now think 
of but three competent master-mariners who made their 
first appearance on board ship '' through the hawse-hole," 
as the saying is. 

A navy is essentially and necessarily autocratic. True 
as may be the political principles for which we are now 
contending, they can never be practically applied on 
board ship, out of port or off soundings. This may seem 
a hardship, but it is nevertheless the simplest of truths. 
Whilst the ships sent forth by the Congress may and must 
fight for the principles of human rights and republican 
freedom, the ships themselves must be ruled and com- 
manded at sea under a system of absolute despotism. . • • 

It should be borne in mind that when this memorable 
State Paper was penned, Paul Jones had never served 
on board a man-of-war. His life, his education, and his 
experiences had only been such as I have in briefest out- 
line described. Yet I venture to affirm that no naval 
officer then living — ^and few naval officers of any age — 



i8j PAUL JONES 

could have better defined the essential duties of a naval 
ofiScer and the moral qualities which fit him to discharge 
those duties with loyalty, dignity, and distinction, than 
this master-mariner whom fortune had made by no seek- 
ing of his own a Virginia planter, and who, though bom 
a British subject, like every other American " rebel," 
had espoiised the cause which even in thb country en- 
listed the S3rmpathies of a Chatham, a Burke, and a Fox, 
and in America was not unworthy to be served by men 
such as Washington, Franklin, Hamilton, Jeffersoni and 
many others whom he reckoned among his familiar 
friends. It was not men such as these that would admit 
a mere self-seeking adventurer to their intimacy. It 
was not to a man who knew so well what a naval officer 
ought to be and to do that the loyalty and devotion of 
comrades in arms wEb shared his own spirit was ever 
denied. It is true that he quarrelled with many of his 
associates and subordinates. But many of them were 
rogues, traitors, cowards, scoundrels, " scalljrwags." For 
these he had no use and with them he had no patience. 
With men of his own temper he lived, like Nelson, as 
with " a band of brothers." 

The report of Paul Jones was at once adopted by the 
Committee to which it was made, but not before it Jiad 
been submitted by Hewes to Washington, who made the 
following comment on it : '' Mr. Jones is clearly not 
only a master-mariner within the scope of the art of 
navigation, but he also holds a strong and profound 
sense of the military weight of command on the sea. His 
powers of usefulness are great, and must be constantly 
kept in view." But his powers of usefulness were not 
confined to the survey of ships suitable for the Continental 
navy and the preparation of the foregoing report. He 
reported also on the nature of the nuUinel required for 
such a navy and the best method of employing it. This 
report was presented to the Committee on October 3, 
1775. It displays no less sure an insight into the true 
conditions and requirements of such a warfare on the 



AMERICA'S NAVAL NEEDS 183 

seas as was open to the Continental forces than its prede- 
cessor did into the essential requirements of the personnel. 
For political, strategic, mechanical, and financial reasons, 
Paul Jones strongly and wisely deprecated the construc- 
tion of ships of the line : 

Such vessels are too large and costly both in building 
and keeping in commission, and require too many men 
for our present resources. Their use is mainly strategical, 
for which purpose they must operate in fleets and squadrons, 
calculated to fight ranged battles, or to make extensive 
demonstrations, or to protect military expeditions over 
sea, or to overawe inferior powers. The posture of our 
affairs does not present such requirements. We cannot 
hope to contend with Britain for mastery of the sea oa 
a grand scale. We cannot now for a long time hope for 
conditions admitting of such an attitude. As it is, only 
four powers are able to maintain fleets of the line capable 
of standing up in ranged battle. They are England, 
France, Spain, and the Netherlands, and their fleets are 
the growth of centuries. 

Moreover, America had no dockyards, no accumula- 
tion of seasoned timber of scantling suitable for capital 
ships, no money to build such ships, no guns wherewithal 
to arm them, and no means of obtaining such guns. On 
the other hand, Paul Jones would not ''go to the other 
extreme and counsel the fitting out of small vessels able 
only to harass the enemy's commerce. That character 
of sea warfare may, I think, be left in the main to the 
enterprise or cupidity, or both, of private individuals or 
associations who will take out letters-of-marque or equip 
jMivateers." He knew well the vital importance of offen- 
sive warfare, even of such offensive warfare as alone can 
be conducted by a belligerent who does not seek '* to 
contend for mastery of the sea on a grand scale." He 
will not peddle with coast defence, nor with any such 
restricted form of offence as is conducted in home waters 
by vessels having only a limited radius of action. He 
wants, at all hazards, to harry the enemy's coasts and 



1 84 PAUL JONES 

attack his commerce in his own waters. For this purpose 
he desires frigates at least as large and as heavily armed 
as those then being employed by England and France, and 
as many as he can get — ** at least six " canying thirty- 
six twelve-pounders. ''I would not counsel smaller ones, 
such as twenty-eights or even thirty-twos ; because the 
drift of progress is to make frigates heavier all the time, 
and anything inferior to the twelve-pounder thirty-six 
gun frigate is now behind the times. On the other hand 
I would take a step further than the English and French 
have yet gone in frigate design. I would create a class 
of eighteen-pounder frigates to rate thirty-eight or forty 
guns. ... By this means we shall have a ship of frigate 
build and rate, but one-half ^;ain stronger than any 
other frigate now afloat. In addition to the six already 
proposed to carry twelve-pounders, it would be wise to 
provide for at least four of the new class of eighteen- 
pounder frigates I propose, and if possible six." There 
is a modem ring about these remarks which may well 
suggest to the reflective reader that the conditions of 
naval warfare, and their expression in terms of matMel, 
vary rather in degree than in kind from age to age, and 
that the solution of the problems presented by them is 
essentially identical in all ages. Not less modem nor, I 
will add, less happily inspired, are the views of Paul Jones 
on the use to be made in warfare of the tnatMel he recom- 
mends : 

We should, at the earliest moment, have a squadron 
of four, five, or six frigates like the above— either or 
both classes — constantly in British waters, harbouring 
and refitting in the ports of France, which nation must, 
from self-interest alone, lean toward us from the start, 
and must sooner or later openly espouse our cause. 

Keeping such a squadron in British waters, alarming 
their coasts, intercepting their trade, and descending now 
and then upon their least protected ports, is the only 
way that we, with our slender resources, can sensibly 
affect our enemy by sea-warfare. 



STRATEGIC POLlCYi OF JONES 185 

Rates of insurance will rise ; necessary supplies from 
abroad, particularly naval stores for the British dock- 
yards, will be cut off; transports canying troops and 
supply-ships bringing military stores for land operations 
against us will be captured ; and last, but not least, a 
considerable force of their ships and seamen will be kept 
watching or searching for our frigates. 

In planning and building our new frigates I would 
keep fast sailing, on all points, in view as a prime quality. 
But no officer of true spirit would conceive it his duty to 
use the speed of his ship in escape from an enemy of like 
or nearly like force. If I had an eighteen-pounder frigate 
of the class above described, I should not consider myself 
justified in showing her heels to a forty-four of the present 
time, or even to a fifty-gun ship built ten years ago. 

A sharp battle now and then, or the capture and carry- 
ing as prize into a French port of one or two of their crack 
fr^ates, would raise us more in the estimation of Europe, 
where we now most of all need countenance, than could 
the defeat or even capture of one of their armies on the 
land here in America. And at the same time it would 
fill all England with dismay. If we show to the world 
that we can beat them afloat with an equal force, ship 
to ship, it will be more than any one else has been able 
to do in modem times, and it will create a great and most 
desirable sentiment of respect and favour towards us on 
the Continent of Europe, where really, I think, the ques- 
tion of our fate must ultimately be determined. 

Beyond this, if by exceedingly desperate fighting, one 
of our ships shall conquer one of theirs of markedly 
superior force, we shall be hailed as the pioneers of a 
new power on the sea, with untold prospects of develop- 
ment, and the prestige, if not the substance of English 
dominion over the ocean, will be forever broken. Happy, 
indeed, will be the lot of the American captain upon 
whom fortune shall confer the honor of fighting that 
battle 1 

Thus, alike in personnel and in matMel, Paul Jones 
became the first author and only begetter of the American 
Navy — ^its father in every sense of the word. Nor was it 
long before he found employment in the great service he 



1 86 PAUL JONES 

had thus created. In December 1 775 the G>ininittee above 
mentioned recommended the appointment of five cap- 
tains, five first lieutenants, and eleven second lieutenants, 
Paul Jones being placed not, as he might have expected, 
among the captains, but at the head of the list of lieu- 
tenants. He accepted the situation with dignity, but 
not without disappointment, and was nominated first 
lieutenant of the Alfred^ one of the ships he had surveyed 
and recommended for purchase, under the command of 
Captain Dudley Saltonstall. He received his commission 
forthwith, and going on board the Alfred^ with several 
members of the Committee, he, in the absence of Salton- 
stall, who had not yet reached Philadelphia, was directed 
by John Hancock, one of the Committee, to take com- 
mand of the ship and break her pendant. This was the 
" Pine Tree and Rattlesnake " emblem, with the motto 
" Don't tread on me," which ^vas worn for a few months 
only by Continental ships in commission. It was after- 
wards replaced by the historic '' Stars and Stripes," and 
this flag, too, Paul Jones had the honour of first hoisting 
when he took command of the Ranger. 



IV 

The first exploit of the new navy was no very glorious 
one. In February 1776 a squadron of four vessels, of 
which the Alfred was one, set forth under the command 
of Commodore Ezekiel Hopkins on an expedition against 
the Bahamas and British commerce in those waters. It 
returned early in April, having captured Fort Nassau in 
New Providence, and failed to capture a British sloop, 
the Glasgow f which made good its escape although assailed 
and chased by the whole squadron. The result was a 
series of courts-martial, ofiicial censures, and dismissals 
from the service, the Commodore being cashiered, and 
Saltonstall placed in retirement, which unhappily for his 
own fame, proved to be only temporary. That Jones 



JONES AND LORD DUNMORE 187 

himself incurred no blame b shown by the fact that barely 
a month after his return in the Alfred he was appointed to 
the command of the Prcmdence sloop-of-war, and sailed 
m her, in June, on a general cruise ranging from Bermuda 
to the Banks of Newfoundland. I need not record the 
incidents of this cruise, though they showed Paul Jones at 
his . best as a seaman of consummate daring and infinite 
resource. On his return to port in the autumn he was 
promoted to the rank of captain, receiving his commis- 
sion from the hands of Thomas Jefferson, and heard for 
the first time of the utter ravaging of his plantation in 
Virginia, at the dose of the previous year, by Lord Dun- 
more, the British Governor of the Colony. Lord Dunmore 
had been driven from his residence in Virginia and taken 
refuge on board a British man-of-war. " There were,'' 
says Lecky, " no English soldiers in the province, but 
with the assistance of some British frigates, of some 
hundreds of loyalists who followed his fortunes, and of a 
few runaway negroes, he equipped a marine force which 
spread terror along the Virginian coast and kept up a 
harassing though almost useless predatory war. Two 
incidents in the struggle excited deep resentment through- 
out America. The first was a proclamation by which 
freedom was promised to all slaves who took arms against 
the rebels. The second was the burning of the important 
town of Norfolk, which had been occupied by the pro- 
vinciab, had fired on the King's ships, and had refused 
to supply them with provisions. It was impossible by 
such means to subdue the province." 

Jones was one of the principal sufferers by this ill- 
starred enterprise of Lord Dunmore's. His plantation 
was ruined, all his buildings burned to the ground, his 
wharf demolished, his live stock killed, and every one 
of his able-bodied slaves of both sexes carried off to 
Jamaica to be sold. But he did not repine or complain. 
'' This is, of course, a part of the fortune of war," he wrote 
to his fiiend Hewes. " I accept the extreme animosity 
displayed by Lord Dunmore as a compliment to the sin- 

»5 



1 88 PAUL JONES 

cerity of my attachment to the cause of liberty. His 
lordship b entitled to his own conception of civilized 
warfare. He and his know where I am and what I am 
doing. They can affect me only by ravage behind my 
back. I do not complain of that." But he did deplore 
the fate of his negroes, and he acknowledged that all his 
worldly resources were destroyed. " I have/' as he said 
in the same letter, *' no fortune left but my sword, and 
no prospect except of getting alongside the enemy.'' A 
few weeks later he was again at sea, this time in com- 
mand of the Alfred, with the Providence in company 
and under his command. The cruise lasted about a 
month. Jones returned to port Mdth seven prizes, two 
of which were transports fully laden with clothing and 
other supplies for the King's troops. The loss of these 
supplies to the British forces was serious enough ; to the 
Continental forces, ill-equipped and impoverished as they 
were, the gain was incalculable. 

This cruise was the last of the services rendered by Paul 
Jones to the American cause in American waters. Hence- 
forth he plays his part on the larger stage of European 
warfare and diplomacy. I have dealt in some detail with 
his early years and his early services to the cause of his 
choice, because it is this portion of his life, too often 
ignored or misunderstood by his English biographers, 
which has operated most to his discredit. For example, 
Sir John Laughton, writing in 1 878, reads the story I have 
told in outline above in a widely different sense : 

I have been thus particular in tracing the early life 
of John Paul, because its detail, uninteresting in itself, 
appears to offer some explanation of both his character 
and his choice of a career. A peasant lad, who had been 
knocking about the world in small trading ships from the 
time he was twelve years old ; who had served during 
five or six years, as he was growing from boyhood into 
manhood, on board a slaver ; a Manx smuggler, a ruined 
merchant, possibly a fraudulent bankrupt, or too clever 
executor, is not the man whose path we should expect to 



TWO VIEWS OF JONES 189 

find hampered by needless or even customary scruples. 
The world was Ms oyster, with his sword he would open 
it. He felt himself capable of achieving distinction, if 
only he had a field for his talents ; and he had seen enough 
to make him believe that in the war then breaking out, 
the revolutionary side would give him the greatest oppor- 
tunities. To him country was an idle word, patriotism 
an unknown idea. Through life the one object of his 
worship and admiration was himself. 

My readers must choose for themselves between this 
picture and that which I have drawn. I will, moreover, 
cite an independent witness to character in the writer 
whom I have already mentioned as having written a Lif^ 
of Paul Jones f as early as 1825. This writer, I am assured 
by my friend Mr. John Murray, is no other than the 
illustrious Benjamin Disraeli, afterwards Earl of Beacons- 
field, and Prime Minister of England.^ He at any rate, 
whether from sympathy of temperament or from greater 
generosity of appreciation, saw Paul Jones and his career 
in a much kindlier light than has been conmion among 
his countrymen ; and since the volume is now rare and 
little known, I need offer no 9cpo\ogy for citing his final 
appreciation : 

That by law he was a pirate and a rebel, I shall not 
deny; since by the same law Washington would have 

> The work Is entitled The Life of Paid Jon$s, from OrigimU Document 
in the Possession of John Henry Sherhurtte, Esq,, Register of the Navy of the 
United States. London, John Murray, Albemarie Street, mdccczxv. The 
present Mr. John Mnmy has very kindly allowed me to inspect and oonsvtt 
a copy of this work which has never passed out of the possession of his finn. 
He assures me that there Is no doubt that it is substantially the work d 
Disraeli, who was at this period in the literary employ of his grandfather. 
Disraeli's name does not appear on the title-page any more than it does on 
another work published by John Murray in r832, and entitled England and 
France ; or a Cure for the Ministerial Gallomania. But the records and 
traditions of the firm attest that both were Disraeli's handiwork, and that 
if he was not the actual writer d every line and every word, he was at any 
rate the superintending and largely contributory editor. This attribution 
is confirmed by abundant internal evidence of style and treatment. In a 
private letter to Mr. Murray the late Sir Spencer Walpole pronounced parts 
of the England and France volume to be " very disxy-ish." My readers will 
judge for themselves of the extract here given. 



190 PAUL JONES 

been drawn and quartered, and Franklin had already 
been denounced as " a hoary-headed traitor." But we 
have seen that nothing can be more erroneous than the 
prevalent history of Ins character and fortunes. As to 
his moral conduct it would seem that few characters 
have been more subject to scrutiny and less to condemna- 
tion. His very faults were the consequences of feelings 
which possess our admiration, and his weaknesses were 
allied to a kindly nature. He was courageous, generous, 
and humane ; and he appears to have been the only one 
in this age of revolutions whose profession of philanthropy 
was not disgraced by his practice. As to his mental 
capacity, it cannot be denied that his was a most ardent 
and extraordinary genius. Bom in the lowest rank of 
life, and deprived by his mode of existence from even the 
common education which every Scotchman inherits, Paul 
Jones was an enthusiastic student, and succeeded in 
forming a style which cannot be sufficiently admired for 
its pure and strenuous eloquence. His plans abo were 
not the crude conceptions of a vigorous but untutored 
intellect, but the matured sjrstems which could only have 
been generated by calm observation and patient study. 
His plan for attacking the coast of England was most 
successful in execution, though conceived on the banks 
of the Delaware ; and we cannot but perceive a schooled 
and philosophic intellect in his hints for the formation 
of the navy of a new nation. Accident had made him 
a republican, but the cold spirit of his republicanism had 
not tainted his chivalric soul, and his political principles 
were not the offspring of the specious theories of a dan- 
gerous age. There was nothing in the nature of his 
mind which would have prevented him from being the 
commander instead of the conqueror of the Serapis. He 
delighted in the pomp and circumstance of royalty, and 
we scarcely know when to deem him happiest — ^when the 
venerable Franklin congratulated him for having freed 
all his suffering countrymen from the dungeons of Great 
Britain, or when he received a golden-hilted sword from 
the '' protector of the rights of human nature." Although 
he died in his forty-fifth year, his public life was nojt a 
short one, and by his exertions at the different Courts of 
Europe he mainly contributed to the success of the 
American cause. Now that the fever of party prejudice 



JONES IN THE RANGER 191 

has subsided, England wishes not to withhold from him 
the tribute of her admiration. America, " the country 
of his fond election/' must ever rank him not only among 
the firmest, but among the ablest of her patriots. 



In June 1 777 Jones was appointed by Congress to com- 
mand the Ranger, a new vessel of 308 tons, designed to 
carry an armament of twenty long six-pounder guns, 
which had just been launched from the navy yard at 
Portsmouth in New Hampshire. Jones fitted her out 
and reported her as ready for sea on October 15. But 
as her destination was to carry the war into the enemy's 
waters in accordance vnth the views which Jones had, 
as we have seen, already advanced, he was directed to 
wait for despatches of importance which Congress ex- 
pected to be in a position to transmit to France in a few 
days. In other words, the surrender of Burgo}me at 
Saratoga was known to be imminent — ^it took place on 
October 17 — ^and Congress desired to employ the Ranger 
to carry the news to Europe and especially to France, 
whose friendship for the United States was shortly to 
ripen into an alliance. Jones received his despatches 
about midnight on October 31, and set sail at once, de- 
claring that he would spread the news in France in thirty 
days. He did not quite fulfil his promise, but he landed 
at Nantes on December 2, and, posting forthwith to Paris, 
he placed the despatches in Franklin's hands on the 
morning of December 5. " On February 6, 1778," says 
Mr. A. C. Buell, Paul Jones's latest biographer, '' the 
Treaty of Alliance that assured American Independence 
was signed and sealed at Versailles — just two months 
after the arrival of the news." 

It had been intended that on his arrival in France 
Jones should hand over the Ranger to Simpson, his second- 
in-command, and himself take command of a new frigate 
at Amsterdam for the United States Govern* 



193 PAUL JONES 

ment. But the British Government got wind of the 
transaction, an embargo was laid on the ship, and before 
Jones landed at Nantes, she had been sold by Franklin 
to the French Government. Jones therefore remained 
for a time in command of the Ranger, and, after refitting 
her at L'Orient, he put in at Brest, where the French 
Grand Fleet was lying under the command of D'OrviUiers. 
Here, on February 14, 1771, after some politic negotia- 
tion on Jones's part, the United States flag, which he had 
been the first to hoist on board the Ranger, received the 
first salute ever offered to it by a foreign naval power. 
Jones was detained at Brest for nearly two months, owing 
to differences of opinion among the American Com- 
missioners in Paris as to his ulterior destination. In 
the end the views of Franklin, who desired to keep Jones 
in European waters, prevailed, and at last, on April 10, 
the Ranger sailed to try her fortunes in British waters. 
Baffled by the weather Jones entered the Irish Channel 
from the southward, having originally intended to pass 
to the west of Ireland and enter it from the northward. 
It was well for him that he did so, for, before he left Brest, 
the British Government had got wind of his intentions 
smd had promptly despatched from Plsrmouth a frigate 
and two sloops to look after him on the west coast of 
Ireland. They were detained at Falmouth by the same 
gale which kept him out of the Atlantic, and they never 
got on his tracks. Jones made straight for his native 
haunts ; and, learning that Whitehaven, the cradle of his 
maritime career, was then full of shipping, he resolved 
to make a descent on it, relying on his intimate know- 
ledge of the harbour and its approaches, and hoping to 
be able to destroy all the shipping assembled there. 
Delayed for some days by contrary winds, he at length 
got near to the port on the night of April 22, and made 
his attack. It was not successful in its attempt on the 
shipping, the attack having been made too late in the 
night, owing to the wind having dropped before he had 
got as near in as he desired, and at daybreak he was com- 



ATTACK ON WHITEHAVEN 193 

pelled to withdraw his small landing party after a sharp 
skirmish with the local militia. His own comment on 
this adventure is as follows : 

Its actual results were of little moment, for the in- 
tended destruction of shipping was limited to a single 
vessel. But the moral effect of it was very great, as it 
taught the English that the fancied security of their 
coasts was a myth, and thereby compelled their Govern- 
ment to take expensive measures for the defence of 
numerous ports hitherto relying for protection wholly on 
the vigilance and supposed omnipotence of their navy. 
It also doubled or more the rates of insurance, which m 
the long run proved the most grievous damage of all. 

This is amply corroborated by Disraeli, who says : 

The descent at Whitehaven produced consternation 
all over the kingdom. Expresses were immediately de- 
spatched to all the capital seaports; all strangers in 
Whitehaven were immediately ordered to be arrested ; 
similar directions were forwarded throughout the country. 
Look-out vessels were appointed at every port ; continual 
meetings were held all down the coast ; companies were 
raised by subscription ; and all forts and guns were im- 
mediately put into condition. 

A nation which relies on sea power is peculiarly sensi- 
tive to alarms of this kind. Jones had discovered the 
secret of getting on its nerves. His next adventure was 
of a more equivocal character, though his own motives 
were generous and his subsequent action was even chival- 
rous after a certain florid fashion of his own. Paul Jones 
shared to the full the sentiments of all Americans and 
of not a few Englishmen concerning the harsh treatment 
by the English authorities of American prisoners of war. 
By way of remedy for the evils complained of, he con- 
ceived the idea of seizing some Englishman of rank and 
repute and holding him as a hostage until the condition 
of the prisoners was ameliorated. The time and the place 
seemed favourable to his design. Baffled at White- 



194 PAUL JONES 

haven, and yet having spread terror and consternation 
far and wide, he struck across to the Bay of Kirkcud<- 
bright, and there anchored off St. Mary's Isle, the seat 
of the Earl of Selkirk. He desired by this prompt change 
of scene to spread the impression abroad that there was 
more than one American warship on the coast, but he 
had also another purpose in view. This, together with 
the proceedings which ensued, are perhaps best described 
in a very characteristic letter — bombastic or chivalrous 
according as we view it, and certainly highflown in any 
view of it — ^which he wrote to Lady Selkirk on the day 
of his return to Brest : 

Madam, — It cannot be too much lamented, that, in 
the profession of arms, the ofiEicer of fine feelings and 
real sensibility should be under the necessity of winldi^ 
at any action of persons under hb command, which his 
heart cannot approve, but the reflection is doubly severe, 
when he finds himself obliged in appearance to counte- 
nance such acts by his authority. 
' This hard case was mine, when on the 23rd of April 
last, I landed on St. Mary's Isle. Knowing Lord Sel- 
kirk's influence with the King, and esteeming as I do his 
private character, I wished to make him the happy instru- 
ment of alleviating the horrors of hopeless captivity, 
when the brave are overpowered and made prisoners of 
war. It was perhaps fortunate for you, madam, that 
he was from home ; for it was my intention to have taken 
him on board the Ranger and to have detained him until, 
through his means, a general and fair exchange of prisoners, 
as well in Europe as in America, had been effected. When 
I was informed by some men whom I met at landing, 
that his lordship was absent, I walked back to my boat, 
determined to leave the island. By the way, however, 
some officers, who were with me, could not forbear express- 
ing their discontent, observing that, in America, no deli- 
cacy was shown by the English, who took away all sorts 
of moveable property ; setting fire, not only to towns, 
but to the houses of the rich, without distinction, and not 
even sparing the wretched hamlets and mildi-cows of the 
poor and helpless at the approach of an inclement winter. 



JONES AND LADY SELKIRK igS 

That party had been with me, the same moming, at 
\^tehaven ; some complaisance, therefore, was their 
due. I had but a moment to think how I might gratify 
them, and at the same time do your ladyship the least 
injury. I charged the two officers to permit none of the 
seamen to enter the house, or to hurt anything about it ; 
to treat you, madam, with the utmost respect ; to accept 
of the plate which was offered, and to come away with- 
out making a search, or demanding anything else. I am 
induced to believe that I was punctually obeyed. . • . 
I have gratified my men ; and when the plate is sold, I 
shall become the purchaser, and will gratify my own 
feelings by restoring it to you, by such conveyance as you 
shall please to direct. 

The rest of the letter need not be quoted at length ; 
one or two sentences of it have been cited already. It 
contains a bombastic description of the action, shortly 
to be mentioned, between the Ranger and the Drake, and 
concludes with a rhetorical appeal to Lady Selkirk, " to 
use your persuasive arts, with your husband's, to endea- 
vour to stop this cruel and destructive war in which 
Britain can never succeed." As to the plate, Jones 
redeemed his pledge, and it ultimately found its way, after 
many vicissitudes, back to St. Mary's Isle. It is said 
that Jones expended some 1C140 out of his own pocket over 
the transaction. 

Before his descent on Whitehaven, Jones had at- 
tempted to surprise and capture the Drake, an ill-manned 
and ill-equipped sloop of war which was serving as guard- 
ship off Carrickfergus in Belfast Lough. He intended to 
anchor alongside and carry the Drake by boarding ; but 
owing to some miscarriage with the anchor, the attempt 
failed and the Ranger stood out to sea. The morning 
after the raid on St. Mary's Isle, the Ranger was again 
cruising o£F Belfast Lough and, this time, the Drake was 
not slow to accept the challenge. Working out of the 
Lough against a contrary wind, she came within hail of 
the Ranger late in the afternoon, and the action inmie- 
diately b^an. In a httle more than an hour the Drak0 



196 PAUL JONES 

was reduced to a wreck by the Ranger's fire at dose 
nmge, her commandmg officer was dead, her second-in- 
command was dying, and she hauled down her flag. 
It was not a very glorious victory in itself, for though 
the two ships were about equal in armament/ the DnJks 
was ill prepared for the fight ; and though she was very 
gallantly fought, she was overpowered by the superior 
gunnery of the Ranger. In the biography of Jones, con- 
tributed by Sir John Laughton to the Dictionary of 
National Biography, it is stated that " in reality the Drake 
was no match for the Ranger ; and at this time her crew 
was mainly composed of newly raised men without any 
officers except her captain and the registering lieutenant 
of the district, who came on board at the last moment as 
a volunteer. She had no gunner, no cartridges filled, 
and no preparation for handing the powder." Neverthe- 
less, since she left her anchorage for the purpose of chal- 
lenging and fighting the Ranger, it must be presumed 
that she was stationed there for fighting purposes. If 
she was too ill equipped to fight a ship of her own size 
and armament, she had no business to be there at all. 
It b remarked by Captain Mahan that the capital fault 
of the strategic policy of England during the War of 
American Independence was that she *' tried to protect 
all parts of her scattered empire by dividing the fleet 
among them." On a small scale we have a significant 
illustration of thb faulty distribution in the stationing 
of the Drake off Carrickfergus. The illustration is not 
without warning when the policy of " showing the flag " 
by scattering war-ships of little or no fighting value all 

' It was stated at the court-martial on the Draks's survivors tbat her 
twenty gons were only fonr-ponnders. But the archives of the French 
Admiralty contain evidence that when she was sold as a prise at Brest, her 
battery was described as " seise pitees de neuf livres de balle et quatre pitees 
de quatre.*' This is corroborated by Jones's own account ci the engagement. 
The Ranger's armament, as altered by Jones while fitting her out, was fourteen 
long nine-pounders and four six-pounders. Her complement was 126 officers 
and men ; that of the Draks was, according to Jones, 157. But several of 
these were hastily drafted from the shore. 



THE RANGER AND THE DRAKE 197 

over the world is still advocated by naval authorities 
of no mean repute. If — quod absit — ^we were ever to be 
at war with the United States again, of what use would 
it be to have stationed in the Western Atlantic a squadron 
so weak that it must abandon its station as soon as hos- 
tilities were imminent ? To " show the flag " in any 
quarter, by means of weak and practically non-combatant 
war-ships, is just as futile, and just as likely to lead to 
humiliation in the event of serious hostilities. 

For the capture of the Drake was a humiliation to 
British naval arms even if it was a foregone conclusion 
in the circumstances. It was the first blow — shortly to 
be followed by a still more mortifying one — struck by 
the American Navy on this side of the Atlantic, and in 
what might well have been regarded as the least acces- 
sible of British waters. It was a proof that the views of 
Paul Jones concerning the best mode of conducting the 
war at sea were as sound as they were original. It showed 
that the British Navy was not invulnerable to skill and 
daring even in its own waters. It consolidated the alliance 
between France and the United States. Its direct effects, 
moreover, were not disproportionate to these its larger 
consequences. To quote Disraeli again, it produced 

a consternation in the minds of the inhabitants of the 
surrounding coasts quite unparalleled. The descent upon 
Whitehaven — ^the expedition to St. Mary's, and the bold- 
ness of its avowed object — ^the capture of the Drake 
followed with such rapidity, that the public mind was 
perfectly thunderstruck. Rumour increased the terror 
for which there was but good reason. The daily journals 
teemed hourly with circumstantial accounts of strange 
seventy-fours seen in the Channel — of expeditions which 
were never planned — ^and destruction which never 
occurred I In one night Paul Jones was in all parts of 
England, and his dreadful name was sufficient reason for 
surveys of fortifications, and subscriptions to build them. 
At Whitehaven they subscribed upwards of a thousand 
pounds, and engineers were immediately ordered down 
to take a survey of the harbour, in order to erect some 



198 PAUL JONES 

works on the north side of it. Four companies were im- 
mediately ordered to Whitehaven, and a company of 
Gentleman Volunteers was also formed there. 



Jones forthwith repaired his own damages and patched 
up those of his prize, and as the alarm had now been 
thoroughly given and it was certain that a superior British 
force would very soon be on his tracks, he made the best 
of his way round the west coast of Ireland, making for 
Brest. He reached that port on May 8, and was received 
with every mark of honour by the naval authorities of 
the port. Shortly afterwards Jones turned over the 
Ranger to his second-in-command, and she was ordered 
back to the United States. Jones then spent several 
months in France, and mainly in Paris, endeavouring to 
obtain a more important command, either directly under 
the French Government, now allied with the United 
States, or, through its agency^ under the flag of the United 
States. In these endeavours he experienced frequent 
disappointments. He was not generally popular in the 
Frendi Navy, though he had many warm friends amoi^ 
its superior officers, and the French Ministry constantly 
deluded him with promises which it had very little inten- 
tion of fulfilling. But Jones was not to be baffled by 
official indifference. He had many friends at Court, 
among whom the most devoted were the Due and Duchesse 
de Chartres, especially the latter. Whatever may have 
been Jones's defects, moral and personal, in society he 
was iiresistible — even in the fastidious and exclusive 
society of the ancien rigtme in France. This we have 
' imony of Franklin himself, who, in 1 780, intro- 
s to the Comtesse d'Houdetot in the following 
lo matter what the faults of Commodore Jones 
. I must confess to your ladyship that when 
; with him no man, nor, so far as I can learn, 
I for a moment resist the strange magnetism of 
e, the indescribable charm of his manner ; a. 
g of the most compliant deference with the 



JONES AT THE FRENCH COURT 199 

most perfect self-esteem I have ever seen in a man ; and 
above all, the sweetness of his voice and the purity of his 
language." A man so gifted could afiford to smile at 
official indifference and knew how to counteract it. On 
the suc^estion of the Due de Chartres he drafted a letter 
to the King of France, bespeaking his countenance and 
assbtance. This draft he submitted to Franklin, who 
returned it without comment or sanction, and, in fact, 
disclaimed all official responsibiUty, though he did not 
forbid Jones to present the letter nor in any way seek 
to persuade him not to present it. The letter was pre- 
sented to the King by the Duchesse de Chartres early in 
December, and on December 17, Jones was received in 
audience. The result was that de Sartine, the French 
Minister of Marine, who had hitherto baffled all Jones's 
attempts to obtain employment afloat, wrote to Jones 
on February 4, 1779, to tell him that " His Majesty has 
thought proper to place under your command the ship 
Ls Duras, of forty guns, now lying at L'Orient." The 
ship was to be armed and fitted out at the cost of the 
French Government, and Jones was authorized to enlist 
French volunteers for her crew should he find it impos- 
sible to obtain American subjects in sufficient numbers 
to complete her complement. The Duchesse de Chartres, 
whose private fortune was immense, now again showed 
her friendship for Jones by insisting on placing a sum of 
10,000 louis — ^not far short of equivalent to the same 
number of pounds sterUng — to his credit. Jones accepted 
it reluctantly, and resolved to r^ard it as a loan. But 
when, some years later, his circumstances would have 
enabled him to repay the loan^ he asked the Due d 'Orleans, 
as the Due de Chartres had then become, if the Duchesse 
would allow him to do so, the Due replied, " Not unless 
you wish her to dismiss you from her esteem and banish 
you from her salon. She did not lend it to you ; she 
gave it to the cause.'' 

The Duras was a worn-out East Indiaman which the 
Fofench Government had purchased and partially refitted 



200 PAUL JONES 

as an armed transport. It took Jones several months to 
get her into fighting trim as a man-of-war. He renamed 
her the Bon Homme Richard, out of compliment to Frank- 
lin, his revered friend and patron, who had employed 
the pseudonym of ** Poor Richard " for several of his 
publications. Her burden was about i,ooo tons, and 
when Jones put to sea in her she carried an armament 
of forty-two guns, namely six eighteen-pounders on a 
lower gun-deck, twenty-eight long twelve-pounders on 
the gun-deck proper, and eight long nine-pounders on 
the quarter-dedc. This, said Jones, '* made her, with the 
eighteen-pounders, a fair equivalent of a thirty-six gun 
frigate ; or without them, the equal of a thirty-two as 
usually rated in the regular rate-lists of the English and 
French Navies." Her crew was a very miscellaneous one, 
for Jones had to man her as best he could. " Not more 
than fifty," he records, *' including officers, were Ameri- 
cans. A hundred and ninety odd were aliens, partly 
recruited from British prisoners of war, partly Portuguese, 
and a few French sailors and fishermen. In addition to 
these 240 seamen, I shipped 122 French soldiers who were 
allowed to volunteer from the garrison, few or none of 
whom had before served aboard ship, and the conunandant 
of the dockyard loaned me twelve r^ular marines, whom 
I made non-conmiissioned officers. . . . My reason for 
shipping such a large number was that I meditated de- 
scents on the enemy's coasts, and also that I wished to 
be sure of force enpugh to keep my mixed and motley 
crew of seamen in order." ^ The Ban Homme Richard 



^ It 13 not pleasant to note that English subjects should have shipped under 
an enemy's flag, even though they obtained release from captivity by so 
doing. But otherwise the miscellaneous character of the crew of the Ban 
Homme Richard will cause little surprise to students of naval history. Thirty 
yean later, in 1808, Captain, afterwaxds Admiral, Sir Byam BCartin, who 
commanded the Implacable in the Baltic, gave the following description of 
the crew of that ship. " I have j ust now been amusing myself in ascertaining 
the diverrity of human beings wlidch compose the crew of a British man-of-war. 
and, as I think you wUITm entertained with a statement of the ridiculous 
medley, it shall follow prediely as their place of nativity is inserted in tin 






CHARACTER OF LANDAIS 201 

was to be the flag-ship of a small squadron, of which 
Jones, flying the American flag, was conmiodore, the 
other ships being the Alliance, commanded by Pierre 
Landais, also bearing an American commission, a new 
American frigate carrying a gun-deck battery of twenty-six 
long twelve-pounders and ten long nine-pounders above ; 
the Pallas, a smaller frigate, commanded by a French 
officer named Cottineau, and armed with twenty-two long 
nine-pounders, and ten long six-pounders ; and the 
Vengeance, a twelve-gun brig carrying six-pounders, com- 
manded by a Frenchman named Ricot. Landais was a 
reckless and unscrupulous adventurer who had been 
cashiered from the French Navy, and having made his 
way to America had foisted himself on the United States 
naval authorities as an officer of high distinction. Ac- 
cepted at his own valuation, he was given the conmiand 
of the Alliance which brought Lafayette back to France. 
Disloyal, insubordinate, quarrelsome, self-willed, and self- 
seeking, Landais .proved a traitor to his adopted flag 
during the cruise of the squadron, and on its arrival at 
the Texel, after the famous fight with the Serapis in 
which he bore a very equivocal part, he was deprived of 
his command by Jones and ordered by Franklin to report 
himself in Paris. Later, through the machinations of 
Arthur Lee, one of the American Commissioners in Europe, 
he was restored to the command of the Alliance, in which 
Arthur Lee, having ceased to be a member of the Euro- 
pean Conmiission, was to take passage to the United 
States. Franklin stoutly contested this arrangement, 
and peremptorily forbade Landais, who had been ordered 

■hip's books : English 285, Irish 130, Welsh 25, Isle of Man 6, Soots 29, 
Shetland 3, Orknejrs 2, Guernsey 2, Canada i, Jamaica i, Trinidad x, St. 
Domingo 2, St. Kitts i. Martinique i, Santa Gnu i, Bermuda i, Swedes 8, 
Panes 7, Prussians 8, Dutch x, Germans 3, Corsica i, Portuguese 5. Sicily 1, 
Minorca x, Ragusa i. Brazils i, Spanish 2, Madeira x, Americans 28, West 
Indies 2, Bengal 2. This statement does not include ofllcers ci any description, 
and may be considered applicable to every British ship with the exception 
that vtry few of them have so many noHvs subjects." — Lsit$rs of Sir T. Bymm 
MturHn, vol. tt.. Navy Records Society, 1898. 



«o3 PAUL JONES 

for trial by court^nartial on his arrival in the United 
States, to " usurp command of the AUianct." The 
French Government gave or^sn that if the ship attempted 
to leave L'Orient under the command of Landais the 
ccHnmandant of the port was to stop her at all hazards, 
even if it was necessary to sink her by a cannonade from 
the forts. Jones, who was in Paris at the time, was 
infonned of this order, and forthwith proceeded with all 
haste to L'Orient, where he succeeded in persuading the 
commandant to suspend the orders to fire. " M. de 
Thevienard," he reported to Franklin, " had made every 
necessary prq>aration to stop the AUianct, ... He had 
the evening before sent orders to the forts to fire on the 
AlUoHct, and, if necessary, to sink her to the bottom 
if they attempted to pass or even approach the barrio' 
across the entrance of the port. Had I remained silent 
an hour longer the dreadful work would have been done. 
Your humanity will, I know, justify the part I acted in 
preventing a scene that would have rendered me miser- 
able for the rest of my life. At my request, and on my 
agreeing to take the whole responsibility, the Chevaliw 
de Tbevenard suspended the orders to fire, and the AUiane* 
was permitted to b6 warped and towed through the rocks, 
and is now at anchor in the outer roads." The AUianc* 
sailed the next day, with Lee on board and Landais in 
command. But the latter soon showed his cross-grained 
and even crazy disposition by shaping a course for the 
Azores, and declaring his intention of cruising in the West 
Indies. Lee, thereupon, resuming his resigned authority 
a* a rnrntnissioner of the United States, took upon him- 
clare Landais insane — he had graduated M.D. 
u^h — and ordered the second-in-command to 
re of the ship. On the arrival of the AUianct 
, a court of inquiry was held and Landais was 
mfit to command. He never served in the 
Navy again. Jones has often been represented 
Isome, headstrong, vindictive, and relentless. 
that Landais was a knave and a traitor; he 



THE SQUADRON PUTS TO SEA 303 

knew also that Lee was bitterly hostile to himself, and 
he believed him to be a traitor to his country. He had 
only to remain passive, and the French guns of L'Orient 
would have rid the world of both. But hp entertained 
no thought of private vengeance when the public interests 
were at stake. He knew that the destruction of the 
Alliance would not only sacrifice the lives of more than 
two hundred valiant and loyal seamen, but might gravely 
prejudice that alliance between France and the United 
States on which so much was to depend, and of which 
the very name of the ship was the conunemorative sjrmbol. 
When all this is considered, it must, I think, be conceded 
that Jones was, at any rate, no mere swashbuckler. 

The little squadron first put to sea on June 19, but 
returned to port within a few days, the Bon Homme 
Richard and the Alliance having fouled each other in a 
violent storm off Cape Finisterre. Landais was after- 
wards charged with having wilfully caused this mis- 
adventure, but his guilt was never judicially established. 
Six weeks were occupied in repairing the damaged ships, 
but the delay was not disadvantageous in the end. An 
exchange had just been arranged between certain Ameri- 
can prisoners confined in England and the English prisoners 
whom Jones had brought to France after the capture of 
the Drake. Nearly all the American prisoners Uberated 
were enlisted by Jones for service in his squadron, and a 
corresponding number of the aliens originally shipped 
were discharged. Jones thus acquired the services of 
many officers and petty officers who afterwards fought so 
gallantly and even desperately in the fight with the 
Serapis. Prisoners of war received no very gentle treat- 
ment in England in those days, and American prisoners 
in particular, being regarded as rebels rather than pri- 
soners, were probably treated more harshly than the 
rest. Jones, in one of his letters, speaks of a certain 
Captain Cunningham, an American naval officer who 
was "confined at Plymouth, in a dungeon and in fetters." 
It was, as we have seen, in order to secure a hostage for 
16 



204 PAUL JONES 

the better treatment of American prisoners in England 
that Jones had planned to carry off the Earl of Selkirk 
from St. Maiy's Isle. Anyhow, the liberated Americans 
were animated by a bitter spirit of resentment ; and 
wh^n one of them, John Mayrant, led the boarders of the 
Ban Homme Richard over the side of the Serapis, he did 
so to the cry of " Remember Portsea jail I " Naturally 
enough they fought with desperation when the time 
came. At the court-martial which was held on the sur- 
render of the SerapiSf her captain was asked to what he 
attributed the " extraordinary and unheard-of desperate 
stubbornness " of his adversaries. " I do not know, sir," 
was his reply, *' unless it was because our Government, 
in its inscrutable wisdom, had allowed, if it did not cause, 
the impression to be spread abroad that Captain Jones 
and his crew would be held pirates or, at least, not entitled 
to the usages of civilized war." There is, indeed, little 
doubt that, had Jones been worsted in that memorable 
encounter, he and his followers might have ended their 
days on a British gallows. On his arrival at the Texel 
after the battle he was denounced to the States-General 
by the British Ambassador at the Hague as '' a certain 
Paul Jones, a subject of the King, who, according to 
treaties and the laws of war, can only be considered as a 
rebel and a pirate." 

Early in August the squadron was again ready for sea. 
Just before it set sail on August 14 Jones was compelled 
— apparently at the instance of Le Ray de Chaumont, 
the French naval commissary of the squadron — to sign 
a so-called " Concordat," which placed the control of the 
squadron under a sort of cduncil of war composed of all 
the captains. In a letter to his friend Hewes, Jones de- 
nounced this Concordat — which out of politic regard for 
the exigencies of the French alliance Franklin had sanc- 
tioned and induced Johes to accept — as " the most amazing 
document that the putative commander of a naval force 
in time of war was ever forced to sign on the eve of 
weighing anchor ; " and declared that, by signing it, he 



THE CONCORDAT jos 

was unable to see that he had done less than " surrender 
all military right of seniority, or that he had any real 
r^ht to consider his flag-ship anything more than a 
convenient rendezvous where the captains of the other 
ships may assemble, whenever it pleases them to do so, 
for the purpose of talking over and agreeing — ^if they can 
agree — ^upon a course of sailing or a plan of operations 
from time to time/' Nevertheless he signed it. It added 
greatly to his difficulties, but it did not prevent his 
triiunphing over them in the end. Indeed, by lending 
some cloak to the disloyalty of Landais, it may have 
averted an open rupture between the choleric commodore 
and his intractable lieutenant, though it certainly put 
little or no restraint upon the insubordination and inde- 
pendence of the latter. Be this as it may, it is, as Mr. 
Buell truly says, by no means the least merit of Jones's 
famous achievement off Flamborough Head, " that his 
genius, sorely tried as it had been by other obstacles, 
finally rose superior to even Le Ray de Chaumont's 
' Concordat.' " 

VI 

The moment was not ill-chosen for a raid in British 
waters. Jones had clearly before his mind the advan- 
tages of a diversion effected at this particular juncture. 
England was already fighting at sea in two hemispheres, 
and was hard put to it to hold her own. Spain had con- 
cluded an alliance with France, and had declared war 
against England on June i6, 1779. D'Orvilliers, with a 
fleet of twenty-eight sail of the line — ^the fleet with which 
he had bafikd Keppel the year before — ^had put out from 
Brest unopposed, and before the end of July he had 
effected his junction with the Spanish fleet off the Penin- 
sula and made at once for the Channel with a combined 
fleet of no fewer than sixty-six sail of the line. By 
August 16 he was off Pl3rmouth, Admiral Sir Charles Hardy, 
who was on the look-out for him with the Channel Fleet 
of only thirty-eight ships, having missed him by taking 



9o6 PAUL JONES 

station too far to the westward and southward of ScUly. 
I have examined this situation at some length in the pre- 
ceding essay on Duncan.^ For many days D'Orvilliers 
remained unchallenged in the Channel, and it was not 
until September i that the two fleets came in sight of 
each other near the Eddjrstone. But Hardy declined 
to risk an action, and D'OrviUi^^ did not attempt to 
force one. Divided counsels, distracted and vacillating 
plans of campaign, the indifferent equipment of both the 
allied fleets and a raging sickness among their crews 
compelled, or at any rate induced, him to retreat, and 
Hardy, not less ingloriously, anchored his fleet at Spit- 
head on September 3. It was just at this very time that 
Jones entered the North Sea with his squadron, having 
passed to the westward outside Ireland and the Hebrides. 
On the morning of the 17th he was off the Firth of Forth, 
and this was probably the first intimation of his proceed- 
ings and whereabouts that was likely to reach the British 
Government. It was not merely luck that thus gave 
him his opportunity. It was, at least in some measure, 
astute calculation as well. He knew that so long as 
D'Orvilliers was at sea and aiming at the Channel there 
would be very few ships to spare to cruise at laige in 
remoter British waters. 

The first part of the cruise was comparatively unevent- 
ful save for the occasional capture of prizes, which were 
sent into various ports, French, Danish; and Dutch, their 
crews being detained as prisoners on board the Bon Homme 
Richard. It thus came about that when Jones engaged 
the Serapis he had more than two hundred British prisoners 
confined under hatches.' Off the west coast of Ireland the 

* Sec pp. X33-*. 

* The recovery of the prise-money due for these prises and others taJcen 
in his earlier cruise gave rise to much tedious and intricate negotiation, in 
which Jones took an active part in later years as a Special Commissioner 
appointed by the United States for the puxi)ose. I do not propose to deal 
at any length with this part of Jones's career, and need only remark here 
that in the conduct a( the negotiations Jones displayed remaricaUe patience, 
perseverance, and diplomatic address, and handled the many difficult questions 
of international and maritime law involved -with the touch of a master. 



THE CRUISE BEGUN 207 

squadron encountered a gale, and the Alliance became 
detached. But on September i she was sighted off 
Cape Wrath, having just taken one prize and being then 
in pursuit of another, which Jones helped her to capture. 
Jones ordered Landais to send these prizes to Brest or 
L'Orient, but Landais, after nightfall, directed them to 
make for Bergen, where they were forthwith seized and 
restored to the British Government, the Kingdom of 
Denmark, which at that time included Norway, not hav- 
ing recognised the United States and being wholly under 
the influence of England. Jones subsequently expended 
much tedious and fruitless negotiation in an endeavour 
to obtain compensation from the Danish Government 
for the seizure of these prizes. 

The squadron now cruised along the east coast of 
Scotland, taking a few small prizes, and on September iQ 
it was off the Firth of Forth. Jones here attempted to 
make a descent on Leith, but was baffled by a gale which 
sprang up just as his boats were being lowered for the 
attack, and drove him out to sea. In this attempt the 
Alliance took no part, Landais having by this time ceased 
to attend to the commodore's signals, and begun to main- 
tain an entirely independent attitude. Baffled at Leith 
by the weather, Jones pursued his course to the south- 
ward, giving Spurn Head as his rendezvous. He knew 
that a British convoy from the Baltic was due about this 
season of the year, and that it generally made its landfall 
at Flamborough Head after crossing the North Sea. He 
intended to intercept it if he could, but his intentions 
were only partially fulfilled, for the convoy escaped. He 
got news of the convoy on the evening of September 22, 
when he was off the Spurn and intending the next morn- 
ing to attack a fleet of colliers windbound and anchored in 
the mouth of the Humber. The Vengeance brought him 
word that the Baltic convoy had put into Bridlington Bay 
and was there awaiting a favourable wind to carry it to 
the Downs. The Pallas was then in company, and the 
Alliance was hull down to the southward. Jones at once 



JOS PAUL JONES 

sent the Veptgeance to give Landais a rendezvous off 
Flamborough Head, and forthwith made sail thither with 
the Pallas in company. He reached the rendezvous before 
dayhght, and there hove to for a time to enable his con- 
sorts to come up with him. The morning was occupied in 
successive manoeuvres for position, which need not be 
recounted in detail. It suffices to say that the convoy 
was so handled that it had weathered Flamborough Head 
so as to fetch Scarborough before Jones could get into 
position to intercept it, and that its escorting men-of-war, 
the Serapis and the Countess of Scarborough, had occupied 
a covering position between Jones and hk intended prey. 
But Jones was not to be baffled. If he could not reach 
the convoy itself, he would try conclusions with its escort. 
The Serapis, having seen the convoy safe to leeward, 
awaited his onslaught, with the Countess of Scarborough 
under her lee. Jones ordered the Pallas to attack the 
latter, and prepared himself to attack the Serapis, order- 
ing the Vengeance at the same time to keep out of harm's 
way. " You are not big enough," he said, " to bear a 
hand in this.'* The Countess of Scarborough was a hired 
vessel, temporarily commissioned as a man-of-war, carry- 
ing twenty-four guns. She was no match for the Pallas, 
and was overpowered by the latter and compelled to 
surrender, after a gallant action in which both vesseb 
suffered severely. The Alliance was in the offing, but her 
treacherous captain took very little share in the action — 
enough, indeed, to afford the captain of the Serafns some 
colourable pretext of having surrendered to a superior 
force, and more than enough to furnish proof of his mahg^ 
nant treachery by firing only when he was much more 
likely to hurt the Richard than to hit the Serapis. Soon 
after 7 p.m. the two chief combatants, the Serapis and 
the Richard, were within short range of each other abeam, 
some seven miles due east of Flamborough Head, the 
wind being light from the S.S.W. and veering to the 
westward, the sea smooth, the sky clear, and die moon 
full, both ships going free on the same tack and heading 



THE RICHARD AND THE SERAPIS 209 

approximately N.W., the Richard holding the weather- 
gage. The Serapis twice hailed the Richard, and the 
second time was answered with a broadside. 



VII 

Then ensued a conflict the like of which has seldom 
been seen on the seas. 

" The Serapis, forty guns," says Disraeli, " was one of 
the finest frigates in his Majesty's Navy, and had been 
oflP the stocks only a few months. Her crew were picked 
men, and she was commanded by Captain Richard Pear- 
son, an officer celebrated even in the British Navy for 
his undaunted courage and exemplary conduct. The 
Bon Homme Richard was an old ship with decayed timbers, 
and had made four voyages to the East Indies. Many of 
her guns were useless, and all were ancient. Her crew 
consisted partly of Americans, partly of French, and 
partly of Maltese, Portugueze, and even Malays ; and 
this crew was weak also in numbers, for two boats' crews 
had been lost on the coast of Ireland. . . . The Portugueze 
and the other foreigners could speak neither French nor 
English, and chattering in their native tongues, with- 
out ceasing, added not a little to the difficulties which 
presented themselves. The American commander had 
nothing to trust to but his own undaunted courage and 
extraordinary skill." 

There are some slight inaccuracies, and even some 
picturesque exaggerations in this contrast, but in the 
main it is just. Perhaps no man who ever lived except 
Jones could have handled such a crew as he did. This, 
indeed, is the generous and unsolicited testimony of 
Pearson himself, who stated in his evidence before the 
court-martial which tried and acquitted him for the loss 
of his ship, that although more than half the crew of the 
Ban Hopnme Richard *' were French — or at any rate not 
Americans," yet '' long before the close of the action it 
became clearly apparent that the American ship was 



2IO PAUL JONES 

dominated by a commanding will of the most unalterable 
resolution, and there could be no doubt that the intention 
of her commander was, if he could not conquer, to sink 
alongside. And thb desperate resolve of the American 
captain was fully shared and fiercely seconded by every 
one of his ship's company. And, if the Honourable Court 
may be pleased to entertain an expression of opinion, 
I will venture to say that if French seamen can ever be 
induced by their own officers to fight in their own ships 
as Captain Jones induced them to fight in his American 
ship, the future burdens of his Majesty's Navy will be 
heavier than they have heretofore been." * 

The broadside of the Richard was answered almost 
simultaneously by that of the Serapts, and the firing con- 
tinued with fury on both sides. In a very short time the 
Richard's lower tier of eighteen-pounders was put out of 
action, some of the guns being dismounted and the rest 
disabled in various ways, not without grave injury to the 
structiu*e of the ship. They were old guns, which had 
been condemned as of no further use in the French Navy, 

1 It is worth while to record on the testimony of one of his own officeis. 
Henry Gardner, how Jones achieved this result. Gardner says : 

I sailed, in my time, with many captains ; but with only one Paul Tones. 
He was the captain cA captains. Any other commander I sailed with had 
some kind of method or fixed rule which he exerted towards aU those under 
him alike. It suited some, and others not ; but it was the same rule all the 
time and to everybody. Not so Paul Jones. He always knew every officer 
or man in his crew as one friend knows anotiier. Those big black eyes of his 
would look right through a new man at first sight, and, maybe, see something 
behind him 1 At any rate, he knew every man, and always dealt with each 
according to his notion. I have seen him one hour teaching the French 
language to his midshipmen, and the next hour showing an apprentice how 
to knot a " Turk's-head " or make a neat coil-down of a painter. He was in 
everybody's watch, and everybody's mess all the time. In fact, I may say 
that any ship Paul Jones commanded was full of him, himself, all the time. 
The men used to get crasy about him when he was with them and talking to 
them. It was only when his back was turned that any one could wean them 
away from him. If yon heard peals of laughter from the forecastle, it was 
likely that he was there spinning funny yams for Jack off watch. If you 
heard a roar of merriment at the cabin-table, it was likely that his never- 
failing wit had overwhelmed the officers' mess. 

He was very strict. I have seen him stemlv reprove a young sailor, who 
approached him, for what he called " a lubber s walk " ; say to him, " See 
here, this is the way to walk." And then, after putting the novice through 
his paces two or three times* he woidd say to him : Ah, that's better ! 



THE RICHARD'S GUNS SILENCED dii 

and they only fired eight shots in all. " Three of them," 
says Jones, " burst at the first fire, killing almost all the 
men who were stationed to manage them/' The remain- 
ing guns on the main and upper decks of the Richard were 
serviceable and were very well served. But they were 
overmatched by the superior armament of the Serapis. 
After about half an hour of this furious cannonade Pear- 
son tried to get athwart the Richard's hawse, so as to rake 
her and possibly to secure the weather-gage on the oppo- 
site tack. But this attempt failed, bafiled apparently by 
the veering of the wind. Pearson accordingly bore up 
again to leeward, but not soon enough to prevent the 
Richard fouling the Serapis^ the jib-boom of the former 
engaging with the mizen-rigging of the latter. Jones at 
once attempted to grapple, but though his grapnels caught 
they failed to hold, and the ships fell apart again. The 
cannonade was then renewed as furiously as ever, and it 
was very soc n plain enough that the Richard was getting 
by far the worst of it. *' Dick," said Jones to Richard 

Yonll be a blue-water sailor before yott kxiow it, my boy 1 " And thea he 
would give the shipmate a guinea out of his own pocket. 

Above all things he hated the cat-o'-nine-tails. In two of his ships — the 
Providence and the Ranger — ^he threw it overboard the first dav out. There 
was one in the Alfred that he never allowed to be used, and two in the Rtdkatd 
that were never used but twice. He consented to flog the lookout forward 
when the Richard fouled the Alliance the second day out from L'Orient ; and 
also he allowed old Jack Robinson to persuade him that two foretop-men 
ought to be whipped for laying from aloft without orden when the sauall 
struck us in the Rtchard off LeiUi. But when he consented to this he stnctly 
enjoined upon old Jack that the men must be flogged with their shirts on, 
which, of course, made a farce of the whole proceeding. He said at this time : 
" I have no use for the cat. Whenever a sailor of mine gets vicious beyond 
my persuasion or control, the cheapest thing in the long run is to kiU htm 
right away. If 3rou do that, the others will undentand it. But if 3rou trice 
him up and flog him, all the other bad fellows in the ship will sympathise 
with him and hate you." 

All the men under his command soon learned this trait in his character. 
One Sunday when we were off the west coast of Irdand, lust after we had 
lost the baige and Mr. Lunt, he addressed the crew on the suoject of discipline. 
He told them that, many years before, when he was a boy m the merchant- 
service, he had seen a man " flogged round the fleet " at P6rt Royal, Jamaica. 
He said the man died under the lash ; and he then made up lus mind that 
Paul Jones and the cat-o'-nine-tails would part company. ^ I tell you, my 
men," he said, " once for all, that when I become convinced that a sailor of 
mint must be killed, I will not leave it to be done by boatswsin's mates under 
slow torture of the lash I But I will do it myself-— and so G-^ d — qmck tiiat 
it will make your heads swim I " 



212 PAUL JONES 

Dale, his first lieutenant in command of the gun-deck, 
** his metal is too heavy for us at this business. He is 
hammering us all to pieces. We must close with him ; 
we must get hold of him t Be prepared at any moment 
to abandon this deck and bring what men you have left 
on the spar«<ieck — and give them the small arms for 
boarding when you come up." Already there were three 
or four feet of water in the hold, and the ship had sunk 
to at least two feet below her ordinary trim. But a 
change was at hand. The wind continued to veer, and 
to freshen as it veered, the Richard getting the advantage 
of it first so as to weather the Serapis and stop her way 
by taking the wind out of her sails. Meanwhile the 
eannonade continued, and the gun-deck of the Richard 
was in turn abandoned, so that she could now only fire 
with a few of her quarter-deck guns. Gradually the 
Richard forged ahead and began to wear across the bows 
of the Serapis. If she could complete thij manoeuvre 
before the Serapis recovered her way, she would have 
another opportunity to grapple, and should that manoeuvre 
succeed, the fortune of the day might still be reversed. 

It was at this critical juncture that Landais thought 
proper to take a hand in the game. The Alliance came 
up to windward, and when on the Richard's port-quarter, 
about two cables away, she fired a couple of broadsides 
which in the relative position of the three ships could 
hardly have hit the Serapis and hardly have missed the 
Richard. She then sheered off out of gunshot, having 
done all the mischief she could. All this time Jones was 
pursuing his manoeuvre of getting ahead of the Serapis, 
crossing her bows, and rounding to on the opposite tack 
so as to lay his ship close alongside, and, since his guns 
were now mostly silenced, to bring his musketry into 
play. In this he succeeded, aided by a fortunate puff 
and favourable slant of the wind, which from the position 
of the two ships could not reach the sails of his adversary. 
Pearson thus describes the situation in his despatch to the 
Admiralty : " I backed our topsaib in order to get square 



) 



. •' 



m • 



-< 



- ^ RICHARD GRAPPLES SERAPIS 213 

3r with him again, which as soon as he observed, he then 
: 2 filled, put his helm a-weather and laid us athwart hawse ; 
- V his mizen shrouds took our jib-boom, which hung him for 
rz. some time, till it at last gave way, and we dropt alongside 
r^z of each other, head and stem, when the fluke of our spare 
r 2i anchor, hooking his quarter, we became so close, fore and 
jr: aft, that the muzzles of our guns touched each other's 
-:: sides. In this position we engaged from half-past eight 
-^: to half-past ten ; during which time, from the great 
^^ quantity and variety of combustible matters which they 
^2 threw in upon our decks, chains, and in short into every 
. .r part of the ship, we were on fire no less than ten or twelve 
jf times in different parts of the ship, and it was with the 
greatest difficulty and exertion imaginable at times that 
!, we were able to get it extinguished. At the same time 
I the largest of the two frigates kept sailing round us the 
whole action, and raking us fore and aft, by which means 
she killed or wounded almost every man on the quarter- 
and main-decks.'' It is only right to quote this testi- 
mony in regard to the action of Landais in the Alliance, 
though it may be observed that it was manifestly Pearson's 
interest to make out that he was defeated by two ships 
and not by one. There is, on the other hand, abundant 
American testimony to show that Landais' action was 
not continuous, and that on the two successive occasions 
vAten he opened fire he did so with little or no r^;ard to 
the immunity of the Richard, and with no chance at all of 
doing the Serapis more harm than he actually did to the 
Richard. 

No sooner had the anchor of the Serapis caught in the 
mizen-chains of the Richard than Jones had it securely 
lashed there, passing, it is said, some of the lashings with 
his own hand. The main-deck of the Richard had now 
been abandoned, for Jones had determined, as soon as 
he could grapple, to fight the battle out with musketry 
and hand-grenades. Only two or three guns on his 
quarter-deck were still serviceable, and these were trained 
on the mainmast of the Serapis. It was otherwise with 



214 PAUL JONES 

the Serapis. Her starboard broadside was now brought 
into action ; the gun's crews were shifted over, and as 
the starboard port-sills had been lowered and could not 
be triced up because the ships were so close together, they 
were blown out by the first discharge of the broadside. 
Thus the material destruction of the Richard went on 
apace. Nevertheless, Jones was now beginning to get 
the upper hand on deck. He kept up such a murderous 
fire from his small arms that scarcely a man could live 
on the deck of the Serapis^ and in particular he directed 
his personal efforts to frustrating every attempt made 
by the crew of the Serapis to cast loose the fastenings 
of the anchor which held her to the Richard. Neverthe- 
less, the Richard was fast getting lower in the water, and 
was frequently set on fire. " I had," says Jones, " two 
enemies to contend with besides the English — fire and 
water." It was probably at this stage of the action, though 
Pearson puts it later, that some one on board the Richard 
called for quarter. Thereupon, as Pearson said at the 
court-martial, '' Hearing, or thinking that I heard, a call 
for quarter from the enemy, I hailed to ask if he had 
struck his colours. I did not myself hear the reply ; but 
one of my midshipmen, Mr. Hood, did hear it, and soon 
reported it to me. It was to the effect that he was just 
beginning to fight. This I at first thought to be mere 
bravado on his part. But I soon perceived that it was 
the defiance of a man desi>erate enough, if he could not 
conquer, to sink with his ship alongside." But Jones 
was not going to sink until he had conquered the Serapis. 
The guns of the Serapis continued to pound the timbers 
of the Richard, but the musketry of the Richard continued 
to clear the decks of the Serapis. The ships were now 
drifting and swinging, and by this time, about half-past 
nine, the Serapis was nearly head to wind, — ^the wind 
being now at W.N.W., — ^and still paying off to leeward. 
It was in this situation that the master-at-arms of the 
Richard, believing that the ship was about to sink, opened 
the hatch below which the prisoners were confined and 



PEARSON'S DESPATCH 215 

bade them come on deck. Jones, who was at hand — ^he 
seems to have been ubiquitous during the fight — ^knocked 
the master-at-arms down and ordered the hatch to be 
again secured. Those who had escaped were ordered to 
man the pumps. One who refused was shot dead by 
Pierre Gerard, the commodore's French orderly, subse- 
quently a captain in the French Navy, who was second- 
in-command of the Neptune at Trafalgar.^ 

All this time the struggle for the mastery of the deck 
of the Serapis was proceeding with unabated fury, and 
Jones now sent up a supply of hand grenades into the 
main-top. These he directed the officers and men in the 
top to drop, if they could, from the yard-arm through 
the enemy's main-hatch. The expedient was successful, 
and practically decided the conflict. At the third at- 
tempt a midshipman named Fanning, who was outermost 
on the yard-arm, managed to drop his grenade through 
the hatch on to the main-deck of the Serapis, where it 
ignited and exploded a row of cartridges ranged all along 
the deck. " About half-past nine," says Pearson in his 
despatch, " either from a hand grenade being thrown in 
at one of our lower-deck ports, or from some other acci- 
dent, a cartridge of powder was set on fire, the flames of 
which, running from cartridge to cartridge all the way 
aft, blew up the whole of the people and ofiicers that 
were quartered abaft the mainmast ; from which un- 
fortunate circumstance all those guns were rendered 
useless for the remainder of the action, and I fear the 
greatest part of the people will lose their lives." Through- 
out this period of the action the two ships still continued 

> Jones was afterwards accused of mnrdering his prisonen. At a court 
of inqiiiry held by order of the French Minister of Marine at Jones's request, 
G6ranl explicitly stated that he killed the man on his own responsibility and 
without any orders from the commodore, who was standing by at the time. 
Asked farther why he did this in the immediate presence of his commanding 
officer and withont his orders, he replied : " Pour ^viter les d^ sa grtoents, 
monsieur ; aussi pour encourager les autres prisonnieis ; ainsi pour subvenir 
an Commodore les besoins d'un devoir asses p6nible." Evidently Gerard 
bad not been his commodore's orderiy for nothing. Also he had apparently 
read his Voltaire. 



dt6 PAUL JONES 

swinging until, about ten o'clock, the Serafns was heading 
nearly due south. Here the Alliance again put in an 
appearance^ She returned from the northward, running 
down again to leeward, and, as Jones stated in the formal 
charges he subsequently preferred against Landais, " in 
crossing the Richard's bows Captain Landais raked her 
with a third broadside, after being constantly called to 
from the Richard not to fire but to lay the enemy along- 
side." Pearson stated in his despatch that the Serapis 
also suffered heavily from this broadside of the Alliance, 
** without our being able to bring a gun to bear on her." 
This testimony is unimpeachable, but so also is the testi- 
mony which avers that the Richard received a full share 
of the same broadside. Anyhow, the Alliance, without 
attempting '' to lay the enemy alongside," ran off to 
leeward and took no further part in the action, nor did she 
attempt to destroy or capture any of the ships of the 
convoy. 

Before thb, Pearson, according to fai^ despatch, had 
attempted to board the Richard, but his boarders had 
been repuked by a superior number of the enemy '' laying 
under cover with pikes in their hands ready to receive 
them." He now anchored his ship, hoping that the 
enemy might drift clear as soon as the strain came on the 
cable. It was his last chance, but the lashings still held. 
It was now Jones's turn to board. He had collected a 
numerous boarding party of his best American seamen — 
men fresh from imprisonment in England — under the 
break of the quarter-deck, and bidden John Mayrant to 
lead them over the side as soon as he gave the signal. 
There was now very little fight left in the Serapis. Henry 
Gardner records that '' after the battle the prisoners said, 
without exception, they had no more stomach for fighting 
after tb^ explosion, and were induced to return to their 
guns and resume firing only by their strict discipline and 
the example of their first lieutenant, who told them that 
if they would hold out a few minutes longer, the Richard 
would surely sink." Jones, perceiving that their fire 



SURRENDER OF THE SERAPIS tif 

was slackening, and their spirit waning, shouted to May* 
rant, " Now is your time, John. Go in I " Instantly, 
with a cry of " Remember Portsea jail," Mayrant sprang 
over the netting, followed by his men, and began fighting 
his way aft. There was little resistance, though Mayrant 
himself, at the moment of onslaught, was wounded in the 
thigh by a pike. He shot his opponent down, and this 
was the last casualty of the action. Pearson, seeing that 
the boarders were steadily making their way aft and 
that further resistance was useless, now strudc his flag. 
Some accounts say that he hauled it down with his own 
hands. Anyhow, he says himself, " I found it in vain, 
and in short impracticable, from the situation we were 
in, to stand out any loi^r with the least prospeet of 
success ; I therefore struck (our mainmast at the same 
time went by the board)." It is true that he attributes 
his surrender mainly to the fire of the Alliance^ and does 
not mention the onslaught of Ma3rrant and his men. But, 
however the result may have been brought about, he 
frankly acknowledged himself beaten. He had foi^^ht 
manfully and skilfully to the finish, and with all the 
tenacity and endurance of British seamen at their best. 
But Jones had fought, as Pearson acknowledged at the 
court-martial, " with extraordinary and unheard-of des- 
perate stubbornness " ; and this, he added, " had so 
depressed the spirits of my people that when more than 
two hundred had been slain or disabled out of three 
hundred and seventeen all told, I could not urge the 
remnant to further resistance." Of course it may be 
urged that Jones and all his men fought with halters round 
their necks, and that this was the secret of their ** extra- 
ordinary and unheard-of desperate stubbornness." But 
it were more generous to acknowledge that Jones fought 
as he did because, being the man that he was, a man of 
Nelson's mould, he knew no other way of fighting. 

The cost of victory was appalling. I have quoted 
Pearson's account of the condition of his own ship when 
he hauled down his flag. Here is his account of the 



di8 PAUL JONES 

Richard : "On my going on board the Ban Homme 
Richard, I found her in great distress ; her quarters and 
counter on the lower deck entirely drove in, and the 
whole of her lower-deck guns dismounted ; she was also 
on fire in two places, and six or seven feet of water in 
her hold, which kept increasing upon them all night and 
next day, till they were obliged to quit her, and she sunk, 
with a great number of her wounded people on board of 
her. She had three hundred and six men killed and 
wounded in the action ; our loss in the Serapis was abo 
very great." Jones himself, in a letter to Franklin, de- 
scribes the condition of his ship at a moment when after 
the final broadside of the Alliance he was advised to sur- 
render by some of hb comrades " of whose courage and 
good sense he entertained the highest opinion." He re- 
jected their advice, but he acknowledges that the situa- 
tion was well-nigh desperate. " Our rudder was entirely 
off ; the stem-frame and transomes were almost entirely 
cut away ; the timbers by the lower deck, especially from 
the mainmast to the stem, beii^ greatly decayed by age, 
were mangled beyond every power of description ; and a 
person must have been an eye-witness to have formed a 
just idea of the tremendous scene of carnage, wreck, 
and ruin that everywhere appeared." Nevertheless, he 
was the victor, the victor in. spite of Landab, and perhaps, 
after all, mainly because the Alliance was still " in being " 
and still intact. Pearson seems to have held that even 
if the Richard surrendered or sank, the Serapis, in her 
battered and dbpirited condition, must have fallen an 
immediate prey to the Alliance, which had only fired 
three broadsides at times when the Serapis could not 
possibly reply. There b evidence to show that thb was 
abo the calculation of Landab himself.^ He would cer- 

^ The best account of Landais'a conduct as it appeared to the officeft of 
Jones's squadron is given by Disraeli. It is as follows : " His gross disiespect 
to the commodore, his disobedience of signals, his refusal to answer them, 
his unauthorised and mischievous separation from th^ squadron, his impudent 
and arrant cowardice, formed the subject of ten distinct accusations, which 
were proved by all the officers who could bear witness to the facta. His 



THE SEQUEL OF THE VICTORY 219 

tainly not have been sorry to see the Richard sink with 
Jones on board, knovdng full well that should that happen 
the laurek of the victory, albeit wholly unearned, would 
be his alone. But fate and the fortitude of Jones decreed 
that this reward of his treachery, at any rate, he should 
not reap. Balked of his prey, he stood aloof as soon as 
he saw that the Serapis had surrendered, and gave no 
help whatever in the overpowering task which now con- 
fronted Jones of saving what he could from the wreck. 
The Richard was slowly but inevitably sinking. She re- 
mained afloat for some thirty hours after the end of the 
battle. In the short interval Jones had to provide first 
for the safety and sea-worthiness of the Serapis^ which 
had lost her mainmast and otherwise suffered severely in 
the action ; next to transfer to her over two hundred 
prisoners held in the Richard and over one hundred 
wounded of his own men ; to take care of these latter 
as well as of about the same number of men wounded in 
the Serapis ; and to guard the unwounded remainder of 
the crew of the latter, numbering one hundred and eleven. 
To carry out all this he had only about one hundred and 
fifty of his own men left fit for service, and many of these 
had been injured slightly in action. The ships had been 
cut adrift as soon as the action ceased, so that the transfer 
of wounded and prisoners to the Serapis had to be effected 
by boats, of which there were only three available. For- 
tunately the wind had died away during the night and the 

conduct during the engigement with tbe Smmpis, and his ntinoiis nei^act ill 
not dcttzoying and capturing the Baltic fleet, wexe the anbject of fifteen other 
accusations, and wexe proved in the same manner. The chief officers of the 
Attiancs bore witness to the ill-conduct of their commander. Among other 
facts De Cottinean averred that when the Ban Hamm^ (? S$ftb^) appeared 
off FlamboroQ^ Head, Landais distinctiy stated to him that if, as it appeared 
to be, it were a ship of fifty gnns, ' he should decidedly run away,' ahhongh 
he knew the Pallas, from her heavy sailing, must have fallen a s a cr ifi ce . It 
was also distinctly proved that Landais had stated that he should not have 
cared had the Ban Hammg struck, as then, from the shattered state of the 
S$rapis, he should have had both ships for prises." A man of this character 
and in this mood would assuredly not be very careful to spare his consort 
when he opened fire on her adversary. 

17 



220 PAUL JONES 

sea fell dead calm, or the Richard must have simk with 
many of the wounded and prisoners still on board. The 
Pa//a5 rendered some assistance, and about one hundred 
of the unwounded prisoners — ^including Pearson himself 
— ^were ultimately berthed on board her, but not before 
the Richard had foundered. It is not recorded what 
became of the Vengeance, but as much fog prevailed for a 
day or two after the action she may have lost touch with 
the commodore, as the Alliance certainly did with much 
less excuse. The Alliance, at any rate, had not been 
ordered as the Vengeance was to keep out of the way. On 
the contrary, she had been ordered, as we have seen, to 
** lay the enemy alongside." Anyhow, she was not seen 
after the battle, and with the Vengeance she reached the 
Texel before the Serapis and PaUas did with the Countess 
of Scarborough in company. This was natural enough, 
for neither had any serious damages to repair. 

Pearson, as we have seen, reported that the Richard 
sank " with a great number of her wounded people on 
board of her." This is at variance with the American 
accounts, which declare that all the wounded were trans- 
ferred to the Serapis, though some died in the boats. 
Jones's own narrative is quite explicit on this point. It 
was, however, written some years afterwards, and it is 
also so characteristic that it may well serve as an epilogue 
to this heroic conflict : 

No one was now left aboard the Richard but our dead. 
To them I gave the good old ship for their cofi&n, and in 
her they foimd a sublime sepulchre. She rolled heavily 
in the long swell, her gun-deck awash to the port-sills, 
settled slowly by the head, and sank peacefully in about 
forty fathoms. 

The ensign-gaff, shot away in the action, had been 
fished and put in place soon after the firing ceased, and 
our torn and tattered flag was left flying when we aban- 
doned "her. As she plunged down by the head at the 
last, her tafFrail momentarily rose in the air ; so the very 
last vestige mortal eyes ever saw of the Bon Homme 



THE SEQUEL OF THE VICTORY a^t 

Richard was the defiant waving of her unconquered and 
unstricken flag as she went down. And as I had given 
them the good old ship for their sepulchre, I now be^ 
queathed to my immortal dead the flag they had so 
desperately defended for their winding-sheet I ^ 



VIII 

The calm lasted until the forenoon of September 2$, 
when the Serapis, with the Pallas and Countess of Scar^ 
borough in company, was about seventy miles east of 
Flamborough Head. Fogs and fortune had screened 
them from several British men-of-war which by this time 
were on the look-out for them. Jones had hoped to take 
his ships into Dunkirk ; but a stiff south-westerly wind 
now sprang up and freshened into a gale by the 27th. 
The battered Serapis could make no head against it, and 
Jones let her drive before it. The Pallas and her prize 
were more weather^y, but Cottineau and his officers would 

^ This flag bad its own romantic history. On June 14, 1777, Congress 
passed two resolntions. The first was, " That the flag of the thirteen United 
States of America be thirteen stripes alternate red and white ; that the nnion 
be thirteen stars in a bine field, representing a new constellation " ; the 
second, "That Captain Paul Jones be appointed to command the ship 
Ranger." While Jones was fitting out the Rongw at Portsmouth, some girls 
of his acquaintance offered to hold a " quilting party," and to make him a 
flag for his new command from slices of their best silk gowns. Jones accepted 
the offer, and supplied the specification for the flag in accordance with the 
recent resolution of Congress. It is said that the thirteen white stars of the 
" new constellation " were cut out of the wedding dress of one of the girls, 
named Helen Seavey, who had just been married. The flag was first hoisted 
on board the Rang§r on July 4, 1777. If it was not the first specimen of the 
" Stars and Stripes " ever hoisted, it was certainly the first ever seen in 
Europe and the first ever saluted by a foreign power. When Jones quitted 
the RoHgtf, he took the flag with him, regarding it as his personal p ro p er t y, 
and he commissioned the Richard with it. When he returned to America, 
he apologised to one of the makers of the flag for not having brought it back 
to them with all its glories. " I could not," he said, " deny to my dead on 
her decks, who had given their lives to keep it flying, the glory of taking it 
with them." " You did ezacUy right, commodore," the lady relied. "That 
flag is just where we all wish it to be--flying at the bottom of the sea over 
the only ship that ever sunk in victory. If you had taken it from her and 
brought it back to us, we would hate you I 



t» 



Sai PAUL JONES 

not desert their commodore, although Jones more than 
once signalled to them to bear up for port and leave him 
to take care of himself. On the 29th the wind shifted to 
N.W., and Jones again attempted to shape cr course for 
Dunldrk. The remainder of the voyage may best be 
described in the words of Nathaniel Fanning^ one of the 
surviving officers of the Richard : 

^ During this time the scenes on board beggared descrip- 
tion. There were but few cots, and not even hammocks 
enough for the wounded, so that many of them had to lie 
on the hard decks, where they died in numbers day by 
day. The British officers, with watches of their men, 
took almost the whole charge of the wounded, and so left 
us free to work the ship. Our surgeon. Dr. Brooke, and 
Drs. Bannatyne and Edgerley, the English surgeons, per- 
formed prodigious work, and by their skill and ceaseless 
care saved many Uves. In the common danger enmity 
was forgotten, and every one who could walk worked 
with a will to save the ship and their own lives. Finally, 
on the fifth day, the wind abated and hauled to the north- 
west, when we ran down to the coast of Holland, and 
made the entrance of the Helder, through which we 
made our way into the Texel, where we anchored about 
3 p.m., October 3, finding there the Alliance and Ven^ 
geance, which came in the day before. During these few 
days, including those not wounded who died from sheer 
exhaustion, we buried not less than forty of the two 
crews. Neither the commodore nor the brave British 
officers ever slept more than two or three hours at a time, 
and were sometimes up for two days at a time. 

On his arrival at the Texel Jones was at once sur- 
rounded with a fresh crop of difficulties. First he had 
to deal with what he regarded as the treachery and mutiny 
of Landais. He forthwith sent to Franklin a formal 
indictment of Landais' conduct and suspended him from 
his command. But Landais at first paid no attention to 
the order. Jones then sent Cottineau to warn him that 
Jones himself would enforce the order within twenty-four 



JONES AT THE TEXEL 233 

hours, and Landais thereupon challenged Cottineau to a 
4uel and went on shore. The duel took place, and Cot- 
tineau was wounded. Landais then withdrew to Amster- 
dam and challenged Jones himself ; but before the pre- 
liminaries could be settled Landais thought proper to go 
to the Hague and seek to enlbt the sympathy of the 
French Ambassador at that place. The latter declined 
to see him. Landais then sent him a written memorial, 
which the ambassador again declined to receive, taking 
care to inform him at the same time that he had received 
a despatch from the French Grovemment to the effect 
that Franklin had notified Landais of the charges pre- 
ferred against him, and had ordered him '' to render him- 
self forthwith into Dr. Franklin's presence to answer 
them." Landais then thought proper to obey FrankUn's 
order and left the Hague for Paris. With this he passes 
out of my story, as I have already related all that needs 
to be related concerning his subsequent career. 

Next, Jones had to make the best provision he could 
for the wounded prisoners on board the Serapis. Of 
these there were one hundred and fifty in all still surviv- 
ing, some of them having been wounded in the Countess of 
Scarborough. As the Serapis had also over one hundred 
wounded of the Richard's crew, and the Pallas had a 
dozen or more wounded of her own, it was clearly to the 
interest of all parties to land at least the British wounded 
as soon as possible. At first the Dutch authorities re- 
fused to allow any one to be landed. But Jones's request 
to be allowed to land hb wounded prisoners was warmly 
seconded by Sir Joseph Yorke, the British Ambassador 
at the Hague, and this powerful influence induced the 
Dutch authorities to relent. All the wounded prisoners 
were landed and housed in barracks at the Texel, where 
Jones continued to furnish them with such hospital sup- 
plies and medical attendance as he could obtain. Jones 
was also allowed to take command of the fort in which 
they were housed, and to place a guard there. All the 
prisoners, wounded and unwounded, were, after much 



224 PAUL JONES 

tedious and intricate negotiation, ultimately handed ov^ 
to the French Government. The French Government 
claimed also not only the PaUas and the Vengeance — 
which were conunanded by French officers — ^and the 
Countess of Scarborough, the prize of the former, but even 
the Serapis herself. The claim was enforced, greatly to 
the chagrin of Jones, and for diplomatic reasons Franklin 
himself had supported it. " This deprivation of the 
Serapis,** writes Jones, " was the sorest of all my wounds. 
• . . The Serapis had been taken by an American ship 
under the American flag, and commanded by virtue of an 
American conmussion. I could not conceive by what 
shadow of right M. de Sartine could claim her as a French 
prize, and he made no attempt to set up any." But the 
action of the French Government was probably the best 
way out of a serious diplomatic difficulty, and in any 
case, neither Franklin nor Jones could resist it, lest by 
so doing they should prejudice the French alliance, which 
was all-important to the United States. The Alliance, 
being an American ship, was not claimed by the French 
Government. She was left to Jones, as he bitterly said, 
" to do what I pleased or what I could with " her. We 
shall shortly see what he could do with her. 

The diplomatic difficulty above mentioned was only a 
part of a much greater difficulty with which Jones was 
confronted and perplexed during his harassed stay at 
the Texel. We have seen that the British Ambassador 
at the Hague had supported Jones's request to the Dutch 
Government to be allowed to land his wounded prisoners ; 
but at the same time, or immediately* afterwards. Sir 
Joseph Yorke represented to the Dutch Government that 
" a certain Paul Jones," being a subject of the King, 
'' could only be considered as a rebel and a pirate," and 
that, in consequence, he and all his men should be given 
up. In a subsequent despatch, written some three weeks 
later, he repeated the same demand. Jones was now to 
show that his diplomatic address was no unworthy a 
complement to his fighting capacity. Under date Novem- 



JONES AND THE STATES GENERAL 225 

ber 4, 1 779, he addressed the following letter to the States 
General : 

High and Mighty Lords : 

Begging your gracious and condescending con- 
sideration, I, Paul Jones, Captain of the United States 
Navy, represent and humbly relate that before me has 
been laid copy of a letter addressed to your High Mighti- 
nesses, under date of the 9th of the month of October, 
by His Excellency Sir Joseph Yorke, Ambassador Extra- 
ordinary and Plenipotentiary of His Majesty the King 
of Great Britain. That in the said letter the said Sir 
Joseph Yorke states that " two of His Majesty's ships, the 
Serapis and the Countess of Scarborough^ arrived some 
days ago in the Texel, having been attacked and taken 
by force, by a certain Paul Jones, a subject of the King, 
who, according to treaties and the laws of war, can only 
be considered as a rebel and a pirate." 

And on this ground His Excellency Sir Joseph Yorke 
demands that the ships and crews be given up. 

Also has been laid before me copy of memorial of the 
said Sir Joseph Yorke, under date of the 29th of October, 
just past, renewing the said demand '' most strong and 
urgent for the seizure and restitution of the said vessels 
as well as for the enlargement of their crews, who have 
been seized by the pirate Paul Jones, a Scotchman, a 
rebellious subject, and a state criminal." Also conjuring 
your High Mightinesses to " treat as pirates those whose 
letters (commissions) are found to be illegal for not being 
issued by a sovereign power." 

May it please Your High Mightinesses, I conceive 
from the foregoing that the only question in dispute be- 
tween His Excellency Sir Joseph Yorke and myself is 
the question whether my commission has been " issued 
by a sovereign power." If my commission has been 
issued by a sovereign power, then Sir Joseph Yorke 's 
contention that I am a " pirate," etc., must fall. 

The commission I hold, of which I transmit herewith 
a true copy and hold the original subject to examination 
by Your High Mightinesses or your authorized envoy for 
that purpose, and which original I have already exhibited 
to His Excellency Commodore Riemersma, commanding 
the fleet of Your High Hightinesses, now at anchor in 



226 PAUL JONES 



these Roads, is issued by the G>ngress of the United States 
of America in due form, signed by the President thereof 
and attested with the seal. 

Such being true, the only Question left to decide is the 
question whether the United States of America is a sove- 
reign power. 

On this question, I take it for granted that Your High 
Mightinesses will agree with me that neither Sir Joseph 
Yorke nor his master, the King of Great Britain, can be 
considered competent sole judge of last resort. If they 
could be so considered, then all questions of every descrip- 
tion would be subject to ex parte decision by the arbitrary 
will of one party, in any contest — a doctrine which must, 
in the estimation of every judicial mind, be too prepos- 
terous to contemplate without levity. 

Your High Mightinesses cannot fail to be aware that 
the question of the sovereignty of the United States of 
America has been passed upon by qualified and com- 

B^tent judges. That sovereignty has been recognized by 
is Most Christian Majesty the King of France and 
Navarre, in the form of a solemn treaty of amity and 
alliance done at Versailles nearly a year ago and now a 
casus belli in the estimation of His Majesty the King of 
Great Britain. The independence of the United States, 
and with it their rightful sovereignty, has been recognized 
by His Most Catholic Majesty the King of Spain and the 
Indies. The belligerent rights of the United States have 
been acknowledged by His Majesty Frederick II., King 
of Prussia, and by Her Imperial Majesty Catharine II., 
Empress of all the Russias. 

It does not become me, who am only a naval officer 
of command rank, to enter upon discussion of the motives 
of statecraft which may have induced such attitudes or 
such action on the part of the august potentates men- 
tioned ; but Your High Mightinesses will, I do not doubt, 
agree that it is within my province, humble as it may be, 
to invite attention to existing facts of common notoriety 
and concealed from no one. In the face of so much evi- 
dence, there is before us, by way of rebuttal, nothing but 
the ex parte declaration of His Excellency Sir Joseph 
Yorke, in behalf of his master the King of Great Britain, 
a party principal in the case to be adjudicated. 

And now, if I may for one moment further beg the 



JONES AND THE STATES GENERAL 217 

patient indulgence of Your High Mightinesses, I recur 
to the language of His Excellency Sir Joseph Yorke, 
wherein^ to fortify, apparently, his contention that I am 
" a rebellious subject and state criminal," he declares that 
I am not only ** the pirate Paul Jones/' but also that I 
am '' a Scotchman." 

Candor compels me, may it please Your High Mighti- 
nesses, to admit that this last, alone of all Sir Joseph's 
allegations, is true and indisputable. But while admitting 
the truth of Sir Joseph's assertion of my Scottish birth, 
I deny the validity of his inference made plain by his 
context. That, under the circumstances now being con- 
sidered, the fact of Scottish birth should be held to con- 
stitute the character of a " rebellious subject and state 
criminal," more than birth elsewhere within the dominions 
of the King of Great Britain, I do not conceive to be a 
tenable theory. It cannot have escaped the attention of 
Your High Mightinesses that every man now giving fealty 
to the cause of American Independence was bom a British 
subject. I do not comprehend, nor can I conceive, a 
difference in this respect between birth as a British sub- 
ject in Scotland and birth as a British subject in Virginia, 
Pennsylvania, New York, New England, or elsewhere on 
British soil, there being in the eyes of British law no differ- 
ence between the soil of the parent realm and the soil of 
colonies in respect to the relations or the rights of the 
subject. 

If the reasonhig of Sir Joseph Yorke be sound, then 
General Washington, Dr. Franklin, and all other patriots 
of birth on the soil of America when a British colony, 
must be, equally with me, " state criminals." No formal 
proclamation has been made to that effect, within my 
knowledge, by due authority of the King and his Minis- 
ters. Whatever may be the impression of exigency, it is 
dear that the Government of His Britannic Majesty has 
not yet undertaken to proclaim wholesale outlawry against 
nearly three millions of people in America now in arms 
for the cause of Independence. Such proclamation seems 
to have been reserved for my especial honour, in a port 
of a neutral state, and on the ipse dixit of an ambassador 
without express authority from Crown, Ministers, or 
Commons. It is inconceivable that so unauthorized a 
proceeding can have weight or that so unexampled an 



328 PAUL JONES 

exception can prevail with the reason of so judicial a 
body as the Assembly of Your High Mightinesses. 

With these humble representations I confidently repose 
trust in the traditional candor and in the infallible justice 
of the High and Mighty Lords of the States General of 
the Netherlands. 

(Signed) Paul Jones, 

Captain U. S. Navy. 

On Bond the U. S. Ship S^rapis, 
November 4, 1779. 

This must have been the letter of which Horace Wal- 
pole wrote to the Countess of Ossory on October i» 1782 : 
" Have you seen in the papers the excellent letter of Paul 
Jones to Sir Joseph Yorke ? ElU notis dit Hen des vMUs. 
I doubt Sir Joseph can answer them. Dr. Franklin 
himself, I should think, was the author. It was certainly 
written by a first-rate pen. . . ." It is true that the 
letter was not written to Sir Joseph Yorke, but was 
addressed to the States General. But it was a direct 
reply to two letters which Sir Joseph Yorke had, as Jones 
knew, addressed to the States General concerning the 
legality of Jones's commission and the international status 
of his flag, and it might very well have been loosely desig- 
nated by Walpole as " the letter of Paul Jones to Sir 
Joseph Yorke." Jones left the Texel before the end of 

1779, and by that time his indirect controversy with Sir 
Joseph Yorke was at an end. He is not likely to have 
addressed that diplomatist on any public matter at any 
subsequent date, and indeed there does not seem to be 
extant any letter of any kind addressed by Paul Jones 
to Sir Joseph Yorke at any date. On the other hand, 
the letter to the States General was published in an 
English Blue Book in 1782, shortly before the date of 
Walpole 's letter to Lady Ossory, together with other 
official correspondence relating to the rupture between 
England and Holland, which took place at the end of 

1 780. If this was the letter in question, however, Walpole 
is clearly wrong in attributing its composition to Franklin. 



THE DIPLOMATIC SITUATION 329 

It is dated November 4, and it refers to a memorial 
addressed by Sir Joseph Yorke to the States General on 
October 29. Between these dates there was no time 
for a copy of this memorial to have reached Franklin in 
Paris and for Franklin to have drafted a reply to it and 
sent it to Jones at the Texel. Besides, Franklin did not 
entirely approve of the line taken by Jones in this matter. 
It is thus certain that Franklin had no hand in the 
letter to the States General ; and even if this is not the 
letter so highly commended by Horace Walpole, it is at 
any rate a document which no one can read without 
acknowledging that ''it is certainly written by a first- 
rate pen." Jones was in a very difficult, not to say a 
very equivocal, diplomatic position. He had no diplo- 
matic authority, he could not afford to offend France, 
nor would Franklin have sanctioned any action of his 
that was likely to do so. There were influences at work 
in France which were by no means friendly to him, and 
were in fact so potent that they ultimately succeeded in 
enforcing the claim of the French Government to the 
Serapis. He had therefore to be very circumspect in 
that direction. On the other hand, so far as he had any 
voice in the matter, it was manifestly quite impossible for 
him to acquiesce for a single moment in the demand of 
Sir Joseph Yorke that he should be treated by the States 
General " as a rebel and a pirate." He could not expect 
to persuade the States General to recognize the United 
States as an independent sovereign power. They had so 
far declined to do so, and were not at all disposed to 
incur the enmity of England by doing it at this juncture. 
But he did hope to induce them to show equal discretion 
towards France by declining to treat as a rebel and a 
pirate a man who had sailed from a French port with the 
sanction of the French Government and with French 
officers under his command ; and he knew that if he did 
so induce them, the relations between Holland and Eng- 
land, already none too friendly, would be, as he wished 
them to be, still further embittered. This hope was not 



230 PAUL JONES 

disappointed. After a loi% debate on the question raised 
by Sir Joseph Yorke, the States General, on November 19, 
passed ^ resolution declaring : i. That they ** decline to 
consider any question affecting the legality of Paul Jones's 
commission or his shUus as a person." 2. That it b " not 
their intention to do anything from which it might law- 
fuUy be inferred that they recognize the independence of 
the American Colonies." 3. '' That ... it shall be sig- 
nified to Paul Jones, that, having put in to place his 
injured vessels in shelter from the dangers of the sea . . . 
he shall make sail as soon as possible when the wind and 
weather shall be favourable, and withdraw from this 
country." 

Thus, by the first clause of this resolution, the only 
question to which Jones had addressed himself in his 
letter to the States General was decided practically in his 
favoiur and to the complete discomfiture of Sir Joseph 
Yorke, who in one of his conununications to the States 
General had pompously declared that " the eyes of all 
Europe are on your resolution." The second clause merely 
left the situation in statu qtw, and astute as his diplomacy 
was, Jones could hardly have expected that unaided he 
could do that which the combined diplomacy of France 
and the United States had failed to do, namely, induce 
Holland to " recognize the independence of the American 
Colonies." But though the status quo was unchanged in 
appearance, the refusal of the States General to treat 
Jones as a rebel and a pirate did so far alter the situation 
that within little more than a year England declared war 
against Holland on December 20, 1780, alleging as the 
chief among the causes of the war " that in violation of 
treaty the States General suffered an American Pirate 
(one Paul Jones, a Rebel and State Criminal) to remain 
several weeks in one of their ports ; and even permitted 
a part of his crew to mount guard (with arms and muni- 
tions, under his authority) in one of their Forts in the 
TexeL" As to embroil Holland and England was, rightly 
or wrongly, one of the main objects which Jones avowedly 



ENGLAND AND HOLLAND EMBROILED 231 

aimed at, this result too must be set down to the credit 
of his diplomatic address. He also succeeded in attain- 
ing this object without putting any additional strain on 
the relations of Holland with the United States. As to 
the third clause of the resolution of the States General, 
though it was stringent and even peremptory in terms, 
it was not very stringently enforced. Jones remained at 
the Texel, undisturbed, for more than a month after the 
States General had formally decreed his expulsion. There 
must have been considerable complaisance on the part 
of the Dutch executive authorities to enable him to do 
this. An English squadron was cruising outside the 
Texel, intent on his capture whenever the Dutch should 
thrust him out. They allowed him to wait until an 
easterly gale had driven this squadron off the coast, and 
when he did leave he got away unharmed. 

In truth he had still much to do before he could leave 
the Texel. The question of what to do with the prisoners 
was still unsettled, as was also that of the status of his 
flag. The action of the French Government, which 
Franklin did not and Jones could not resist, ultimately 
settled both, though as regards the flag in a manner very 
mortifying to Jones, and, as he contended, without a 
shadow of right. An attempt was first made to evade 
the difiiculty by giving Jones a commission in the French 
Navy, and authorizing him to hoist the French flag in the 
Serapis in token of his right, thus acquired, to command 
the squadron without further question. But Jones flatly 
declined to be a party to this transaction. It would, he 
contended, completely stultify the argument he had 
addressed to the States General in reply to Sir Joseph 
Yorke, and he pointed out that " on his arrival in the 
Texel he had publicly declared himself an officer of the 
United States of America ; that he was not authorized 
by his Government to receive the proffered oommisnon ; 
and that he conceived, moreover, that, under existing 
circumstances, it would be dishonourable to himself and 
disadvantageous to America to change his flag/' He was 



232 PAUL JONES 

prepared to allow Cottineau to hoist the French flag in 
the Pallas, the Vengeance, and the Countess of Scarborough, 
which was the prize of the former. But the Serapis, 
which was his own prize, and the Alliance, which was an 
American ship built and commissioned in America, he 
insisted on retaining under his own command and under 
the American flag. But de Sartine, the French Minister 
of Marine, was inexorable as r^ards the Serapis, prompted, 
as Jones beUeved, by Le Ray de Chaumont, the French 
Commissary of the squadron, who desired to have the 
fingering of the prize-money. Franklin, perhaps nolens 
volens, was fain to support de Sartine, and Jones had to 
give way. He was left, as he said, to do what he pleased 
or what he could with the Alliance. 

On the other hand, the solution of the difficulty as 
r^;ards the prisoners was far more satisfactory. The 
French Government, when it took over the «hips, also 
took over the custody of the prisoners. They were for- 
mally handed over to the French Ambassador at the 
Hague, and placed on board the ships which by the same 
authority now hoisted the French flag, namely, the Serapis, 
the Pallas, the Vengeance, and the Countess of Scarborough, 
These ships then left the Texel under convoy of the Dutch 
fleet. At an earUer date Franklin had written to Jones : 
" I am uneasy about your prisoners, and wish they were 
safe in France ; you will then have completed the glorious 
work of giving Uberty to all the Americans that have so 
long languished for it in the British prisons, for there are 
not so many there as you have now taken." When their 
safety was assured, Jones wrote to Le Ray de Chaumont : 
'' It is the greatest triumph which a good man can boast 
— a thousand times more flattering to me than victory." 
Let those scoff at this who will as turgid and insincere. 
For my part I prefer the more generous appreciation of 
Disraeli, who writes as follows concerning the general 
attitude of Jones on this question : 

These prisoners were Jones's great pride. Early in 



JONES AND HIS PRISONERS 233 



life his feelings had been excited by the description of 
the sufferings of his countrymen who were imprisoned in 
the mother country. His objects in removing the war 
to Europe were mainly to retaliate on the Eng&h for the 
scenes of havoc he had witnessed in " the country of his 
fond election " and to deliver the imprisoned Americans 
from their dungeons. On his arrival in France, intent 
upon this grand purpose, Jones met with a congenial spirit 
in the most illustrious of the American Commissioners. 
Franklin, that mighty master of the human mind, soon 
dived into the innermost recesses of Jones's soul. He 
was struck with his daring courage, his manly frankness, 
and his enthusiastic sentiments. He perceived him bold 
in purpose, systematic in conception, and firm in execu- 
tion. The wily poUtidan smiled at the chivalric and 
romantic sentiments of his youthful friend ; but the prac- 
tical philosopher felt that, to perform extraordinary 
actions, a man must often entertain extraordinary senti- 
ments, and that in the busiest scenes of human life enthu- 
siasm is not alwajrs vain, nor romance always a fable. 

Jones was now left alone at the Texel with the Alliance, 
still flying the American flag, to do what he pleased or 
what he could with. Sir Joseph Yorke was baffled, 
though if he was no match for Jones in diplomacy, he was, 
to do him justice, equally anxious for the well-being of the 
wounded prisoners, and even co-operated with Jones in 
securing for them suitable housing together with proper 
medical care and comforts. Jones met him once at the 
house of Van Berckel, the Grand Pensionary. They main- 
tained a ceremonious courtesy towards each other, but 
soon came to a friendly understanding concerning supplies 
for the prisoners. Sir Joseph offered to obtain these 
suppUes and consign them to Jones himself; but Jones 
warily declined this proposal, '' for fear," as he frankly 
told Sir Joseph, " that malicious enemies might accuse 
me of appropriating them," and he requested that they 
might be consigned to Dr. Edgerly, the late surgeon of 
the Countess of Scarborough. '' Two dasrs later," says 
Jones, " Sir Joseph sent by a hoy from Amsterdam a 



^34 PAUL JONES 

goodly supply of medicines, blankets, food, tobacco, 
considerable wine and some liquors. And with the con- 
signment of these articles to Dr. Edgerly, as I had re- 
quested, he sent also a private letter to that gentleman, 
requesting him to inform me that if, as he (Sir Joseph) 
suspected, the wounded Americans might also be in need 
of such suppUes as he had sent, they should have an im- 
partial share ; * because,' said Sir Joseph in his letter to 
Dr. Edgerly, ' we all know that old England can never 
tell the difference between friends and foes among brave 
men wounded in battle, even if some of them may, per- 
ad venture, be rebels.' " It is pleasant to record these 
courtesies between two such antagonists. Even Sir 
Joseph Yorke, it would seem» could not resist the charm 
of Jones's personal fascination. 

The Dutch authorities at the Texel do not seem to 
have been in any hurry to enforce the order of the States 
General for Jones's expubion from that anchorage. That 
order was, as we have seen, sanctioned by the States 
General on November 19. But it was not until Decem- 
ber 26 that the Alliance finally took her departure. No 
attempt seems to have been made to thrust her out at a 
time when she could hardly avoid falling into the clutches 
of the British squadron cruising outside. On the con- 
trary, she was allowed to wait until an easterly gale which 
arose on Christmas Day had driven the squadron quite 
off the coast, leaving only one or two fiigates behind. 
The wind abated the next day, and Jones, seizing the 
opportunity while the coast was dear, put to sea about 
10 p.m. and, eluding the vigilance of the British frigates 
still on the watch for him, shaped a course for the Straits 
of Dover. " He now," sajrs Nathaniel Fanning, " ran 
through the Straits of Dover and down the English 
Channel, passing close enough in to fire a shot at the 
Channel Fleet anchored off Spithead, and then cruised 
as far south as Corunna, where he remained two weeks, 
watering and victualling his ship. Spain being at that 
time at war with England, the Alliance was most cordially 



JONES IN RUSSIA 235 

received, and the civilities of the town were exhausted 
in entertaining Commodore Jones and his officers. . . . 
On January 28, 1780, having refitted, watered, and vic- 
tuaUed the Alliance, Jones sailed from Corunna for 
L'Orient." Here he anchored on February 14. Except 
when he returned to America in the Ariel — ^which he did 
in December 1780 — he never hoisted the United States 
flag at sea again, though he lived until 1792, dying in 
Paris on July 1 8 in that year, at the age of forty-five. 



IX 

Here, then, ends the active career of Paul Jones as 
a fighting seaman, and here ends my story. The rest 
is merely epilogue. It b true that Jones subsequently 
took service in the Russian Navy at the invitation of the 
Empress Catherine, who gave him the rank of Rear-Ad- 
miral, and afterwards promoted him to that of Vice- 
Admiral. But this episode in his life affords little addi- 
tional material for the appreciation of his quality as a 
great sea-officer. He commanded a Russian squadron in 
the Liman at the time of the siege of Oezakoff in 1788, 
and in the engagement known as the Battle of the Liman 
on June 17 in that year he inflicted a severe defeat on 
the Turkish fleet. But he was very treacherously served 
by Nassau-Si^en, who commanded a flotilla of gunboats 
nominally under his orders, and the laurels of his victory 
were filched away from him by Potemkin, who presented 
to the Empress a fabricated report of the engagement, 
in which Jones's services were ignored. Alike in the 
Liman and at St. Petersburg he was made the object of 
incessant and unscrupulous intrigues, which finally drove 
him out of the Russian service. Suwaroff alone appre- 
ciated him and stood his constant friend. If it be held 
that he demeaned himself by taking mercenary service 
under the Russian flag, the argument can only be* sus- 
tained by condemning at the same time the large number 
18 



336 PAUL JONES 

of British naval oflken at that time serving in the Russian 
Navy, many of whom did not disdain to take part in the 
intrigues against him, while others more honourably, but 
not less ungenerously, resigned their commissions sooner 
than accept him as a comrade. He withdrew &om Russia 
broken in health and, for a time, blasted in reputation. 
But his fair fame was subsequently vindicated by the 
efforts of his friend the Comte de S^^ur, the French Am- 
bassador at St. Petersburg. I extract from the pages of 
Disraeli the following letter from S^;ur to the French 
Minbters at Berlin and Hamburg : 

St. Pbtbssburo, 26IA Atigusi, 1789. 

Sir, 

The Vice-Admiral Paul Jones, who will have the 
honour to deliver this letter, commanded during the last 
campaign a Russian squadron stationed on the Liman. 
The Empress has decorated him on this occasion, with the 
order of St. Anne. He had a right, by his actions, to a 
promotion and to a recompense, but this celebrated sailor, 
knowinfi[ better how to conduct himself in battles than in 
courts, has offended, by his frankness, some of the most 

Sowerful people, and amongst others Prince Potemkin. 
[is enemies and his rivals luive profited by his momen* 
tary disgrace to hasten his destruction. Calumny has 
served their purposes ; they have given credit to reports 
absolutely false. They have accused him of violating a 
girl. The Empress, being deceived, has forbid him the 
court, and wished to bring him to trial. Every person 
has abandoned him ; I alone have upheld and defended 
him. The country to which he belongs, the order of 
military merit which he bears, and which he has so nobly 
acquired, his brilliant reputation, and, above all, our long 
acquaintance, have made it a law to me. My cares have 
not been in vain. I have caused his innocence to be 
acknowledged. He has repaired to court, and has kissed 
the hand of the sovereign, but he will not remain in a 
country where he believes himself to have been treated 
with injustice. ... I beg you. Sir, to render to this brave 
man, as interesting by the reverses of fortune which he 
has met with as by his past success, every service which 



JONES'S CAREER 237 

may be in your power. It will lay me under a true 
obligation, and I snail share, in a lively manner, his grati- 
tude. 



It is no part of my purpose to portray what I may 
call the civil career of Paul Jones, except so far as it has 
incidentally served to illustrate his character and the 
estimation in which he was held by some of the most dis- 
tinguished of his contemporaries in two hemispheres. 
My sole object has been to draw a faithful portrait of his 
career as a fighting seaman, and that purpose has now 
been fulfilled. I have shown him rising from the village 
school and the hard apprenticeship of the merchant ser- 
vice to the command of ships and the inherited ownership 
of a plantation in Virginia. I have shown him equipping 
himself, during that hard apprenticeship and its subse- 
quent arduous voyagings, with manners and education 
which afterwards enabled him to shine in the most fas- 
tidious society in Europe. I have shown him taking 
his side in a quarrel which divided brother from brother 
in both hemispheres, and I have no apology to offer for 
his choice. I should as soon think of apologizing for 
Washington or for Franklin. I have shown him found- 
ing an infant navy and laying down imperishable principles 
for the governance and guidance of its officers. I have 
shown him teaching his comrades how to fight in their 
own waters, and how to carry the war, even with their 
diminutive resources, into the enemy's waters with 
tremendous and unexampled effect. I have shown him 
waging one of the most desperate battles that ever were 
fought on the seas, and snatching victory out of the very 
jaws of defeat by his own unquenchable stubbornness 
of fight and in spite of the treachery, fully attested and 
almost openly avowed, of his principal lieutenant. I 
have shown him w£^;ing and winning, not less brilliantlyi 
a diplomatic battle, if not single-handed, at any rate with 
little countenance and no assistance at all from the 
accredited representatives of the two Governments he 



338 PAUL JONES 

served. If these achievements and accomplishments are 
not the notes of a personality cast in truly heroic mould, 
I know not where to look for them, nor can I refuse to 
recognize them because Paul Jones had to the full some 
of the most characteristic defects of his qualities — an 
inordinate self-esteem, a propensity for grandiloquence, 
and a very manifest reluctance to hide his candle under 
a bushel. Let us remember that Nelson himself was 
not without like defects, and that the impression made 
on the cold and dispassionate Wellington by the only 
talk he ever had with him was that, until Nelson found 
out who Wellington was, '' the conversation was almost 
all on his side and all about himself, and in, really, a style 
so vain and so silly as to surprise and almost disgust me." 
There are many Englishmen who have never carried their 
acquaintance with Paul Jones and his character any 
further than this initial stage of Wellington's memorable 
interview with Nelson. If I have enabled even a few 
of them to reconsider their original impression, as Wel- 
lington did his, I shall not have written in vain. 

I need hardly say that the foregoing comparison im- 
plies no sort of pretence to place Paul Jones on a level 
with Nelson as a sea-commander. To do so would be 
preposterous. '* There is but one Nelson," and Jones's 
lack of opportunity would forbid the comparison, if 
nothing ebe did. Except in the Liman Jones never com- 
manded a fleet in action, and no man knew better than he 
did that the highest sea-capacity is neither displayed nor 
. called for in the conflict of single ships. I find in Disraeli 
some very significant extracts from a memorandum on 
this subject which he addressed to the United States 
Government in 1782, while he was superintending the 
fitting out of the America, the first line-of-battle ship ever 
built by the United States.^ I subjoin these extracts 
here : 

The beginning of our navy, as navies now rank, was 

^ Jones was to have commanded this vessel ; bat during the antiimn of 
1 783 a Fxench man-of-war was lost in the harbour of Boston, and Congress 



JONES ON NAVAL TACTICS 239 

so singularly small, that, I am of opinion, it has no pre- 
cedent in history. Was it a proof of madness in the first 
corps of sea-officers to have, at so critical a period, launched 
out on the ocean with only two armed merchant ships, 
two armed brigantines, and one armed sloop, to make 
war against such a power as Great Britain ? To be 
diffident is not always a proof of ignorance. I had sailed 
before this revolution in armed ships and frigates, yet, 
when I came to try my skill, I am not ashamed to own 
I did not find myself perfect in the duties of a first lieu- 
tenant. If midnight study and the instruction of the 
greatest and most learned sea-officers, can have given me 
advantages, I am not without them. I confess, how- 
ever, I have yet to learn ; it is the work of many years' 
study and experience to acquire the high degree of science 
necessary for a great sea-officer. Cruising after merchant 
ships, the service in which our frigates have generally 
been employed, affords, I may say, no part of the know- 
ledge necessary for conducting fleets and their operations. 
There is now, perhaps, as much difference between a battle 
between two ships, and an engagement between two 
fleets, as there is between a duel and a ranged battle 
between two armies. The English, who boast so much 
of their navy, never fought a ranged battle on the ocean 
before the war that is now ended. The battle off Ushant 
was, on their part, like their former ones, irregular ; and 
Admiral Keppel could only justify himself by the ex- 
ample of Hawke in our remembrance, and of Russel in 
the last century. From that moment the English were 
forced to study, and to imitate, the French in their evolu- 
tions. They never gained any advantage when they had 
to do with equal force, and the unfortunate defeat of 
Count de Grasse was owing more to the unfavourable 
circumstances of the wind comine a-head four points at 
the beginning of the battle, which put his fleet into the 
order of echiquier when it was too late to tack, and of 
calm and currents afterwards, which brought on an 
entire disorder, than to the admiralship or even the vast 
superiority of Rodney, who had forty sail of the line against 
thirty, and five three-deckers against one. By the account 

jMtfsed a resolution preaenting the Ametica to the King of France in place of 
the Magnifique which was lost, and she passed into the French Navy nnder 
the name of the Franklin. 



a40 PAUL JONES 

of some of the French officers, Rodney might as well have 
been asleep, not having made a second signal during the 
battle, so that every captain did as he pleased. 

The English are very deficient in signals, as well as in 
naval tactics. This I know, having in my possession their 
present fighting and sailing instructions, which compre- 
hend all their signals and evolutions. Lord Howe has, 
indeed, made some improvements by borrowing from the 
French. But, Kempenfelt, who seems to have been a 
more promising officer, had made a still greater improve- 
ment by the same means. It was said of Kempenfelt, 
when he was drowned in the Royal George, England had 
lost her du Pavillion. That great man, the Chevalier du 
Pavillion, commanded the Triumphant, and was killed 
in the last battle of Count de Grasse. France lost in 
him one of her greatest naval tacticians, and a man who 
had, besides, the honour (in 1773) to invent the new 
system of naval signals, by which sixteen hundred orders, 

S[uestions, answers, and informations can, without con- 
usion or misconstruction, and with the greatest celerity, 
be communicated through a great fleet. It was his fixed 
opinion that a smaller number of signals would be in- 
sufficient. A captain of the line at this day must be a 
tactician. A captain of a cruising frigate may make shift 
without ever having heard of naval tactics. Until I 
arrived in France, and became acquainted with that great 
tactician Count D'Orvilliers, and his judicious assistant 
the Chevalier du Pavillion, who, each of them, honoured 
me with instructions respecting the science of governing 
the operations, etc., of a fleet, I confess I was not sensible 
how ignorant I had been, before that time, of naval tactics. 



There are several points of extreme interest in this 
remarkable memorandum. When Jones says that " the 
English . . . never fought a ranged battle on the ocean 
before the war that is now ended," he is moving by antici- 
pation in the same order of ideas as that which inspired 
Clerk of Eldin in his famous Essay on Naval Tactics, 
which was printed in the same year but not published 
until later. Clerk's exordium, which was written in 1781, 
is as follows : 



JONES AND CLERK OF ELDIN 241 

Upon inquiring into the transactions of the British 
Navy, during the last two wars, as well as the present, 
it is remarkable that, when single ships have encountered 
one another, or when two, or even three have been engaged 
of a side, British seamen, if not victorious on every occa-^ 
sion, have never failed to exhibit instances of skilful 
seamanship, intrepidity, and perseverance ; yet when 
ten, twenty, or thirty great ships have been assembled, 
and formed in line of battle, it is equally remarkable that, 
in no one instance, has ever a proper exertion been made, 
anything memorable achieved, or even a ship lost or won 
on either side«^ 

Again, Jones's reference to Howe and Kempenfelt 
exhibits an acquaintance with the contemporary history 
of the British Navy and with the special attainments of 
two of its leading personalities — one of whom is now 
almost forgotten except for his tragic and imtimely death 
— which is little short of amazing in a man with his limited 
opportunities of study and observation. In truth he 
might well say, " If midnight study arid the instruction 
of the greatest and most learned sea-officers can have 
given me advant^es, I am not without them." I will 
cite further testimony to the profundity and acumen of 
his studies of naval warfare from the pages of Mr. BuelL 
It relates to the time when Jones, in command of the 
Ranger^ first put into Brest just before his raid upon 
Whitehaven : 

The Duchess of Chartres instantly took a fancy to the 
dark, slender, distingu^ '* Chevalier, sans titre, de la 
mer," — " the untitled knight of the sea," as she used to 
call him : and Paul Jones at once became a welcome 
visitor at her cottage-palace at Brest. The afternoon 
before the Ranger saUed, the Duchess gave a luncheon to 

^ Clerk, in a note, explain^ that " neither the gallant manoenvres off 
St. Chxiatopher's, nor the memorable lath of April, took place till the spring 
following." These two actions are of conrse Hood's brilliant encounter with 
De Grasse in January 1782, and Rodney's famous mtory over the same French 
Admiral off Dominica on April 12, lySa, 



343 PAUL JONES 

Captain Jones, at which the G>unt D'Orvillieis was pre- 
sent. The Duchess was granddaughter of the Count de 
Toulouse, son of Louis XIV., by Hadame de Montespan ; 
and h^ grandfather had conunanded the French fleet in 
the great battle with the aUied Ei^lish and Dutch fleets 
off Malaga, August 34 and 35, 1704. 

That battle was, up to that time, the most creditable, 
or, perhaps, least discreditable, to the French Navy of 
all its encounters with the fleets of England ; and the 
Duchess took infinite pride in the exploit of her ancestor. 
In some Mray the subject of the battle off Malaga was 
brought up at this luncheon. Jones, whose studies of 
naval history fully equipped him for the discussion, made 
bold to traverse a criticism offered by D'Orvilliers on 
the failure of de Toulouse to follow the Anglo-Dutch 
fleets under Sir George Rooke when they retreated to- 
wards Gibraltar after two days' fighting. In this debate, 
Jones, who took the side of de Toulouse, displayed know- 
ledge of the strategy and tactics of that great combat 
which challei^ed the admiration of D'Orvilliers himself, 
as welt as that of all the other French officers present. 
In the course of his review of the event, he showed that 
he knew to a ship, to a gun, and almost to a man, the 
strength of the respective fleets. He also exhibited com- 
prehensive knowledge of the grand strategy of the cam- 
paign as a whole, and an accurate understanding of the 
pobtical bearing of the operations upon the dynastic 
questions involved in the war of the Spanish succession. 
This amazed D'Orvilliers, who had previously r^arded 
him with a sort of patronizing interest as a Yankee skipper 
of something more than usual dash and cleverness. 

and most convincing testimony is still 
is contained in a letter addressed by 
791, the year before his death, to his 
ral the Comte de Kersaint, one of the 
^ French naval officers of his time. I 
jiven by Mr. Buell. If I call this letter 
e teaching of Qerk of Eldin at the end 
century and of that of Captain Mahan 
nineteenth. I hardly think I shall over^ 



JONES ON NAVAL WARFARE 243 

estimate its extraordinary penetration, sagacity, and 
breadth of view. It runs as follows : 

It has not been my habit to indulge in comment upon 
French naval tactics as I have read of them in 
history or observed them in the last war. But my long 
and happy personal acquaintance with your Excellency, 
dating from our first accidental meeting in the Chesapeake 
in 1775, emboldens me to offer a few observations of a 
character that I have hitherto withheld. 

I have noticed — ^and no reader of the naval history 
of France can have failed to notice it — ^that the under- 
lying principle of operation and rule of action in the 
French Navy have always been calculated to subordinate 
immediate or instant opportunities to ulterior if not 
distant objects. In general I may say that it has been 
the policy of French admirals in the past to neutralize 
the power of their adversaries, if possible, by grand 
manoeuvres rather than to destroy it by grand attacks. 

A case in point of this kind b the campaign of the 
Count de Grasse in his conjoint operation with the land 
forces of General Washington and the Count de Rocham- 
beau, which so happily resulted in the capitulation of 
Comwallis at Yorktown. It is well-known to you, as an 
officer of important command in the French fleet on that 
occasion, that for at least three days — ^that is to say, 
from the moment when Admiral Graves appeared off the 
Capes (of the Chesapeake) until he beat his final retreat 
to New York — ^it was in the power of the Count de Grasse 
to bring him to close and decisive action with a superiority 
of force that could have left no doubt as to the issue. 
It b true, as may be said, that the ulterior object of the 
grand strategy in that operation, viewed by kmd as weU 
as by sea, was accomplished by the skilful manoeuvring, 
the imposing demonstration, and the distant cannonade 
practised by the Count de Grasse, without determined 
attack or persistent pursuit. It may abo be urged — 
which I have heard from the Marqub de Vaudreuil and 
the Chevalier de Barras — ^that de Grasse was hampered 
in thb respect by the nature of hb agreement with de 
Rochambeau, approved by Washington, that it should 
be the policy to preserve the French fleet from the con- 
tingencies of close action, so far as might be done without 



344 PAUL JONES 

sacrificing its efficiency in the adjunctory sense to the 
operations by land. 

Yet, admitting all this in fidl force, it has always seemed 
to me that there was a moment when the — perhaps un- 
expected — development of weakness and ineptitude on 
the part of Admiral Graves a£Forded de Grasee abundant 
justification for revision if not momentary discarding of 
the terms of any prior understanding he may have had 
with de Rochambeau and Washington. De Grasse had 
more ships, more men, and more guns than Graves had. 
His ships were better found and sailed faster, either ship 
for ship, or measuring the manoeuvring power of the fleet 
by the slowest or dullest of all, than the ships of Graves. 
In my judgment, there has never been an occasion in all 
the naval wars between France and England when the 
opportunity was so distinctly and so overwhelmingly on 
the side of France as in those few October da}rs in 1781, 
off the Capes of the Chesapeake — when France actually 
had, for the moment, command of the sea. 

Now, my dear Kersaint, you know me too well to accuse 
me of self-vaunting. You will not consider me vain, in 
view of your knowledge of what happened in the past 
off Carrickfergus, off Old Flamboro' Head, and off the 
Liman in the Black Sea, if I say that, had I stood — ^for- 
tunately or unfortunately — in the shoes of de Grasse, there 
would have been disaster to some one off the Capes of 
the Chesapeake ; disaster of more lasting significance 
than an orderly retreat of a beaten fleet to a safe port. 
To put it a little more strongly, there was a moment when 
the chance to destroy the enemy's fleet would have driven 
from me all thought of the conjoint strategy of the cam- 
paign as a whole. 

I could not have helped it. 

And I have never since ceased to mourn the failure of 
the Count de Grasse to be as imprudent as I could not 
have helped bdng on that grandest of all occasions. 

Howbeit, as I have already said, the object of grand 
strat^y in that operation was accomplished by the 
manoeuvring of the Count de Grasse without general action- 
in-line. But I confess that, under similar conditions, the 
temptation to destroy as well as repuke the fleet of the 
en«ny would have be«i resistless, had I been the com- 
mander* It would have cost more men and periiaps a 



VAUDREUIL AND TOULOUSE 245 

ship or two ; but, in my opinion, success in naval war£eu% 
is measured more perfectly by the extent to which you can 
capture or sink the ships and kill the seamen of the enemy 
than by the promptness with which you can force him, by 
skilful manoeuvre or distant cannonade, to sheer off and 
thereby, with your consent, avoid a conflict that could 
hardly result otherwise than in conquest for you and 
destruction to him. 

It is recorded that, in battle some years ago, when the 
English Guards and the French Guards came in contact, 
one said to the other, " Gentlemen, fire first, if you please.' 
Chivalrous as that may appear in history, I firankly con- 
fess that it represents an imagination of the amenities of 
warfare which I not only do not entertain but which I 
cannot conceive of. 

The year after the operations of the Count de Grasse 
off the Capes, I was cruising in the West Indies, having 
the honour to be the guest of the Marquis de Vaudreuil 
on board his flag-ship, the Triomphante, and I offered for 
his consideration some reflections similar to the above. 
I am happy to say, that the noble Marquis did not dis- 
agree with me. And I am sure that, had the noble Mar- 
quis on that occasion enjoyed opportunity to bring to 
action the fleet of Admiral Pigott before it was reinforced 
by the other division just at the moment peace was pro- 
claimed, other tactics would have been pursued. . . . 

You will by no means infer from these cursory observa- 
tions that I fail to appreciate, within my limited capacity, 
the grandeur of the tactical combinations, the skill of the 
intricate manceuvres, and the far-sighted, long thoi^ht- 
out demonstrations by which the Count de Toulouse drove 
Rooke out of the Mediterranean in August 1 704, with no 
more ado than the comparatively bloodless battle off 
Malaga ; or the address with which La Gralissoni^ re- 
puked Byng from Minorca in 1756 by a long-range battle 
of which the only notable casualty was the subsequent 
execution of Byng by his own Government for the alleged 
crime of failing to destroy the fleet opposed to him I or 
the brilliant campaign of my noble friend, the Count 
D'Orvilliers, off Ushant in July 1778, when he forced 
Keppel to retreat ignominiously to England; not by 
stress of defeat, but by the cunningly planned and adroit^ 
executed expedient of avoiding, on any terms but his 



346 PAUL JONES 

own, the battle which Keppel vainly tried to force upon 
him. Let me' assure you that none of these great events 
has been lost upon my sense of admiration. 

Most impressive to me of all the triumphs of the French 
Navy is the matchless signal-s3rstem of the great Pavilion, 
with the portentous secrets of which I had the honour of 
being the first foreign officer to be entrusted when the 
full code was placed in my hands by D'Orvilliers in per- 
son, on the eve of my sailing from Brest in the little 
Ranger f April 1778, 

And yet, my dear Kersaint, one reflection persecutes 
me, to mar all my memories and baffle all my admiration. 
This is the undeniable fact that the English ships and 
English sailors whom La Galissoni^e manoeuvred away 
from Minorca, under Byng, in 1756, remained intact and 
lived to ruin Conflans in Quiberon Bay three years later 
under Sir Edward Hawke ; and the ships and seamen of 
Graves, whom de Grasse permitted to escape from his 
clutches off the Capes of the Chesapeake in October 1 78 1 , 
were left intact, and lived to discomfit de Grasse Imxiself 
off Santa Lucia and Dominica in April 1 782, under Rodney. 
You know, of course, my dear Kersaint, that my own 
opportunities in naval warfare have been but few and 
feeble in comparison with such as I have mentioned. But 
I do not doubt your ready agreement with me if I say 
that the hostile ships and commanders that I have thus 
far enjoyed the opportunity of meeting, did not give 
any one much trouble thereafter. True, this has been 
on a small scale ; but that was no fault of mine. I did 
my best with the weapons given to me. The rules of 
conduct, the maxims of action, and the tactical instincts 
that serve to gain small victories may always be expanded 
into the winning of great ones with suitable opportunity ; 
because in human affairs the sources of success are ever 
to be found in the fountains of quick resolve and swift 
stroke; and it seems to be a law inflexible and inexor- 
able that he who will not risk cannot win. 

Thus, from my point of view, it has been the besetting 
weakness of French naval tactics to consider the evolu- 
tions of certain masters of the art of naval warfare as the 
art itself. Their evolutions, as such, have been magnifi- 
cent ; their combinations have been superb ; but as I lopk 
at them, they have not been harmful enough ; they have 



JONES'S THEORY OF WAR 247 

not been calculated to do as much capturing or sinking 
of ships, and as much crippling or killing of seamen, as 
true and lasting success in naval warfare seems to me to 
demand. 

This may be a rude— even a cruel — ^view ; but I cannot 
help it. The French tactical system partakes of the 
gentle chivalry of the French people. On the wave as 
on the field of honour, they wish, as it were, to wound 
with the deUcate and polished rapier, rather than kill with 
the clumsy — ^you may say the brutal — ^pistol. I frankly 
— or if so be it humbly — confess that my fibre is not fine 
enough to realize that conception. To me war is the 
sternest and the gloomiest of all human realities, and 
battle the crudest and most forbidding of all human 
practices. Therefore I think that the true duty of every 
one concerned in them is to make them most destructive 
while they last, in order that the cause of real humanity 
may be gained by making them soonest ended. I have 
never been able to contemplate with composure the 
theory of the purely defensive in naval tactics. With all 
due respeqt to the sensibiUties of Frenchmen, I make 
bold to say that better models of action are to be found 
in Hawke at Quiberon Bay, and in Rodney off Santa Lucia 
and Dominica than in de Grasse, either when successful 
in the Chesapeake or when beaten in the West Indies. . . . 

But, my friend, I fear that I weary you. Let me 
thank you again for your compliments and kind wishes. 
I hope that France, in her struggle for liberty, may, as 
America did, find use for me, no matter in what capacity 
or what grade of my profession — ^from a sloop-of-war to 
a fleet — on the high seas. But, should France thus 
honour me, it must be with the unqualified understanding 
that I am not to be restricted by the traditions of her 
naval tactics ; but with full consent that I may, on suit- 
able occasion, to be decreed by my judgment on the spot, 
try conclusions with her foes to the bitter end or to death 
at shorter range and at closer quarters than have hitherto 
been sanctioned by her tactical authorities. 

Nelson's favourite signal in action was, it will be re- 
membered, " Engage the enemy more closely." ^ In like 

' The device on the cover of this volume shows, in heraldic symbolism' 
the flags used by Nelson in making this signal at his three great batties of 



a48 PAUL JONES 

manner it was Paul Jones's fixed aspiration and resolve 
that if he was ever called upon to carry the flag of France 
into a fleet action, it would only be on the unqualified 
understanding " that I may, on suitable occasion, to be 
decreed by my judgment on the spot, try conclusions 
with her foes to the bitter end or to death, at shorter 
range and at closer quarters than have hitherto been 
sanctioned by her tactical authorities." That is the very 
spuit of Nelson. Napoleon, with his unerring insig:ht, 
saw this and said : " Our admirals are alwa}rs talking 
about pelagic conditions and ulterior objects, as if there 
was any condition or any object in war except to get in 
contact with the enemy and destroy him. That was 
Paul Jones's view of the conditions and objects of naval 
warfare. It was also Nelson's." Is it too much to say, 
on the strength of these testimonies, that had his oppor- 
tunities been equal to those of Nelson, Paul Jones might 
have shown that he was cast in the same mould? At 
any rate, no one can blame the American people if they 
think so, and none can gainsay them. 

the Nile, Copenhagen, and Trafalgar. The meaning of the signal was the 
same in each case, but it so happens that the flags denoting it were changed 
between 1798 and 1801, and again between 1801 and 1805. Full information 
on the subject will be found in a very interesting official publication, entitled 
Nelson's Signals : The Evolution of the Signal Flags, written by the Admiralty 
Librarian, and issued by the Naval Intelligence Department under the 
authority of the Admiralty. 



THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS 

LESSONS ^ 

IT will best serve the purpose of the following paper — 
— ^which is in no sense to discuss the affair of the 
Dogger Bank controversially from an international point 
of view, but only to point its moral for future guidance 
and warning — ^to accept the conclusions of the Inter- 
national Commission of Inquiry and to state the facts, 
as far as possible, in the language of its report. The French 
text of the report will be quoted where necessary. 

While anchored at the Skaw, and indeed previously 
since the departure of the fleet under his conmiand from 
Reval, Admiral Rozhdestvensky had received '' nom- 
breuses informations des ^ents du Gouvemement Im- 
perial au suject de tentatives hostiles k redouter, et qui, 
selon toutes vraisemblances, devaient se produire sous 
la forme d'attaques de torpilleurs ; en outre pendant son 
s^jour k Skagen, TAmiral Rojdestvensky avait €t6 
averti de la pr^ence de b&timents suspects sur la c6te de 
Norw^e." One of his transports coming from the north 
also reported having seen four torpedo craft exhibiting 
only a single masthead light. This information naturally 
induced the Commander-in-Chief to take every possible 
precaution for the protection of the ships under Ms com- 
mand against torpedo attack. He left the Skaw twenty- 
four hours earlier than he originally intended, sending 
off his fleet in six separate " Echelons," his own dcheloUi 
consisting of the battleships SuvarojSf, Alexander III, Bar(h 
dino and Orel, and the transport Anadyr, leaving last at 

^ Nwal Annual, 1905. 
249 



2«o THE DOGCZft BAXK AND US LESSONS 



iB. l in e d to steam at tweiTe knots, and die remainder at 
toi. Tbe camae preaerSxsd atni c ais to 1ia¥« led dose to 
tile Dagger Baizk^ weS kzioarn to all pilots and mariners 
as a piace where fishing itaacb of manjr nafkms are likely 
ta be met with a large ninnhfis, Tkis is not the direct 
course from tne Saw to tke Fnglich Channel, but an 
Afrrrriral Jtavin^ any reason to ^■^t*^ ^ a torpedo attack 
would TBtTiraZv aroid the course on which his assailants 
be most likelj to look fcr him. On the other hand, 
Ev^ator who sets hcs coarse so as to pass near the 
Dogger Bank mnst be asbiiuacJ to know that he will 

nshing craft, 
precnfing that nnder the Admiral's 
f the transport J^amdkolihiy 



I 1 »" o t • I 



escorted br the ciiia e ts DrntHwi Domskoi and Aurora. 
Owing to '* une ararie de machi ne/* the Kamckaika fell 
astern, while her escorting auiseis went on at the pre- 
scribed speed, with the resoit that bjr 8 pjn« on October 21 
she was some fiftv miles astern of the rear <diek>n of the 
fleet. In thb position she met the Swedish vessel Aide- 
bmnm and several other craft, and, mistaking them for 
toqxdo craft, she c^iened fixe upon them, sending a wire- 
less message to the Gnnmander-in-Ciiief at 8^5 to the 
effect that she was "' attaqn^ de tons c6t6s par des tor- 
piUenrs." This message was duly received by Admiral 
Rozhdestvensky, and naturally put him still more on the 
alert, inducing him " k signaler k ses bAtiments vers 10 
heures du soir de redoubkr de vigilance et de s'attendre 
k une attaque de torpiDeurs/' The significance of this 
warning would be emphasized by the fact that the Com- 
mander-in-Chief had previously issued a standing order 
whereby each " offider chef de quart *' had been authorized 
** k ouvrir le feu dans le cas d'une attaque ^vidente et 
imminente de torpilleurs. Si Tattaque venait de Tavant 
U devait le faire de sa propre initiative, et, dans le cas 
contraire, beaucoup moins pressant, il devait en r6f£rer k 
son Commandant/' A majority of the Commissioners 



THE FIRST ALARM 251 

considered that, having regard to all the circumstances, 
there was nothing excessive in these orders. 

The Kamchatka having reported herself as some fifty 
miles astern, when she believed herself to be attacked 
between 8 and 9 p.m., Admiral Rozhdestvensky might 
very well calculate that the torpedo craft reported by 
her would overtake his own squadron about i a.m. on 
the follovdng morning, October 21. His course was 
south-westerly, and this brought him towards that hour 
into close proximity to the Dogger Bank and its fishing 
craft. There were some thirty vessels there, spread over 
a space of several miles, and the Conmiissioners state 
without reserve, that all the vessels " portaient leurs feux 
r^lementaires et chalutaient conform^ment k leurs r^les 
usuelles, sous la conduite de leur maltre de ptehe, suivant 
les indications de fusses conventionelles." Of the pre- 
ceding Echelons which had passed near them, none had 
reported by wireless telegraphy anything suspicious or 
unusual in their proceedings, and in particular Admiral 
FSlkersahm, who had passed with his Echelon to the 
northward of them, had examined them closely with his 
searchlights, " et, les ayant reconnus ainsi pour des b&ti- 
ments inoffensifs, continua tranquillement sa route." 
Shortly after Admiral Folkersahm had passed, the last 
Echelon arrived in the neighbourhood of the fishing fleet. 
*' La route de cet Echelon le conduisait k peu prte siur le 
gros de la flottille des chalutiers, qu'il allait done 6tre 
oblige de contoumer, mais dans le sud.'' This would 
seem to imply that instead of passing round the fishing 
fleet on the north, as Admiral Folkersahm had done, 
Admiral Rozhdestvensky found that his course would 
take him " sur le gros de la flottille,'' and would have 
altered course accordingly to the southward, so as to 
leave the flotilla on his starboard hand, but for a series 
of occurrences which at the moment htg^n to arrest his 
attention, and apparently induced him to keep his course 
and pass through the flotilla, though more to the south- 
ward than the northward. He would therefore have 

19 



2S2 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

fishing-boats both to port and to starboard of him through- 
out the subsequent proceedings. By the first of these 
occurrences — the firing of a green nxriKt, to wit — the 
already tense apprehension of the officers on the hri^ 
of the flagship was still further quickened. Sudi an 
occurrence in such drcumstances might well seem to wear 
an aspect of menace to officers who were at the moment 
on the look-out for an immediate attack by torpedo craft ; 
but in reality this fatal rocket was merely the regular 
signal by which the admiral of the fishing fleet indicated 
to his consorts that they were to shoot their trawls to 
starboard. 

Very shortly after the display of this alarming but 
wholly innocent signal the officers of the Suvaroff, eagerly 
scanning the horizon through their night glasses, discerned 
*' sur la crite des lames dans la direction du bossoir k 
tribord " — that is, over the starboard cathead — '* et k 
une distance de i8 ^ ^o encablures un b&timent qui leur 
parut suspect parce quHls ne lui voyaient aucun feu et 
que ce bfttiment leur semblaient se dinger vers eux k 
contrebord.'' This is their own deposition. Twenty 
cables are 4,000 yards, or two nautical miles. The ex- 
treme beam of the laigest torpedo craft is less than 24 
feet or 8 yards, and the vessel now entering on the scene 
is reported to have been advancing end on ** k contre- 
bord/' The Commissioners report that at the time " la 
nuit ^tait k demi obscure, un peu voil^e par une brume 
l^g&re et basse." To have discovered so small an object 
at so great a distance on such a night reflects infinite 
credit on the vigilance of the discoverers and their keen- 
ness of vision, but it ako shows that they could not well 
have overlooked such of the fishing boats as were nearer 
to them, and were all carrying their regulation lights. 
Anyhow, " lorsque le navire suspect fut 6c\Bir6 par un , 
projecteur les observateurs crurent reconnaitre un tor- 
pilleur k grande allure." The speed of the Suvaroff was 
ten knots. " Grande allure " for a torpedo craft ad- 
vancing to the attack can hardly be put at less than 



THE ALARM INTENSIFIED 253 

twenty knots. The two craft were thus approachii^; 
each other at the rate of thirty knots — ^that is, a nautical 
mile in every two minutes. As they were only two nau- 
tical miles apart when the " navire suspect " was first 
sighted, they would be abreast of each other in four 
minutes. All who have any practical experience of the 
use of the searchlight in such circumstances must acknow* 
ledge that it was handled with consummate skill by the 
officers of the Suvaroff on this occasion, but at the same 
time they will draw the irresistible inference that the 
speed of the advancing vessel must have served to differ- 
entiate it absolutely from any of the fishing craft in its 
neighbourhood. Be this as it may, the Commissioners 
go on to say, '^ C'est d'aprte ces apparences que TAmiral 
Rojdestvensky fit ouvrir le feu sur ce navire inconnu " ; 
and to this they append the following conunent : ''La 
majority des Commissaires exprime k ce sujet I'opinion 
que la responsabilit^ de cet acte et les rteultats de la 
cannonade essuy^e par la flottille de pCche incombent k 
TAmiral Rojdestvensky.'* 

Almost inmiediately fire was opened a small vessel was 
observed right ahead of the Suvaroff ^ and so dose that 
course had to be altered to port to avoid her. Illuminated 
by a searchlight this vessel was seen to be a trawler. 
Accordingly, " pour emp6cher que le tir des vaisseaux fut 
dirig6 sur ce b&timent inoffensif, Taxe du projecteur fiit 
aussitdt relev^ ^45^ vers le del ** — ^this beii^ apparently 
a signal preconcerted for the purpose. " Ensuite rAmiral 
fit adresser par signal a I'escadre Tordre de ne pas tirer 
sur les chalutiers." 

It may not here be amiss to recapitulate the succession 
of events, all of which must have taken place within four 
minutes, if the suspidous vessel which caused the Suvaroff 
to open fire was steaming at twenty knots, while two 
minutes more at the same speed would have taken her 
astern of the whole squadron. These are, — (i) discovery 
of a suspicious vessel on the starboard bow at a distance 
of dghteen or twenty cables ; (3) her recognition by means 



2S4 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 



of the searchlight as a torpedo craft steaming at high 
speed ; (3) order given to open fire on her ; (4) discovery 
of a small vessel right ahead of the Suvaroffi^{s) course 
altered to port in order to avoid her ; (6) her recognition 
as a trawler by means of the searchlight ; (7) signal made 
not to fire on the trawlers. The outside allowance of time 
Mrithin which all these things must have happened is from 
seven to eight minutes, even if the speed of the suspicious 
vessel was not more than fifteen knots, and at the end of 
that period the vessel in question must have been well 
astern of the rear ship of the Russian line, having to- 
wards the close of it passed the latter on its starboard 
side, and therefore between it and such vessels of the 
fishing fleet as were situated to the northward. It would 
have been little short of a miracle in the circumstances 
for all the vessels of the fishing fleet so situated to have 
escaped injury, however unintentionally inflicted ; and 
as the fire of the Russian squadron lasted, according to 
the Commissioners, from ten to twelve minutes, it would 
seem that the conclusion at which a majority of them 
arrived can hardly be seriously disputed : "La dur^ du 
tir k tribord, m6me en se pla^ant au point de vue Russe, 
a sembl^ k la majority des Commissaires avoir ^t^ plus 
longue qu'elle ne paraissait nteessaire." There is nothing 
to show that any order was given by the Admiral to fire 
on any vessel other than that which originally aroused 
his suspicions and caused him to open fire. It does not 
appear that any other suspicious vessel was observed on 
the starboard hand. The suspicious vessel in question 
must, as we have seen — ^" d'aprte les depositions des 
t^moins," to borrow a convenient phrase of the Com« 
missioners — ^have passed well astern of the Russian line 
in less than eight minutes. Yet the fire was continued 
for ten or twelve minutes in all. Unless, therefore, 
the Russian ships were firing entirely at random — as 
they easily might have been, for the thing has been 
done over and over again in manceuvres — ^they must have 
been firing, however unwittingly and unintentionally, at 



THE SUSPECTED VESSEL 255 

the unofFending trawlers on their starboard hand and at 
nothing else. 

What the suspicious vessel was the Commissioners do 
not attempt to determine. The Aurora was certainly hit 
several times in the course of the firing. But beyond 
suggesting that the Aurora, steaming in the same direc- 
tion as the fleet and showing no lights astern, may have 
been the vessel which originally aroused suspicion on 
board the Suvaroff and induced Admiral Rozhdestvensky 
to open fire, the Commissioners were apparently unable 
to ascertain where she was or how she came there. The 
Dmitri Donskoi was also present, since her identification 
by the Commander-in-Chief, after she had made her 
number, induced the latter to make a general signal to 
cease fire. But the precise position of the Dmitri Donskoi, 
whether to port or starboard of the Russian line, is not 
determined by the Commissioners. It only remains to 
add at this stage of the narrative that if the conjecture 
of the Commissioners that the Aurora was the suspicious 
vessel in question is well founded, and if as they also sug- 
gest she was steaming in the same direction as the fleet, 
her relative bearing and distance could not have changed 
materially, so that the original belief of the Commander- 
in-Chief and his staff that the suspicious vessel was a 
torpedo craft steaming towards the fleet " k contrebord,'' 
and '' k grande allure," must have been promptly dis- 
allowed by the event. In that case the continuance of 
the starboard firing for ten or twelve minutes becomes 
more incomprehensible than ever. 

So much for the starboard firing. The cause of the 
firing to port is even more obsctu^. Just as the trawler 
above-mentioned was discerned right ahead of the Suvaroff 
and course was altered in order to avoid her, " les obser- 
vateurs du Suvaroff aper^urent k b&bord un autre b&ti- 
ment qui leur parut suspect, k cause de ses apparences 
de mime nature de^elle de I'objectif du tir par tribord. 
Le feu fut aussitdt ouvert sur ce deuxiime but et se trouva 
ainsi engage des deux bords." It b here stated by the 



356 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

G>mmissioners that, according to the standing orders pre- 
viously issued to the squadron, " Tamiral indiquait les 
buts sur lesquels devait £tre dirig^ le tir des vaisseaux en 
fixant sur eux ses projecteurs/' Every one who has any 
practical experience of torpedo operations will recognize 
at once that such a method of indication is exceedingly 
vague and very apt tb be mbleading, even when the 
searchlights are worked from the flagship alone. If other 
ships in company are working their searchlights more 
or less at random at the same time confusion and mb- 
understanding are inevitable ; at least, such is the opinion 
of the Commissioners, and no naval officer will dispute it. 
" Mais comme chaque vaisseau balayait Thorizon en tout 
sens autour de lui avec ses propres projecteurs pour se 
garer d'une surprise, il 6tait difficile qu'il ne se produistt 
pas de confusion." In this confusion, either by sheer 
accident or through a mistake, quite intelligible and far 
from inexcusable in the circumstances, the majority of 
the injuries sustained by the trawlers would seem to have 
been inflicted. It is clear that Admiral Rozhdestvensky 
personally did all he could from first to last to prevent the 
fire of his squadron being directed on any of the trawlers 
dbtinctly recognized as such, and the Commissioners 
record their unanimous opinion to this effect. But had 
he been an angel from heaven his efforts must have been 
unavailing in the situation as described by the Commis- 
sioners. 

The majority of the latter declare that the starboard 
fire was, in their judgment, unduly prolonged. They 
hesitate to record the same opinion regarding the firing 
to. port, on the ground that their information on the sub- 
ject was insufficient, and it must be acknowledged that 
on this and several other points the Russian case was 
allowed to go by default. None of the logs of any of the 
ships engaged were produced. The Russian witnesses 
were few, and their testimony threw little light on the 
more obscure aspects of the situation. Nevertheless a 
majority of the Commissioners recorded their conclusion 



FINDING OF THE COMMISSION 257 

in no ambiguous terms : "La majority des Commissaires 
constate qu'elle manque d'^l^ments prdcis pour recon- 
naltre sur quel but ont tir^ les vaisseaux, mais les G)m- 
missaires reconnaissent unanimement que les bateaux de 
la flotille n'ont commis aucun acte hostile ; et la majority 
des Commissaires £tant d'opinion qu'il n'y avait, ni 
parmi les chalutiers, ni sur les lieux aucun torpilleur, 
Touverture du feu par I'Amiral Rojdestvensky n'^tait 
pas justifiably" This opinion, however, was not shared 
by the Russian Commissioner, who, on the contrary, 
recorded his opinion '' que ce sont pr^cis^n^ent les b&ti- 
ments suspects s'approchant de I'escadre dans un but 
hostile qui ont provoqu^ le feu." The two conclusions 
are not irreconcilable. The majority of the Commissioners 
content themselves with recording the fact that no torpedo 
craft was present. The Russian Commissioner does not 
appear to dispute this, but contends that the approach 
of " b&timents suspects " sufficed to justify the Russian 
flagship in opening fire. It will be seen in the sequel that 
his view is not wholly without justification from the his- 
tory of manoeuvres. 

The order to cease fire was given as soon as the Dmitri 
Donskoi was identified by Admiral Rozhdestvensky, and 
the " la file des vaisseaux continua sa route et disparut 
dans le sud-ouest sans avoir stopp^." The fact that they 
did not stop to ascertain what damage had been done, and 
to render such assistance as might be required by the 
innocent victims of the cannonade, was naturally criticized 
in many quarters. But the Commissioners exonerate 
Admiral Rozhdestvensky on this point : " Les Commis- 
saires sont unanimes k reconnaitre, qu'aprte les circon- 
stances qui ont pr^c^^ Tincident et <:elles qui Tout pro- 
duit, il y avait & la fin du tir assez d'incertitudes au sujet 
du danger que courait T^chelon des vaisseaux pour decider 
I'Amiral k continuer sa route." Notwithstanding this, 
however, the majority of the Comimissioners express their 
regret that Admiral Rozhdestvensky " n'ait pas eu la pre- 
occupation, en frandussant le Pas de Calais, d 'informer les 



358 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

autorit^ des Puissances maritimes voisines qu'ayant itt 
amen< k ouvrir le feu pvhs d'un groupe de cfaalutiers, ces 
bateauxi de nationality inconnue, avaient besoin de 
secours/' Though this regret was not unanimous at the 
G>mmission it will hardly find a dissentient elsewhere. 
The stem and urgent necessities of war may, as the Com- 
missioners acknowledgCi take precedence of the daims of 
humanity at the moment of conflict. They cannot ex- 
cuse or even extenuate indifference to those claims after 
the emergency b past. 

Finally, the Commissioners declare " que leurs appr6- 
ciations . • . ne sont pas dans leur esprit de nature k 
Jeter aucune dteonsid^ration sur la valeur militaire ni 
sur les sentiments d 'humanity de I'Amiral Rojdestvensky 
et du personnel de son escadre/' If my purpose were 
controversial this conclusion, apparently so inconsistent 
with the previous findings, might invite some criticism. 
But the Commission was neither a judicial tribunal nor a 
diplomatic conference. It combined some of the charac- 
teristics of both. Its abnormal composition is reflected 
in the several paragraphs of its report. On essential points 
judgment is given against Admiral Rozhdestvensky. 
The trawlers are exonerated altogether. Their conduct 
was unimpeachable throughout. There was nothing in it 
to arouse a shadow of suspicion. The responsibility for 
opening fire and for all that ensued is thrown upon Admiral 
Rozhdestvensky. There were no torpedo craft '' ni 
parmi les chalu tiers ni sur les lieux.'' Admiral Rozhdest- 
vensky was not, therefore, justified in opening fire. Even 
on his own showing the starboard fire was unduly pro- 
longed. As to the firing to port, the evidence produced — 
by no means all that might have been produced — ^is insilfii- 
cient to sustain a similar conclusion, so that " not proven " 
is here the verdict rather than *' not guilty." Admiral 
Rozhdestvensky did all he could to prevent injury to 
fishing-boats, but in the confusion caused by his opening 
fire without adequate justification his efforts were unavail- 
ing. He was not called upon to stop in the midst of what 



PROBLEM OF THE ALARM 259 

he regarded as imminent dai^r, but he was called upon 
to report the incident to the Powers interested at the 
earliest possible moment. These are the judicial aspects 
of the Commission's finding. Then diplomacy steps in 
and seeks to soothe military and national susceptibilities 
by declaring that Admiral Rozhdestvensky's *' valeur 
militaire '' is unimpaired, and his " sentiments d'humanit^ " 
unimpeachable. Those who are best qualified to appre- 
ciate the full weight of the judicial censure will probably 
be the last to demur to the diplomatic gloss. 

Now, the problem which still awaits solution is to deter- 
mine what it was that first provoked the Russian fire. It 
cannot have been the fishing fleet — that is quite dear. 
When Admiral Rozhdestvensky set his coiuse so as to 
pass close to the Dogger Bank, he must have known that 
at that point he would probably come across a large 
assemblage of trawlers. The green rocket may well have 
puzzled him, but it should not have made him see torpedo- 
craft or other hostile vessels where there were none to be 
seen. The majority of the Conmiissioners record their 
conviction that no torpedo craft were there. The Russian 
Commissioner, on the other hand, stoutly adhered to his 
conviction " que ce sont pr^cis^ment les b&timents sus- 
pects s'approchant de Tescadre qui ont provoqu^ le feu." 
The Dmitri Danskoi and the Aurora do not answer to this 
description, because the only way in which the Commis- 
sioners attempted to explain the Aurora's being mistaken 
** par une illusion d'optique nocturne '' for torpedo craft, 
was by supposing that she was not '* s'approchant de 
Tescadre " but steaming in the same direction. 

Yet the presence of any torpedo craft other than Rus- 
sian is absolutely excluded by the evidence laid before 
the Commissioners. The absence of Russian torpedo 
craft on the other hand seems rather to have been taken 
for granted than established by positive evidence. Their 
presence is highly improbable, no doubt, but not perhaps 
more improbable a priori than the presence of the Dmitri 
Donskoi and the Aurora^ which must have been wholly 






26o THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

une3q>ected by Admiral Rozhdestvensky, or he would not 
have fired on them. If, then, the possible, albeit un« 
avowed, presence of Russian torpedo craft is not excluded 
by any of the positive evidence presented, it would furnish 
an hypothesis which explains more of the facts than any 
other yet sugg;ested, and goes far to reconcile the view 
taken by the Russian Commissioner with that taken by 
his colleagues. It is difficult to say why, if Russian tor- 
pedo craft were present, their presence should not have 
been acknowledged ; but it is not more easy to explain 
the persistent economy of evidence in the presentation of 
the Russian case — an economy which baffled the majority 
of the Commissioners and provoked comments scarcely 
to be distinguished from remonstrances. 

If this hypothesis could be entertained the whole inci- 
dent would be explained. Admiral Rozhdestvensky, 
having discovered two torpedo boats, opened fire on them 
before they were seen to be his own, and in the confusion 
that ensued the other ships fired on anythii^ they could 
see, and continued their fire for several minutes after they 
ought to have realized that they were firing on unoffending 
fishing craft. No other hypothesis so completely vindi- 
cates the ** valeur militaire " of the personnel of the 
Russian squadron, nor can any other be suggested which 
does not bring the judicial findings of the Commission 
into somewhat sharp conflict with its diplomatic conclu- 
sion. 

Passing now from the judicial, diplomatic, and naval 
aspects of the case, we have next to consider its psycho- 
logical aspects. How was it that the Russian Admiral 
and his officers were brought into a state of mind which 
predisposed them to make a mistake so deplorable in its 
nature, and so terrible in its consequences ? That they 
did make a mistake is beyond all question. It was a mis- 
take if they fired on the Aurora and Dmitri Donskoi. It 
was a mistake if they fired on their own torpedo craft. 
It was a mistake if they fired on nothing at all. It was 
the worst mistake of all if they fired on the fishing boats 



ROZHDESTVENSKY'S INFORMATION 261 

believing them to be torpedo craft. Whatever its nature, 
then, this mistake requires explanation. In the first 
place there were the " nombreuses informations des 
Agents du Gouvemement Imperial." The weight at- 
tached to this information reflects little credit on the 
Russian Naval Inteltigence Department. Admiral Rozh- 
destvensky was bound of course to give due heed to in- 
formation received from official or other well-authenticated 
sources. But the Russian Naval Intelligence Department 
must have known, as every other Naval Intelligence De- 
partment knew, or might have known, that there were 
no Japanese torpedo craft in European waters. The in- 
formation received by Admiral Rozhdestvensky is not 
stated to have come from the Russian Admiralty. It 
came from " agents of the Imperial Government. '' It 
would appear that the Russian Admiralty had no such 
information, for if it is hardly conceivable that such 
information would not have been laid before the Com- 
mission. If it had none, the inference is that there was 
none to be had, and in that case, unless the Russian Naval 
Intelligence Department is to be regarded as wholly in- 
competent, it might surely have been expected to instruct 
Admiral Rozhdestvensky that the unsifted warnings of 
local agents were not to be taken for more than they were 
worth — ^which must have been very little indeed. 

However, Admiral Rozhdestvensky did believe these 
warnings and made his dispositions accordingly. This 
was the first stage in the formation of the *' psychological 
atmosphere," which alone accounts for the tragedy of 
the Dogger Bank. An attitude of expectancy had been 
created even before the squadron left the Skaw. It was 
accentuated by the adventures of the Kamchatka^ herself 
manifestly enveloped in the same psychological atmo- 
sphere. It was brought to a state of extreme tension 
by the green rocket of the fishing fleet. It passed into 
action premature, disastrous, and unjustifiable when the 
appearance of the suspicious vessels liberated all that 
pent-up expectancy and fired a train which had been laid 



262 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

many hours and perhaps several days before. The Rus- 
sian officers saw what they expected to see and took 
action accordingly. 

What they saw is from this point of view inmiaterial. 
It may have been nothing at all. It may have been a 
torpedo craft, as they undoubtedly believed at the time, 
and as apparently they still believed when their evidence 
was tendered to the Commission. In that case it can only 
have been a Russian torpedo craft. It may have been the 
Aurora, as the Commissioners seem to su^^est. It may 
have been a fishing boat. The point is that whatever it 
waS| whether it was anything or nothing, it was taken for 
a torpedo craft because that was what it was expected to 
be. There is nothing at all surprising in this, and there 
would not be much fault to find with it if the fire had not 
been unjustifiably opened, unjustifiably prolonged, and 
very inadequately controlled, with the deplorable result 
now known to all the world, a result which cost at least 
three lives — one Russian and two British — ^and very 
nearly plunged two great nations into war. There are so 
many officers in the British Navy who have made the 
same mistake that there is probably no officer of any 
experience in the service who does not know how easy it 
is to make it, and how much more difficult it is to avoid 
it. In other words, the experience of British naval officers 
would lead them to assume, almost as a matter of course, 
that such a mistake was actually made by the officers of 
the Baltic Fleet, and at the same time to make every 
reasonable allowance for its being made. But to make 
a mistake is one thing. All men are liable to it. It is 
quite another thing to persist in it beyond all reason or 
precedent, and to make no such efforts to repair it as 
humanity must needs dictate, so far as they are consis- 
tent with the legitimate accomplishment of the military 
duties of a commander in time of war. The more ready 
British officers may be to make allowance for the original 
mistake the more fully will they concur in the censure 
passed by a majority of the Commission on the conduct 



MISTAKES IN MANOEUVRES 263 

of the Russian Admiral at subsequent stages of the pro- 
ceedings. 

It will surprise many perhaps to learn that naval 
opinion in this country is quite ready to make all reason- 
able allowance for the original mistake. Yet it can be' 
shown from authentic records that if, with the Commis- 
sioners, we set aside the hypothesis that hostile torpedo 
craft were actually present at the Dogger Bank on the 
night of October 21, there is no possible explanation of 
what occurred on that occasion which cannot be paral- 
leled by what has happened over and over again in the 
course of the naval manceuvres and other sea exercises 
of the British Fleet. In his evidence before the Com- 
mission Commander Keyes, an officer of large experience 
in the operations of torpedo craft, mentioned several re- 
corded cases at manoeuvres, including, as reported in The 
Times f " one in which a flagship leading the Mediter- 
ranean Fleet mistook a battleship for a destroyer. • . . 
Another case occurred at the manoeuvres in 1902. The 
Darts observed through glasses what she thought to be a 
four-funnelled destroyer. The searchlight was directed 
on her, but failed to reveal anything. Yet in reality the 
boat thus taken for a destroyer was the four-funnelled 
cruiser Andromeda.** A very close parallel to these cases 
is to be found in the Naval Annual for igoi, where it is 
stated that " on one occasion a destroyer was said to 
have passed, at night, six friendly battleships steaming 
without lights, and to have mistaken them for torpedo 
boats." The opposite mistake, that of taking torpedo 
craft for battleships or other large craft, has also been 
made. In the Naval Annual for 1900 it is recorded that 
'' Admiral Domville had received circumstantial reports 
from the commanding officer of his destroyers that the 
A Fleet or a considerable portion of it had been observed 
during the night steering southward in the neighbourhood 
of Holyhead. It would seem that a flotilla of A's torpedo 
boats was mistaken by the officer in question for the 
main body of the A fleet, and reported as such to head- 



264 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

quarters." If then the Russian officers mistook the 
Aurora for a torpedo craft they are not without justifica- 
tion in the records of British manoeuvres. Even if they 
mistook nothing at all for a torpedo craft the same justi- 
fication may be pleaded. In the NavcU Annual for 1892 
the official report on the manoeuvres of 1891 is cited for 
a remark of Captain, now Admiral, Dumford on " the 
extraordinary way people think they see torpedo boats 
when none are there." Even if they mistook fishing 
vessels for torpedo craft there is an approximate parallel 
to be cited. In the Naval Annual for 1901 I myself 
recorded the incident as follows : 

The Minerva, scouting off the west coast of Ireland, 
got amongst a fleet of fishing boats off the Skelligs, on 
the night of July 27. Mistalang them for torpedo-boats 
and remaining among them for some hours, she persuaded 
herself that she must have been torpedoed, and loyally 
hoisting the " Blue Peter " — ^the signal for being out of 
action — she proceeded quietly to Milford, there to await 
the decision of the umpires. As no torpedo boats were, 
nor, under Admiral Rawson's orders, could have been 
engaged, the decision was naturally given in her favour. 
• . • Such an incident could not, of course, happen in 
war, but, even in war, cruisers which mistake fishing boats 
for torpedo-boats are likely to meet with strange adven- 
tures. 

Lastly, if, as has been suggested above, the Russians 
fired on their own torpedo craft, this is an incident of 
no infrequent occurrence in manoeuvres, British and 
foreign. A French incident may be cited. In the Naval 
Annual for 1894 it is related that " the Isly came in sight 
and the Turco'' — a " torpilleur de haute mer " — ^' was 
sent ahead to communicate with her ; but not being recog- 
nized by the Furieux and the Epervier, the Turco was 
fired on by these vessels. About the same time a friendly 
torpedo-boat was fired on by the Buffle, in spite of the 
private signab displayed by the former." The latter 



LESSONS FOR THE FUTURE 265 

instance is an'otreme case, perhaps; but it shows, at 
any rate, how easy it is to make the mistake in question, 
even in circumstances which might be expected to render 
such a mistake ahnost impossible. Manoeuvres are not 
war, of course, nor should the analogy be pressed unduly. 
In manoeuvres there is a definite field of operations pre- 
scribed, and within that field, and more especially, at cer- 
tain positions, designated beforehand by the strategic 
and tactical characteristics of the area, every ship on 
both sides knows that it must be on the look out for 
torpedo attack. Here the psychological atmosphere which 
generates a state of acute mental expectancy must needs 
exist, and may easily lead to mistakes which, if not excus- 
able, are at least intelligible. But if in manoeuvres an 
admiral were to go outside the manoeuvre area to a posi- 
tion where the probable presence of fishing vessek in 
large numbers was a matter of maritime notoriety, he 
would hardly be entitled to plead the psychological atmo- 
sphere and its concomitant state of expectancy as a valid 
and suflScient excuse for any mistake that he made in 
consequence. Now the analogy of the Dogger Bank inci- 
dent is in large measure of this latter character. The 
actual theatre of war was thousands of miles away. The 
presence of hostile torpedo craft was so improbable in 
the circumstances, that the suspicion of it should never 
have been allowed to take so firm a hold as it did on 
the minds of Admiral Rozhdestvensky and his oflScers. 
On the other hand, the presence of innocent fishing boats 
was almost a certainty. It is the duty of a naval officer 
who knows his business to weigh these alternative proba- 
bilities, and to draw a sound conclusion from them. It 
would seem that Admiral Folkersahm did this, while 
Admiral Rozhdestvensky did exactly the reverse. 

Nevertheless, the significance of the whole story and 
the lessons it has to teach belong rather to the future 
than to the past. Whatever may be the value of the 
torpedo in war — a question not relevant to the present 
discussion — there can be no doubt that the torpedo 



266 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

craft is a weapon of such tremendous and peculiar menace 
that it creates a psychological atmosphere of its own. In 
the case of Admiral Rozhdestvensky and his o£5icers, it 
was able to create that atmosphere at the distance of 
nearly half the globe. Such a remarkable case of action 
at a distance is not perhaps likely to be repeated. But 
when the two belligerents are separated by no greater 
distance than, to avoid indiscreet analogies, let us say 
that which in ancient warfare separated the Romans 
firom the CarthaginianSi the experience of the Dc^er Bank 
is not at all unlikely to be repeated, unless its lessons are 
taken seriously and learnt betimes. Two things are 
almost certain. Innocent vessek will often be mistaken 
for torpedo craft, and torpedo craft will always be fired 
on at sight. About the latter proposition there seems 
to be no sort of doubt. In the Niwal Annual for 1896 
Captain Bacon— one of the highest authorities on tor])edo 
warfare in the Navy — wrote as follows : 

The danger to the country is so great, if boats are 
allowed to rove about without definite orders, that too 
much stress cannot be laid on the following points* The 
boat ... is of no value compared with the ship, and 
therefore the onus of sinking a friendly ship should Ue 
entirely on the boat. A boat at night is a pariah to 
every ship afloat. ... A ship should alwajrs fire on any 
boat — whether suspected of being a friend or an enemy 
— ^that approaches her at night, since it is far better to 
sink a friendly boat than risk losing a ship by mistaking 
the identity of an enemy's boat. Since, therefore, every 
ship should fire on every approaching boat, no boat should 
take the fact of a ship firing on her as evidence that she 
is an enemy. The only safe way yet known of conduct- 
ing an attack on a doubtful ship is for the boat to chal- 
lenge the sUp by a signalling method, and to allow a 
reasonably safe time for reply. The time occupied in 
approaching will ordinarily be sufficient, so that no real 
delay is caused to the boat. ... A procedure such as 
the above cannot be too strongly insisted on if boats are 
to be used with safety in waters where both enemy's and 



POSITION OF TORPEDO CRAFT 267 

friendly ships may be met with. Moreover, a torpedo 
attack should be a deliberate attack. 



This, then, is the roHanaU of torpedo attack and defence, 
as formulated by one of the highest authorities on the 
subject in our own naval service. Captain Bacon, how- 
ever, is only an individual, it may be objected, and the 
official theory may be different. The official theory is 
identical. In the Naval Annual for 1903 it is related how, 
during manoeuvres in the Mediterranean, the Implacable 
was attacked by a destroyer of her own side, and the 
official narrative of the operations is cited as remarking, 
''it is most unlikely that this would have happened in 
war, for the destroyer, which was in sight long before she 
attacked, would have been fired on without waiting to 
ascertain whether she was friend or foe." It is clear, 
then, that Captain Bacon's views cannot be denied the 
authority of official sanction. It may thus be taken for 
granted that in war all torpedo craft will be fired on at 
sight unless they have previously disclosed their identity. 
It follows that if a friendly torpedo craft is not to be 
spared, except on terms with which a neutral cannot 
comply, a neutral torpedo craft will fare still worse. A 
neutral torpedo craft, however, has clearly no business 
to be there at all. If she sights a belligerent fleet, the 
best thing she can do is to show it a clean pair of heels 
at once. Nothing on earth can save her if she once 
allows herself to be caught within the range of belligerent 
fire. In the abstract, of course, she has just as much 
right to use the sea as any other vessel that floats. In 
like manner a husbandman has every right to till his 
fields, if he chooses, under the fire of two contending 
armies. But if he is killed it is his own fault. 

So far, then, there is no great difficulty. The neutral 
torpedo craft must take her chance. She has no business 
to be there intentionally, and if she is there by accident, 
she must do her best not to be there as soon as possible. 
But the neutral trading vessel, whether fishing boat or 
20 



268 THE DOGGER BANK AND ITS LESSONS 

larger craft, stapds on quite a different footing. In the 
clash of war she is innocent, defenceless, and helpless, 
and yet experience shows that she runs a very appreciable 
risk of being mistaken fcH* a torpedo craft, and, as such, 
of being fired on at sight. How is this to be prevented? 
If Dogger Bank incidents were Ukdy to become common, 
the situation would be rendered intolerable to a neutral 
Power possessing a large mercantile marine and a navy 
adequate to its protection. It must be made clear to the 
belligerent that he cannot make with impunity such 
disastrous mistakes as Admiral Rozhdestvensky made 
at the Dogger Bank, that it is safer for him to run the 
risk of a not very probable torpedo attack than by making 
a mbtake to incur the much more probable and much 
more serious risk of having the fleets of a powerful neutral 
added to the fleets of an adversary with whom he is 
already at war. In other words, the commander of a 
belligerent fleet or ship must show the real quality of his 
" valeur miiitaire.'' He must not allow his military judg- 
ment to be sophisticated by a psychological atmosphere 
mainly of his own creation. The right of firing on a 
torpedo craft at sight carries with it the correlative duty 
of not mistaking an innocent vessel for a torpedo craft. 
Such a mistake may occasionally be made in circumstances 
which go far to excuse it ; but such circumstances must 
needs be very rare, and were not to be found, in the judg- 
ment of the Commission, in the situation at the Dogger 
Bank: " A torpedo attack," sajrs Captain Bacon, '* should 
be a deliberate attack." The defence against such an 
attack must be equally circumspect. The psychological 
atmosphere must be distrusted, the state of expectancy 
must be controlled. The sea is the common highway 
of peaceful commerce and industry. The belligerent com- 
mander must never forget this, nor allow himself to 
open fire on whatever looks like a torpedo craft on a 
dark night without waiting to ascertain whether what he 
is attacking is a furtive and insidious assailant or only a 
flock of defenceless and unoffending sheep, such as Quixpte 



LESSON OF THE INCIDENT 269 

mistook for the troops of " the infidel, Alifanfaron of 
Taprobana." If he acts in thb heedless fashion, he dis- 
credits his own " valeur militaire/' and runs the risk of 
turning neutrals, wholly against their will, into his coun- 
try's enemies. These are lessons which it behoves all 
maritime Powers to learn. It was because Admiral 
Rozhdestvensky had not learnt them that innocent lives 
were sacrificed on the Dogger Bank, and the world was 
brought within a hair's breadth of almost universal war. 



THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

** \](/AR/' said Napoleon, " is an affair of positions." 
VV iliis IS espedally true of naval war. It is the 
principle which governs the conflict of fleets, and it deter- 
mines their distribution. The essence of all naval warfare 
will be found to consist in the effort of each belligerent to 
interrupt the maritime communications of the other and 
to secure his own. When either belligerent has succeeded 
in establishing a complete and unassailable control over 
the maritime communications of his adversary, and has 
thereby obtained complete security for his own, the object 
of naval warfare is attained. There is nothing more for 
the victorious fleet to do except to hold what it has won ; 
and that is comparatively easy, because the situation sup- 
posed implies that the enemy no longer possesses any 
naval force which is capable of challenging its hold. The 
history of naval warfare is an almost unbroken succession 
of illustrations of this broad principle, and there is no 
illustration of it more impressive, more instructive, nor 
more conclusive than the great naval campaign which 
ended at Trafalgar. Trafalgar was the dosing scene of 
the long maritime struggle between England and Napoleon. 
It put an end once for all to Napoleon's plans for the 
invasion of England, and it opened the way for the great 
counter-stroke against him in the Peninsula which ended 
at last in his overthrow. 

It is only another way of stating the same broad prin- 
ciple, to say that naval warfare is essentially a struggle 
for the command of the sea. G>mmand of the sea means 

^ Tk$ UniM S$rvie$ Magaiine, October 1905. 

270 



COMMAND OF THE SEA 271 

the control, absolute and unassailable, of the enemy's 
maritime communications, and it means nothing else. 
Meaning that, it means everything that naval warfare, as 
such, can attain. In the case of an island, it means that 
such an island cannot be invaded, starved out, or other- 
wise injured from the sea so long as its sea defence is 
unimpaired. In the case of two Powers not possessing 
a common frontier, it means that neither can assail the 
other without first making its conmiunications across the 
sea secure. The Crimea, for example, could never have 
been invaded if the Russian fleet had been able to " im- 
peach ** the fleets of England and France upon the seas. 
Had the naval resources of Russia been sufficient to 
enable her to try conclusions with England and France 
upon the seas, the armies of England and France could 
not have been landed in the Crimea until the naval issue 
had been decided, nor could they even have been trans- 
ported to Varna. 

Now England, being an island, can only be assailed 
from the sea. The British Empire, being an assem- 
blage of far-flung possessions, acknowledging a conunon 
sovereignty and separated from the seat of that sove- 
reignty and from each other by vast stretches of ocean 
distance, can only be held together by secure maritime 
communications. The United Kingdom, being an indus- 
trial and mercantile community, sending the products 
of its industry across the seas to all parts of the world, 
and receiving payment for them in food and other im- 
ported' conmiodities, is the centre of a vascular system 
which is essential to its wholesome nourishment and 
even to its very existence. It has been calculated, I 
think, that the interchange of conmiodities between these 
islands and the parts across the seas is carried on without 
ceasing, day and night, from year-end to year-end, at 
the rate of some two tons per minute. The loss of the 
conunand of the sea by England, or, to speak more accu- 
rately, the failure to secure it in the event of war, would 
mean the suspension of this interchange with all its incal- 



wvw 




«l ^M ^ I . 



widi the fall advantage of occiq>y- 



k follows that 

at the 

it fa, 

itiafiy a 

allow Itself to 

ing the best pOBitinns §tt its df frncf upon the seas. It 

fa on tfafa principle that the naval farces of Gteat Britain 

hare always been dfatriboted. In eariy times, when ships 

were small and their c ap adtjr far fcr e phig die sea was 

limited, and when tfafa coantryhad few possessions and no 

naval stations abroad, naval operaticHis of any magnitude 

or dmation were of necessity con&Md to hcxne waters. The 

great dockyards and naval arsenak grew up on the southern 

shores of the kingdom, partly because the p<nts in which 

they were establfahed were specially convenient for the 

purpose, but still more because they were nearest to the 

shores of the enemies with whom we were Ukdy to con- 

tend« Portsmouth, in mid-channel, not only stands over 

against France, but gives equal facility of exit through 

either outlet of the Channel. Chatham looks towards 

the North Sea and the coasts of Holland. Plymouth stands 

over against Brest, and looks across the Bay of Biscay to 

the coasts of Spain. Gradually, as the Empu^ expanded 

and ships became more self-supporting and more capable 



DISTRIBUTION OF NAVAL FORCE 273 

of keeping the sea during the vdnter, the several stations 
of the British Fleet abroad were successively established, 
each representing a more or less well-marked phase either 
of the naval history of the country or of the development 
of its maritime trade and other transmarine interests. If 
we think of the great Battles at sea, from the battle of 
Sluys in 1340 to the battle of Trafalgar in 1805, and con- 
sider them in relation to their geographical position, we 
shall recognize at once the significance of Napoleon's 
saying that war is an affair of positions, and perceive, as 
on a chart, the historical origin and co-ordination of 
British naval stations at home and abroad. 

These stations were determined, then, by the experi- 
ence of great wars. But practically a century and more 
has passed since our experience of great wars on the sea 
came to an end — ^for the Crimean War had no new ex- 
perience of the kind to yield, because the sea power of 
Englmid and France was so overwhelming in that conflict 
that all its battles were fought on land. Many things 
have happened during the hundred and more years which 
have elapsed since England was last called upon to defend 
her position on the seas. Immense changes have taken 
place. Ships are no loiter propelled by sails, nor depen- 
dent on the wind for the direction in which they can 
move. They can now move at great speed in any direc- 
tion, and to any point at which their presence is required. 
On the other hand, their mobility being dependent on a 
continuous supply of fuel, they are no longer so self- 
supporting as they formerly were. They can move faster 
from place to place, but they cannot go so far without 
replenishing their fuel^ nor can they keep the sea for so 
long. The tel^raph now links all parts of the earth 
together, reducing the time required for communication 
to a n^ligible quantity practically independent of dis- 
tance, and this, combined with rapidity and certainty of 
movement, makes it easier to summon a ship or a squadron 
from the Channel or the Mediterranean to any part of the 
Caribbean Sea, for example, than it was a hundred years 



274 THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

ago to summon them from Barbados or Bermuda to 
Jamaica. The devdopmtot of wireless tel^;raphy greatly 
enlarges facilities of this kind. Above aU, the balance 
and distribution of naval power throughout the world 
has undergone unprecedented changes. For all these 
reasons, and others which might be adduced, the tradi- 
tional distribution of the naval forces of England — a 
survival of the great war modified from time to time in 
detail rather than in principle by the growth of new 
interests and conditions — ^has gradually become more and 
more antiquated, and was recognized by the Admiralty a 
few years ago as in larg^ measure obsolete. 

There are now six great naval Powers strong enough, 
actually or prospectively, to challenge the position of 
England on the seas, either singly or in some combination 
of two or more of them. These are France, Germany, 
Italy, Russia, the United States, and Japan. In the 
abstract these must all be r^;arded as possible enemies, 
since no one can forecast the vicissitudes of international 
relations, nor the issues which may from time to time 
bring into antagonism or conflict nations which at this 
moment are full of friendship for each other. The friend- 
ships of nations are, unhappily, more precarious than 
those of individuals, and we see constantly among indi- 
viduals and families how the closest friendship and even 
affection may be turned to the bitterest hatred by mis- 
understanding, divergence of interest, real or supposed, 
alleged misconduct on one side or the other, quarrek, 
litigations, and conflicts. If, on the other hand, we 
consider in the concrete the existing relations between 
England and the several Powers enumerated, we may, 
and do, find differences of attitude and of sentiment in 
different cases, but we shall find no certain or even im- 
mediately probable causes of war with any one of them. 
Hence the disposition of the naval forces of this country 
must be adjusted, not to this or that contingency of war, 
whether r^;arded as imminent or as proximate, not to 
this exacerbation nor to that rapprochement — ^both pos- 



THE GEOGRAPHICAL CONDITIONS 27s 

sibly ephemeral — of international sentiment, but to the 
large and permanent conditions of the situation, and in 
this sense to all the reasonably probable contingencies 
of international conflict. By so regarding the problem 
we get rid| once for all, of the idea, as mischievous as it is 
ill-founded, that the general disposition of the naval 
forces of England is based on suspicion of or antagonism 
to this Power or that. We regard all the Powers enu- 
merated as, in the abstract, possible competitors, either 
singly or in conjunction, for that mastery of the seas 
which is essential to the security of the British Empire, 
and we make our dispositions accordingly, without pre- 
judice to our concrete relations with any one of them. 
Every Power which means to hold its own does this, both 
on sea and on land ; and every Power must do it. Any 
Power which refrained from doing it might as well dis- 
pense with a Navy and an Army altogether. The possi- 
bility of war implies the necessity of preparation for war ; 
and as war is an affair of positions, it also implies the 
occupation, within the limits of international right, of the 
positions which are most conducive to the successful 
conduct of such wars as are possible, however unlikely or 
remote. 

One broad distinction may, however, be made. Of the 
six Powers enumerated, four are essentially, though not 
exclusively, European Powers, while the other two, the 
United States and Japan, are extra-European altogether. 
With Japan England is in alliance, and so long as that 
alliance endures the disposition of England's naval forces 
will be in some measure affected by the consideration that 
so far from England and Japan being likely to meet in 
arms, the Japanese fleet may be regarded as a factor of 
no small moment in England's distribution of her forces. 
The United States will be considered separately here- 
after. Of the four European Powers, one, Italy, is essen- 
tially, though not quite exclusively, a Mediterranean 
Power. Another, Germany, is in like manner essentially 
a Northern Power. The other two, France and Russia, 



276' THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

are both Northern and Mediterranean Powers. It is true 
that recent events have practically erased Russia for a 
time from the Ust of great naval Powers. But we are 
here dealing not so much with the situation of the moment 
as with the permanent geographical grouping of the 
European Powers, and we have to consider not merely 
the present but the future. 

NoW| the characteristic of the four European Powers 
under consideration is that the bulk of their naval forces 
is concentrated in European waters. It follows that if 
ever we have to fight any or all of them, we shall have 
to fight them, in the first instance, in European ^eaters. 
We shall find their fleets there, and we must fight them 
there. Where we shall find them, or whether we shall 
find them at all outside their own ports, depends upon 
the amount of force they can, either singly or in concert, 
put into the field. But if ever we are at war with one or 
more of this group of Powers, it will be from some Euro- 
pean port or ports that their fleets will put to sea. It 
follows that the bulk of the naval forces of this country 
must be concentrated in European waters. We must 
always be ready to wage war on two fronts, the Northern 
front and the Mediterranean front. This is a condition 
inherent in the situation, since the naval forces of our 
possible enemies in Europe are some in the Mediter- 
ranean and the Black Sea, some in the Atlantic, the 
Channel, the North Sea, and the Baltic, while those of 
two of them, France and Russia, are by geographical 
necessity distributed between the two regions. We have 
only to think of the sites of the great sea-fights of modem 
times in relation to the situation thus defined to see 
how completely history illustrates the thesis here pro- 
pounded— Solebay, Copenhagen, Camperdown, Gravelines, 
the Downs, Beachy Head, Cape La Hogue, Ushant, 
Quiberon Bay, the offing of Cape Finisterre, Cape St. 
Vincent, Lagos Bay, Trafalgar, Gibraltar, Malaga, Toulon, 
Minorca, the Nile. These names are an epitome of the 
naval history of England since the defeat of the Armada, 



DISPOSITIONS OF 1904 2ji 

and they show how regularly the stress of conflict ranges 
from the North Sea to the Mediterranean, according to 
the strategic and political distribution of naval force from 
time to time. The political connection between Spain 
and the Netherlands determined the place of the battle 
of Gravelines. The Dutch wars attracted the centre of 
strategic moment to the North Sea and the Channel ; the 
French and Spanish wars drew it back s^in to the At- 
lantic and the Mediterranean. It is idle to conjecture 
what political combinations the future may have in store. 
But it is certain that the growth of a powerful German 
Navy, with its bases on the North Sea, must have the 
effect of once more withdrawing the centre of strate- 
gic moment farther away from the Mediterranean, and 
placing it nearer to the waters which surround the British 
Isles. 

Nevertheless, the strategic importance of the Mediter- 
ranean, although diminished in some measure by recent 
changes in the balance and distribution of naval power, 
is very far indeed from being extinguished. The Mediter- 
ranean station has long been r^arded as the premier 
station of the British Navy. It is so no longer, though 
its importance is still immense. The premier station is 
now that which comprises the North Sea and the Channel. 
This was illustrated in a very significant manner^ towards 
the close of 1904. For a short period during the autunm, 
England and Russia were brought within measurable 
distance of war by the Dc^er Bank incident. France 
being the ally of Russia, it was not impossible that, had 
a casus belli arisen, it m^ht have involved France in the 
quarrel. Naval dispositions suitable to the occasion were 
made by the British Admiralty, but these did not involve 
any reinforcement of the British Fleet in the Mediter- 
ranean. The following account of what was done ap- 
peared in The Times of December 31, 1904 : 

Lord Charles Beresford, with the Channel (now called 
Atlantic) Fleet was ready at Gibraltar, and Sir Compton 



278 THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

Domvile's ships made their way from Venice and Fiume 
to Malta. These two fleets were more than enough to 
deal with the Russians, had occasion arisen. But an 
important detail, kept very secret at the time, has since 
become known. Four battleships were detached frx>m 
Lord Charles Beresford's fleet and sent north, the report 
being that they had gone to " shadow " the Russians at 
Vigo. They did not do so, but steamed at full speed 
to Portland. At the same time, all available submarines 
were sent to Dover, and other measures were taken not 
common in time of peace. 

It appears from this that the Home (since called the 
Channel) Fleet was concentrated at Portland, and heavily 
reinforced from Gibraltar. Its advanced guard of tor- 
pedo craft was placed still farther to the eastward. The 
whole of the immediately available naval forces of France 
and Russia were well to the westward of these positions. 
Yet it is evident that the available British naval forces in 
Home waters were looking quite as much to the eastward 
as to the westward. This does not mean, of course, that 
war with Germany was regarded as imminent. It is not 
conceivable that Germany should have attacked this 
country because this country had protested against the 
action of the Russian Fleet at the Dogger Bank, and 
failing to obtain reparation had enforced its protest at 
the point of the sword. But it does mean that the exis- 
tence of a strong naval Power in the North Sea — ^whether 
well-aifected to this country or not b immaterial — ^is a 
factor in the general situation which this country can 
never, at any time, overlook, and must take seriously 
into account whenever war with any other naval Power 
seems to be so imminent as to involve the strategic move* 
ment and disposition of fleets, squadrons, and flotillas. 
This principle is fully recognized in the military disposi- 
tions of the Continental Powers. Germany is compelled 
by her geographical position always to stand on guard, 
alike on her eastern and on her western frontier. It is 
well known that in 1870 a friendly undei^tanding with 



REDISTRIBUTION OF NAVAL FORCES 279 

Russia relieved Prussia of all serious anxiety for the 
security of her eastern frontier, and thus enabled her to 
exert her full strength against France. Thus does war 
operate in many unexpected ways and often in regions 
far removed from the actual theatre of hostilities. To 
these, its indirect effects, improbable it may be at the 
outset, but always to be reckoned in the category of 
future contingencies, no prudent nation can allow itself 
to be blind. The dispositions made in the autumn of 1904 
were no menace to any neutral Power, and implied no 
undue suspicion of any such Power. But they were signs 
of England's resolve to be ready at all points, if war 
should unhappily overtake her. 

They were also an object-lesson in the strategy of posi- 
tion. They illustrated in the most impressive manner 
the true meaning of that permanent redistribution of the 
naval forces of this country, which has since been carried 
into effect with the object of securing in full measure the 
initial advantage of well-selected positions in the event 
of war. War with Russia was the immediate contingency 
of the moment. The obligations imposed on France by 
her alliance with Russia were such as must, in any case, 
impose an immense strain on her neutrality, and might 
compel her, however reluctantly, to make common cause 
with her ally. The neutrality of Germany was not to 
be taken for granted. Hence this country was brought 
face to face with contingencies of international conflict 
as serious as almost any with which she is ever likely 
to be confronted. The dispositions then adopted, under 
the stress of exceedingly strained relations, were precisely 
those which have since been made permanent by the 
subsequent redistribution of the Fleet. The main fleets 
were Echeloned, as it were, between the North Sea and the 
Mediterranean in accordance with the paramount condi- 
tion which requires this country to be ready on two fronts 
and to deny the passage of " the Straits " to any hostile 
force. The Channel Fleet was at Gibraltar, and there it is 
now permanently based, its designation being changed 



38o THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

to that of the Atlantic Fleet to indicate its true position 
and function. In the circumstances of the moment it 
was compelled to detach half its battleship force for the 
purpose of reinforcing what was then called the Home 
Fleet, and has now once more reverted to that title. This 
movement of concentration was strictly in accordance 
with the principle enunciated above, that, owing to 
changes in the balance of naval power in Europe, and a 
consequential transfer of the centre of strategic moment 
to the northward, the premier Fleet of this country is now 
the Fleet in home waters, and no longer the Mediterranean 
Fleet. But in future it will not be necessary, as it was 
at the moment under consideration, to weaken the Atlantic 
Fleet for the purpose of reinforcing the Home Fleet. 
The former is still partially based on Gibraltar, and this 
disposition indicates that, when it is not required to act 
independently, it is to be regarded as a potential reinforce- 
ment of the Mediterranean Fleet not less than of the 
Home Fleet. In any case, it is the connecting link between 
the two, the centre of a broad front, one flank of which 
covers the North Sea and the other the Mediterranean. 
For immediate reinforcement, whenever occasion may 
require, the Fleets in home waters will, henceforth, look 
to that portion of the Home Fleet proper, which under 
the title of " Fleet in Commission in Reserve," was 
brought into existence simultaneously with the new 
scheme of distribution, and was then so organized, as it 
still is in part, as to be ready to take the sea at any 
moment with reduced but sufficient and fully trained^ 
crews, as soon as steam can be raised in the boilers — ^and 
to take the sea with full complements as soon as the 
necessary ratings can be drafted on board. Even as 
early as July, 1905, a most imposing demonstration was 
given of the vast potentialities for immediate reinforce- 
ment then enjoyed by the Channel Fleet, by the assem- 
bling in Torbay and in the offing of nearly two hundred 
pendants, representing exclusively the Channel Fleet and 
the Fleet in Commission in Reserve, as it was then called. 



SUBSEQUENT DISPOSITIONS 281 

with their afiiliated squadrons and flotillas ; and before 
reaching Torbay their fighting efficiency had been tested 
by a succession of tactical and strategic exerdses. The 
recent development of the Home Fleet, which now con- 
tains the newest and most powerful ships in the Navy, 
and is kept at all times fully manned and constantly 
exercised at sea, is a still more impressive manifestation 
of the principles which determined the redistribution of 
1904. 

Enough has now been said, perhaps, concerning the 
strategy of position as it affects the distribution of the 
main fleets, which are still, as they always have been, the 
controlling factor in naval war. The " capital ships '* 
are henceforth to be concentrated exclusively in European 
waters — ^the former concentration of battleships in Far 
Eastern waters having been due to exceptional and 
transient circumstances — and are to be so distributed as 
to be ready for instant action, with every advantage of 
position in all probable contingencies of European war- 
fare. Nothing could more fully justify the new scheme 
of distribution than what happened at the time of the 
Dogg^ Bank incident, which inmiediately preceded its 
promulgation. That incident was wholly unexpected, 
and no foresight could have anticipated it. The Mediter- 
ranean Fleet was scattered over the Adriatic and the 
Levant, the Channel Fleet (then known as the Home Fleet) 
was cruising round the British Isles. Yet instantly, and 
to all appearance automatically, the naval forces of this 
country fell into the positions assigned to them under 
the new scheme of distribution, these positions being 
thus shown to be those best adapted to the strategic re- 
quirements of a very grave international complication. 
It remains to consider the proper distribution, as deter- 
mined by the strategy of position, of the ** cruiser '^ 
element of naval force. Naval warfare has two main 
purposes — ^to destroy the main fleets of the enemy, and 
to protect, or to assail, maritime commoxe. Broadly 
speaking, the former purpose is the function of '' capital 



282 THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

ships/' the latter is the function of the " cruiser " pro- 
perly so called. I purposely refrain from employing the 
term " battleships '' for the former class, because the 
distinction between the battleship and the cruiser would 
seem to be rapidly disappearing. But the distinction 
between ** capital ships '' and cruisers is primordial and 
fundamental. ** Capital ships " are ships which are 
" fit to lie in a line/' as our forefathers used to say. If a 
cruiser is fit to lie in a line — and Togo showed that in his 
judgment some armoured cruisers are, or were — it be- 
comes a " capital ship " whenever it is employed as a 
tactical unit in the line of battle. But '' cruisers " proper 
are those ships which, whether fit to lie in a line or not, 
are not so employed, but are separately employed, either 
singly or in squadrons, not in the contest with the main 
fleets of the enemy, but in the protection or the destruc- 
tion of commerce, or more generally, in the control of sea 
communications. The distinction is thus one rather of 
emplojrment than of constructive t3rpe. The cruiser is 
no longer to be defined positively by its structure and 
armament ; it is rather to be defined negatively by its 
not being employed as a " capital ship," even though it 
may be in every way " fit to lie in a line." There is 
also another and most important fimction of cruisers 
proper, which is that of collecting and transmitting in- 
telligence, of actii^ as the eyes and ears of a fighting 
fleet. But this function is rather tactical than strategic 
It is not materially affected by the strategy of position, 
with which alone I am here concerned. I assume, as a 
matter of course, that the main fleets, when placed in 
position, are provided with a contingent of cruisers suffi- 
cient for the effective discharge of this indispensable 
function. 

Now, it might at first s^ht appear that whereas the 
main principle in the disposition of fighting fleets is con- 
centration, the main principle in the disposition of cruisers 
proper is dispersion. In a certain sense and up to a 
certain point this is true, and the maintenance and dis- 



EXTRA-EUROPEAN DISPOSITIONS 283 

position of naval forces by this country in extra-Euro- 
pean waters is still laiigely governed by this consideration. 
The amount of force required in those waters is deter- 
mined by the amount of force maintained by other Powers 
there, and its disposition, in time of war, is determined 
in like manner by the dispositions of the enemy. Under 
the new scheme of distribution, outlying squadrons, con- 
sisting mainly of ships of little or no fighting value, and 
employed chiefly for police or diplomatic purposes, have 
been disestablished, provision being otherwise made for 
such police and diplomatic services as cannot be dispensed 
with. " Care has been taken," said the First Lord of the 
Admiralty in his memorandum of December 6, 1904, 
'' to leave enough ships on every station for the adequate 
performance of what I may call peace duties of Imperial 
police, and the four cruiser squadrons will be employed 
to show the Flag in imposing force wherever it may be 
deemed to be politically or strategically desirable/' For 
the rest, the cruisers working in extra-European waters 
are now organized in three groups as follows, to quote 
again the same memorandum : '' The Extern group will 
comprise the cruisers of the China, Australia, and East 
Indies stations. The responsibility will rest on the Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the China station for the strategical 
dbtribution of those cruisers in time of war, so that they 
may at the earliest possible moment deal with all ships 
of the enemy to be found in those waters. The Cape of 
Good Hope Squadron will be a connecting link between 
either the Eastern group and the Mediterranean cruisa:8, 
or the Eastern group and the Western group. The 
Western group of cruisers will consist of the cruisers under 
the command of the Commander-in-Chief of the North 
American and West Indian station, and the mobilized 
cruisers with which he will be reinforced in time of war." 
The constitution and disposition of this latter group 
will be considered presently. It suffices to remark here 
that the whole organization is manifestly and avowedly 
based on a dear perception of the strategy of position. 
21 



a84 THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

Its essential principle is embodied in the words, '' so that 
they may at the earliest possible moment deal with all 
ships of the enemy to be found in those waters." To 
deal with them effectively is to prevent their preying 
upon commerce, and thereby to secure the maritime com- 
munications of the Empire throughout the waters affected 
How far they will be concentrated and how far dispersed 
depends entirely on the dispositions of the enemy, their 
sole business being to " deal with '* all his ships and give 
a good account of them. 

But how about the cruisers in European waters? 
Should they be concentrated or dispersed ? That, again, 
depends largely on circumstances. For the present they 
are concentrated and organized in so many several squad- 
rons, one being affiliated, but not attached, to each of 
the main fleets, which is also furnished with " a sufficient 
number of attendant cruisers " for scouting purposes. 
*' These cruiser squadrons will be detachable from the 
fleets to which they are affiliated for special cruiser exer^ 
cises or for special crubes." That is their peace disposi- 
tion. How they wiU be employed in war depends upon 
circumstances, and chiefly on the dbpositions of the 
enemy. Will the enemy seek to attack British mari- 
time commerce by means of detached cruisers or by 
means of organized squadrons? That is a question 
which only experience can answer. What seems to be 
certain is that he will use powerful armoured cruisers for 
the purpose, and probably use such vessels only. In 
that case we can only employ armoured cruisers to im- 
peach him. Small cruisers, slow in speed, weak in arma- 
ment, and inadequately protected against gun-fire, will 
apparently be out of court on both sides, certainly on the 
enemy's side if we employ armoured cruisers against 
them, and not less certainly on our side if he does the 
same. If he concentrates, we must concentrate. If he 
disperses, we must disperse ; but in either case we must 
take care to be in superior force at the critical point. 
The question is far too large to be considered fully 



THE GUERRE DE COURSE 285 

here/ and it only concerns the strategy of position, in so 
far as the guerre de course is now much more largely an affair 
of position than it was in the wars of the sailing-ship 
period. It is an afifair of position in two ways. In the 
first place, ships which seek to prey upon conmierce must 
issue from certain ports, and are therefore best impeached 
in the neighbourhood of those ports. They must also 
make frequently for certain ports to replenish their fuel 
— ^not necessarily the same ports; but still only certain 
ports, which again defines their position within ascertain- 
able limits. All this makes for concentration. In the 
old days, when privateering was permitted, ships could 
leave almost any port of the enemy, and return to any 
other port, and this made for dispersion on both sides, 
especially as the disparity between privateer and frigate 
in those days was much less than the disparity between 
small unarmoured cruiser and large armoured cruiser in 
these days, the advantage of speed being nearly always 
on the side of the privateer. In the second place, nuuri- 
time commerce is no longer distributed' almost at random 
over the ocean as it was in the old sailing days. It takes 
certain definite courses, and it converges on certain 
definite points — ^namely, the ports of clearance and 
deUvery. The courses can be changed and varied almost 
indefinitely within such wide limits as would greatly 
embarrass the enemy without greatly increasing the dura- 
tion of the transit, so that, regard being had to the limited 
coal-supply of modem warships, especially when cruising 
at high speed, it would seem that only at the points of 
convergence would a modem commerce-destroyer be 
likely to destroy enough commerce to liquidate its own 
coal-bill. But the points of convergence are known and 
rigidly determined by geographical conditions. Concen- 
tration of the defence at these points, necessarily within 
easy reach of British naval bases, would go far to check- 
mate the depredations of the assailant. On the other 
hand, if the enemy disperses, the defence need no longer 

> It is more fully considexed in the next following essay, pp. 293-390. 



886 THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

be concentrated, adequate preponderance of force being 
presupposed in either case. I do not pretend that the 
for^[oing is an exhaustive or even an adequate discussion 
of this great subject. Its sole purpose is to point out the 
relation between the strategy of position and the guerre 
d$ course^ and to suggest that the problems presented by 
the latter in these days are of quite a different and of a 
much more complicated order than those presented by 
it in the days of sailing-ships. 

It only remains to consider the relation of the stratqor 
of position to the navy of the United States. It seems 
at first sight a paradox that the rise of the United States 
into the position of one of the great naval Powers of the 
world should coincide in point of time with the disestab- 
lishment of the North American and Pacific stations, and 
the demobilization of the naval bases associated with them. 
But the reason is not far to seek, being partly strat^c 
and partly political. When the American navy was weak 
in the Atlantic and still weaker in the Pacific, the squad* 
rons maintained by England in those r^ons were quite 
adequate to deal with it in the unhappy event of war. 
But now that the American navy is strong in both seas, 
the maintenance of such squadrons as were formerly 
maintained by this country in those regions would be a 
violation of the very first principles of the strat^y of 
p6^ition, since in the event of war these weak and detadied 
squadrons would be confronted by an overwhelming force 
of the enemy operating with the great advantage of 
having its bases and the central sources of national powtf 
at hand. There would thus be no alternative for a weak 
squadron in those waters but to retire precipitately the 
moment war became imminent. It could take no offai- 
sive action whatever, and could not evep defend the 
West Indian possessions of the Crown. Canada, in such 
a contingency, must be defended mainly on land, though 
of cotirse the command of the sea is essential to the mili- 
tary defence of Canada. 

If ever England and the United States do unhappily 



THE FOURTH CRUISER SQUADRON 287 

go to war, the issue will be decided, not by such ships 
as were formerly stationed on either side of the North 
American Continent, but by the " capital ships " of both 
Powers. If, therefore, we are to maintain any permanent 
naval force in the North Atlantic or the Pacific, it must 
be in the one case such a force as is capable of giving a 
good account of the main fleet of the supposed enemy, 
and in the other, such as is capable of dealing " at the 
earliest possible moment with all ships of the enemy to 
be found in those waters." The latter condition is, as 
matters stand at present, potentially satisfied by the 
general disposition and oi^anization, as described above, 
of the British naval forces in the Pacific. The former 
could not be satisfied without gravely weakening and 
practically paralysing the naval defences of this country 
in European waters ; and even then .it would be a very 
questionable disposition for the particular contingency 
under consideration. There is no more reason why this 
country should keep a large moiety of its naval forces in 
American waters to meet the remote contingency of a 
war with the United States, than there is why the United 
States should keep the bulk of its naval forces in European 
waters to meet the same remote contingency. The 
elements of time and distance here take precedence of 
the mere strategy of position, and they operate equally 
on both sides. For the two Powers to keep their respec- 
tive naval forces on their own side of the Atlantic is at 
once a sign of mutual good-will and the best assiurance 
of its permanence. 

For this reason, then, the North American and West 
Indian Squadron has practically disappeared as a factor 
in the strategy of position. But the British possessions 
on the other side of the Atlantic are not to be wholly 
deprived of the countenance and comfort of the British 
flag afloat. In place of the disestablished squadron, a 
fourth cruiser squadron— designated above as the wes- 
tern group of cruisers — ^has been organized, consisting 
mainly of ships allocated to the training service afloat. 



288 THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

This squadron is henceforth to consist of valuable modem 
fighting ships, and though its base will be in Home waters, 
its cruising ground will include the whole of the former 
North American station — a station which, " extending as 
it does from the Pole to the Equator, will give the admiral 
in command opportunities of organizing the training of 
his crews under better climatic conditions than can be 
found anywhere else. ... In time of war it will only be 
necessary to remove from those ships cadets, or youths, 
or boys still under training, and to complete the crews 
with the small additions required for war." The squadron 
will also be reinforced in time of war with a contingent of 
mobilized cruisers. The essence of the change is that 
this squadron now takes its oi^anic place in a general 
scheme of distribution, based on the strategy of position, 
and no longer occupies a station which has been rendered 
isolated and untenable by the rise of the American navy, 
and even obsolete by the growing friendship between this 
country and the United States. 

For it is this, after all, which really governs the whole 
situation as between these two great and kindred naval 
Powers. " Blood is thicker than water." The two navies 
found that out long ago, when Commodore Tatnall first 
uttered the words in the China seas. It has taken the 
two nations longer to discover it, but they have found it 
out at last. At Bermuda, in 1899, I had the privilege of 
meeting the late Admiral Sampson, who was visiting the 
island with his squadron still fresh from the honours of 
the Cuban War. The American fleet was received with 
the utmost cordiality, and the birthday of Washington, 
which occurred during the visit, was honoured by a salute 
from the flagship of the British Commander-in-Chief."^ I 
have often thought since that that salute may have been, 
in its sjrmbolic aspect, as significant an event in the 
world's history as even the Boston tea-party. For, 
whereas the one marked the beginning of national estrange- 
ment, the other was, perhaps^ the first overt sign of a 
growing national reconciliation. Admiral Sampson him- 



ADMIRAL SAMPSON'S VIEWS 289 

self was deeply impressed by it, as well as by the whole 
character of his reception in Bermuda. He told me 
that it had impressed on him the conviction that the 
friendly feeling towards England then beginning to be 
entertained by the people of the United States was 
abundantly reciprocated on the English side. I ven- 
tured to assiu^ him that this feeling on the part of Eng- 
land was no new or ephemeral growth, but that in spite 
of occasional interruptions, not arising in England, and 
deeply regretted by the mass of the English people, it 
had existed for many years. He replied, " That may 
be, but the feeling in the United States has been, I acknow- 
ledge, of quite a different character, until a very recent 
date. We in the United States have been accustomed 
to regard England as the only European Power with 
which our relations, being close and sometimes critical, 
were likely to give rise to serious differences. England is 
the only European Power with which, up to last year, we 
have ever fought. The traditions of our revolution and 
of our war of 181 2 have sunk deep into the national mind, 
and have for a long time stood in the way of any cordial 
and permanent understanding. In common with the 
great mass of my countrymen, I shared these feelings 
myself until quite lately. But for some reason or an- 
other, which I cannot assign with confidence, though it 
is probably connected directly and indirectly with the 
recent war between the United States and Spain, a vast 
and marvellous change, to me as welcome as it was un- 
expected, has now come over the feelings of the people of 
the United States. Whether it is likely to be permanent 
or not I cannot say with confidence, but I sincerely hope 
it is. Instead of regarding England as our only probable 
enemy in Eiut>pe, we now regard her as our best and per- 
haps our only friend, and at any rate as the friend best 
worth having. The deeper sentiment of a conmion origin 
and faith, a common literatiu^ and history, of common 
laws and kindred institutions, has finally overpowered 
what still survived of the revolutionary sentiment of 



ago THE STRATEGY OF POSITION 

antagonism. We feel that the result of the war has 
brought us into contact and possible conflict with more 
than one European Power. We feel also that with Eng* | 

land our friend and the British Fleet on our side we have 
nothing to fear frxim any other Power, or even from two 
or three of the Powers of Europe combined. An alliance 
would perhaps be premature, nor is it needed so long as 
the feeling on both sides remains what it is at present. 
Possibly we could not hope in the first instance for more 
than the moral support of England in any conflict with a 
Continental Power. But that would suffice, and in times 
of real diflSiculty it would ripen sooner or later into a 
defensive alliance. I say frankly that in my opinion 
the United States have mott to gain from such an alliance 
than England has, though the moral and even material 
advantage to England is manifestly not inconsiderable, 
and is likely to grow with time. For this reason I rejoice 
unfeignedly at the change of sentiment which has lately 
come over public opinion on this side of the Atlantic. I 
am not less gratified by the assurance that no such change 
is needed on the other, and if any words of mine can 
cement a friendship which would, I believe, make for the 
welfare of the whole world, it is at once a pleasure to myself 
and a duty to my country to utter them." 

That was now ten years ago. Admiral Sampson's 
words were prophetic, for no one on either side of the 
Atlantic can doubt that the relation between England and 
the United States is now closer and more friendly than 
that between any two other Powers in the world. In fact, 
the difference is one of kind and not merely of degree ; 
and on both sides of the Atlantic it is now fully recognized 
that the relation between the two nations is really that 
which Plato thought ought to subsist between Greek 
state and Greek state as contrasted with that between 
any Greek state and the world outside Hellas. Plato 
refused to give the name " war " to any difference be- 
tween two Greek states. He would only call it " dis- 
cord/' the word used by Greek writers to describe the 



ENGLAND AND THE UNITED STATES 291 

internal conflicts— often, unhappily, armed conflicts — of 
Greek political parties. " There is," he said, " a differ- 
ence in the names ' discord ' and ' war,' and I imagine 
that there is also a difference in their natures ; the one 
is expressive of what is internal and domestic, and the 
other of what is external and foreign, . • . and any 
difference that arises among Hellenes will be regarded by 
them as discord only — ^a quarrel among friends, which 
is not to be called a war ; . . . they will quarrel as those 
who intend some day to be reconciled." If we translate 
this into modem phraseology, it means simply that two 
nations so situated will never quarrel at all, in the sense 
of going to war. Just as political parties nowadays 
compose their '' discords " without resort to arms, so 
two kindred nations, like England and the United States, 
will find some way out of their differences without at- 
tempting to destroy each other. It is a far cry from 
the Republic of Plato to the New York Tribune and its 
whilom editor, now Ambassador of the United States to 
the Court of King Edward VII., but the distance is bridged 
over in a few words uttered by Mr. Whitelaw Reid at a 
banquet given to welcome him on his arrival in England : 
*' You would be less than kind if, at this date and after 
all that has gone before, you should expect from me this 
evening a long speech on the expediency or necessity for 
friendly relations between our two countries. Now, if 
ever, is surely a time when one need not weary you by 
saying at length such an undisputed thing in such a 
solemn way. Of course we ought to be on good terms. 
Why not ? Let me put it a little differently. Of course 
we are on good terms. Why not? What conceivable 
reason is there now why the two great branches of the 
English-speaking family should not be, as they are, actually 
enjoying the friendly relations we are told it is our duty 
night and day Mo bring about. That is their normal state 
— ^that has been increasingly for a good many years their 
historical state. It is the thing that now comes naturally. 
The opposite is what would be unnatural, difficult, against 



390 

antagoni 
brought 
than oti' 
land oui 
nothing 
or thrc' 
would t 
the fee 
Possibl 
than t 
Contin 
of rea 
defend 
theU 
than 
adva 
and i 
unfe- 




HE ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF 

COMMERCE 1 

r' pHE harassment and distress caused to a country 

1- by serious interference with its commerce will 
conceded by all. It is, doubtless, a most important 
ondary operation of naval war, and is not likely to be 
andoned till war itself shall cease ; but, regarded as ^ 
imary and fimdamental measure, sufficient in itself to 
ush an enemy, it is probably a delusion, and a most 
angerous delusion when presented in the fascinating 
arb of cheapness to the representatives of a people. 
'Especially is it misleading when the nation against whom 
t is to be directed possesses, as Great Britain did and 
does, the two requisites of a strong sea-Power — a wide- 
spread healthy commerce and a powerful Navy/' Such 
b the considered judgment of Captain Mahan on the 
subject which is to be discussed in this essay. The same 
great writer has shown that during the war of the French 
Revolution and Empire the direct loss to this country 
*' by the operation of hostile cruisers did not exceed 
2^ per cent, of the commerce of the Empire ; and that 
this loss was partially made good by the prize-ships and 
merchandise taken by its own naval vessels and priva- 
teers." During the same period the French mercantile 
flag disappeared entirely from the seas, while the volume 
of British maritime commerce was more than doubled. 
In a former war, when the British supremacy at sea was 
more seriously challenged, premiums of fifteen guineas 
per cent, were paid in 1782 on ships trading to the Far 

1 Nmfol AnniuU, 1906. 
39J 



THE SISATEGY OF POSITION 

Ttat IS tlie idea of Pbto exfucssed 
1 of the world. It explains 
r de Au^s* rf po rariw has no practkal applkatioii 
^ cne «f the CaitBd States, since both nations are 
- altogether from the 
pKvirv af tkex- i 



THE AnAo: 



^ brs 

be coKsJd fcr it i i iiE=i^ » ^„^ sr-nr— 

Mconilaryi^mM! rfMnL i«: Dt j; arr 2c- -~ 

abandoned tifi ^ g^K ^aj ^^ ""^ " 

pnnaiy lai iaaanBai ui'mL,,^ 

tmsl an aam, i i pnmcL- i 

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294 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

East. From the spring of 1793 to the end of the great 
struggle with Napoleon no premiums exceeding half that 
rate were paid. From all this it would seem to follow that 
of two belligerents in a naval war, that one which estab- 
lishes and maintains an effective command of the seas 
will be absolute master of the maritime commerce of the 
other, while his own maritime commerce, though not 
entirely immune, will suffer no such decisive losses as 
will determine or even materially affect the course and 
issue of war, and may, indeed, emerge from the war 
much stronger and more prosperous than it was at the 
beginning. 

Such is the ascertained and undisputed teaching of 
history in the past. But history deals only with the 
past, and the past, to which appeal is made above, differs 
so widely from the present in respect of the methods, oppor- 
tunities, implements, and international conventions of 
naval war, as well as in respect of the conditions, volume, 
and national importance of maritime commerce in these 
days, that we must needs be very warily on our guard 
against taking the history of the past as an unconditional 
guide in the naval warfare of the present and the future. 
The teaching of the late war in the Far East, which was 
waged entirely under modem conditions, has not yet 
been sufficiently studied, its data have not yet been w&- 
ciently sifted, to justii^ any detailed and critical exami- 
nation. But certain broad principles seem to emerge from 
it. It has been said above that an effective command 
of the sea is the condition precedent of the compara- 
tive immunity of the maritime commerce of a belligerent. 
The Japanese command of the sea was never fully 
established until after the battle of Tsu-Shima. For 
that reason it was impossible for Russian maritime com- 
merce to be seriously assailed by Japan an}rwhere outside 
the area of immediate conflict ; it may be added that the 
volume of Russian maritime commerce is so insignificant 
that, even had it been possible for Japan to assail it in the 
open and at a distance, it would have been scarcely worth 



THE WAR OF SECESSION 295 

her while to do so. But within the area of immediate 
conflict — ^the only area that counted for practical purposes 
— ^the e£fective, but not absolute, command of the sea 
was secured by Japan from the very outset. This is 
proved by the fact that the transport of the Japanese 
armies in unprecedented numbers across the sea to Man- 
churia, their maintenance and continuous reinforcement 
there with all the supplies that a modem army in the 
field requires, though not entirely unmolested, was never 
seriously interrupted. A command of the sea which, 
though not absolute, is effective enough to secure the 
transport, supply, and reinforcement of great armies — 
that is, to maintain the continuous flow of a stream of 
immense volume — must needs be more than effective 
enough to furnish a corresponding immunity to the much 
smaller, though doubtless more widely diffused, stream 
of private maritime commerce, and even of neutral com« 
merce engaged in the transport of contraband. A certain 
amount of damage was done, no doubt, from time to time, 
by Russian cruisers, which possessed, in Vladivostock, a 
secure and unmolested base. But it was comparatively 
insignificant, and it had no appreciable effect on the 
course and issue of the war. 

The teaching of the Cuban War between Spain and 
the United States need not be considered. Maritime 
conmierce, its defence and attack, hardly came into view 
in connection with it. Spain had too Uttle conmierce 
to be worth the attention of the United States, and no 
warships at all that could be employed against the com- 
merce of the United States. But the case is somewhat 
different with the American War of Secession. This was 
waged in the period of transition from the old warfare to 
the new. Navies akeady consisted ahnost exclusively of 
steamships, but these steamships still possessed consider- 
able sail-power, and many of them employed steam only 
as an occasional auxiliary, while the mercantile marine 
of all countries, and more especially of the United States, 
still consisted very largely of sailing-ships. Now, an 



296 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

armed steamship, even if only fumbhed with auxiliary 
steam-power, must needs be master of every unarmed 
sailing-ship it meets, and, being possessed of sail-power, 
it is endowed vdth a mobility, a range of action, and a 
power of keeping the sea which are far greater than those 
of any warship which, being propelled by steam alone, 
can go no further afield than its coal endurance allows. 
These considerations go far to explain the relatively very 
large amount of damage done by the Alabama and other 
commerce-destroying cruisers fitted out by the Southern 
States during the American War of Secession. The naval 
forces of the North were very greatly superior to those 
of the South ; so much so, that they were able to main- 
tain a fairly effective blockade of the Confederate ports 
over a very wide extent of sea-board. But, concentra- 
ting their attention almost exclusively on the maintenance 
of that blockade, they were not able^ or were adjudged 
by the naval authorities to be not able, to afford adequate 
protection to the sea-going mercantile marine of the 
North. The consequence was that the Alabama and her 
consorts had things nearly all their own way for many 
months, and that the mercantile flag of the North disap- 
peared almost entirely from the seas. This, however, 
was due quite as much to faults of strategic disposition as 
to deficiency of naval force. The career of the Alabama 
very quickly came to an end when effective measures 
were taken to bring her to book. Had these measures 
been taken, as they should have been, at the outset, her 
depredations would have been comparatively insignificant. 
Her career b a very instructive object-lesson — applicable, 
however, for the most part, only to her own peculiar and 
very exceptional period of transition — ^in the methods of 
commerce-destruction ; but, rightly regarded, it b a still 
more instructive object-lesson in the wrong methods of 
commerce defence. It proves only what really needs no 
proof, that a single armed steamship can do immense 
damage to a mercantile marine consbting almost entirely 
of sailing-ships wholly unarmed if no attempt b made 



THE ALABAMA 297 

to bring her to book. The attempt to forecast what 
would happen m a naval war in these days to the British 
mercantile marine from the depredations of the Alabama 
during the War of Secession b a very unintelligent one, 
and quite a foolish one, if the real facts of the case are 
either entirely ignored or sedulously misinterpreted. 

For, after all, apart from the very exceptional circum- 
stances and conditions of the time, these depredations, 
though very serious and almost ruinous in their indirect 
effects, were not so extensive as has often been repre- 
sented. The damages wrought by the Alabama and 
such of her consorts as came within the purview of the 
Geneva Tribunal were assessed by that Tribunal at some 
jC3,ooo,ooo sterling ; and it has often been said that the 
Government of the United States experienced some diffi- 
culty in discovering claimants for the whole of that 
amount — which was really a very insignificant sum com- 
pared with the total cost of the war to the North. In a 
Memorandum communicated by the Admiralty to the 
Royal G>mmission on Supply of Food and Raw Materials 
in War, it is stated that, " even the Alabama herself only 
averaged three prizes per month during her career, and the 
Shenandoahf which met with no opposition in her attack 
on the American whalers, only averaged 3*8 per month, 
and the average number of prizes for the whole thirteen 
Confederate Government commerce - destroyers only 
amounted to 2*7 per month, and some of these appear to 
have been small fishing craft and insignificant coasters.'' 
The Report of the Commission further states, on the 
authority of information supplied to it — ^though whether 
by the Admiralty or not is not stated — ^that " the Con- 
federate cruisers were eight in number, and that at dif- 
ferent times they fitted out captured sailing-ships as 
tenders to the total number of four. The former cap- 
tured three steamers and 208 sailing-ships, and the latter 
captured nineteen sailing-ships. It also appears that of 
the eight cruisers three were steamers without sail-power, 
and their career was short, and five were steamers with 



298 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

good sail-power, of which the three best sailers {Alabama, 
Florida, and Shenandoah) had the longest careers. The 
Alaba$na once cruised for five months without coaling, and 
four tunes for three months." Thus the steamers with- 
out sail-power were ineffective and their careers were 
short, although the efforts of the North were intermittent, 
and strategically often ill-conceived. Those which pos- 
sessed good sail-power were able to keep the sea for a 
much longer period than any modem vessel, whether war- 
ship proper or merchant ship armed for the occasion, 
could do. It is thus manifest that any inferences drawn 
from the depredations of the Alabama and her consorts 
must be drawn in accordance with these authentic and 
very significant facts and figures. 

Nor, again, must too great stress be laid on the fact 
that the depredations of the Alabama and her consorts 
practically drove the Federal mercantile flag from the seas 
for the time being. This is entirely in accordance with 
the teaching and experience of naval hbtory. A single 
cruiser unmolested and unpursued is practically in com- 
mand of the whole area of sea left undefended against 
her depredations. The hostile mercantile flag cannot, 
therefore, exist within that area. It is not so much the 
certainty of capture, but the appreciable risk of capture, 
which drives the ships flying that flag home, and they 
will not quit their shelter again until the assailant is dis- 
posed of, any more than birds scared by a hawk will 
quit their hiding-places until the hawk is out of sight. 
But this is quite a different thing from the actual captures 
made by the assailant. Floating commerce disappears 
and its profits vanish so long as the assailant is un- 
molested and undisposed of, but in ordinary circumstances 
it would reappear as soon as that consummation was 
reached. It did not reappear in anything like the same 
volume, either during the War of Secession after the 
Alabama was disposed of, nor afterwards when the war 
was over. But the Alabama and her consorts counted for 
very little in this result. We learn from the Admiralty 



MODERN MARITIME COMMERCE ct99 

Memorandum already quoted above that " a Select 
Committee of the American Ccmgress in 1 869 reported that 
the decline in American tonnage due to the war amounted 
to a loss of less than 5 per cent, of the whole firom cap- 
tures, together with a further loss of about 32 per cent, 
of vessels either sold or transferred temporarily to neutral 
flags ; and they concluded that American shipping did 
not revive after the war, owing to the burdens of taxa- 
tion which the war had left imposed on all the industries 
of the country, but which operated with peculiar hard- 
ness on the shipping interest, inasmuch as it was thereby 
subjected to the unrestricted competition of foreign rivals, 
not only in home ports, but in all parts of the world.*' 
We have seen that the loss to British maritime conmierce 
during the wars of the French Revolution and Empire 
did not exceed an average of 2| per cent, annually during 
the whole of the period of conflict, and that at the end 
of that period the volume of conmierce, in spite of its 
losses, was at least doubled. The direct loss to the mari- 
time commerce of the Northern States of the Union 
during the War of Secession was about twice as much under 
conditions which deprived the Federal Government of 
that e£Fective command of the sea which is essential to 
the defence of commerce. In addition, the maritime 
commerce of the United States suspended during the war 
did not revive afterwards ; but that was due to economic 
and fiscal causes, with which the Alabama and her con- 
sorts had Uttle or nothing to do. Surely in the Ught of 
these facts and figures it is time that the Alabama mjrth 
should be taken as finally exploded. 

It would thus appear that there is nothing in the his- 
tory of the recent past to disallow the teaching of the 
more distant past, to the effect that the conmiand of 
the sea is essential for the successful attack upon com- 
merce, and that an adverse command of the sea is a sure 
saf^;uard against such an attack. Still it is not to be 
denied that the conditions of modem naval warfare and 
of modem maritime commerce differ very materially 
22 



300 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 



from those which prevailed in the wars of the past, 
maritime commerce, with which we are mainly concerned, 
is vastly greater now that it was in the wars of the eigh- 
teenth century, and it is also immeasurably more impor- 
tant to the welfare and even to the very existence of the 
country. Then it was mainly a source of wealth ; now 
it is an absolute necessity of bare existence. If we lost 
it in those days we were the poorer, but we were still able 
to feed ourselves and to maintain the bulk of our internal 
industries. War would have been infinitely more burden- 
some in those conditions, but unless or until the country 
was successfully invaded it would not have been destruc- 
tive to the nation. In these days the total destruction 
of our maritime commerce would, even without invasion, 
mean national destitution and collapse. There is no 
need to labour this point. It is accepted on all hands with- 
out dispute. A fleet in effective command of the sea is 
the only thing in these days that stands or can stand 
between this nation and its destruction. 

On the other hand, British maritime commerce, though 
now so vastly greater in volume and vital importance, is 
in many respects less assailable than it was in the days of 
old. Not only has the substitution — ^now so largely 
effected-— of steam for sails endowed the modem merchant 
vessel with a much higher average speed, but it has 
enabled it to take much more direct courses, and, what 
is much more important, to vary those courses within 
very wide limits, almost at discretion. In the old days 
the courses open to a sailing-vessel were rigidly circum- 
scribed within 1 8 points of the compass out of 32 — or 20 
points at the outside — according to the direction of the 
wind. Hence, in order to reach her destination, a sailing- 
vessel was often compelled to steer a very indirect course, 
so as, by taking advantage of the prevailing wind, to 
enable her to get towards her destination by a succession 
of oblique courses determined by the wind alone, and 
therefore not calculable beforehand. A steamship can at 
all times steer towards any prescribed point of the com- 



THE TRADE ROUTES 301 

pass. Hence, the maritime commerce of the world is 
now for the most part confined to certain well-defined 
" trade routes/' so insignificant in width that, even when 
traced on a globe of considerable dimensions, they are 
little more than lines. Outside the areas bounded by these 
lines it is hardly too much to say that a hostile cruiser 
seeking to prey upon commerce would be hard put to 
it to find so much commerce to prey upon as would pay 
her own coal-bill. It follows that hostile cruisers engaged 
in a guerre de course must, to make their warfare effective, 
lie in wait for their prey on or in the immediate neigh- 
bourhood of the trade routes. It is there, then, that the 
belligerent in command of the sea will send his cruisers 
to intercept them. He can also in many cases give in* 
structions by telegraph to merchant vessels of his own 
nationality to take for a time some divergent course, 
sufficiently removed from the ordinary trade route to 
throw the assailant off the scent. In these circumstances 
the havoc wrought by the raiding cruiser, though vexatious 
and costly for the moment, is not likely to be ruinous in 
the long-run. 

Now as far as British maritime commerce is concerned 
the only trade routes which need be considered are those 
which traverse the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. 
These all converge finally in the area of sea defined by the 
Land's End, Cape Clear, and Cape Finisterre, and it is 
manifest that within that area it is most likely that British 
naval force will at all times be found supreme. The sub- 
sidiary route which leads to British ports round the 
North of Ireland might also be assailed, and would there- 
fore have to be guarded ; but here again the point of 
attack is much nearer to the centres of British naval 
power than it is to the naval bases of any other nation. 
The case is different in tHe Mediterranean, but not so 
different as to constitute an exception to the general rule, 
so long as the British command of that sea is unimpaired. 
In any case the defence of conunerce which follows a 
clearly defined trade route must needs be a simpler matter 



302 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

than it was when routes were varied indefinitely accord- 
ing to the windi and when therefore there was not very 
much more reason for finding the ships to be assailed in 
one position than in another, except, indeed, at the 
points of concentration ; and at these, of coiu^e, the 
defence was much stronger and more highly organized 
than anjrwhere else. " War," said Napoleon, "is an 
affair of positions." When the positions are known 
beforehand they can, of course, be much more easily 
assailed than when they are not. On the other hand 
they can also be much more easily defended. The best 
way to defend them is, if possible, to catch the assailant 
as he leaves his port. If that fails, the next best thing 
is to keep a sharp look-out for him at each of the com- 
paratively few positions for which he must make. Even 
if his speed, vigilance, and ingenuity enable him to evade 
capture there, two results must inevitably follow. He 
will do little damage so long as he is constantly being 
hunted off the trade route, and within a very short time 
his coal will be exhausted and his powers of offence will 
be paralysed until he can replenish his bunkers. Then 
the whole proceeding will be repeated da capo. The 
hunter will become the hunted. The last thing that a 
commerce-destroyer wants to do is to fight engagements 
with his equals. He may prove victorious in the engage- 
ment, but, even so, he is not likely to come off scot-free, 
or in any condition to pursue his enterprises with effect. 
In his evidence before the Food Supply Commission, 
Admiral Sir C}rprian Bridge, an expert strategist, a 
former Director of Naval Intelligence, an experienced 
Commander-in-Chief afloat, and a profound student of 
naval history, stated " that it would be a liberal estimate 
to allow fourteen dajrs without replenishing coal bunkers 
for a commerce-destroyer proceeding at any considerable 
speed." That represents the extreme tether of such a 
vessel. If she has a long way to go before reaching her 
hunting ground, much of her coal will be burnt before she 
can set to work, since she must go at high speed in order 



MODERN DIFFICULTIES 303 

to minimize the risks of observation and capture by the 
way. More will have to be reserved to enable her to 
reach a friendly coaling station or some secure and secluded 
position at sea for the purpose of replenishing her bunkers. 
How many dajrs will be left to her for the prosecution 
of her marauding purpose under conditions which imply 
that she must be prepared at any moment either to fight 
an action which must bring her career as a commerce- 
destroyer to an end, or to run away as fast as she can, 
well knowing that unless she can give her pursuers the 
slip she will never be left until she has been hunted down ? 
The Food Supply Commission was officially assured by 
the Admiralty that if the enemy should merely detach 
one or two cruisers from his main forces for the purpose 
of harassing oiu- commerce we could always spare a 
superior number of vessek to follow them. Such a 
superior number should make assurance doubly sure ; 
for Admiral Bridge pointed out to the Commission that, . 
'' even if only one of our cruisers were in pursuit, it could 
be made too dangerous for a hostile cruiser to remain on 
or about a trade route." He added, however, that in his 
opinion protection could be best assured " by keeping the 
enemy's commerce-destroyers continually on the look- 
out for their own safety." The whole strategy of the 
situation is here succinctly defined. If the enemy's cruisers 
are concentrated, being confronted, as, ex hypothesis they 
must be, by a similar concentration in superior numbers 
on our part, they cannot be destroying commerce, this 
being essentially an operation which involves dispersion. 
If, on the other hand, the enemy disperses his cruisers 
for the purpose of preying upon commerce, there is no- 
thing to prevent our detaching a superior number of 
cruisers to pursue them ; that required superiority of 
numbers being implied not only in the " two-Power stan- 
dard," but also in"* the fundamental proposition that the 
safety of this country depends absolutely on an assured 
command of the sea. 
The next point to be considered is that, whereas the 



304 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

volume of maritime commerce to be attacked has increased 
enormously, the number of its possible assailants has very 
materially diminished. The number of the sheep is 
vastly greater, but the wolves are less numerous, and the 
watch-dogs are more than their match. The tendency of 
modem naval development has been to increase altogether 
beyond comparison the power of the individual units of 
naval force, but to diminish their aggregate numbers. In 
the year of Trafalgar there were 556 British sea-going 
warships in commission, of which 106 were ships of the 
line and the remainder cruisers large and small, including 
firigates other than ships of the line. Thirty-two more, 
twelve being ships of the line, were *' in ordinary " — that 
is, available for sea-service. There were also built or 
building 1 30 more, of which twenty-six were ships of the 
line. The total tonnage of all these ships was 634,278 
tons ; that of the sea-going and fighting ships actually 
available for sea-service was 430,1 15 tons, or far less than 
the tonnage of forty modem battleships. The tonnage of 
the ships of the line in commission and in ordinary was 
208,817 tons, or far less than the tonnage of a dozen 
modem battleships.^ The British Navy is now far 
stronger than it ever was in time of peace or war, and its 
annual cost has in recent years reached an unprecedented 
figure. Its effective fighting units are now all in commis- 
sion either afloat or in reserve, with the exception of a 
small number of not very modem ships which are kept 
in readiness for emergency, though not in commission. 
In the Navy List for January, 1909, the total number of 
ships mostly in commission, and all either available for 
the pendant or in a more or less advan<5ed stage of pre- 
paration, is given as 1 79, of which 59 are battleships, 39 
armoured cruisers, 21 protected first-class cmisers, 35 and 
17 protected cruisers of the second and third classes re- 

1 These figures, with the ezc^>tion of the tonnage for modem battleships, 
are taken from a paper read at the Institution of Naval Architects on July 19, 
1905. by the Chief Constructor of the Navy. Sir Philip Watts explained in 
a note tiiat the tonnage of 1805 ships is given in " builders' old measorement." 



PRIVATEERING 305 

spectively, and 8 scouts. These 179 pendants are of 
course inuneasurably superior in offensive and defensive 
force to the 700 odd pendants of 1805 ; but as commerce- 
destroying is essentially an affair of the dispersion of 
naval force, and does not— or did not in the old days 
— require any considerable weight of armament in the 
individual assailant, it stands to reason that out of an 
aggregate of 700 pendants many more could be spared 
for dispersion than can possibly be the case out of an 
aggregate of 1 79 pendants in all. Torpedo craft are not 
reckoned in the foregoing enumeration, because, as will 
be shown presently, torpedo craft are very inefficient 
vessels for the prosecution of a guerre de course, except in 
special circumstances and within a very limited range of 
action. But for the purposes of full comparison it may 
be mentioned that the number of British destroyers is 
given in the Naval Annual for 1908 as 155, and of first- 
class torpedo-boats as 115, thus raising the total number 
of pendants to 449, as against 700 odd in 1805. As the 
British Navy is more than equal to those of any two 
other Powers, it follows that the total number of available 
pendants possessed by any other single Power cannot 
be more than half of this total. 

There is moreover another point of very great impor- 
tance in this connection. " Privateering is and remains 
abolished " was a clause in the Declaration of Paris 
formulated in 1856, but not accepted either then or since 
by all the maritime Powers. It may be urged, perhaps, 
that the Declaration of Paris is a mere paper convention 
which some Powers have not formally accepted, and that 
it might not be respected by a bel%erent who found it 
his interest to disregard it. If it rested on the compara- 
tively feeble sanction of International Law alone this 
argument would not be without weight. But privateer- 
ing is not merely forbidden by International Law ; it is 
also largely disallowed and put out of date by the changes 
that have taken place in the materials and methods of 
naval warfare. In the old days a privateer could be 



306 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

built and armed in almost any port of the enemy ; she 
could obtain supplies and execute necessary repairs in 
almost any other port. She required a very moderate 
armamenti her chief defence against the warships of the 
enemy being her capacity to show a clean pair of heels. 
In many cases it was not even necessary to build a vessel 
for the purpose. For longshore warfare against the 
enemy's ships traversing narrow waters, and often forced 
by the wind to hug the shore, any handy vessel, a fishing 
smack or even a row-boat, would sometimes serve ; and 
this kind of warfare against the slow and unhandy craft 
of those da3rs was often very destructive. Thus, both 
in the narrow seas and in the open, the privateer was 
almost ubiquitous and withal exceedingly elusive. It is 
recorded of one famous French sea-going privateer that 
the value of her prizes amounted to something like a 
million sterling before she was captured. All this kind 
of warfare is now manifestly obsolete ; no row-boat, fish- 
ing smack, or small craft of any kind, such as might easily 
overpower a ship becalmed or overhaul a slow sailer near 
the shore, would have much chance even against a modem 
" tramp," which is never becalmed, need never approach 
the coast, and jcan generally steam some ten knots at a 
pinch. Their occupation is gone without the aid of 
International Law at all. The sea-going privateer, on 
the other hand, must needs be a vessel of very high speed, 
and therefore of considerable size. In these days of rapid 
communication her construction could hardly escape 
observation, and her first exit from port would rarely 
be unmolested or even unobserved by an enemy who 
knew his business. Even the Alabama game is probably 
played out. Her construction was perfectly well known 
to the Federal Government, and though she left this 
country without her armament, she would certainly have 
been stopped by the British Government but for a con- 
currence of untoward circumstances — ^the chief of which 
was the sudden illness of the law officer to whom the 
papers were referred — ^which are very unlikely to occur 



MODERN CRUISERS 307 

in the same combination again. The consequences to 
this country were such that a weak neutral in any future 
war is not likely to care to face them. Nor will it be at 
all a promising speculation to build a fast sea-going priva- 
teer even in a belligerent country ; her construction is 
almost certain to be detected, and she is likely to have a 
very short shrift as soon as she puts to sea. If the country 
of her origin is one which has adhered to the Declaration 
of Paris, her crew if captured will assuredly be treated as 
pirates. Thus privateering is practically a thing of the 
past ; the imperfect sanctions of International Law might 
not have been strong enough to abolish it if circumstances 
had not already practically put an end to it, as indeed the 
Declaration of Paris itself admits. " Privateering is and 
remains abolished." 

We may thus conclude with some confidence that the 
commerce-destroying of the future will be conducted by 
the regular and recognized warships of a belligerent, with 
the possible addition of exceptionally fast merchant 
steamers armed and commissioned for the time being as 
regular warships. But these latter, being no match, 
except in speed, for any sea-^oing warship proper, must 
needs take to flight whenever a hostile cruiser is sighted, 
so that on a trade route, properly guarded, their depreda- 
tions would have to be conducted under very untoward 
conditions. It is probable, too, that the struggle for 
existence, of which war is one of the extremest forms, 
would lead rapidly to the elimination from the ranks of 
conmierce-destroyers of all warships except large, fast, 
and powerful armoured cruisers, since the emplo}rment 
of even one of this type of vessel would, sooner or later, 
place at her mercy every unarmoured vessel of speed 
inferior to her own. Now, as against any single antago- 
nist, this country possesses an ample supply of armoured 
cruisers for the protection of her trade routes, and even as 
against any two Powers her position is still one of assured 
superiority, especially when it is considered that no an- 
tagomst, whether single or combined, who was attempting 



3o8 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

to dispute the command of the sea with this country, 
would ever dream of fatally impairing the strategic and 
tactical efficiency of his fighting fleet by sending off all 
or any considerable proportion of the comparatively few 
armoured cruisers he possesses to prey upon British com- 
merce. If he takes the sea at all it must be for the pur^ 
pose of trying conclusions with the British fleets in the 
open, in which case he will want all the available units 
of effective force that he can scrape together for the pur* 
pose, or for the purpose of some distant Mid hazardous 
combination — ^how hazardous let the story of the Trafalgar 
campaign bear witness — ^in which case all the armoured 
cruisers he can lay his hands on will not be more than 
sufficient for the indispensable work of scouting. If, on 
the other hand, recognizing that he is not strong enough 
to try conclusions in the open, he remains within the 
shelter of his fortified bases, then every cruiser which 
manages to make its escape must and will be shadowed, 
pursued, and harried to the bitter end by a superior force 
of British cruisers detached from the main fleets for the 
purpose^ The main fleets will of course be strategically 
so placed as to have the best chance of bringing the 
enemy to an action as soon as possible whenever he takes 
the sea. Their positions will be so chosen as to be just 
beyond the range of nocturnal torpedo attack, and yet 
not so far afield but that intelligence of the enemy's 
movements can be very rapidly transmitted to them. 
Tc^o has shown how the thing can be done, and what 
Togo did no British admiral need fear being unable to do. 
Close and vigilant as the watch on the enemy's ports 
may be, however, it is probable that single cruisers may 
make their escape from time to time, and even get dear 
away ; but if they are bent on commeroe-destrojring, 
their destination must needs be known within such narrow 
limits of approximation as have b ted above. 

There they must be looked for, hadowed 

and harried until they are finally ^Sn 

Before that is done they will very ** 



VIEWS OF THE ADMIRALTY 309 

few captures or even many if our naval forces are insuffi- 
cient or ill-disposed. But no one need suppose that any 
nation can go to war without incurring losses. The thing 
is to reduce the losses to a minimum, and that is done by 
a sufficiency of naval force, by strategic wisdom in its 
disposition, by incessant vigilance and tactical skill in its 
handling. The Admiralty has declared that if one or 
two cruisers should escape the surveillance of oiu* squad- 
rons we could always spare a superior number to follow 
them. There is no reason to fear that any future Alabama 
will be left unpursued for even as much time as her 
bunkers will allow her to keep the sea. 

The conclusions here reached are closely in accord 
with the view taken by the Admiralty in its conmiunica- 
tions with the Food Supply Commission. Some of these 
communications were confidential and have not been 
made public, but in a memorandum printed by the Conv* 
mission the Admiralty laid down two broad general prin- 
ciples as deduced from the teaching of naval history : 
'W. That the command of the sea is essential to the suc- 
cessful attack or defence of commerce, and should there- 
fore be the primary aim. 2. That the attack or defence 
of commerce is best effected by concentration of force, 
and that a dispersion of force for either of those objects 
is the strategy of the weak, and cannot materially influ- 
ence the ultimate result of the war." With the strategy 
and dbpositions best adapted for securing and maintain- 
ing the conmiand of the sea — ^which must always be not 
merely the primary but the paramount aim of this country 
— I am not here concerned. Concentration of force must, 
according to the Admiralty, be its indefeasible condition. 
The dispersion of force for the purpose of attacking com- 
merce is, we are told, the strategy of the weak, and, it is 
added, that it would be not less the strategy x>f the weak 
to disperse force, in the first instance, for the defence 
of conmierce. This might seem to imply that the stronger 
naval Power might safely and even, in certain circum- 
stanoeSi with advantage leave its commerce to take care 



3IO ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

of itself until it is attacked. Paradoxical as this con- 
clusion may seem, there is nevertheless no small element 
of truth in it. If it be true that an attack upon conmierce 
by a Power which does not command the sea cannot 
materially influence the ultimate result of the war, that 
belligerent would be a fool who jeopardized his own com- 
mand of the sea by dispersing his forces for the defence 
of commerce to such an extent as to give his adversary an 
advantage in the main conflict. Conversely, the other 
belligerent would be still more a fool if, when his only 
hope, and that a slender one, of securii^ the command 
of the sea lay in the combination and concentration of 
all his available forces, he dispersed any of them in pur- 
suit of a strategic object which could not materially 
affect the ultimate result of the war. From this point of 
view there is no little wisdom in leaving commerce to take 
care of itself until it is attacked — ^first, because it cannot 
be attacked by the enemy without weakening his chance 
of obtaining the command of the sea ; and, secondly, 
because if it is attacked the stronger belligerent will 
alwasrs be able to dispose of its assailants before they have 
done any irreparable damage. The strategic question 
here involved is not, however, to be settled by merely 
abstract considerations. It depends upon the concrete 
conditions of the particular conflict in hand. If the naval 
forces of this country are so superior to those of the 
adversary that the latter cannot hope to secure the 
command of the sea, and will not risk all in contending 
for it, he will naturally turn to the alternative of attempt- 
ing to harass British maritime commerce as much as 
possible. In that case it might be expedient to guard the 
trade routes from the outset, but alwajrs and only on the 
condition that the main fleets are not thereby so weakened 
as to place their command of the sea in any jeopardy. 
If, on the other hand, the enemy's naval forces are so 
powerful as to compel this country to use all its forces to 
overawe or overpower them, then, since the defence of 
commerce is merely a secondary object, and the conunand 



THE DETACHED COMMERCE-DESTROYER 311 

of the sea alwa3rs the primary, and to this country the 
paramount, object of naval warfare, it stands to reason 
that the primary object must not in any way or to any 
degree be sacrificed to the secondary. The same reasoning 
applies to the weaker belligerent. So long as he has any 
chance, or thinks he has any chance, of obtaining the 
conmfiand of the sea he will be exceedingly chary of 
detaching from his main fleets, which alone can enable 
him to compass his purpose, any ship, either fit to lie in 
the line or qualified to serve him by scouting, for the 
purpose of preying on commerce ; and if she does not 
answer to one or other of these descriptions she will be a 
very inefiicient commerce-destroyer at the best. The ship 
which is to prey upon commerce with any effect in these 
days will always have to be appreciably superior in speed, 
or else at least not inferior in armament, to any of those 
which are likely to be told off to defend it. 

Let us now consider how it will fare with a commerce- 
destroyer thus detached, and compare the conditions of 
her warfare with those of her predecessors in the days of 
old. It may be presumed that she will start from the 
port or station in which the main forces of the enemy, 
or some considerable portion of them, are concentrated for 
the purposes of the main conflict — for if she is known to 
be isolated and detached already, the port in which she is 
stationed is not likely to be left unobserved. The first 
thing she has to do is to get away undetected, or at least 
unmolested, and it must be assumed as a matter of course 
that any port in which a main fleet of the enemy is con- 
centrated will be closely watched by a superior force of 
the British Fleet. Evasion is not easy in these circum- 
stances, but it will now and again, perhaps not infre- 
quently, be successfully accomplished. Having regard 
to the port from which she issues, the trade routes which 
are nearest to it, and the limits of her coal-supply, it will 
not be difficult to determine her probable destination ; 
and even if she has escaped entirely undetected, her pre- 
sence in this or that locality will soon be known by the 



312 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

non-arrival at home of merchant vessels she has captured, 
if not by the arrival in one of her own ports of her prizes 
for adjudication. In these days of telegraphs and uni- 
versal publicity, proceedings such as these cannot long 
be kept secret. So far in the hypothetical case under 
consideration every advantage has been given to the 
commerce-destroyer. She has been allowed to escape 
undetected, to reach her cruising ground without mbhap, 
and there to be unmolested until such time as the news 
of her depredations have reached this country. It need 
hardly be said that these favourable conditions will very 
rarely prevail in practice, but if we consider the worst 
case that could happen and see what it comes to, we shall 
be in a better position for considering any less extreme 



Next, having got our commerce-destroyer on to her 
cruising station, let us consider what she can do there. 
It is by no means so easy a thing for a commerce-destroyer 
in these days to capture a merchant vessel and send her 
into port for adjudication as it was in former times. 
The mere capture will, of course, be effected without diffi- 
culty. An unarmed merchant vessel has no choice but 
to surrender when summoned by an armed warship, and 
here it may be remarked parenthetically, that to arm 
a merchant vessel with a view to enabling her to resist 
must always be a very questionable policy in these days. 
She cannot by any feasible method of armament be made 
equal to the feeblest of cruisers likely to be employed 
in the attack on commerce, and any show of armed resis- 
tance will entitle her assailant to send her to the bottom 
without further parley. But assuming that she surrenders 
when summoned, what is the assailant then to do ? In 
the old days, any half-dozen seamen commanded by a 
midshipman or a warrant officer were competent to navi- 
gate the prize into port. They had only to disarm the 
crew and put them under hatches and the thing was done. 
Nowadays the complement of a man-of-war is very 
highly specialized, and, as a rule, no man-of-war carries 



DIFFICULTIES OF CAPTURE 313 

more stokers and engine-room specialists than are re- 
quired for the efficient working of the engines. As the 
assailant of commerce must always be ready to put forth 
her extreme speed in the very probable event of coming 
across an enemy, she will only part with any portion of 
her engine*room complement with very great reluctance. 
Every prize she makes in these circumstances materially 
impairs her own efficiency, and it is safe to say that she 
will make very few before she is at the end of her tether 
in this respect. It may be that very large cruisers will 
be able to provide in some measure against this con- 
tingency by shipping an extra complement at the outset, 
^ut their resources in this respect are strictly limited, 
not only by inexorable conditions of space, but also by 
the consideration that the supply of skilled stokers and 
other engine-room specialists is by no means inexhaus- 
tible, and that their employment in this subsidiary operas 
tion of warfare must needs pro tanlo impair the efficiency 
of the main fightii^ fleets. If a commerce-destroyer 
must carry the engine-room complement of some tluee 
or four ordinary men-of-war for the purpose of capturii^ 
about a dozen merchant ships of the enemy, and must 
run an appreciable risk of having them all taken prisoners 
or sent to the bottom before she has made a single cap- 
ture, it may well be questioned whether the game will be 
found to be worth the candle. 

But, it may be sug^;ested, there is another alternative. 
Instead of capturing the prizes and sending them into 
port for adjudication, the assailant may sink them with- 
out further ado. International Law sanctions this in 
certain contingencies, and no doubt it will sometimes be 
done even in defiance of/ International Law. But the 
proceeding is not without its difficulties and disadvantages. 
It entails the loss of all prize-money in respect of the ships 
so dealt with, and thereby it eliminates one of the strongest 
motives which actuated the commerce-destruction of the 
past. But besides this it requires the assailant to oifer 
the hospitality of an already overcrowded ship to the 



314 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

crews of the vessek thus disposed of. There will be no 
great consideration shown to such prisoners, of course. 
But in any case they must be fed, and they must be 
accorded as much cubic space as will suffice, if only 
barely, to keep them alive until they can be disembarked. 
The crew of a single tramp will cause very little difficulty. 
But if the assailant happens to come across an Atlantic 
liner with 2,000 or 3,000 persons on board, she is likely 
to find herself in a very awkward dilemma. If she deter- 
mines to send her prize into port, she will have to provide 
an adequate prize crew for the purpose. If she deter- 
mines to send her to the bottom, she must take on board, 
feed, and house all those 2,000 or 3,000 persons, and 
then her position if she has to fight an action will 'be 
no very enviable one. Perhaps the best thing for her 
to do would be to escort her prize into port. But this 
is to risk her own destruction as well as the recapture of 
the prize — which must be faced in any case — ^and it 
also withdraws her from her hunting ground. 

There is yet another respect in which the modem 
commerce-destroyer is sharply differentiated from her 
predecessors in the past. They were propelled by sails 
and could keep the sea as long as their supply of food and 
other stores lasted, and this period may be put at not 
less than six months on the average. It is true that the 
supply of water was limited and could only be replenished 
by a visit to the shore. But a fully equipped naval base 
was not necessary for this purpose, and there were many 
secluded places on neutral coasts where water could be 
clandestinely obtained by a belligerent ship with very 
little risk of prevention, or even of detection. The modem 
commerce-destroyer, on the other hand, depends solely 
on steam, and must replenish her bunkers at least once 
a fortnight. Neutral ports are closed to her, for none but 
a very powerful and very benevolent neutral would risk 
the displeasure and possible retaliation of a belligerent 
in command of the sea by supplying the ships of the other 
belligerent with fuel to be immediately used in the further 



LIMITED RADIUS OF ACTION 3^5 

prosecution of their belligerent enterprises. If the com- 
merce-destroyer's own ports are far distant, she will use 
up no small percentage of her total coal-supply in going 
to and fro ; and broadly it may be stated that if the 
distance from her base to her cruising ground is much 
more than a quarter of her radius of action as measured 
by her coal-supply, she will be very slow to engage in the 
enterprise at all. Let us suppose that it takes her three 
and a half days to get to her cruising ground, and, of 
course, the same time to get back. Allowing her four- 
teen days' total coal-supply, how long will she be able 
to stay there? Certainly less than seven days, because 
she must always keep an appreciable amount of cpal in 
reserve to loeet the contingency of ji sustained pursuit 
at topmost speed by an adversary, neither weaker nor 
slower than herself. It is hazardous to attempt to evalu- 
ate the amount of this reserve in exact figures, but it 
could hardly be less than two days' supply ^t jnorm^ 
speed, because at high speed the consumption of co^l 
increases much more nearly in a geoinetrical than in an 
arithmetical ratio to the increment of speed attained. 
No captain of a man-of-war in his senses would ever 
allow hb coal-supply in time of war to run down to a 
point at which it would only just suffice to take him 
back to his nearest port at economical speed. Hence, in 
the case supposed, the number of days for which a com- 
merce-destroyer with a supply of coal for fourteen days 
on board could engage in her enterprise at a distance of 
three and a half dasrs' steaming firom her base would be 
five at the outside. Her only alternative would be to 
coal at sea. But this cannot be done in all localities, nor 
in any but the finest weather. The colliers must meet her 
at a {Mrearranged rendezvous, and they are liable to 
capture in transit. If she takes them with her they 
may still be captured by an enemy who putd her to flight ; 
and even if at last she finds a place and a time at which 
she can coal without great difficulty, she is liable at any 
and every moment to be surprised by an enemy just 
23 



3i6 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

when she is in the very worst trim either for fighting or 
for running away. 

It remains to consider the part likely to be played 
by torpedo-craft in the work of conmierce-destruction. 
In the first place a torpedo-craft b incapable either of 
furnishing a prize crew to a captured vessel or of taking 
on board the crew of a merchant vessel of any but the 
smallest size. Her radius of action is also extremely 
limited, because in the daytime she is no match for any 
sea-going warship except in speed. Hence she will for 
the most part confine her operations to half the distance 
she can cover between dusk and dawn, and the limits of 
her cruising ground being thus defined, it will not be 
difficult for a belligerent in command of the sea to organize 
an offensive defence against her attacks which will render 
her operations, to say the least, extremely hazardous. 
It is true that there are certain r^ons of the Mediter- 
ranean in which British merchant vessels might, in certain 
contingencies, be exposed to assault from hostile torpedo- 
craft. But the limits of these regions are determined 
by the radius of action of the torpedo-craft as above 
defined, and until the menace of the torpedo-craft within 
these limits is abated by the offensive defence above 
mentioned, it may be necessary to direct British merchant 
vessel3 to keep outside them. This question was very 
fully considered by the Food Supply Commission in view 
of an opinion advanced in his evidence by Admiral Sir 
John Hopkins to the effect that " on the assumption of 
our Channel and Mediterranean Fleets being masters of 
the situation to a certain extent ... it is certain that a 
British ship could not go through the Mediterranean in 
those circumstances." The phrase *' being masters of the 
situation lo a certain extent" is not very happily chosen. 
If it means that the fleets in question are in effective 
command of the sea, then it also must mean, ex vi termini^ 
that the operations of any commerce-destroyer, whether 
cruiser or torpedo-craft, will assuredly be extremely 
hazardous within the area of command. If, on the other 



TORPEDO CRAW 3i> 

hand, it medns Anything less than this, then the assump- 
tion is totally at variance with the fundamental postulate 
that in any maritime war this country must command 
the sea or perish. It may be, indeed, that even when 
an effective command of the sea is estabUshed, it will be 
impossible, as Sir John Hopkins said, " to safeguard every 
route so minutely that hostile cruisers could not creep 
in on some part of it and molest oiur mercantile marine.'' 
So far as this is so it may perhaps serve in some measure 
to sustain the modified opinion subsequently expressed 
by Sir John Hopkins/ to the effect that " a British ship 
could not go through the Mediterranean under the cir- 
cumstances cited without running great risks/' But on 
this it may be observed, first, that the risks run by the 
marauding cruisers are likely to be at least as great as 
those run by the mercantUe marine ; and, secondly, that 
the more effective way of safeguarding the route threa- 
tened may very well be to watch the ports of exit of the 
marauders, with a sufficient force properly disposed and 
adapted for the purpose, rather than to patrol the route 
itself and wait for the marauders to appear. Be this as 
it may, it is worthy of note that Admiral Bridge, on being 
asked if he concurred in the opinion of Sir John Hopkins, 
replied, " Not at all " ; and that the Comimission itself 
sunmied up the whole controversy as follows : " We may 
point out that in view of the geographical position of the 
principal maritime countries, British ships could scarcely 
be in any serious danger, except in the case of a war with 
France " — now, happily, a much more remote contingency 
than it was when the Commission was conducting its in- 
quiries — ** where they would be threatened with attack 
from the French torpedo-boat stations on the North 
African coast. Moreover, in this case the danger to com- 
merce seems to be considerably less than would appear 
at first sight, when it is remembered that British vessels 
need not pass within one himdred miles of these stations, 
and that torpedo-craft are singularly ill-adapted for prey- 
ing upon conmierce. Such craft can neither spare pri2^ 



ai8 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

crews nor accommodate any one above their complement 
number, so that, if employed against commerce, they 
could only compel vesseb to follow them into port on 
pain of being torpedoed. A French torpedo-boat which 
had captured a grain-ship in the Mediterranean would 
very likely have had to steam two hundred miles, the 
speed on the return journey being limited, of course, tqr 
the speed of the captured ship." It may be added that 
in this process of convoying the prize into port the tor- 
pedo-KTaft would run great risk of capture, with very 
little chance of escape. The only other waters which might 
seem to afiford good hunting ground for torpedo-craft 
bent on commerce-destroying are the English Channel 
and its approaches. But these are precisely the r^ons 
in which the British command of the sea is likely to be 
most effective and ubiquitous. Indeed, it may be aflSrmed, 
with some confidence, that so long as this country holds 
the effective command of the sea, hostile warships of any 
kind will be very chary of entering the Channel at all, 
and not very eager to approach it. Even in the con- 
tingency, now happi^ so remote, of a war with France, 
it must be remembered that torpedo-craft issuiog from 
French ports in the Channel will be met by a sustained 
offensive defence on our part. If the experience, fre- 
quently repeated, of manoeuvres is any guide it would 
seem that such an offensive defence, skilfully organized 
and relentlessly pursued, very soon results in effectually 
abating the menace of hostile torpedo-craft. At Port 
Arthur, again, the Russian torpedo-craft did next to no- 
thing, being completely overmatched by the offeuMve 
defence of the Japanese. 

It results, from the foregoing investigation, that, so 
long as this country retains an effective command of the 
sea, the maritime commerce of the whole Empire, though 
not entirely immune to injury and loss, will, on the whole, 
be exposed to far less risk than British maritime com- 
merce had to incur in the war of the French .Revolution 
and Empire* That risk has been estimated at not more 



SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS J19 

1 

than if per cent, per annum on the total value of the 
commerce involved. This conclusion is established by the 
following considerations : 

1 . Ail experience shows that commerce-destrojdng never 
has been, and never can be, a primary object of naval 
war. 

2. There is nothing in the chaises which modem times 
have witnessed in the methods and appliances of naval 
warfare to suggest that the experience of former wars is 
no longer applicable. 

3. Such experience as there is of modem war points 
to the same conclusion and enforces it. 

4. The case of the Alabama, rightly understood, does 
not disallow this conclusion, but on the whole rather con- 
firms it. 

S* Though the volume of maritime commerce has 
vastly increased, the number of units of naval force cap- 
able of assailing it has decreased in far greater proportion. 

6. Privateering is, and remains, abolished, not merely 
by the fiat of International Law, but by changes in tli^ 
methods and appliances of navigation and naval warfare 
which have rendered the privateer entirely obsolete. 

7. Maritime commerce is much less assailable than in 
former times, because the introduction of steam has con- 
fined its course to definite trade routes of extremely 
narrow width, and has almost denuded the sea of com- 
merce outside these limits. The trade routes being 
defined, they are much more easy to defend, and much 
more difficult to assail. 

8. The modem commerce-destroyer is confined to a 
comparatively narrow radius of action by the inexorable 
limits of her coal-supply. If she destrojrs her prizes she 
must foi^o the prize-money and find accommodation for 
the crews and passengers of the ships destroyed. If she. 
sends them into port she must deplete her own engine- 



320 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF' COMMERCE 

room complement, and thereby gravely impair her effi- 
ciency. 

9. Torpedo-craft are of little or no use for the purposes 
of commerce-destruction except in certain well-defined 
areas where special measures can be taken for checking 
their depredations. 

Of course, all this depends on the one fundamental 
assiunption that the commerce to be defended belongs 
to a Power which can, and does, command the sea. On 
no other condition can maritime commerce be defended 
at all. But on no other condition can the British 
exist. 



The foregoing essay was written early in 1906, and 
published in the Naval Annual in the spring of that 
year. In the summer of the same year the Admiralty 
oif;anized a scheme of manoeuvres, the main purpose 
of which was to elucidate the problems involved in the 
attack and defence of commerce by experiment on a 
large scale at sea, so far as such experimental examina- 
tion of them could be prosecuted under the limiting con- 
ditions necessarily incidental to a state of peace. Two 
great fleets — ^the Red and the Blue — ^were opposed to 
each other, and their relative strength is sufficiently indi- 
cated for my piupose in the table given below of their 
comparative losses throughout the operations. 

The " General Idea " of the operations was expounded 
by the Admiralty as follows : 

The ' co-operation of the mercantile marine has been 
invited. 

The general idea of the manoeuvres is based upon the 
assimtiption (for manoeuvre purposes) that war has broken 
out between a stronger naval power (Red), and a weaker 
but still formidable naval power (Blue), 



GENERAL IDEA 321 

Although under such circumstances the primary object 
of the Red Commander-in-Chief would be to seek out and 
defeat the Blue Fleet wherever it appeared, it is not to be 
expected that the Blue Commander-in-Chief would risk a 
general engagement with the Red Fleet unless he could 
bring to action a portion at a time, and under conditions 
favourable to himself. 

Among the steps that he would be likely to take to 
cause a Aspersion of the Red Fleet, with a view to obtain- 
ing such an opportunity, the most likely to succeed 
would be an attack on the Red trade. 

In adopting this course he would count not only on 
the actual loss he would be able to inflict on his enemy, 
but also, if the Red nation was one largely dependent on 
its conmierce, he would be able to reckon on creating a 
national panic which might compel the Red Conmiander- 
in-Chief to disperse his forces to an extent that neither 
the actual risk to commerce nor sound strategy would 
justify. 

The investigation of the actual risks to which the trade 
is likely to be exposed under these conditions, and of the 
best means of affording it protection without sacrificing 
the main object of talong every opportunity of bringing 
the enemy's fleet to action, is evidently of great impor- 
tance not only to those who have to conduct the opera- 
tions, but also to the mercantile conmiunity. 

An under-estimate of the risk to the trade, and a too 
great concentration of the Red forces, might give the 
enemy the chance of inflicting great and avoidable loss 
on the merchant shipping, while, on the other hand, an 
over-estimate of the risk might lead to a great rise in the 
rate of insurance and an almost complete stoppage of 
trade, which would be more injurious to the country 
than any losses likely to be inflicted directly by the enemy. 

In either case a demand would probably arise on the 
part of the Red community for an injudicious dispersion 
of the Red forces on expeditions for the direct protection 
of trade, which would render them liable to be defeated in 
detail, and greatly reduce the chance of bringing the 
enemy's main fleet to action. 

In the Naval Annual for 1907 I reviewed the results 
of these operations. I append here such extracts from 



32a ATTACK AND DEI^ENCE OF COMMERCE 

the remarks I then made as will enable my readen to 
judge how far my theoretical examination of the problem 
was or was not corroborated by a subsequent experi- 
mental study of it in the conditions prescribed by the 
Admiralty, 

The operations of the Blue side were very narrowly 
restricted. Practically they could be directed only against 
merchant vessels plying to and from Mediterranean and 
South Atlantic ports, and even within these limits the Blue 
forces were not allowed to attack the trade at the points 
of its greatest concentration — ^that is, in the inmiediate 
neighbourhood of its home ports or within the Gut of 
Gibraltar. Henc^, for practical purposes, some position 
on the trad^ route between Ushant and Cape St. Vincent 
was designated and virtually prescribed as that which 
the main body of the Blue Fleet should take up in the 
pursuit of its purpose of preying upon British maritime 
conmierce. Moreover, only a fraction — considerably less 
than 25 per cent. — of the total amount of commerce travel- 
fing the trade route within the period of the operations 
was really assailable by the Blue forces. The trade route 
was traversed by upwards of four hundred vessels— either 
merchant steamers or warships representing merchant 
steamers— during the period in question. Of these only 
ninety-four in all — sixty merchant steamers and thirty- 
four warships — ^were liable to capture or destruction, and 
fifty-two of them, or 55 per cent., were actually captured 
before the operations came to an end. . • . 

Of the several squadrons and divisions assigned to the 
Blue side, the Battle Squadron and Second and Fifth 
Cruiser Squadrons were told off by the Blue Commander- 
in-Chief to operate off the coast of Portugal in what may 
be called an oceanic attack on the trade. The Sixth 
Cruiser Squadron and all the Destroyer Divisions, except 
that at Lagos, together with the Submarine Flotilla, were 
left to operate nearer home with the Blue home ports as 
their bases. Their fate was significs^it, and may be here 
recorded. ... Of the Fifth Cruiser Squadron the five 



ISOLATED CRUISERS j«3 

torpedo-gunboats were put out of action durifig the course 
of the operations without having made any captures at 
all. The Sappho and Scylla alone survived. The Sappho 
captured three merchant vessels and the Scylla seven. 
These two ships afford a striking illustration of the amount 
of damage to commerce that isolated vessels can do — so 
long as they are unmolested — even in waters strongly 
occupied by a greatly superior naval force. Their cap- 
tures were all effected either at the mouth of the English 
Channel or within about a hundred miles south-west of 
Ushant. It seems probable that they mans^d to hit 
some point on the '' clearly defined route '^ outside the 
ordinary trade route Which was assigned by the Red 
Commander-in-Chief to merchant vessels associated in 
groups ; and their success seems to suggest that a gtierre 
de course conducted by isolated ships engaged on a roving 
cruise is by no means out of date yet. Between them the 
Sappho and the Scylla account for very nearly one-fifth, 
that is little less than 20 per cent., of all the captures 
effected by the Blue side. Both survived to the end, the 
Sappho making the first capture of the war, and very 
nearly the last. It must be added, however, that had 
the war been a real and a lasting one these two vessels 
would very soon have reached the end of their tether. 
The low enduring mobility — that is, the limited coal 
capacity— of the modem warship compels it to return 
very frequently to a base for coal. It is more than pro* 
bable that, when the Sappho and the ScyUa reached this 
point, they would have found the access to their base 
closely barred by the already victorious forces of the 
enemy. 

Of the thirty-one destroyers assigned to the Blue side, 
five stationed at Lagos and the rest in Blue home ports, 
eighteen, or 58 per cent., were lost in the course of the 
operations, and only thirteen survived. Of the five 
destroyers at Lagos, three were lost, but not before they 
had captured four merchant vessels, and their loss was 
more than counterbalanced by the loss to the Red side 



334 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COBfMERCE 

of four out of the five Mediterranean destroyers operating 
off Lagos. Of the twenty-six Blue destroyers operating 
from home ports, fifteen were lost, but the several flotillas 
accounted for the capture of nine merchant vessels, while 
of the Red forces, two cruisers and five destroyers were 
adjudged to have been put out of action by Blue de- 
stroyers. The Submarine Flotilla did nothing, and suffered 
no damage throughout the operations. Its opportunity 
might have come if any of the Blue ports had been block- 
aded by the Red side. But that phase of the operations 
was never reached, though it was well in sight before the 
manoeuvres came to an end. 

It is a fact of no little significance that of the fifty-two 
merchant vessels finally captured or sunk by the Blue 
side, nine were captured or sunk by two cruisers opera- 
ting singly, and twelve were captured or sunk by a few 
destroyers operating in pairs Or in small groups. In other 
words, the guerre de course proper prosecuted by these 
insignificant vessels — for the two cruisers were unarmoured 
third-class cruisers — accounted for twenty-one out of 
fifty-two captures in all — ^that is, for just over 40 per 
cent. These figures m^^ht at first sight be taken to imply 
that the guerre de course is still best conducted in th^ 
way, and that the comparatively slow, weak, unarmoured 
cruiser may still, as Admiral Custance, the distinguished 
author of Naval Policy^ contends, have an important 
function to discharge in war. But before these conclu- 
sions are accepted we have to look at the operations as 
a whole, and to bear in mind that the time assigned to 
them was not sufficient to afford a complete view of the 
strategic conditions involved, nor of the final results to 
which these conditions must inevitably have led. It is 
the recorded opinion of the chief umpire that '' it is 
practically certain that the commencement of the third 
week of the war would have seen all commerce-destrojring 
ships either captured or blockaded in defended ports." 
If that is so, it is clear that the rate of capture maintained 
for a few days by the cruisers and destroyers in question 



MANOEUVRE STRATEGY 3^S 

must in a few days longer have fallen to zero. We have 
also to consider that the Red Commander-in-Chief very 
properly made it his chief and primary business to seek 
out and engage the main body of the Blue Fleet, well 
knowing that, as Nelson said, if the trunk was destroyed, 
the branches would perish with it. With this task in 
hand he could well afford to neglect the sporadic guerrs 
de course of his adversaries, in the assured confidence that 
as soon as his own command of the sea was firmly estab- 
lished the marauding vessels would very quickly be 
disposed of. In the opinion of the chief umpire this con- 
fidence was justified. It may further be doubted whether 
in real war the capture or destruction of merchant vessels 
by destroyers will be found to be as feasible as it was 
made to appear during the manoeuvres. But this ques- 
tion is fully discussed in the preceding essay, and need 
not here be reopened. 

" The Blue Commander-in-Chief," says the comment 
of the Admiralty on the operations, " was directed to 
carry out a plan of campaign which is generally allowed 
to be strategically unsound." The meaning of this seems 
to be that it was suggested in the " General Idea " that 
he would probably seek to cause a dispersion of the Red 
Fleet, and with that object he would oiganize an attack 
on the Red trade as the best means available to tempt 
the Red side to divide its forces and so give him a chance 
of engaging a portion of it at a time. As a rule, it may 
be said that an inferior naval force will not take the sea 
unless it means to fi^t. It is clear that the Blue Com- 
mander-in-Chief did n^ mean to fight if he could help 
it, or unless he could encounter a detached force of the 
enemy over which he could gain a decisive advantage 
before the latter could be reinforced. It would, there- 
fore, be strategically unsound for him to take the sea 
at all with his Battle Squadron, unless he held, as appar- 
ently he did, that the instructions of the Admiralty 
required him to use his whole force in an organized and 
simultaneous attack on the Red trade. On that assump- 



326 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

tion practically only one course was open to him — to 
occupy some portion of the trade route sufficiently re- 
moved from the Red bases to give him at least a chanee 
of maintaining his position long enough to enable him 
to create a panic at home by the interruption and de- 
struction of the floating trade. Such a position could not 
be near the entrance to the Channel, because that region 
was sure to be occupied in overwhelming force by the 
Red forces opposed to him. It must, therefore, be off 
the coast of the Peninsula, and not south of Cape St. 
Vincent, because the South Atlantic trade was not to 
be molested south of that latitude, and Cape St. Vincent 
was, moreover, in the immediate neighbourhood of his 
protected base at Lagos. Hence, if he adopted this plan 
of campaign, it was practically certain that his main 
force would, sooner or later, be found in the occupation 
of the trade route off the coast of Portugal. He did adopt 
this plan, and, viewing the situation as he did, it may 
be conceded, with the Admiralty, that, " he achieved his 
mission with great ability." It is^ however, as the same 
authority points out, " open to question whether he 
might not have achieved a greater measure of success by 
the employment of his cruisers only for the guerre de 
course, and the concentration of his battleships for 
attacks upon the line of the Red Admiral's communica- 
tions." . . • 

Regarded in the abstract as a means for the intercep- 
tion and destruction of floating commerce, nothing could 
be better than the disposition adopted by the Blue Com- 
mander-in-Chief, the nature of which may be gathered 
from the annexed chart reproduced from the official report 
on the operations. It spread a net through which no 
merchant vessel could pass without being detected in 
ordinary weather, because if any one line was passed 
in the night, the next, which was about a hundred and 
thirty miles distant, must be passed in the daytime. It 
permitted of rapid concentration by one line or another 
if the merchant vessels were accompanied by warships, 



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THE BLUE DISPOSITIONS 3»7 

and though it exposed the battleship line to some risk of 
being overpowered in detail before the ships could be 
effectively concentrated for action, yet it placed a screen 
of cruisers so far ahead and astern oif this line as to render 
such a risk almost infinitesimal in these days of wireless 
telegraphy. But, regarded in the concrete, the dis- 
position is open to the fatal criticism that it must forth- 
with be dislocated and broken up as soon as the enemy 
appears in force. If the proof of the pudding is in the 
eating, this criticism is conclusive and final. It was not 
until the morning of June 27 that the ships were all in their 
stations. Before dark on that same day scarcely one of 
them remained there. The Battle Squadron was partly 
concentrated and partly captured or dispersed. The 
Fifth Cruiser Squadron was flying in all directions. The 
Second Cruiser Squadron was steaming as hard as it could 
for Lagos. ... 

In making this ill-fated disposition the Blue Com- 
mander-in-Chief was no doubt largely influenced by the 
instructions he had received from the Admiralty, which 
were in effect — as defined by layseU as the correspondent 
of The Times attached to the Blue side — ^' to endeavour 
to use his fleets, as a real enemy would in like circum- 
stances, for the purpose of causing a conmierdal crisis in 
England by the destruction rather than the capture of 
British merchant steamers, with a view to employing his 
fleets to advantage at a later stage if this measure had 
the desired effect of causing any dispersal of the British 
forces.'' But if this was his purpose it was not fulfilled. 
The dispositions made off the coast of Portugal were very 
ineffectual for the destruction of commerce, as may be 
seen from the list of captures, and very disastrous to the 
ships and squadrons taking part in them. Nor had they 
any appreciable effect in causing a dispersal of the British 
forces. Hence there is no little force in the suggestion 
of the Admiralty that the Blue Conmiander-in-Chief 
might have " achieved a greater measure of success by 
the employment of his cruisers only fw the guerre de course, 



328 ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 

and the concentration of his battleships for attacks upon 
the Red Admiral's communieations/' 

It remains to give the results of the campaign as tabu- 
lated in the official '' Sunmiary of Red and Blue losses/' 
and then, to quote the comments of the Admiralty. The 
comparative losses of the two sides are given in the fol- 
lowing table : 



ClMioCflk^. 



Battleshini 

Armoiued Craiaefs 

OUier Crniiex*' . 

Scouts 

Torpedo Gunboats 

Destvoyois 




20 

n 

NU 
41 



I 



•9 

NU 
13 



19*1 

15 
16 

8 
28 



I 

I 



4-5 

2X-0 

33-3 
NU 

317 




9 

7 
xo 

5 
31 



BIATB. 



! 



2 
4 
4 

5 
x8 



J' 
J 

I 



7 
3 
6 

Nil 
13 



I 

I 



22-2 

571 
40-0 

100 
580 



These figures speak for themselves. The official com- 
ments also speak for themselves ; the only remark to be 
made on them is that the destruction of commerce in the 
face of a hostile conmiand of the sea would probably be 
found in actual war to be a much more difficult busmess 
than the manoeuvres made it appear. If that is so, it 
would seem that the risks involved are not likely to be 
greater than could be covered by insurance, if only owners 
and underwriters can be induced to keep their heads. 



AoMiRALr^r Remarks 

The manoeuvres were deprived of much of their value 
owing to the small proportion of merchant vessels which 
accepted the Admiralty terms for taking part. 

The percentage of loss of merchant vessels was high 
(55 P^r cent.), and would appear alarming were it not for 
the fact that this success of Blue was only achieved at the 



COMMENTS OF THE ADMIRALTY 329 

expense of the complete disorganisation of his fighting 
forces, and that, as stated by the chief umpire, had 
hostilities continued, " it is practically certain that the 
commencement of the third week of the war would have 
seen all commerce-destroying ships either captured or 
blockaded in their defended ports/' 

It is probable also that the percentage of loss would 
have been very considerably lower had it been possible for 
all the merchant ships traversing the manoeuvre area, to 
the number of upwards of four hundred, to take a part 
in the proceedings. As it was, the attack of the twenty- 
seven oattleships and cruisers and thirty destroyers of 
the Blue Fleet was concentrated upon the inadequate 
number of sixty merchant steamers and thirty-four gun- 
boats and destroyers representing merchant steamers ; in 
consequence, the actual percentage of loss is misleading, 
and affords little or no basis for calculation of the risks 
of shipping in time of war. It should also be noted that 
considerations of expense and the fact that the attacking 
fleet was on the seaward flank of the trade routes pre- 
vented wide detours being made for the purpose of avoid- 
ing captiue. 

The summary of Red and Blue losses will show the cost 
of a guerre de course against a superior naval power, and 
proves that, although a temporary commercial crisis might 
possibly be caused in London by this form of attack, the 
complete defeat of the aggressor could not be long delayed, 
with the result that public confidence would be quickly 
re-established and the security of British trade assured. 

To make an enemy's trade the main object of attack, 
while endeavouring to elude his fighting ships, b gener^ 
ally recognized as being strategicaUy incorrect from the 
purely naval point of view, and this procedure could only 
be justified if there were reason to suppose the hostile 
Government could by such action be coerced into a mis- 
direction of their strategy or premature negotiations for 
conclusion of hostilities. 

As it was considered desirable, however, that the risks 
to British shipping should be examined, under the most 
unfavourable conditions conceivable, the Blue G>nunan- 
der-in-Chief was directed to carry out a plan of campaign 
which is generally allowed to be strat^cally unsound, 
and there b no doubt that, fettered as he was by these 



S30 ATTACK AMD DEFENCE OF COMMERCE 



limitations^ he achieved his mission with great ability, 
though it is open to question whether he might not have 
achieved a greater measure of success by the employment 
of his cruisers only for the guerre de course and die con- 
centration of hb battleships for attacks upon the line 
of the Red Admiral's communications. 



THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE^ 

I MUST begin my lecture with an acknowledgment 
and an apology — an acknowledgment of the high 
honom* done me by your commandant and your professor 
of military history in inviting me to address so well- 
informed and, I hope, so critical a professional audience 
as yourselves on a subject connected with your profession ; 
and an apology for my audacity in accepting their invi* 
tation. I am neither a sailor nor a soldier ; I am an 
outsider to both those noble professions, though I have 
devoted some time and thought to the study of their higher 
functions and relations. You will bear with me if I say 
many things which you know as well as I do, and some 
things which may provoke your dissent. I have no 
dogmas to propound. My sole object is to offer you some 
food for reflection and, perhaps, some material for profit- 
able discussion among yourselves. If I can attain that 
object I shall not regret my audacity, and I am sure you 
will forgive it. 

The subject of my lecture is what has been called " The 
Higher Policy of Defence." By this I understand the 
due co-ordination of all the agencies of warfare, naval 
and military, offensive and defensive, and their intelli- 
gent adaptation to the conditions historical, geographi- 
cal, political, and economical, of the countries, states, 
or Powers supposed to be engaged in war. It will be seen 
at once that the problem of defence so conceived cannot 
be studied in the abstract. We cannot disengage it from 

& A lecture deliveied by lequett at the Royal Stafi College, Camberley, 
on December g, 1902, and printed in the NaiioHol Reviiw, January, 1903. 

24 33« 



332 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

its circumstances and conditions. For instance, the prob- 
lem of defence for a country like Switzerland, which 
has no seaboard, must differ fundamentally from the 
problem of defence for a Power like the British Empire, 
which is essentially a maritime Power, having no land 
frontiers except such as are in the last resort defensible 
only through the agency of sea power. These two cases 
are perhaps the extreme limits within which the problem 
of defence varies for different countries. On the one 
hand we have a country which has no direct interest in 
the sea at all, which has nothing but land frontiers to 
defend and nothing but land forces to defend them withal ; 
on the other, we have a country with vital interests in 
every quarter and on all the seas of the earth, which can 
neither defend itself nor attack its enemies without 
crossing the sea. I say it cannot defend itself without 
crossing the sea because that is a very poor conception 
of national, to say nothing of Imperial defence, which 
regards its primary object as the defence of our own 
shores. That might be, and, indeed, would be, our ulti- 
mate object if all else were lost. But before that object 
could even come into view our Empire would be at an 
end. The British Empire, it has been well said, is the 
gift of sea power. By sea power it has been won, by sea 
power it must be defended. This is not to say that it must 
or can be defended by naval force alone. On the con- 
trary, that would be as fatal a mistake as to say that the 
problem of defence for England is concerned primarily 
with the defence of these shores. A few years ago we 
had to defend ourselves in South Africa. We should 
never have effected our purpose if we had relied on naval 
force alone. On the other hand, we should never even 
have begun to effect it if the seas had not been open to 
us. Sea power and naval force are not convertible terms. 
Naval force is that particular agency of warfare which 
takes the sea for its field of operations ; military force 
is that particular agency of warfare which takes the land 
for its field of operations. Both are essential elements 



THE ECONOMICS OF WARFARE 333 

of sea power. Both are equally indispensable factors in 
any rational study of the problem of defence presented 
by the British Empire. The whole problem consists in 
co-ordinating their respective and characteristic functions, 
and in so applying their respective and characteristic 
agencies as to obtain the greatest effect from the least 
expenditure of energy. The higher policy of defence is, 
in fact, a problem in the economics of warfare. 

I cannot pretend to offer anything like a complete 
solution of this tremendous problem within the limits 
of a lecture. I can only attempt to determine a few of 
its fundamental data, and, if it may be, to indicate the 
direction in which its solution must be looked for. I am 
confronted at the outset with a difficulty of nomenclature. 
For my particular purpose the word " defence " is, I must 
acknowledge, not very well chosen. From a political 
point of view it is, indeed, not only correct but indis- 
pensable. Of purely aggressive warfare, of wanton and 
unprovoked attacks on the rights, liberties, or territories 
of other nations I am not here to speak at all. Such war^ 
fare finds no place in the higher policy of defence. From 
a military point of view, on the other hand, the word 
" defence " tends unduly to confine our attention to only 
one branch, and that by no means the more important 
branch, of the operations of warfare. It is hardly a 
paradox to say that all defence is attack. It is nothing 
but the truth to say that attack is by far the most effec- 
tive form of defence. " The more you hurt the enemy," 
said Farragut, " the less likely he is to hurt you " ; and 
all operations of warfare between belligerents of anything 
like equal power are conducted on this principle. The 
belligerent who acts purely on the defensive is already 
more than half beaten, and is probably only holding out 
in the hope either of receiving assistance from without or 
of his assailant becoming exhausted. In either case the 
offensive is resumed the moment it becomes possible. In 
any other case, the issue is fore-ordained. For this reason 
no two nations are likely to go to war unless each expects 



334 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

to overcome the other. For any object less paramount 
than national existence no nation will go to war well 
knowing beforehand that it must be beaten. If national 
existence is at stake it will, of course, prefer to perish 
fighting. That is the only case in which from a military 
point of view a belligerent will act on the defensive, and 
then only so far as he needs must. From a political point 
of view, on the other hand, defence, and defence^only, 
is the sole object of all warlike preparation ; but even 
so, as soon as issue is joined, defence will always in the 
first instance take the form of attack. 



Of entrance to a qnarrel ; but, being in. 
Bear it that the oppoeer may beware of thee. 

This, then, is one fundamental datum of the higher 
policy of defence, and fix)m it we may proceed with little 
dispute or difficulty to another. War reduces human re- 
lations to their simplest and most primitive form. It is 
a conflict of wills ending in a trial of strength. Each bel- 
ligerent seeks to invade the territory of the other for the 
purpose of attacking his armed forces, and, if it may be, 
of defeating them. No conflict can take place until the 
common frontier has been passed by one belligerent or 
the other, and, as the fortune of war decides, the more 
successful of the two must needs advance further and 
further into the territory of the other, his ultimate object 
being to occupy the capital in which are concentrated the 
powers of government and the control of the state's re- 
sources. But no army can advance for a single day's 
march into an enemy's territory unless either it carries 
its own supplies, or can exact them from the enemy, or 
can organize a secure and continuous system of transport 
whereby its daily needs can be satisfied. To carry its own 
supplies for a lengthened campaign is impracticable. To 
exact them from the enemy in any sufficient measure is 
out of the question, and in respect of munitions of war 
quite impossible. Hence a system of continuous supply 



SECURITY OF COMMUNICATIONS 335 

along a secure line of communication is the only prac- 
ticable expedient. It follows from this again that the 
line of advance into an enemy's territory must be deter- 
mined by the indefeasible necessity of checking and, if it 
may be, of defeating the armed forces of the enemy, and 
thereby of making it impossible for them to interrupt 
the communications of the assailant. In the war of 1 870 
the Prussian armies had contained one French army 
at Metz and compelled another to surrender at Sedan 
before they advanced on Paris, I suppose no one will 
contend that until this had been done Paris could have 
been invested. 

I have started with an analjrsis of the simplest con- 
ditions of warfare on land because that is the kind of 
warfare with which soldiers are professionally most 
familiar, and because, addressing an audience of soldiers, 
I shall hope to carry you more readily with me along the 
line of advance I propose to follow if I make no assump- 
tions to begin with to which you are likely to take excep- 
tion. We have seen first that attack is the most eifective 
form of defence, and secondly that the further the attack 
is pushed the more absolutely does it depend on the 
security of the line of communication. There is a third 
condition, equally fundamental, perhaps, but much more 
difficult to determine in the abstract. " War," said 
Napoleon, ^' is an affair of positions." It is the special 
function of the strategic faculty to determine first, what 
is the most advantageous line of advance for an army 
seeking to invade an enemy's territory ; secondly, what 
are the positions which make one line of advance more 
advantageous than another ; and thirdly, what is the 
best way of seizing those positions and turning them to 
full advantage. All this would be simple enough if the 
armed forces of the enemy could be left out of account. 
But it must be assumed, of course, that he on his part 
is seeking to do precisely the same thing, so that at every 
stage of the campaign the position and probable intentions 
of the enemy are the dominant factors in the situation. 



336 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

So much being premised, let us consider how far and in 
what way these fundamental conditions are affected by 
transferring the initial stages of the conflict from the land 
to the sea. I will assume, for simplicity's sake, that the 
two belligerents have no common land frontier, so that 
neither can attack the other or any of the other's posses- 
sions without first crossing the sea. I will assume further 
that both are largely engaged in maritime commerce, 
and that this commerce is carried on, for the most part, 
in ships flying their own flags. It is obvious that if both 
have navies, the first contact and conflict between two 
such belligerents must take place on the sea, and the 
question is, in what position each belligerent would desire 
it to take place — ^war being an affair of positions — ^if the 
choice lay with him ? It will hardly be disputed that 
each belligerent would desire it to ttJce place as near as 
possible to the shores of the other. He would desire to 
place his fleets in effective contact Math the ports in which 
the enemy's fleets were lying, holding himself in readi- 
ness at all times to fight the latter if they came out, and 
making all practicable dispositions for preventing their 
exit without being compelled to fight. By this means, 
so long as they remained in port he would secure his own 
shores firom assault and his own maritime commerce from 
attack, and he could employ such naval force of his own 
as remained available after providing for an effective 
watch on the enemy's ports in attacking the enemy's com- 
merce so far as it remained at lai^e. If he is not strong 
enough to do this he is not strong enough to act offen- 
sively on the seas, still less to attack his enemy across the 
seas. He must be content to see his fleets sealed up 
in their ports by the superior fleets of his enemy, and 
his maritime commerce either transferred to a neutral flag 
or else swept from the seas altogether. There is in the 
nature of things no other way of opening a war between 
two belligerents which have no common land fix)ntier. 
If each thinks himself stronger than the other both may 
take the seajat once, but even then no miUtary enterprise 



THE OBJECT OF WAR 337 

of any moment is likely to be undertaken until the naval 
issue is decided, however long it takes to decide it. If 
either falters or hesitates to take the sea until it is too 
late the other will take care that, if ever he does take the 
sea, he will do so under every disadvantage of position* 

If I have carried you with me so far, I hope I may 
now ask you to go with me a step further and to assent to 
the proposition that the operations of warfare on land 
and at sea are essentially identical in purpose, though 
their methods and appliances differ very materially and, 
at first sight, fundamentally. What is it that a nation 
aims at, and must of necessity aim at, when it goes to 
war ? It is, and must be, to bend its enemy's will to its 
own, to exact what it holds to be its right, to obtain that 
which the enemy has refused to concede except on the 
compulsion of force. There is only one way of doing this, 
and that is by overcoming the armed forces of the enemy, 
which are the symbol, and in the last resort, the instru- 
ment, of his authority. Now, to overcome these armed 
forces you must attack them, and to attack them you 
must reach them. That is why the first overt act of 
warfare between two countries which have a common 
land frontier is the crossing of the frontier by the armed 
forces of one belligerent or the other. ~ The procedure 
and the purpose are essentially the same when the two 
countries are separated by the sea. If one of the two 
belligerents has no naval force at all, the other will invade 
his territory and attack his armed forces on land. This, 
however, is not naval warfare ; it is land warfare con- 
ducted across the sea. Such was essentially the character 
of the late war in South Africa. Naval force in this 
case operated on its own element only indirectly, so as 
to guarantee the security of transit and communication, 
but it operated most powerfully, nevertheless, because, if 
the naval force available had been insufficient, the security 
of transit and communication necessary to the success of 
our troops might have been fatally impaired by the inter- 
vention of some other naval power which sympathized and 



338 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

might have sided with the enemy. The condition of 
naval warfare properi however, only arises when both 
bell^erents are equipped with naval force. In that case, 
though the ulterior purpose of hostilities remains un- 
changed, it will be found that no operations on land can 
be undertaken by either belligerent until the naval issue 
has been virtuaUy decided — ^the assumption still being, 
of course, that the two belligerents have no common land 
frontier. This, I think, follows irresistibly from the fore- 
going preipises. We have seen that in order to obtain 
the objects for which he goes to war one belligerent or 
the other must advance into the territory of his opponent, 
and must come to close quarters with the armed forces 
of the latter. We have seen that he cannot do this unless 
his communications are secure, and that his advance must 
instantly be arrested and turned into a retreat with capi- 
tulation as his only alternative if his communications are 
severed. The absolute dependence on its communications 
of an armed force in an enemy's country is, I believe, a 
commonplace with all soldiers — ^an axiom of the military 
art. This axiom loses not a jot of its validity when 
applied to offensive warfare across the sea. Before an 
armed force of any magnitude can land on an enemy's 
territory across the seas, there must be no hostile naval 
force at large strong enough to interrupt its communica- 
tions. Any such force must be found, fought, and beaten 
if it is at large, or else it must be securely sealed within its 
own ports by an opposing force strong enough to keep 
it there and ready to fight it if it comes out.* 
There is one great historical example which seems 

* It may be objected that a dose military blockade of the enemy's porta, 
8Qch as was maintained by the British fleets during the Napoleonic war, is 
no longer possible owing to the development of torpedo-craft and submarine 
mines. The objection is a valid one so far as it goes. But the difficulties, 
though formidable, are not insurmountable. Togo surmounted them 
throughout the war in the Far East, as I have pointed out in the preceding 
essay. The so-called blockade wiU be of a character different from that 
which was maintained in the Great War, but Togo's example shows that, it 
need not be less effective. 



NAPOLEON IN EGYPT 339 

at first sight to violate this axiom. Napoleon did suc- 
ceed in reaching Egypt with his army across the Mediter- 
ranean without having first disposed of the British naval 
force in the Mediterranean. But he only did so at tre- 
mendous risk, and he only succeeded — so far as he did 
succeed — ^by an accident. A few more frigates at Nelson's 
disposal would have placed his fleet aqjpss the path of 
the expedition, and in that case it is safe to say that no 
single French soldier would ever have landed in Egypt. 
The whole scheme of campaign was radically faulty, and 
nothing but the destruction of Nelson's fleet by Brueys — 
either before the expedition had started or inmiediately 
after it had landed— <:ould have given it a chance of 
success. But after the battle of the Nile had been fought 
and won by Nelson, the French army in Egjrpt was 
doomed. It was a Frenchman in Eg3rpt who wrote that 
the battle of the Nile '' is a calamity which leaves us here 
as children totally lost to the mother country. Nothing 
but peace can restore us to her." Nothing but peace did 
restore them. Baffled at Acre, deserted by Napoleon and 
Desaix, cut off from supplies, ammunition, and reinforce- 
ments, they finally capitulated to the number of three- 
and-twenty thousand, and were carried back to France 
in British transports just before the conclusion of the 
Peace of Amiens. 

It may be that Napoleon was warned by this bitter 
experience not to attempt the invasion of England with- 
out first securing the naval conmiand of the Channel. 
Certainly he made this at all times a sine qua nan. Some- 
times it was a few weeks he required, sometimes only a 
few hours, but at no time did he think that he could 
safely carry his troops across the Channel in the face of a 
hostile naval force. He was, as Sir Vesey Hamilton has 
shown, confronted at all tunes with a British naval force 
in the waters adjacent to hb ports of exit sufficient to 
make the enterprise of invasion exceedingly hazardous, 
if not absolutely hopeless. He could do nothing until 
this opposing force was swept away. Of coursei if the 



340 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

outljring fleets opposed to him — those oflF Toulon, Brest, 
and the other French arsenals— could have been defeated, 
the victorious French fleets might have advanced up the 
Channel and have covered his transit. But this he was 
never able to bring about. Or, as a much more hazardous 
alternative, he may have hoped that the outlying French 
fleets, without defeating the British fleets opposed to 
them, might be able to give them the sUp, and, getting the 
start of them, to give him the time he needed to get his 
army across. This, however, proved equally impracti- 
cable. There was a moment, as he saw himself, when 
Villeneuve might have given him the opportunity he 
desired. But Villeneuve's nerve failed him ; he could 
not rise to the height of Napoleon's bold conceptions. 
He withdrew to Cadi^ instead of either fighting or steal- 
ing his way into the Channel. It vras then and many 
weeks before Trafalgar was fought that the Army of 
Boulogne was broken up and its colunms were directed 
upon Austria to crush that Power at Austerlitz. 

But while the great fleets of both belligerents were 
far away — ^none nearer than Brest, and two of them for 
a time in the West Indies — and while they were pre- 
occupied with their own immediate objects, strat^c 
and tactical, why, it may be asked, did not Napoleon 
seize the opportunity of their absence and preoccupa- 
tion to transport his invading army across the Channel ? 
For two reasons. Napoleon could not ignore the pre- 
sence of a formidable naval force in home waters, although 
nearly all the commentators on the campaign have ignored 
it, and some even have denied its existence. Napoleon 
must have felt and acknowledged that this force denied 
him access to the shores of England, and that unless he 
could get rid of it for a time it was not possible for him 
even to embark his troops, to say nothing of landing them. 
The situation was exactly the same at the time of the 
Armada. There was Parma in Flanders with his army, 
and, like Napoleon, Parma had collected abundance of 
transport to carry his troops over to England. But 



DIFFICULTIES OF NAPOLEON 341 

between him and the coast of England there lay a Dutch 
fleet, not always directly in the way, but never altogether 
out of the way, and Parma, like Napoleon, found it im- 
possible to move. He awaited the arrival of Sidonia 
with the Armada to cover his passage, and as Sidonia was 
defeated as soon as he arrived — ^if not before — ^the whole 
enterprise came to nought. This, moreover, gives us the 
second reason why Napoleon could not move. The hazard 
was too great, and the memory of Egypt was too fresh. 
It was barely possible, though it was never very likely, 
that Villeneuve, had he been a better man, might have 
evaded the outlying British fleets and might have swept 
and kept the Channel for such a time as would have 
enabled Napoleon and his army to cross. But this would 
only have been a repetition of the Egyptian campaign, 
and Napoleon was not likely to forget how that had 
ended. It must have taught him that a military expedi- 
tion which crosses the sea without having first made its 
conmiunications secure is never likely to recross it except 
by favour of its enemies. The decisive naval battle 
might, in the case supposed, have been fought in the 
Channel and not at Trafalgar ; but we know from the 
result of Trafalgar how it must have ended. At any 
rate, we may safely assume that Napoleon held two con- 
ditions to be essential not only to the success of his enter- 
prise, but even to its prudent initiation — first, that the 
Channel should be free, if only for a time ; and, second, 
that his conmiunications should be secure, if not abso- 
lutely, then at least for so much time as he might deem 
sufficient to enable him to dictate peace in London before 
they were seriously assailed. As neither condition was 
ever fulfilled, the enterprise was never undertaken. Is 
it too much to assume that what Napoleon never dared 
no other man ever will dare ? 

Perhaps no man, save one, ever has dared a like enter- 
prise with impunity. That man was Julius Caesar ; and 
Napoleon, as we know, was a great admirer of Caesar's 
genius and a great student of his campaigns. Caesar in 



34a THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

his final campaign against Pompey had little or no naval 
force of his own ; certainly none that could make head 
for a moment against the Pompeian fleet, which was in 
undisputed command of the Adriatic. Yet although he 
was blockaded at Brundusiumi he managed to escape 
with half his army, and, landing on the coast of Epirus, 
he established himself there to the southward of Dyr- 
rhachium, a Pompeian stronghold which he was never 
able to reduce. His transports were sent back to bring 
over the remainder of hb army under Mark Antony, but 
they were all captured on the way and destroyed. For 
some time Antony was blockaded in Brundusium, but, 
like Caesar, he effected his escape in the end and landed 
to the northward of Dyrrhachium, the army of Pompey 
resting on that stronghold and intervening between the 
two detached portions of Caesar's force. A junction ^^ 
effected, however, and for a time Caesar invested Dyr- 
rhachium on the landward side. The sea being open to 
Pompey, his supplies were abundant and secure, whereas 
Caesar, being cut off from it, was compelled to live on the 
country, and his troops fared hardly enough. An un- 
toward reverse having compromised Caesar's position at 
Dyrrhachium, he marched into Thessaly, whither Pompey 
tardily followed him. The campaign ended with the 
battle of Pharsalus, where Pompey was finally overthrown. 
It has been suggested that Napoleon's plans for the 
invasion of England were inspired by a study of this 
campaign, and that he persuaded himself that he could 
do what Caesar had done. But the analogy halts in at 
least three important respects. Caesar had no alternative. 
If he could not destroy Pompey it was certain that Pompey 
would destroy him. He could not remain in Italy and 
rest content with his possession of Gaul and his conquests 
of Spain and Sicily, because Pompey, being in command 
of the sea and in possession of the resources of the East, 
would sooner or later have attacked him there, and Osar 
was too good a soldier to remain on the defensive so 
long as the offensive was open to him in any way— even 






'y 



NAPOLEON AND CiESAR 343 

in the most desperate way. Secondly, the war was a 
civil one, in which the inhabitants of the invaded country 
^were practically neutral, as is shown by the readiness 
^th which they furnished Caesar with such supplies as 
they had. Thirdly, so long as the Roman soldier retained 
his sword, he carried his ammunition with him. I need 
not point out to an audience of soldiers how greatly the 
problem of transport is simplified, and even how lai^ely 
the necessity for secure conununications is abated, for 
an army which needs no anununition save what it carries 
as a matter of course, and does not expend in fighting, 
and no food beyond what the inhabitants of the country 
in which it is ^hting are willing and able to supply. If 
Napoleon thought of the example of Caesar at all, we may 
be quite sure that he did not overlook considerations 
of this kind. 

The proposition that oversea attack of a military 
character is best prevented by naval force, and can with 
certainty be prevented by adequate naval force properly 
disposed for the purpose, is, I think, more familiar and 
more acceptable to sailors than it is to soldiers ; and for 
this reason I have thought it expedient not merely to 
advance it but to illustrate it by historical examples. It 
is in reaUty an indefeasible deduction from the axiom that 
an army cannot pursue the QfFensive unless its communi- 
cations are secure. '' A modem army,'' says Lord 
Wolseley, " is such a very complicated organism that any 
interruption in the line of communications tends to break 
up and destroy its very life." Hence, where the geo- 
graphical relations of two belligerents are such that neither 
can reach the other ivithout crossing the sea, it follows 
irresistibly that the belligerent who is unable to establish 
a secure line of communication across the sea is ipso facto 
debarred from undertaking an invasion of his adversary's 
territory. Conversely, by denying the sea to your adver- 
sary you establish at the same time your own freedom 
of transit across it. This was clearly shown in the expedi- 
tion to the Crimea. Both aspects of the matter were 



344 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

illustrated not less clearly in quite recent times by the 
war between Spain and the United States. So long as the 
four Spanish warships in the Atlantic were at large no 
attempt was made to land American troops in Cuba. It 
was only when they were known for certain to be in 
Santiago and were there blockaded by a naval force 
irresistibly superior to them that the military expedition 
was allowed to proceed. This is, perhaps, the most ex- 
treme case on record, and it is also one of the most signifi- 
cant. At a very early period of naval warfare we have 
Csesar's bold and successful defiance of a superior naval 
force which sought to bar his passage, but which hap- 
pened to be out of the way when he actually embarked 
and set sail. In that case, however, the difference be- 
tween a transport full of armed men and a warship proper 
was not very great. Each carried the same kind of 
armament — ^namely, a complement of armed men, and 
each could manceuvre with approximately the same 
freedom and mobility when either could manoeuvre at all. 
Hence the disparity between a warship and a transport 
was in those days comparatively insignificant except in 
conditions of weather which enabled the ram to be brought 
into play. In these days, on the other hand, it is im- 
mense and incalculable, the warship being armed with 
long-range weapons of deadly precision, whereas the 
transport" carries no effective armament at all. No 
wonder, then, that in one of the latest phases of naval 
warfare the mere menace of a couple of warships and 
a few destroyers at lai^e was held by the American naval 
authorities to be an absolute bar to the transit of a mili- 
tary expedition from the ports of Florida to the southern 
coast of Cuba. There is no sort of doubt about the 
matter. Even when two Spanish cruisers and two de- 
stroyers were known to be in Santiago, the Secretary of 
the United States navy telegraphed to Admiral Sampson : 
" Essential to know if all four Spanish armoured cruisers 
in Santiago. Military expedition must wait this in- 
formation." This is one of the last words of practical 



DEPENDENCE ON SEA COMMUNICATIONS 345 

naval warfare on the subject. And if it be thought 
that the American naval authorities were unduly timorous 
in the matter, let it be remembered that Captain Mahan, 
the highest living authority on naval warfare, was a 
member of the War Board which organized and controlled 
the campaign.^ 

We have now reached this point, then — ^that a military 
force which seeks to cross the sea for the purpose of 
acting on the offensive in its enemy's territory is even 
more dependent on the security of its communications 
than the same force acting across a land frontier ; that 
its communications are more assailable by sea than on 
land ; that the forces capable of assailing it are less 
easily located and countered ; and that, if its communi- 
cations are once severed, its retreat in the event of a 
reverse is rendered impossible. You may make good 
your retreat until you reach the sea, but there you must 
stand and face your victorious foe, unless you have trans- 
port ready to take you away. It would have been no 
use for Sir John Moore to retreat to Corufia if the French 
fleets had been in command of the adjacent seas. It 
follows from all this that the first thing for each of two 
belligerents which have no common land frontier to do 
must be to endeavour to destroy the naval forces of its 
adversary, and if that proves to be impossible to seal 
them up in their ports. In the absence of a common land 
frontier this is precisely equivalent at sea to the crossiog 
of a common frontier on land by the army of one belli- 
gerent or the other, and until the naval issue is decided 



> Since my lecture was originally delivered a later and ttill more emphatic 
word has been ottered during the war in the Far East ; trat it was practically 
the same word. The first stroke of the war was the elimination of the only 
" fleet in being " which Russia possessed in the Far East, to be fc^owed at 
once by the Japanese invasion of BCanchnria. Its last stroke was the destmc- 
tion of the only other " fleet in being " which Russia was able to send to the 
Far East. Conid this latter fleet have established an effective command 
of the waters in dispute, either Japan must have sued for peace or the Japanese 
invasion of Manchuria must sooner or later have been followed by a Russian 
invasion of Japan. 



346 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

all military operations of an offensive character must 
be in abeyance on both sides. Naval operations are thus, 
in the case supposed, essentially preUminary to military 
operations, but for that very reason they are rarely con- 
clusive in themselves. The utmost that naval force caa 
do is to drive the enemy's flag from the seas. If that 
does not compel him to yield, military force must be 
employed to complete the work which naval force has 
begun. 

Let us now consider the defence of the British Empire, 
and the problems it presents, in the light of the conclu- 
sions we have reached. The British Empire, I need 
scarcely remind you, consists of an insular nucleus where 
the powers of government are concentrated, and of trans- 
marine possessions in all parts of the world. It has 
grown from within outwards. Its growth has at all 
times been associated with freedom to cross the seas, and 
must have been arrested at once if that freedom had at 
any time been denied to the merchants and people, and, 
in the last resort, to the warships and troops of this 
country. It is this freedom of maritune transit, asso- 
ciated with the commercial enterprise which is its foun- 
dation, and with the political power which is its result, 
that has given us in succession the East and West Indies, 
the North American Continent — ^half of which we lost 
mainly through a temporary default of sea-power — ^the 
whole of Australasia, so much of Africa as is now subject 
to our hegemony, together with all the other transmarine 
possessions of the Crown. An insular State endowed 
with commercial aptitudes and ambitions must needs 
trade across the seas, and to that end must secure respect 
for its flag and free transit for its ships. For this reason, 
even when the power of England was wholly confined 
within the fo]ur seas, she claimed and asserted the sove- 
reignty of those seas. On the cover of the volumes pub- 
lished by the Navy Records Society you will find the 
figure of a gold coin issued by Edward III. in 1344. On 
it is represented a ship of the period, in which is seated 



DEVICE OF THE KOBLE 34? 

a crowned Sovereign, bearing in one hand a sword and 
in the other a shield displaying the Royal arms of Eng- 
land, thus typifying the armed strength and sovereignty 
of England resting on the sea. Even so early as the 
reign of Henry VI . this S3ncnbolism of Edward III.'s noble 
was recorded in the following lines : 

For four things our noble aheweth to me — 
King, ship, and sword, and power of the sea. 

" It was no mere coincidence," says Sir John Laughton, 
" which led to the adoption of such a device in 1344, 
four years after the most bloody and decisive victory of 
Western war — ^the battle of Sluys — ^which, by giving 
England the command of the sea, determined the course 
of the great war which followed, determined that Cr^cy 
and Poitiers should be fought on French soil, not on 
English." What was determined then by the battle of 
Sluys has been determined ever since by the offensive 
prowess of the same defensive arm. Freedom of transit 
across the seas secured to ourselves and denied to our 
enemies — secured and denied by one and the same agency, 
that of supremacy at sea — ^has kept these islands from 
invasion and expanded our Empire into the uttermost 
parts of the earth. Is it presumptuous to believe that 
what has made the Empire will keep it ? Is it to slight 
the Army to insist that the prowess of the sister service 
alone has enabled it to achieve so glorious and so ubiqui- 
tous a record ? Surely it is much more unworthy of 
both services to insist that, as the Navy may no longer 
be able to do what it always has done for more than 800 
years — ^namely, to keep the seas open — ^the army must 
now be prepared to do what it never has done through- 
out the same long period — ^namely, to defend its native 
soil. No, no. The Navy to keep the seas, the Army to 
fight across them, is the policy that has made the Empire. 
It is the only policy that can keep it. 
For let us not deceive ourselves. The freedom of 

25 



346 THfi HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

transit across the seas which has made the Empire is also 
essential to its continued existence and cohesion. It 
matters not by what agency this freedom is interrupted. 
If it is once interrupted the Empire is at an end. The 
Empire does not consist merely of the British Islands 
and the many Britains across the seas. It is a living 
organism, not a mere geographical skeleton. Its nervous 
system consists of the lines of communication which link 
all its parts together, its vascular s]rstem of the commerce 
which flows incessantly along those lines. Its vital prin- 
ciple is the sentiment of conmion nationalityi of commu- 
nity in race, language, Uterature, history, and institutions. 
But just as life itself becomes extinct if the nervous 
system is paralysed and the vascular system ob- 
structed, so the living organbm which we call the Empire 
could not survive a similar catastrophe. If, for instance, 
the specific gravity of the sea were to be so changed that 
no ship could float on it, we can all see that two conse- 
quences must immediately follow. These islands would 
be impregnable to human assault, but the British Empire 
would cease to exist. We should never communicate 
with any part of it again except by telegraph. Every 
detached pcMtion of it would be thrown entirely on its 
own resources, and human intercourse would be circum- 
scribed for ever by the boundaries of sea and land. Pre- 
cisely the same result as regards the Empire would follow 
from such a change in the balance of naval power as should 
drive the British flag from the seas. Such a change could 
only come about in one way — ^namely, by the overthrow, 
complete, final, and irretrievable, of our supremacy at 
sea. In this case it needs no ailment to show that with 
the destruction of its nervous and vascular system the 
Empire itself would perish. The wants of its several 
parts might be supplied by the ships and traders of other 
nations, but we could send no single man to defend them, 
and they would one and all be liable to invasion and 
conquest except so far as they were able to defend them- 
selves. It is not less plain that the effect on these islands 



THE SEA AND THE EMPIRE 349 

would be equally disastrous and irretrievable. They would 
be liable to invasion, of course, for not six Army Corps 
nor six times that number would enable us to withstand 
the vast military forces of the Continental Powers if 
there were no British warships afloat to prevent their 
reaching our shores. But they might not even be worth 
invading. When the German armies invested Paris 
their leaders never dreamt of attempting to take it by 
assault. They knew that by interrupting its communica- 
tions and by cutting off its supplies it must sooner or 
later be reduced, and in the meanwhile they had work 
to do in France which, if it could be successfully accom- 
plished, was certain to bring about the advent of the 
" psychological moment " of surrender. A similar policy 
applied to these islands in the case supposed would in- 
evitably produce the same result in time, and it is rather 
an economic than a military problem to determine whether 
reduction by maritime investment would or would not 
be a more efficient and less costly way of effecting the 
desired result than reduction by invasion in irresistible 
force. I shall not attempt to solve this problem. I 
cannot believe that the people of this country and their 
rulers will ever be so unmindful of the things which 
belong to their peace as to allow it to become a practical 
one. I have shown that it never can become a practical 
one until the Empire is at an end. If it ever does become 
a practical one it will hardly matter the toss of a half- 
penny whether the enemy invests or invades. In either 
alternative he will conquer, and the sun of England 
will set for eVer. I do not mean that maritime invest- 
ment will starve us out. There b always food in this 
country for many months, and there is never at any 
moment much more food in the world than would keep 
its inhabitants aUve until after the next harvest or a 
little longer. It is, moreover, impossible to blockade 
these islands so completely that neutral nations anxious 
to trade with us would recognize the blockade as effective ; 
and therefore sufficient food to keep us alive at famine 



350 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

prices might always be expected to reach us in neutral 
bottoms. But this country does not live by bread alone. 
It lives by maritime commerce so vast, so ubiquitous, and 
so complicated in its international dealings and relations, 
that if the British flag were driven from the seas the 
neutral tonnage remaining available would be quite in- 
sufficient to carry the world's commerce. In that case 
all countries would suffer in proportion to the volume of 
their maritime trade and the amount of it carried in 
British ships. But this country would suffer far more 
than any other, because the volume of our maritime 
trade is not far from equal to that of all the rest of the 
world, and nearly all of it is carried la British ships. 
These ships incessantly moving to and fro, representing a 
money value of at least two hundred miUions always 
afloat, and a capital employed in the industries they sus- 
tain at home of many times that amount, cannot be 
driven from the seas without entailing an economic crisis 
of unexampled magnitude and severity. It would mean, 
as I have said elsewhere, that our mills were standing, 
our forges silent, our furnaces cold, and our mines closed. 
It is, in fact, no more possible to conceive of this country 
subsisting withoutl maritime commerce than it is of a 
steam-engine working without water in the boiler. 

Thus, even if there were no risk of invasion, it would 
still be necessary for us to keep the seas open for the 
security of our maritime commerce, which is our very 
life blood. Moreover, the naval force which suffices for 
this paramount purpose is also sufficient to protect these 
shores from invasion and a fortiori to protect from serious 
attack the outlying possessions of the Crown. The mari- 
time commerce of the British Empire cannot be suppressed 
by a few Alabamas. It could only be suppressed by a 
naval force more powerful than our own. " It is not," 
says Captain Mahan, '' the taking of individual ships or 
convoys, be they few or many, that strikes down the 
money power of the nation ; it is the possession of that 
overbearing power on the sea which drives the enemy's 



"THE GREAT COMMON" 351 

flag from it, and allows it to appear only as a fugitive, 
and which, by controlling the great common, closes 
the highwajrs by which commerce moves to or from the 
enemy's shores. That overbearing power can only be 
exercised by great navies." It is this " overbearing 
power on the sea " — I should prefer to call it " over- 
mastering " myself, for there is nothing arrogant nor 
aggressive about it — ^which this country has always 
sought to exercise, and, as a matter of fact, nearly always 
has exercised, from the battle of Sluys onwards. Our 
claim to exercise it is no menace to other nations. It is 
merely the assertion of our right to exist as a nation 
ourselves, the expression in strategic terms of our insular 
position and of our mercantile necessities as affected 
thereby. Every Continental nation makes essentially the 
same claim when it takes such measures as it thinks fit 
for defending its own frontiers. The frontiers of the 
British Empire lie on the further side of the seas which 
wash its territories, not on the hither side. The sea, it is 
true, is " the great common," as Captain Mahan calls it. 
In time of peace every flag which represents a civilized 
Power and a peaceful purpose has as much right to every 
part of it as any other. But it is a common over which 
run the highways of the world's commerce. In time of 
war every naval Power seeks to deny the use of those 
highways, whether for military or for commercial pur- 
poses, to the ships fljdng its enemy's flag. In the war 
between France and Prussia in 1870 the superiority of 
France at sea was so great that the Prussian fl^ prac- 
tically disappeared for a time from the seas. This was a 
disadvantage to Prussia, but not a very serious one, be- 
cause her maritime commerce was at that time almost 
insignificant, and because her inferiority at sea was far 
more than balanced by her triumphant superiority on 
land. But the case is very different with this country. 
England can assert no superiority on land except by 
virtue of an assured superiority at sea. She could not 
even defend her two land frontiers in India and in North 



3$a THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

America unless the seas were open to the transport of 
troops and supplies. Of the ships which frequent the 
ocean highways of the world's commerce some 50 per 
cent, carry the British flag. To deny them the use of 
those highways would be to dismember the Empire by 
severing its communications, and, in the words of the 
late Lord Carnarvon, to reduce this country, in a very- 
short time, to " a pauperized, discontented, overpopu- 
lated island in the North Sea." The only way to avert 
these calamities, calamities so crushing and so universal 
that even the invasion of these islands could add little to 
their effect, is to regard the whole extent of the ocean 
highways — ^that is, all the navigable seas of the globe — 
as so much territory to be held and defended, and to be 
defended with as much preparation, forethought, and 
tenacity as a Continental Power devotes to the defences 
of its land frontier. 

The thing is impossible, you will perhaps say. That 
may be, and of course must be if the forces opposed to us 
are overwhelming and irresistible. But so far as it is im- 
possible and in whatever circumstances it may become 
impossible the defence of the British Empire is also im- 
possible. In all reasonably probable contingencies of 
warfare, however, it is not only possible, but imperative. 
Let us admit at once that if all the great naval Powers 
of the world were combined against us we should perish. 
We might hold out for a time, as Denmark held out 
against Prussia and Austria, but the issue would be 
certain and inevitable. But the combination of all the 
great naval Powers of the world against this country is 
not a reasonably probable contingency of warfare. Curran 
said of the fleas in an Irish inn that if they had only been 
unanimous they would have pulled him out of bed ; but 
his safety lay in the fact that they were not unanimous. 
We must be either very wicked or very foolish, if not 
both, if we ever give to all the Powers of the world such 
simultaneous provocation as would endow them with the 
unanimity denied to Curran's fleas, The reasonably 



DEFENCE OF OCEAN HIGHWAYS 353 

probable contingencies of warfare extend only to conflicts 
with this or that Great Power or with a limited combina- 
tion of Great Powers. For such contingencies we must 
be prepared. The higher policy of defence consists in 
preparing for them adequately, intelligently, and with 
rational regard to the inexorable conditions of the case. 

Now the broad outlines of this policy are clearly set 
forth in the whole course of our naval history from the 
battle of Slu3rs onwards. They have only been obscured 
and obliterated for a time when the conduct of this or that 
campaign has been taken out of the hands of the seamen 
who knew their business and undertaken by politicians 
who had never mastered the secret of the sea. The cam- 
paign of the Armada is perhaps the most famous illus- 
tration of this perilous proceeding. It is well known 
that if the great sea-captains of Elizabeth had had their 
way they would never have allowed the Armada to quit 
the shores of Spain. Drake, the greatest of them all, 
wrote to the Council, " With fifty sail of shipping we shall 
do more good upon their own coast than a great many 
more will do here at home ; and the sooner we are gone, 
the better we shall be able to impeach them." Later he 
wrote to the Queen herself : " These great preparation 
of the Spaniard may be speedily prevented as much as in 
your Majesty lieth, by sending your forces ,to encounter 
them somewhat far off, and more near their own coasts, 
which will be the better cheap for your Majesty and 
people, and much the dearer for the enemy." Later still 
Howard wrote in exactly the same sense : " The opinion 
of Sir Francis Drake, Mr. Hawkyns, Mr. Frobiser, and 
others that be men of the greatest judgment and experi- 
ence, as also my own concurring with them in the same, 
is that the siu-est way to meet with the Spanish fleet is 
upon their own coast, or in any harbour of their own, and 
there to defeat them." This is the true policy of offen- 
sive defence displayed in all its fulness. But the Queen 
and her Council would have none of it. They thought it, 
as Walsyngham wrote to Howard " ^^^ convenient that 



3S4 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

your Lordship should go so far to the south as the Isles 
of Bayona, but to ply up and down in some indifferent 
place between the coast of Spain and this realm, so that 
you may be able to answer any attempt that the said 
fleet shall make against this realm, Ireland, or Scotland." 
They could not understand, as I have said elsewhere, 
that if you wish to impeach a hostile fleet with certainty 
you must go where it is certain to be found, not wait for 
it to appear in some one or other of half a dozen places 
where, after all, it may never be found, and where, if it 
does appear, you may not be at hand to impeach it. 
Hence Howard was forbidden to go and look for the 
Spaniard on his own coast, and practically compelled to 
await his advent in British waters. He triumphed in the 
end, as we know. But to pursue such a policy in these 
days would be fatal. It would leave the seas open and 
the British mercantile flag at the mercy of the enemy. 
In other words, the policy of passive defence spells dfa- 
aster. 

Thus, after a long circuit, I have come back to the 
point from which we started. We have now ascertained 
where the frontiers of the British Empire are. Broadly 
speaking, they lie on the further side of all the seas fre- 
quented by British shipping — ^that is, of all the navigable 
seas of the globe ; and the critical frontier for the time 
being is the coast-line of the enemy's territory, because 
there only can access be gained to his territory by a 
Power which, like England, must cross the sea before it 
can fight on land ; and there also must the enemy be 
impeached — to borrow the expressive Elizabethan word 
— ^if he seeks to cross the sea for the purpose of assailing 
or invading any portion of British territory or even of 
assailing British commerce afloat. There are two excep- 
tions to this general definition. The British Empire has 
two land frontiers, one in India and another in North 
America, each of which is assailable by a Power having 
the resources of a great State and a vast territory at its 
command. But except so far as these two frontiers are 



OUR LAND FRONTIERS AND SEA POWER 355 

defensible by local forces and local resources, reinforced as 
far as may be by Imperial forces transported thither or 
stationed there in anticipation of hostilities, it stands 
to reason that they are not defensible at all unless the 
seas are open, because on that condition alone can they 
derive any further strength or defence from the resources 
either of this country or of any other part of the Empire. 
I do not include in the same category our land frontiers 
in Africa, because they are not, like our frontiers in India 
and North America, directly assailable by a Power of the 
first rank. No such Power can assail them seriously 
without first crossing the sea, and no such Power will or 
can cross the sea to assail them so long as England com- 
mands the sea — ^that is, so long as her real frontiers, those 
which lie on the sea itself, are inviolate. Thus all our 
frontiers, whether on land or on sea, are in the last resort 
defensible by the power of the sea, and by the power 
of the sea alone. Two only are assailable by military 
forces which have not crossed the sea, and even those are 
defensible only by military forces which have crossed the 
sea. In point of fact, the power of the sea is never more 
impressively manifested than when, as it did in South 
Africa, and as it has done from the first in India, it enables 
military forces to operate at thousands of miles from 
their own shores. Every soldier in the British Army 
is in this sense as real and as essential an instrument of 
sea power as are the ships of His Majesty's Fleet. He will 
never be called upon to defend his native soil until our 
power at sea is overthrown. So long as our power at 
sea is maintained he may have to defend his country in 
either hemisphere or on either side of the line, but never 
within the ambit of the British shores. 

It may be thought, perhaps, that the defence of so 
vast a maritime territory as is defined by the further shores 
of the navigable seas of the globe is beyond the com- 
pass of a single naval Power, that the sovereignty of the 
four seas which our forefathers asserted and maintained 
is a very different thing from the coiamsLnd of the sea 



356 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

in general and much easier to maintain. A little con- 
sideration will show, however, that this argument is 
unsound. The sea is all one, as Lord Selbome told the 
G>lonial Conference, and the command of it once estab- 
lished is in large measure independent of the area to be 
covered. The true measure of the naval strei^h required 
to establish an effective command of the sea is determined 
not so much by the area to be covered as by the naval 
strength of the enemy to be encountered. In the Crimean 
War the naval forces of Russia were locked up in Kron- 
stadt and in Sevastopol by the superior naval forces of 
her adversaries, and the command of the sea enjoyed by 
England and France in consequence was absolute in all 
parts of the world, though it was only directly operative 
in the waters immediately in dispute. No Russian mer- 
chant vessel could venture afloat, while the merchant 
vessels of England and France traversed the seas in all 
directions as safely as if the whole world had been at 
peace. I do not know that history affords a more strik- 
ing illustration of the meaning, extent, and effect of an 
assured command of the sea. The local command estab- 
lished and maintained at the critical points became by the 
very nature of the case universal, absolute, and complete 
in all parts of the sea. By preventing the Russian naval 
forces from crossing the sea-frontiers as defined above, 
the English and French fleets made it impossible for 
Russia to do any harm whatever beyond those frontiers. 
The maritime commerce of England and France enjoyed 
complete immunity from attack, their armies were free 
to move in any direction across the seas without the 
least risk to their communications, and did move across 
the disputed frontier to the invasion of the enemy's 
territory. This was only possible, it may be said, because 
the available seaboard of Russia was very limited in 
extent, and because the naval forces of Russia were com- 
pletely overmatched by those of England and France. 
This is true, of course, but it does not vitally affect the 
argument. The available seaboard of any naval Power 



HOW TO GUARD THE SEA-FRONTIER 357 

consists mainly of the arsenals and anchorages in iidiich 
its warships are equipped and sheltered, and of any other 
ports in which a military expedition may be preparing. 
Be these few or many, they are known beforehand, and 
the mobile forces they contain are also approximately 
known at all times. There is no certain way of prevent- 
ing these forces from crossing the frontier to be defended 
except by placing a superior force in a position to im- 
peach them. If this cannot be done there is no command 
of the sea such as England needs unless her Empire is to 
be overthrown. But if it can be done her effective com- 
mand of the sea will be unshaken until each one of her 
fleets in position has been challenged, defeated, and 
driven back into port by the fleets of the enemy. That 
it ought to be done, that it is, indeed, the fixed policy of 
this country to do it, is made perfectly clear by the 
famous declaration of the Duke of Devonshire in 1 896 : 
'' The maintenance of sea-supremacy has been assumed 
as the basis of the system of Imperial defence against 
attacks from over the sea. This is the determining factor 
in fixing the whole defensive policy of the Empire." 

Let me here take a homely illustration. If you have 
a lai^ farm adjacent to a rabbit warren it is certain 
that your crops will be ravaged by the rabbits unless 
you can confine them within the limits of their proper 
territory and keep them off your crops altogether. Where, 
in that case, would you put the frontier of their territory ? 
Obviously you would put it at the further side of your 
cultivated fields. Your farmhouse may be a mile away 
from the warren. But if you stop at home with a gun in 
your hand — or a whole armoury for that matter — ^and wait 
for the rabbits to come within range, you will kill very 
few rabbits, while a great many rabbits will ravage your 
crops in all directions and will in time eat you out of 
house and home. But if you surround the warren with 
a fence which the rabbits cannot pass, your crops will be 
unmolested, and you may cultivate y^^^ fields as freely 
as if there were no rabbits in the \^orld« Here and there, 



358 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

perhaps, a hole will be made in the fence and one or two 
rabbits will get through. But a very modest share of 
sporting strategy will enable you to dispose of these rare 
and fugitive maraudersi Your terriers will make their 
life a burden to them, even if your gun does not make 
an end of them, and at the worst the harm they could 
do would be Uttle more than trifling. Of course, if you 
choose to neglect your fence, your crops will be ravaged 
and your farm ruined. But that is your lookK>ut. You 
can keep the rabbits out if you choose to take the trouble 
and pay for a proper fence. Otherwise you must take 
the consequences. There is no alternative between dos- 
ing the warren and losing the crops. In like manner 
there is no alternative between command of the sea and 
the loss of the Empire. 

Of coiuse, as warships are not rabbits, there is alwasrs 
the possibility that the fence may be broken down and 
the rabbits escape in a body. In that case, to drop the 
illustration, your sea-frontier is invaded and you must 
take measures accordingly. This opens out the whole 
field of naval strategy, and, as I am not writing a treatise 
on the methods of naval warfare, I must leave it in large 
measure unexplored. The broad principle was admir- 
ably stated by the late Admiral Colomb, and I quote his 
words with the more satisfaction because they apply sound 
military analogies to the elucidation of the naval problem. 
" The British Navy," he sa3rs, " like the French or Ger- 
man armies on the defensive, must in the first instance 
guard the frontier and keep their territory — in this case 
water and not land — ^free to lawful passage and barred to 
the march of enemies. Should they fail to keep the 
frontier, they must fall back within the water territory 
and endeavour to beat the enemies which have invaded 
it over the frontier s^ain. Should they fail in this — as 
France failed in the last war — ^the Empire is conquered, 
even as the French Empire was, notwithstanding that a 
sea-girt Metz or a water-surrounded Paris of the Britbh 
Empire should prove so strong in local defence that invest- 



PHASES OF COMMAND OF THE SEA 359 

menty and not assault, must be the tactic employed to 
reduce them." There are thus three possible phases in 
which the command of the sea may be considered, and 
no more. First, where it is complete,, as it was in the 
Crimean War. In this case the military forces of the 
Power which commands the sea are as free to act against 
any portion of the enemy's seaboard as if an undefended 
land frontier were alone in question. For, as Raleigh 
said nearly three hundred years ago, '' A strong army 
in a good fleet which neither foot nor horse is able to 
follow cannot be denied to land where it list in England, 
France, or elsewhere, unless it be hindered, encountered, 
or shuffled together by a fleet of equal or of answerable 
strength." The second phase is when the command of 
the sea is disputed, as it was when Villeneuve gave Nelson 
the slip at Toulon, and making a wide sweep to the west- 
ward, sought to join hands with the other French fleets 
beleaguered in the Atlantic ports. '' Falling back within 
the water-territory," Nelson pursued the absolutely cor- 
rect strategy. He was not decoyed away, as has too 
often been represented. His fleet was at all times a far 
more potent factor in the defence of this country than if 
it had been guarding these shores. Wherever it went 
in pursuit of Villeneuve it was where every British fleet 
ought to be in time of war — ^namely, in the position most 
advantageous in the circumstances for bringing its im- 
mediate adversary to book. Finding that his frontier 
had been crossed and that the water-territory he was 
set to guard had thereby been invaded. Nelson pursued 
the single and supreme purpose of " endeavouring to beat 
the enemies which had invaded it over the frontier again." 
He effected that purpose and consummated it at Trafalgar. 
The third and last phase is where the command of the sea 
is overthrown. Happily we have no experience in this 
country of this last phase later than the Norman Con- 
quest. If we ever do experience it again Admiral Colomb 
has pithily told us what it means — ** The Empire is con- 
quered." Or, in the famous words of the three admirals 



Sdo THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

who reported on the naval manoeuvres of 1888 : " Eng- 
land ranks among the great Powers of the world by virtue 
of the naval position she has acquired in the past. . . . 
The defeat of her Navy means to her the loss of India 
and her colonies, and of her place among the nations. 
. • • Under the conditions in which it would be possible 
for a great Power successfully to invade England, nothing 
could avail her, as, the command of the sea once being 
lost, it would not require the landing of a single man 
on her shores to bring her to an ignominious capitula- 
tion, for by her Navy she must stand or fall." 

We thus see how pr^piant and profound is Napoleon's 
maxim — ^that war is an affair of positions — when applied 
to naval warfare. The proper position for the fleets of 
England in any possible war with a naval Power capable 
of coping with her on the seas is in front of the ports and 
arsenals of the enemy. If that position cannot be main- 
tained the war enters at once on a new phase — that of a 
disputed command of the sea, wherein the chosen frontier 
is crossed and the water-territory is invaded, but it re- 
mains essentially an affair of positions. It would cany 
me too far to develop this proposition in detail, and it is 
the less necessary to do so because the whole subject has 
quite lately been treated in masterly fashion by Ckptain 
Mahan, whose volume, entitled Retrospect and Prospect^ 
contains one of his best papers, '' Considerations Govern- 
ing the Disposition of Navies." It must suffice to have 
directed your attention to this most authoritative ex- 
position of the subject. I will only add a single remark. 
The occupation of positions in any given war is no matter 
of arbitrary choice. Dispositions in relation to the posi- 
tions occupied may be well or ill made according to the 
strategic skill and insight of the commander employed ; 
but the positions themselves are determined by the fact 
that they must at the outset be on the sea-frontier of the 
enemy. If, notwithstanding, the enemy succeeds in 
crossing the frontier, new positions will have to be occupied, 
but they will still be determined by considerations, geo- 



FUNCTION OF THE ARMY 361 

graphical in the maini which leave to neither belligerent 
very much room for choice. These propositions, at 
once elementary and fundamental, are too often ignored 
by heedless and inconsequent thinkers. How often do 
we hear that we cannot trust to naval defence for a country 
which can only be reached across the sea, because, for- 
sooth, the Navy, however strong, may chance to be in 
the wrong place at the critical moment? Why should 
it be in the wrong place when its one business and duty 
is to be in the right place ? Do you ever plan military 
campa^s on this preposterous assumption ? Was Napo- 
leon III. Ukely to mass his armies in the Pyrenees when 
the German armies were advancing towards his eastern 
frontier? When an enemy is seeking to invade this 
country, are our fleets at all likely to be found an3rwhere 
but where they can best impeach the enterprise ? ''I 
wUl conquer India on the banks of the Vistula,'' said 
Napoleon. It was a vain boast. It is no vain boast, 
but a plain statement of inexorable strategic fact, that 
England can best defend all parts of her Empire on the 
sea-frontier of the enemy who seeks to attack them. 

You will perhaps ask me at this point — ^perhaps, indeed, 
you have been asking all along — ^where in all this does the 
Army come in? I can only answer that in this, the 
preliminary defensive stage — defensive in purpose, but 
offensive in method — of a great war to be waged across 
the seas, the Army does not, and cannot, come in at all. 
It cannot come in for the defence of these islands, be- 
cause so long as the sea-firontier is inviolate, and, indeed, 
until the naval forces entrusted with its occupation and 
defence are not only driven back, but finally ousted from 
the intervening water-territory, no invading force can 
reach them. Nor can it cross the seas to attack the 
territory of the enemy, or any of his outlying possessions, 
until the command thereof by the British naval forces is 
so firmly established that its transit and communications 
are secure from all serious attack. These are the only 

in which the Army can come in for the defence 



362 THE HIGHER POLICY OF DEFENCE 

of an Empire which can only be defended by crossing 
the sea, and they are also the conditions in which it 
always has come in throughout the whole course of its 
history. This is why no British regiment bears on its 
colours the record of any military achievement on its 
native soil, while all are justly proud to associate their 
glories with nearly every land but their own. If this is 
not a record and a function with which the Army can be 
content I can assign it no other, nor as regards function 
can I think of a higher one to assign it. I cannot even 
think of the Army as defending these islands, because 
before I can do so I must think of the Empire as destroyed. 
I can only think of the Army as doing what it always has 
done, training itself at home for faithful service abroad, 
garrisoning the Empire's outposts in all parts of the 
world, occupying in far-flung Echelons the long lines 
of comimunication which lead to the confines of the Empire 
— ^and lead also in time of war to weak points in an 
enemy's armour — ready at all times to move in any 
direction at the call of duty and the nation's needs. But 
when I think of the Army as doing all this I must also 
think of the Navy as alone enabling it to do all this. 
The functions of the two arms, the naval and the military, 
are not to be enclosed in separate watertight compartments 
with no communication between them. They are corre- 
lative and inseparable. The Army must not attempt to 
do what the Navy alone can do — ^namely, keep the in- 
vader at bay ; the Navy must not attempt to do what 
the Army alone can do— namely, attack the enemy wher- 
ever he is assailable on land. If the Navy relieves the 
Army of the duty of defending these islands, it also im- 
poses on the Army the duty, and provides it with the 
opportunity, of fighting across the seas wherever its 
services are required. Fifty years ago, when the higher 
policy of defence was little understood and less appre- 
ciated, a special military force was organized for the 
defence of this coimtry against the invader. Fifty years 
ago I was a member of that force myself, and I shared the 



FUNCTION OF THE ARMY 363 

ideas which inspired its formation. Those ideas were 
largely fabe, and if fortune had so willed it, they might 
have been fatal to the Empire. But patriotism is justified 
of all her children. I have the utmost respect for the 
Volunteers, and their successors of the Territorial Force, 
as a valuable auxiliary and reserve — ^never more valuable 
than in these days — ^for a mobile Army, for an Army 
which so long as the Empire endures will always be, not 
a forlorn hope for the defence of these shores, but the 
offensive and ubiquitous weapon of a sea-supremacy co- 
extensive with the Empire ; and I congratulate the sons 
and the grandsons of my comrades-in-arms of 1859 that 
the facts of war have revealed to them what was hidden 
from us by the fallacies of peace, and that the only foe 
they have ever met in the field was encountered at a 
distance of 6,000 miles from the shores they were enrolled 
to defend. 



26 



INDEX 



AckiUes, British ship of the line, 

Trafalgar, 46, 62 
Adamant, BritUh ship of the line. 

Insubordination in, 139; at the 

Texel, z 50-152 
Advance, The, at Trafalgar, 43-54 
Alabama, The, destruction caused 

by, in the American War of 

Secession, 296-^99; in modem 

war&ure, 306-319 
Aldebaran, The, Swedish vessel. 

Dogger Bank incident, 250 
Alexander III, Russian battleship, 

249 
Aljfgd, The, one of the first ships 

in the American navy, under 

command of P&ul Jones, x86 
AUiane§, The, American navy under 

command of Pieire Landais, 201- 

203 ; in the North Sea, 206, 207 ; 

the capture of the S&rapis, 213- 

216, 218, 2X9 : in the Texel, 222, 

224 ; her departure from the 

Texel, 232-234 
America, and Paul Jones, 167-176, 

x86 ; birth of her navy, Z76-186 ; 

her flag, 186, 192, 221 n, 222 n ; 

her first battleship, 238 ; her pre- 
sent naval posi t ion, 286, 287; 

The War of Secession, 295-300; 

The Cuban War, 295, 344 
America, The, first American line 

of battleship, 238 
Anadyr, The, Russian transport. 

Dogger Bank incident, 249 
Andrews, Miss, and Nelson, 86 
Annapolis, burial-place of Paul Jones, 

165 
Arbigland, birthplace of P&ul Jones, 

AfdmU, The, at the battle of Camper- 
down, i6z 

Armada. The, 115, 353 

Atkinson, Thomas, Master of the 
Vit$ciry, 49 

Attack, The, at Trafalgar, 55-67; 



attack and defence of commerce, 

293-330 
Aurora, The, Russian cruiser. Dogger 
Bank incident, 250, 255, 259-264 

Bacon, Captain, on torpedo attack, 

266, 268 
Bannatyne. Dr., British surgeon, 

222 
Barham, Lord, First Lord of the 

Admiralty, Trafalgar, 76, 118; 

and Paul Jones, 167 
Bastia, Siege and reduction of, 106 
Bear down, sailing term explained, i x 
Bear up, sailing term explained, 9, xx 
Beatty, Dr., surgeon of the Vieiory, 

on Nelson, 16, 128 
Belieisle, British ship of the line, 

at Trafalgar, 46, 61 
BeUerophon, British ship of the line. 

at Trafalgar, 46, 62 
Berckel, Van, the Grand Pensionary. 

233 
Beresford, Lord Charles, Naval 

Dispositions of 1904, 277, 278 
Blackwood, British CaptBOn. battle 

of Trafalgar, 56, 58, 69 
Bonaparte, see Napoleon 
Bon Homme Richard, see Richard 
Borodino, Russian battleship. Dogger 

Bank incident, 249 
Boscawen, Admiral, 131, X32 
'• Boston Tea Party," X74 
Brest, French fleet at, X48; P&ul 

Jones at, 192, 198 
Bridge, Admiral Sir Cyprian, on 

Nelson's tactics at Tranigar. 13, 

14. 39. 43. 44. 55. 60, 7X. 75, 77 ; 

on Nelson, X17, X2X ; on attack 

and defence of commerce, 302 
Bridport, Viscount, his mined oppor\ 

tamty, X47, 162 ^ 

BriUmnia, British ship of the line, at 

Trafalgar, 46, 47 
Brodie, Lieut., describee Duncan's 

signals and manoouvres, 152 



365 



366 



INDEX 



Biookd, Dr.. American torgeon, 

22a 
Bromung, Robert, Home Tkottgkis 

from tii Sea, 2, 3 
Bruiz, Fkench Admiral, Nelaon fails 

to i&teroeptf 9^, 102 
Bm e nia u re, rrench flagship at Tra- 
falgar; Nelson's encounter with, 

63-66 
Buell, A. C. Life of Pmd Jones, 

X65 n, 191. 205, 241 
Bunker's HiU. Battle of. 177 
Buxg03rne, John. British General. 

his surrender at Saratoga, 191 
Byng. John, British Admiral. 94 ; 

his execution, 245, 246 



Ctesar. Julius, compared with Napo- 
leon. 342 

Calder. Sir Robert. British Admiral, 
Captain of the fleet at the battle of 
St. Vincent, and Nelson's breach 
of orders. 37, 160 ; and Napoleon's 
attempt on En^^d, 115 ; and 
Villeneuve, xi8 ; Nelson^ Idnd- 
nesB to. 126. 127 

Calvi. a town in Corsica, Siege of, 
106 

Camperdown. Battle of. Admiral 
Duncan the victor of, X29-Z3X, 
152 ; description of the battie, 
156-164 

Camperdown, Earl of, on Admiral 
Duncan. 130, 131, 133, 149; and 
Lord Spencer. 143, Z44; and 
John Qerk of Eldin, 159 

Capital ships, meaning of term, 281, 
282 

Captured vessels, difficulties with, 

314 
Caracdolo. Francesco, Commodore 

in Neapolitan navy, Nelson's share 

in trial and execution of. 90, 98, 99 

Carnarvon, Earl of, quoted, 352 

Chatham, Earl of, an anecdote of, 

103 ; and the American colonies, 

"75 
Chesapeake, The Capes of. 243-244 

Cwce, British ship. Insubordination 

in, 150 

Qerk of Eldin. John, Naoei Todies, 
16. 25-32. 122. 240; Lord Cam- 
perdown on. 159 

Codrington, Edward. British Cap- 
tain ; on the tactics at Trafalgar, 

CoUingwood, Cuthbert, British Ad- 
minJ, Nelson's memorandum at 



tiie battie of Trafalgar, 15. 17-40. 
35 ; the order of sailing. 46. 47 ; 
the attack, 48, 49, 51. 52. 54 «. 55. 
57, 62, 63 ; his signals, 60, 61 ; 
Nelson's pledge to, 66. 67. 69. 70 ; 
and Napoleon. xi8 

Colomb, Admiral, and Nelson's 
tactics at Trafalgar, X3, 71. 76: 
on the fleet in being, X05; oa 
Nelson's courage and dispoakiaii, 
X23, 12^ ; on Sir Chades Hardy's 
incapacity, X35, 137; on ue 
battle of Camp«pdown. X55 ; bow 
to guard the sea frontier, 35S. 359 

Coiossus, British ship of the 1&. 
at Trafalgar, 46, 62 

Command, The second in, duties 

of, 35 
Coxnmeroe, The attack and deloice 

of. 293-330, British maritime, 350 
Communications, Security oi, 335 
Compass, Boints of, ei^lained, 7, 8 
Concentration, Necessity for, 309 
Concordai, The, 204 
Conqueror, British ship of tibe Hae, 

at Trafalgar, 46, 47 
Copenhagen, Battle of. 90, X09 
Cwbett, Julian, FighHng Ineirm 

turns, 25 ; tactics in action 00 

June xst, 30-32; on Nelson's 

tactics at the battle of Trafalgar, 

33, 41, 44, 64-66, 71 
Comwallis, Charies, xst BCaxqub. 

capitulation at Yorktown, 243 
Comwallis, Sir William, Bntnk Ad- 
miral, XX5, X18; the tenacity of, 

X19 
Cottineau, duel with Piem T andals. 

223 ; and Paul Jones, 223, 232 
Countess of Scarborough, Britidi, 

captured by Paul Jones, 208, nao ; 

voyage to the Texel, 221, 223, 225, 

232 
Cruisers. Modem, 307 
Cuban War, The, 295, 344 
Cunningham, Captain, American 

naval officer, imprisoned at Fly^ 

moutii, 263 
Custance. Sir Reginald, British 

Admiral, Navai Todies, 28 ; Nmni 

Policy, 324 



De Bams, Qievalier, and De Giasse, 

De Chartres, Due, afteiwaids Dae 
d'Qri^ans, friendship lor I^miI 
Jones, r67. 177, 198. 199. 24X 

De Qiaumont, Le Ray, French 



INDEX 



367 



Commissary of the Sqnadion, 

the C<mcofdai, 204, 232 
De Cordova, Don Lois, in command 

of Spanish fleet, 133 
Defence, British ship of the line, at 

Trafalgar, 47, 62 
Defence, futility of passive, 36 
Defence, higher policy of, 331-363 
Defence of commerce, 293-330 
Defiance, British ship of tiie line, 

at Trsifalgar, 47, 62 
De Grasse, Connt, French Admiral, 

and the action off Dominica, 

30, 239, 241 « ; and Admiral 

Graves, 243-247 
De Keisaint, The Comte, French 

Vice-Admiral, friendship with Paul 

Jones, 177, 242 
De Rochambeau, Comte, 243 
De Sartine, M., French Minister of 

Biarine, and Paul Jones, 199, 

224, 232 
Desbridre, Col., Trafalgar, 14 n; 

on Collingwood's exclamation, 

18 ft; English fleet in two ^Wo/offs, 

46 n ; ViUeneuve's signal, 51 11 ; 

the act of wearing, 54 n 
De S^gur, Comte de, French Am- 
bassador at St. Petersburg, friend- 

shh) with Paul Jones, 236 
De Inevenard, Chevalier, and Pierre 

T^andais, 201, 202 
De Toulouse, Count, battle off 

Malaga, 242. 245 
De Vaudreuil, Marquis, and Paul 

Jones, 243, 245 
Devonshire, Duke of, on sea suprem- 
^ acy, 357 
De AK^ter, Dutch Admiral, on the 

Texel, 153 ; puts to sea, 154, 155 ; 

battle of Caimperdown, 156-161 
Disraeli, Benjamm, afterwards Earl 

of Beaconsfield, The Life of Paul 

Jones, 1 89-191 ; on the attack 

on Vliitehaven, 193, 197 ; on the 

capture of the Serapis, 209; on 

Pierre Landais's conduct, 218 n ; 

on Paul Jones and his prisoners, 

232 
Dwniri Donskoi, Russian cruiser. 

Dogger Bank incident, 250, 255, 

257. 259. 260 
Dogger Bank, The, first alarm, 
249, 250 ; alarm intensified, 251, 
252; Russians fire on trawleis, 
233 ; sequence of events, 254 ; ^e 
&ding of the Commission, 254- 
259; suggested solution, 259, 260 ; 
the psycSological atmosphere, 260, 



261 ; lessons for the future, 265, 
266 ; duties of neutral craft, 267, 
268 

Dominica, Rodney's action off, 29, 
241 n 

Domvile, Admiral Sir Compton, 
263; dispositions of 1904, 277, 
278 

Donald Currie, Beck & Co., and 
Paul Jones, 171 

D'Orvilliers, Count, Commander of 
the Frendi fleet, his tactics in the 
Channel, 133, I34-I37. 205. 245 ; 
and P^ul Jones, 192, 240, 242 

Drake, Sir Francis, battle of Grave* 
lines, 2; to wrestle a puU, 115; 
on advantage of time and place, 
152 ; on the policy of offensive 
defence, 353 

Drahe, Britii^ sloop of war, captured 
by Paul Jones in the Ranger, 195- 
197 

Dreadnought, British ship of the line, 
at Trafalgar, 47, 62, 127 

Duckworth, Sir J. T., British Ad- 
miral, and Nelson, 97 

Dumanoir, French Admiral, at the 
battle of Trafalgar, 64 

Duncan, British Admiral, victor 
of Camperdown, his greatness, 
129-131, 138, 139: commands 
the Monarch, 132 ; his instinct 
for war, 133 ; on Hardy's retreat 
up the Channel, 134-137; at 
the Texel, 138 ; his attitude 
towards insubordination, 139, 148, 
149 ; and Earl Spencer, 141-145 ; 
Lady Spencer's letter to, 142 ; 
Commander-in-Chief in the N(»th 
Sea, 143; on the Russian fleet, 
145; hcrw he hoodwinked the 
Dutch at the Texel, 147-155 ; 
battle of Camperdown, 156-164 ; 
his tactical inspiration, 158-160 ; 
Jervis on, 160 ; his adiievement, 
162 ; description of, 163, 164 

Dunmore, Earl, and Paul Jones, 187 

Du PaviUion, Chevalier, French 
Commander of the Triumphant, 
his S3r8tem of naval signals, 240, 
246 

Dumford, Admiral, on mistakes in 
manceuvres, 264 

Edgeriey, Dr., British surgeon of 
the Countess of Scarborough, 222, 

_233 

Eng^Umd, embfoQed with HoUand, 
230, 231 ; Paul Jones on her 



368 



INDEX 



naval poation off the Capes of 
the Chesapeake, 243, 244; the 
oommand of the sea, 270, 271 ; 
distributioii of her naval force, 
^73' 274 '» her possible enemies, 
2^4-276 : her geographical con- 
ditions, 276, 277; naval disposi- 
tions of 1904 and after, 277-281 ; 
and the United States, 286-292; 
defence of, 346-363 

Fanning, Nathaniel, and the capture 
of the Sevapis, 215 ; his descrip- 
tion of the scenes on board, 222 ; 
tells how Panl Jones quitted the 
Tezel, 234 

Figkiing Instructions, sse Corbett, 
Julian 

Florenxo, San, Bay of, Nelson and 
the-eiege of Calvi, 106, 107, 108 

Fk$i in Bsing, The, doctrine of, 
104-X09 ; Russian, 345 n 

Fdlkersahm, Russian Admiral, Dog- 
ger Bank incident, 231 

Food Supply Commission, 302, 303, 
309. 316 

France, battle of Trafalgar, 3, 55-79 ; 
her sailors' homage to the Nelson 
column, 5 ; her fleet at Golfe 
Jouan, 106. 107 ; D'Orvilliers in 
the Channel, 133, 135, 205 ; French 
Revolution and naval defeat, 146, 
147 ; alliance with the United 
States, 191, 197 ; treatment of 
captures niade by Paul Jones, 
223, 224 ; Paul Jones on her naval 
warfare, 243-247 ; geographical 
conditions, 276, 277 ; as the ally 
of Russia, 277-279 

Franklin, Ben^imin, American Am- 
bassador in Paxis, and Paul Jones, 
167, 190-X92, 198, 233 ; and 
Pierre Landais, 201, 222 ; the 
Concordat, 204 ; the French claim 
to Paul Jones's prises, 224, 232 ; 
the diplomatic situation, 228, 229 

Fremantle, British Captain with 
Nelson at Teneriffe, Nelson's 
chivalrous conduct, 126 



Galissoni^re, La, repulse of Byng 

from Minorca, 245, 246 
Gardner, Henxy, his description 

of the capture of the Serapis, 

210 n, 216 
Gerard, Pierre, French Captain at 

Trafalgar, on boazd the Richard, 

ai3 



Gttmany, her position 
to England, 275-279 

Gibraltar, its position in war, 279* 
280 

Glasgow, British sloop, escape of. 186 

Going free, meaning of, 9 

Gravelines, Battle of, 2, 115 

Graves, British Adniiral an<f Count 
de Grasse off the Capes of Chesa- 
peake. 243-244 

Giavina, Spanish Admiral, com- 
mander ox the Spanish contingent 
and second in command of the 
combined fleet at Trafalgar, 5a, 

Guerrs de course. The, 285, 286. 30X, 
324, 325, 329. 330 

Guichen, Admiral de, French Com- 
mander-in-Chief, and Rodney, 28. 

29,31 
Guzsardi, Leonardo, Neapolitan 

artist, painter of Nelson's portrait^ 
93 « 



Hamilton, Emma, Lady, Nelson's 
letters to, 16, X7 ; her influence 
over Nelson, 86-88, 90-99, 1x9. 
X2I ; and Lady Nelson, 88 

Hamilton, Sir William, British Minis- 
ter to Naples, and Nelson, 88, 92, 

Hamilton, William Gerard, single- 
speech Hamilton," X29, X30 

Hamilton, Sir Vesey, on Napoleon's 
attack on England, 339 

Hannay, David, SotU^y's Life of 
Nelson, 26, 28, 70 ; Letters of Sir 
Samuel Hood, no 

Hardy, Captain Thomas M., Nelson's 
flag-captain, 24 m, 119, 128; his 
rescue Dy Nelson, 126 

Hardy, Sir Charles, British Admiral 
in command of the Chaimel 
fleet, his retreat, 133, 205 ; his 
incapacity. 134, 138, 141 

Harvey, Eliab, Captain of the 
Timiraire at the battle of Trafalgar, 

74 
Hawke, Sir Edward, British Admiral, 

and Admiral Duncan, 13X, 132 ; 

Quiberon Bay, 246, 247 
Hoche, Lazare, French General, 

expedition to Ireland, 148, 162 
Holland, defeat of the Dutch fleet. 

X 47-1 53 ; the States General and 

Paul Jones, 224-230; embroiled 

with England, 230, 231 ; tiie 

Dutch wan, 277 



INDEX 



369 



Horns Thoughts from the Sea, Robert 
Browning, 2, 3 

Hood, Admiral, Lord, his opinion 
of Nelson. 16; his perfect con- 
fidence in Nelson, zoo ; siege of 
Calvi, 106-108 ; his failure, 147 

Ho^, British Captain of the Defence, 
Nelson's memorandum, 17 

Hopkins, Admiral Sir John, torpedo 
attack on commerce, 316 

Hopkins. Ezekiel, American Com- 
modore, expedition against the 
Bahamas, 186 

Hornby, Sir Geo£Erey, on command 
of the sea, 106 

Hotham, Captain of the Adamant, 
at the Texel, 151 ; on Admiral 
Duncan's action at Camperdown, 
z6i 

Hotham, Sir Henry, Vice-Admiral, 
second in command to Lord Hood, 
and Nelson, 100 ; his failure and 
lost opportunity, zo6, 107, 109, 
no, 113, 147-149. 162 

Howard of Effingham, Charles 
Hardy, quoted, 136, 154 

Howe, Admiral Lord, his tactics, 
30-3*. 39. 55» 122 ; a great com- 
mander, 131 ; and Admiral Dun- 
can, 131 ; his victory of the First 
of June, 141, 146 ; his improve- 
ments in sigxuLls, 240 

Implacable, under command of Cap- 
tain Sir Byam liiartin, her hetero- 
geneous crew, 200 n 

International law, on privateering, 
305 ; as to captures, 313 

Irdand, Paul Jones at Carrickfergus, 

«95 

Jackson, Admiral Sturges, Logs of 
the Great Sea-Fights, 60, 61 

James, V^liam, Naval History, on 
the Trafalgar problem, 13, z8, 
6z* 63* 75* OQ ^® battle of 
Campordown, 161 

Japan, her geographical condition, 
275; her war with Russia, 294, 

295 
Jeflferson, Thomas, and P&ul Jones, 

176, 187 
Jervis, Admiral Sir John, afterwards 
Earl of St. Vincent, Commander- 
in-Chief in the Mediterranean, 
Nelson's disobedience, 37, 100; 
withdrawal from the Mediter- 
nnean, 94; Nelson and the two 
lies. 95. 96. 98, 108 ; resigns 



102 ; Captain BCahan on. 114 ; 
Nelson's disposition, 117, 125 ; 
and Duncan, 132 ; Hardy's retreat 
up the Channel, 138, 141 ; his 
austerity, 149 ; comments on 
Nelson and Duncan, 160 ; Lady 
Spencer's letter of congratulation 
to, 162, 163 

Jervis, Captain of the Foudroyant, 
off Scilly, 133; Hardy's retreat 
up the Channel, 134, 138, 141 

Jones, P^nl, the father of the Ameri- 
can navy, 165 ; his character, 166. 
167, 168 ; his friendship with 
Due and Duchesse de Chartres, 
1^7* 177* 198, i99f 241 : American 
appreciation of, 167; his early 
years and voyages, 169, 170, 237. 
238; his trial for killing a mutineer. 
170; commands the GrantuUy 
Castle, 171 ; settles in Virginia, 
1 71-174; and the continental 
party, 176: and Thomas Jeffer- 
son, 176, 187 ; birth of the Ameri- 
can navy, 177; report on the 
qualities of a naval officer, I7{U 
182 ; report on America's naval 
needs, 183; First Lieut, of the 
Alfred, 186; commands the iVo- 
vidence, 187 ; and Lord Dunmore. 
187 ; his captures, 188 ; Disraeli 
on, 1 89-191 ; commands the 
Ranger and -bears dispatches to 
France, 191 ; attack on White- 
haven, 192, 193 ; lands at St. 
Bfary's Isle, 194 ; his letter to 
Lady Selkirk, 194. 195 ; the cap* 
ture of the Drake, 195-198; at 
the French Court, 198, 199 ; com- 
mands the Bon Homme Richard, 

200, 20Z ; and Pierre Landais* 

201, 202, 222 ; description of his 
capture of the Serapis, 207^^20 ; 
the Concordat, 204 ; his captures 
in the North Sea, 206 ; his qtuditiea 
as a commander, 210 ; on discip- 
line, 211 w ; voyage to the Tezel, 
221, 222 ; his difficulties at the 
Texel, 222-231 ; and Sir Joseph 
Yorke, 224-230. 233, 234; and 
the States General. 227, 228 ; 
and his prisoners. 232. 233 ; left 
alone with the Alliance, 233 ; 
quits the Texel. 234 ; Vice-Ad« 
mizal in the Russian na^nr, 235- 
238 ; Comte de S6gur's eulogy on. 
236. 237 ; on naval tactics. 238- 
242 

Jonan, Golfe, 106 



370 



INDEX 



Kamchatka, RmBiaii transport. Dog- 
ger Bank incident, 250, 251, 261 

Keats. Captain. R. G.. Nelson's 
conversations on tactics at Trafal- 
gar with. 17. 36. 39. 4a. 45» 48 : 
oonunands the Superb, 126 

Keith. Lord. Nelson's disobedience 
of, 90. 101-103 

Kempenfelt. Richard. British Ad- 
miral drowned in the Royal Gscrge, 
his eminence as a tactician. 240 

Keppel. British Admiral. 131 ; Panl 
Jones on. 239, 246 

Keyes. Commander, on mistakcg in 
manoeuvres, 263 

Lafayette. Marquis de, his Mendship 

for Paul Jones. 167 
Landais, Pierre, in command of the 

AUiancs, 201 ; his character, 201. 

202 ; his treacherous conduct. 

203. 207, 208, 212, 213, 216. 218 II 
Lan^ton. Sir John Knox. Professor, 

Nelson, 47. 12 1 ; on Lord Spencer. 

143; on Duncan's tactioail in- 

niiration at battie of Camper- 
down. 158; on Paul Jones. x66, 

168, 188, 189, 196; Studies in 

Naval History, 166 ; on the battle 

of Sluys, 347 
Lccky. W. H., quoted, 187 
Lee, Arthur, American Commissioner 

in Europe, and Paul Jones, 167 ; 

and Pinre Landais. 201, 202 
Leviathan, British ship of the line, 

at Trafklrar. 46, 47 
Lexington, ^ttie of, 177 
Liman. Battie of the. 235 
Line abreast, ahead, of bearing, 

meaning of. 10 
Livingstone. Philip, and the American 

continental party. 176 
Londonderry, Marchioness of, her 

tribute to Nelson, 5, 119 
Louis of Battenberg, Prince, his 

naval invention, 58 
Louis XVI., decorates Paul Jones, 

167 
Louis Philippe and Paul Jones, 167 

Macgregor, Commander Sir Bialoolm, 
24 » 

Magendie, flag-captain of the Bucen* 
taure, plan of the battie of Tra- 
falgar. 76 

Midian, Captain, The Life of Nelson, 
5. 13. 15. x8, 34. 80-116, X17, 131, 
133* 13^1 153; diagram of the 
battie of Trafal^, 58, 78; /«• | 



fluence of Sea Pomer ttpan History, 
104; Naval Ad$ninisirati(m aid 
Warfare, 90 m; on Nelson's in- 
tellect, I2X, 122 : on Paul Jofiea. 
175 ; on England's stratenc policy 
during American War of Indepen- 
dence, X96 ; on attack and defence 
of commerce, 293 ; on the Cuban 
war, 345 ; " the sea the great 
common." 351 ; Retrosfteet and 
Prospect, 360 

Manceuvres, mistakes in, 261*264; 
of 1906, 320-330 

Mars, British ship of the line, at 
Trafalgar, ^6, 49, 62 

Martin, Admiral Sir Bjram, on the 
diversity of the crew of a British 
man^f-war. 20011 

Martin. French Admiral, and Hotiiam* 
109. 148 

Mayrant, John, led the boarders of 
the Richard at the capture of the 
Scrapie, 204, 216, 217 

Memorandum of Nelson at Trafalgar. 
see Nelson 

Middleton, Sir Charies, afterwards 
Lord Barham, First Lord of the 
Admlraltv, and Duncan, 144 , 

Minerva, H.M.S., her mistake in 
manceuvres, 264. 265 

Monarch, British ship of the line. 
132, 133; in Hardy's retreat, 
134; at the battie of Camper- 
down, 156 

Moorsom. Captain of the Revenge, 
on Nelson's plan, 19, 74 ; on 
order of sailing. 47 ; on tiie wind 
and course. 48. 49 

Morrison collection. The, Nelson's 
letters to Lady Hamilton, 90, 91, 
10411, 122 

Murray, John, publisher, Disraeli 
the author of Life of Paul Jones, 
189 

Mutiny, Admiral Duncan's treat- 
ment of, 138, r39, X47-Z5X 



Naples, conduct of Nelson and Lady 
Hamilton at, 90-^7 ; capitulation 
of, 98. 99 

Napoleon Bonaparte, overthrow 
of his naval combinations, 118 ; 
"the winner is the man who is 
last afraid," X38 ; the object 
of war, 248; "war is an amOr 
of positions." 270. 302, 335, 360 ; 
his difficulties in Egypt, 339-^341 ; 
and Caesar, 34a 



INDEX 



371 



NwBan«Siegeii, Commander of flotilla 

of gwiboats mider Paul Jones, 

treachery of, 235 
NoHonal Biography, DicHonary of, 

on Lord Spencer, 143 ; on Paul 

Jones, 166 
National Review, The Higher Policy 

of Defence, 331 
Naval Annual, The Dogger Banh and 

its Lessons, 249-^69; Attach and 

Defence of Commerce, 293-330 
Naval force, distribution of, 274 
Naval officer, Paul Jones on the 

duties of, 1 79-1 8 1 
Naval Policy, see Custance, Adm. 
Naval tenns, meaning of certain, 

9-1 1 

Nmv and the Nation, The, J. R. 
Tnursfield, 105 

Nelson, Horatio, Lord, the anniver- 
saxy of Trafalgar and its meaning, 
1-6; battle of Trafalgar and the 
Nelson touch, y, 70 ; the problem 
stated, and how to solve it, 13, 14, 
71, 72 ; Collingwood and the 
memorandum, 15, 17-21 ; a life- 
long student of naval tactics, 16 ; 
and Lady Hamilton, 16, 17, 87* 
99, 104 ; text of his memorandum, 
22-25 ! its probable origin, 27-32 ; 
Its examination in de^, 33-42 ; 
the powers given to the second in 
command, 35, 36, 40; his action 
at St. Vincent without orders, 
36; the advanced squadron at 
Trafalgar, 38, 39, 43-46 ; the order 
of sailmg, 46, 47 ; death and djring 
words, 48, 71, 79, 119, 120, 126, 
128 ; progress of the advance, 
50-54; the attack, 55763; the 
weather line, 63-65 ; his object, 
65 ; the conclusion, 68-71 ; his 
confidence in his officers, 73, 74 ; 
the evidence considered, 74-79; 
his Life by Captain Bftahan and 
Sonthey, 80; his unique gifts, 
83, 84 ; his loves and mamage, 
86-90, 91, 92; his conduct sind 
mistekes at Naples, 90-99; his 
portrait, 93 n; his disobedience 
of Lord Keith, 99-103 ; " the fleet 
in being/' 105, 106, 109, no ; the 
siege of Calvi, 107, 108 ; and 
ViUeneuve, 111-1x6, 136, 137, 
359: the gxeat lesson, 114-115; 
his secret, 117; his uniqueness, 
1x7-119; his many qualities, 
X21-123, 160; eminently human, 
124, 125: his lovingkindness, 



courage, and thooghtfnlmsii, 125* 
128; his rescue oi Hardy, 126; 
wounded at Teneriffe, 126; and 
Sir R. Cakler, 127, 128 ; the ob- 
ject of a naval commander, 130 ; 
and Admiral Duncan, 132 ; Lady 
Spencer's letter to, 142; and 
Hotham, 147, 148; hu aigiial, 
247 n ; and Napoleon, 339 

Nelson, Lady, see Nisbet, Bin. 

Nelson, Dispatches and Letters of 
Lord, see Nicolas 

Nelson, The Life of, ue Biaban, 
Captain 

Nelson, The Life of, see Southey 

Neptune, British riiip of the line, at 
Trafalgar, 46, 47, 69 

Neutral craft. Duties of, 267, 268 

Newbolt, Henry, Year of Traftdgar, 
2, 19, 20, 22 ; the order of sailuig, 
46i 47; plan of the battle, 52, 
5^* 59. 61, 62, 71 ; on Admixal 
Duncan, X50, 151 

Nicolas, Sir N. H.. Dispatches and 
Letters of Lord Nelson, 13, 52, 58 

Nisbet, Birs., her marriage to Netooo, 
86-88, 91 ; and Lady Hamilton, 
88,89 

Norfolk, town in America, borning 
of, 187 

North, Lord, on Sir Charies Hardy, 

i3« 
Northesk, Rear-Admixal Lord, 47 

Onslow, Vice-Admixal, at the Texel, 

X51 ; at the battle cd Camperdown, 

156, 157 
Orel, Russian battleship. Dogger 

Bank incident, 249 
Orion, British ship of the Une, at 

Trafalgar, 44, 46, 64 

Palermo, Nelson at, 97 

Pallas, American frigate, ihfi raid 

in British watera, 201, 207, 220; 

the voyage to the Texel, 221, 224, 

232 
Parker, Admiral Sir Hyde, xoo, 149 
Pasley, Sir Thomas C, on Nelson's 

plan at Trafalgar, X9» 20 
Passaxo, Battle of Cape, 94 
Paul, John, see Jones, Paul 
Pearson, Richard, British CaptsJn 

of the frigate Scrapie, captured 

by Paul Jones, X67; the fi^t, 

209-222 
Pigott, British Admiral, 245 
Htt, William, his rssignation, 141 ; 

on Admiral Duncan, 149 



373 



INDEX 



ntt, ^raiiam, the younger, on the 
bttttie of Trafalgar, 4; aneodoteof. 
103, 104 
Flymoath, its position in war, 37a 
pAypk§mus, British ship of the Ihie. 

at Trafalgar, 46. 62 
Fortsmonth, its position in war, 272 
Position, strategy of, 270-292 
Potonkin, Prince, and Paul Jones, 

235. 236 
Pnnc$, British ship of the line, at 

Trafalgar. 47, 62 
Pnnۤ of WaUs, British ship of the 

line, Calder's flagship, 127, 128 
Privateering, 305-307. 3«9 
Prooidence, American sloop of war, 

187 
Put down oi^upths helm, meaning of, 

9 



QuarUrfy Review, The Life of NehoH, 
80; Dumcan, i^g 



Rangeit, American warship, under 
command of Paul Jones, carries 
dispatches to Fiance, 191 ; cap- 
tures the British Drake, 195-198 ; 
the first American flag, 221 n 

RedouiMe, French shh> of the line, 
at Trafalgar, 62, 63 ; cause of 
Nelson's death, 71 

Reid, Mr. Whitelaw, American Am- 
bassador, 291, 292 

Revenge, British ^p of the line, 
at Trafalgar, 46, 62, 74 

Richard, Bon Homme, American flag- 
ship under Commodore Paul Tones, 
200; ccdlis&on with the Auianee, 
203 ; her cruise, 206 ; her fight 
with and capture of ^e Serapis, 
208-221 

Riemersma, Commodore, 225 

Robespierre, Franfois Bfaidmilien 
and Villaret, 146, 147 

Rodney, Adiniral, Lord, and De 
Guichen, 28, 29; action off 
Dominica, 29-32 ; his tactical 
methods, 122 ; action off Cape 
St. Vincent, 132; the defeat of 
Count de Grasse, 159, 239, 246, 247 

Rosebery, Lord, on Traf^ilgar, 4 ; 
on Nelson, 117, 123, 124 ; on Lady 
Hamilton, X19 

Royal Sovereign, British ship of the 
line, Collingwood's flagship at 
Trafalgar, 18 », 46, 51-53, 57, 
61, 6a 



Rozhdestveoaky, Rnssiaii Admiral, 
the Dogger Bank incident, 249* 
269 

Russia, her fleet, 145; Paul Jones 
appointed a Vice-Admiral, 235, 
236; the Dogger Bank incident. 
249-^69, 277, 278; her position 
in war, 276. 279, 356, 357 ; mari- 
time commerce, 294, 295 

SaUing large, meaning of, 9 

Sailing ships, their possUjIe tacka* 

7-1 1 
St. Bfary's Isle, Paul Jones lands 

at, 194* 195 
St. Vincent, Lord, see Jervis 
SaltonstaU, Captain Dudley, 186 
Sampson, American Admiral, his 

views on the feeling between 

America and England, 288-290 ; 

the Cuban war* 288, 344 
Sappho, H.M.S., her captures in tiie 

manoeuvres, 323 
Spylki, H.BLS., her captures in tins 

manoeuvres, 323 
Seahorse, British warship, at Tene- 

riffe, 126, 128 
Selkirk, Lady, and Paul Jonea, 173, 

^ 174. X75» 195 

Serapis, British frigate, 166, 190, 
201 ; description of her fight witii 
and capture by Paul Jones, 203- 
221 ; her fate after capture, 223-* 
225, 229, 231 

Sicilies, The Two, see Naples 

Signals, Nelson's book of, 2411; 
French system of, 240, 246 

Slu3rs, The battle of, result of, 347 

Soundings, The, 136, 137 

Southey, Robeot, Life of Nelson, 
x8, 26, 80, 8x, 131 ; on death of 
Nelson, 120 

Spain, battle of Gravelines, 2, 1x5 ; 
the Armada, 105, 353; her fleet 
unites with that of fiance in the 
English Channd, 133, 135; war 
with England, 205 ; the sUai egy 
of position, 277 ; the Cuban war, 

^ a95. 344 

Spencer, 2nd Eail, F'lxtt Lord of 

the Admiralty, letteis from Nelson, 

97, 98; his great services, 141- 

143 ; and Admiral Duncan, 143 

Strategy of position on the sea, 270- 
292 

Stuart, General, siege of Calvi, X07 

Superb, British ship of the line, her 
slow sailing powers, 127 

Suvaroff, Russian batderiiip. tba