Trafalgar

by Nicholas Best

  Clad only in a shirt, Nelson’s body was later removed from the cockpit and carried up to the middle deck by two seamen. A wooden cask had been lashed to the mainmast to receive it. Rotely tipped Nelson in head first and replaced the lid. The cask was then filled with brandy to preserve the corpse for burial. Rotely placed a twenty-four-hour guard on it to keep it safe. There was a rumour going round that some other ship would have to take Nelson home, but the men of the Victory were determined that would never happen. The Royal Navy would have a mutiny on its hands if anyone tried to take Nelson away from them.

  On every ship, as soon as they could find the time, they were writing up the ship’s log for the previous day, giving a terse account of the battle for the record. In several cases, the log-keeper had been killed and the log was written in an alien hand, by someone who hadn’t been expecting to do it. All across the fleet, there was earnest debate as officers struggled to remember the precise details of what had happened during the battle, and at roughly what time. Their watches all told a different time, which didn’t help. Their recollections were all different as well, hazy impressions of gunfire coming from somewhere and ships drifting in and out of the smoke, a kaleidoscope of different experiences from a variety of sources that was impossible to reconcile. Armchair sailors have been grappling with it ever since.

  Among the French, too, the surviving ships’ captains would soon be preparing their own version of events for posterity. For those who were prisoners of the British, their versions would be taken to England and then forwarded to Paris. For those who had escaped, they would go directly to Napoleon. All would tell of immense derring-do, in which the captain had fought heroically against overwhelming odds before being forced to surrender. All were quite clear that wherever the blame for the disaster lay, it certainly wasn’t with them. Everyone had fought superbly by their own accounts – and indeed many of them had.

  Aboard the Algesiras, they had no time yet for the penning of reports. Formerly the flagship of Rear-Admiral Magon, the Algesiras had been dismasted during the battle and taken over by a skeleton crew from the Tonnant. Without a serviceable anchor, she had drifted away from the British fleet during the night and like the Fougueux was heading straight for the reefs north of Cape Trafalgar. The only thing that could save her was a jury mast, but with hundreds of prisoners below deck, Lieutenant Charles Bennett didn’t have enough men to guard the French and erect a mast as well.

  Against his own inclinations, Bennett was forced to return the ship to the French – but only after receiving an assurance that the British would be set free as soon as they reached port. The French came up on deck at once and began to erect topgallants as jury masts. Seven hours later, after narrowly avoiding the reefs, the Algesiras sailed safely into Cadiz while Bennett and his prize crew looked on with distinctly mixed feelings.

  By evening, the storm had worked itself up into a fury. The rain came lashing down and the wind screamed through the rigging at sixty knots. Collingwood’s ships pitched and rolled, their crews powerless to do anything except batten down the hatches and say their prayers as the waves broke over the deck. For the exhausted seamen, struggling at the pumps while the wounded continued to die, it was the last thing they needed after everything they had been through already.

  The Redoutable, which had fought so bravely against the Victory, was being towed by the Swiftsure. Her only surviving mast collapsed under the strain. With water flooding in as well, the prizemaster was forced to send out distress signals at 5 p.m. The Swiftsure immediately hove to and lowered her boats. The British prize crew was rescued and as many of the French as could be managed before darkness fell. But the sea was too rough for the rest to be saved. The Redoutable went down just after 10 p.m. that night, taking perhaps 300 people with her. The Swiftsure was able to pick up a few survivors next morning, when the weather abated for a while, but the death toll was still severe. Added to the men already killed in action, the Redoutable had lost a total of 474 dead and another seventy wounded. It was a bitter price to pay for all the courage and resolution they had displayed over the past two days.

  The improvement in the weather lasted a few hours into the morning of 23 October before deteriorating again. The lull brought an unexpected development from Cadiz, where Admiral Gravina’s ships had arrived the previous day after fleeing the battle. Most were in no state to put to sea again, but a few were still fit for duty. After the drubbing they had received from the British, they were determined to retrieve something from the debacle and regain their professional pride.

  Captain Julien Cosmao-Kerjulien was the senior surviving French officer. From the walls of Cadiz, he could see the captured Santa Ana only two miles away, being towed by the Thunderer. Both were struggling against the swell. Other ships were struggling as well. It was clear to Cosmao-Kerjulien that the few British ships in sight had their hands full with their prizes and were in no position to think about anything else. Taking advantage of the lull in the storm, he decided to lead a sortie from Cadiz to recapture the prizes and bring them back into harbour.

  The sortie consisted of five ships of the line, five frigates and two brigs. It was successful at first. The Thunderer was forced to abandon the Santa Ana to defend herself. The Conqueror similarly had to cut the Bucentaure loose and the Spanish Neptuno was recaptured too. But the British formed a battle line of ten ships to protect the rest of their prizes and the wind suddenly changed direction again, bringing the storm back with it. Cosmao-Kerjulien was compelled to order a retreat to Cadiz while it was still feasible.

  Unfortunately, the storm overtook his force before they could get back. Three ships of the line were lost. One anchored safely outside the harbour, but was driven ashore after the cable broke. Another couldn’t make the harbour and had to surrender to the British after losing her masts. The third ran aground just north of Cadiz with enormous loss of life. If that wasn’t enough, the newly liberated Bucentaure broke up as well, sinking at the entrance to Cadiz harbour, within a mile of the ramparts. Cosmao-Kerjulien had made a brave attempt, but his sortie had ended in a very costly failure for the French.

  At sea, the British were not much happier. If anything, the storm was worse for them because they had nowhere to run to until it was over. Their only option was to keep the hatches battened and ride it out as best they could.

  Unhappiest of all were the prize crews aboard the captured vessels. They had to fight the storm and keep control of their prisoners as well. Aboard the Spanish Monarca, the British were outnumbered ten to one by their captives. The ship had become so unmanageable by 24 October that they all thought they were going to die – a prospect the British sailors greeted by getting drunk, as Midshipman Henry Walker of the Bellerophon recalled:

  You will imagine what have been our sufferings, in a crippled ship, with 500 prisoners on board and only fifty-five Englishmen, most of whom were in a constant state of intoxication. We rolled away all our masts except the foremast; were afterwards forced to cut away two anchors, heave overboard several guns, shot etc to lighten her; and were, after all, in such imminent danger of sinking that, seeing no ship near to assist us, we at length determined to run the ship on shore on the Spanish coast, which we should have done had not the Leviathan fortunately fallen in with us and saved us, all but about 150 Spaniards . . . who were afraid of getting into the boats.

  I can assure you I felt not the least fear of death during the action, which I attribute to the general confidence of victory which I saw all around me; but in the prize, when I was in danger of, and had time to reflect upon the approach of death, either from the rising of the Spaniards upon so small a number as we were composed of, or what latterly appeared inevitable, from the violence of the storm, I was most certainly afraid, and at one time, when the ship made three feet of water in ten minutes, when our people were almost all lying drunk upon deck, when the Spaniards, completely worn out with fatigue, would no longer work at the only chain pump left serviceable, when I saw the fear
of death so strongly depicted on the countenances of all around me, I wrapped myself up in a Union Jack and lay down upon deck for a short time, quietly awaiting the approach of death.

  Happily, Walker rallied and later returned safely to the Bellerophon. The Monarca, however, ran aground and was wrecked.

  Other ships were in trouble, too. Aboard the Intrépide, Lieutenant Gicquel des Touches was struggling to keep the situation under control.

  In the midst of the gloom, while the storm was still gathering strength, we had to pass through a leeward gunport more than eighty wounded who were incapable of moving into the small English boats. We succeeded in this with infinite trouble, by means of a bed-frame and capstan bars. Afterwards, we were towed by an English frigate, which we followed while rolling from side to side and leaking everywhere. I became aware that the pumping was slowing down, and I was warned that the doors of the storeroom had been broken down, and that everyone, English and French, had rushed there to get drunk. When I arrived amongst these men, reduced to the state of brutes, a cask of brandy had just been broken, and the liquid was running over the floor and lapping against the foot of a candle which had been set up there. I only just had time to stamp out the flame, and in the darkness threatening voices rose against me . . . With kicks and punches I had the storeroom cleared, I barricaded the door, and I agreed with the English officer how to avert the danger that was threatening.

  The storm had reached hurricane force by now, so bad that it was threatening to hurl the entire fleet against the Spanish shore. Collingwood despaired of saving all the prize ships captured in the battle. Rather than see them fall back into enemy hands, he decided at length to destroy the crippled ones instead. He gave the order for the crews to be transferred to British ships and the prizes sent to the bottom, those that weren’t sinking already.

  He did so with great reluctance. The prizes were worth a fortune to the British – just under £4 million, by Collingwood’s reckoning. For an admiral, that was enough to buy a country estate and build a gracious stately home. For a junior officer, it was an essential supplement to his pay, which was inadequate to support a family. For an ordinary seaman, if he was very lucky, it might be enough to take a lease on a pub and call it the Lord Nelson. The money was crucial to everyone aboard the British fleet. It was their nest egg, security for their old age. It wasn’t to be sent to the bottom lightly.

  But the storm had left them no choice. The crippled prizes simply couldn’t be saved. Lieutenant John Edwards was aboard the Santissima Trinidad, the biggest prize of all:

  ’Tis impossible to describe the horrors the morning presented, nothing but signals of distress flying in every direction, guns firing, and so many large ships driving on shore without being able to render them the least assistance. After driving about four days without any prospect of saving the ship or the gale abating, the signal was made to destroy the prizes. We had no time before to remove the prisoners, and it now became a most dangerous task; no boats could lie alongside, we got under her stern, and the men dropped in by ropes; but what a sight when we came to remove the wounded, which were between three and four hundred.

  We had to tie the poor mangled wretches round their waists, or where we could, and lower them down into a tumbling boat, some without arms, others no legs, and lacerated all over in the most dreadful manner. About ten o’clock we had got all out, to about thirty-three or four, which I believe it was impossible to remove without instant death. The water was now at the pilot deck, the weather dark and boisterous, and taking in tons at every roll.

  Midshipman Badcock too was aboard the Santissima. ‘Her beams were covered with blood, brains and pieces of flesh and the after part of her decks with wounded, some without legs and some without an arm.’ The Spanish crowded the gangway as the last British boats pulled away. A father and son became separated, the son jumping into the sea and clinging to the gunwales of an overloaded boat as his father tried to haul him aboard. Terrified of being swamped, the British cut the son’s fingers off with a cutlass to get rid of him. The father then made to leap overboard and drown with his son, whereupon the British relented and pulled his son into the boat. They all survived somehow and were taken safely to the Revenge.

  The Santissima’s cat survived as well. The Ajax’s boat had shoved off from the starboard quarter when the cat ran out along a gun muzzle and gave a plaintive mew. The boat returned and took the animal on board. But some people still had to be abandoned, according to a sailor from the Revenge:

  On the last boat’s load leaving the ship, the Spaniards who were left on board appeared on the gangway and ship’s side, displaying their bags of dollars and doubloons and eagerly offering them as a reward for saving them from the expected and unavoidable wreck; but however well inclined we were, it was not in our power to rescue them, or it would have been effected without the proffered bribe.

  Soon afterwards, the Santissima went down in the darkness, the Spaniards’ money no use to them as the waters closed over their heads. The ship’s fate was shared by many others. Of the twenty French and Spanish vessels originally captured at Trafalgar, one blew up and two were recaptured by Cosmao-Kerjulien. Four remained in British hands and were taken to Gibraltar after the storm was over to be valued at the prize office. The rest were either scuttled, burned or wrecked on shore.

  CHAPTER 42

  THE BODIES COME ASHORE

  The storm blew itself out after four terrible days and the ships still afloat won a breathing space at last. They needed it badly after the traumas of the previous week.

  As soon as the weather had calmed down, Collingwood was able to send an account of the battle to the Admiralty. He had written a long dispatch immediately after the action, beginning with the death of Nelson and ending with details of the victory. Two days later, he added a second dispatch about the storm and the loss of some of the prizes. On the morning of 26 October, he gave both dispatches to Lieutenant John Lapenotiere, captain of the Pickle, and told him to sail to England at once and deliver them personally to the Admiralty in London.

  It was the chance of a lifetime for Lapenotiere. Despite his name, he was from Devon, descended from French Huguenots who had come to England with William of Orange. As captain of the Pickle – the second-smallest ship on either side – he had played no active part in the battle beyond dancing attendance on the bigger ships. Instead, he had endured the polite but condescending stares of Midshipman Hercules Robinson and others as they looked down on his tiny little schooner from the poops of their two – and three-deckers. The Pickle had been called the Sting before the Admiralty renamed her. It was difficult for the rest of the fleet to take her seriously under her new name. But she was one of the fastest ships Collingwood had available to get the news back to England, and he was said to have owed Lapenotiere a favour. This was a crucial moment in Lapenotiere’s career.

  He rowed straight back to the Pickle after seeing Collingwood. It was a huge honour to be entrusted with the dispatches. There would be money in it when he arrived at the Admiralty – Lapenotiere could expect to receive £500 in cash and promotion to commander. For a man of thirty-five with a new young wife to support, it was a very welcome boost to his career.

  First, though, the remaining French prisoners had to be released from the Pickle’s bilge and transferred to the Revenge. Lapenotiere waited impatiently while the men were ferried across in the jolly boat. The work was finished by noon. A few minutes later, the Pickle hoisted her sails and turned north-west, bearing her precious dispatches for the 1000-mile journey back to England.

  Aboard the Revenge, the young Frenchwoman Jeanette Caunant had been transferred from the Pickle the day after the battle. She hadn’t eaten for twenty-four hours when she arrived and looked ‘the picture of misery and despair’, according to one of the Revenge’s lieutenants. He lent her his cabin for a dressing room and had a berth erected for her outside the wardroom, protected by a canvas screen. The purser supplied her with two shirts and a blanket,
and the chaplain gave her a pair of shoes. Another lieutenant gave her a piece of sprigged muslin looted from a Spanish ship. Before long, Jeanette had made a dress for herself and was feeling strong enough to start asking after her husband, lost somewhere in the Achille’s sinking. According to one account, he had been killed in the fighting, but nobody knew for sure. With the storm threatening to engulf them all, the Revenge’s lieutenant had had too many other things to think about, without worrying about Jeanette’s problems:

  For several days I was so much busied in securing the ship’s masts, and in looking after the ship in the gales which we had to encounter, that I had no time to attend to my protégée. It was on about the fourth day of her sojourn that she came to me in the greatest possible ecstasy and told me that she had found her husband, who was on board among the prisoners and unhurt. She soon afterwards brought him to me, and in the most grateful terms and manner returned her thanks for the attentions she had received. After this, Jeanette declined coming to the wardroom, from the very proper feeling that her husband could not be admitted to the same privileges.

  On the Euryalus, Collingwood was playing host to Admiral Villeneuve, who had been aboard for several days. He was an object of keen interest to the Euryalus’s officers and men. Midshipman Hercules Robinson was one of many who examined him curiously:

  Villeneuve was a thinnish, tall man, a very tranquil, placid, English-looking Frenchman. He wore a long-tailed uniform coat, high and flat collar, corduroy pantaloons of a greenish colour, with stripes two inches wide, half-boots with sharp toes, and a watch-chain with long gold links.