Jack Tar
Page 32
Map of Italy, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily and Malta
EIGHT
INTO BATTLE
We had a most bloody action which lasted from 7 o’clock in the morning till ¼ after 6 at night; however, we knocked all their fleet to atoms almost, and we can boldly venture to say [so] far as the best day that old England ever saw.
Midshipman William Spry on the Battle of the Saintes on 12 April 17821
Off Chesapeake Bay one cold February morning in 1813, during the war with America, Marine Captain Wybourn was extremely aggravated when the normal routine was thrown into confusion by Vice-Admiral Warren’s decision to practise clearing the ship for battle:
The Admiral suddenly gave orders to clear for action, and all cabins were knocked down, and as great preparation made for fighting as if an enemy had actually been in view. A general exercise took place, and several firing with shots, broadsides of ammunition being ridiculously thrown away. The Admiral says it puts everything in place for real service, but all we have done is to render every officer uncomfortable at a cold, miserable season, for the Chesapeake is colder than England, and nothing but canvas screens to keep out frost and snow, while his own cabin is closed, well-carpeted and a large fire. This put us all out of humour, and dinner not ready till 5 o’clock, the cooks being fighting, and the fire out.2
Apart from experience gained from capturing prizes, some of which put up a determined resistance, efficiency was maintained with training, drills and exercises, though some captains prepared their crews better than others. Such ‘clearing for action’ was rarely practised, since it involved a complete transformation of a warship in readiness for fighting, much to Wybourn’s discomfort.
As soon as one or more strange ships were seen, they were generally hoped to be enemy vessels, with a chance of an easy capture and prize-money. According to Samuel Leech, when HMS Macedonian spotted the American ship USS United States in October 1812, ‘a whisper ran along the crew that the stranger ship was a Yankee frigate. The thought was confirmed by the command of “All hands clear the ship for action, ahoy!” The drum and fife beat to quarters; bulk-heads were knocked away; the guns were released from their confinement; the whole dread paraphernalia of battle was produced; and after the lapse of a few minutes of hurry and confusion, every man and boy was at his post.’3 He added that after the ship was cleared for action in this way, ‘a few of the junior midshipmen were stationed below, on the berth deck, with orders, given in our hearing, to shoot any man who attempted to run from his quarters’.4 A few years earlier the seaman Robert Wilson, on board the frigate Unité in the Adriatic, mentioned how they were called to action: ‘At 9 in the morning, it being very hazy and a perfect calm, we perceived a number of gunboats close to us, and making for us with their sweeps [long oars]. The drum was immediately beat, and every man repaired to his quarters and cleared away for action.’5
In such circumstances, the men invariably pulled together and demonstrated immense cheerfulness and bravery. According to Midshipman William Dillon, when Lord Howe gave his squadron the signal to prepare for battle just before the Glorious First of June in 1794,
a state of excitement was manifested totally beyond my powers of description. No one thought of anything else than to exert himself to his utmost ability in overcoming the enemy. It was also very satisfactory to observe the change of disposition in the ship’s company of the Defence. All animation and alacrity pervaded these men: no more sulky looks. The enemy was near, and all hands were determined to support their Captain. The ships when near each other were cheered by their crews in succession. Death or Victory was evidently the prevailing feeling.6
Similarly at Trafalgar, just as the Victory was about to clash with the French, Marine James Bagley said ‘about 12 o’clock we gave 3 cheers and then the engagement began very hot on both sides’.7 It was a common feature of Royal Navy crews especially to cheer – or huzzah – as they went into battle. ‘It is a disputed point, whether cheering should be allowed,’ Midshipman George Elliot commented. ‘I say decidedly yes. No other nation can cheer. It encourages us and disheartens the enemy. I still distinctly recollect the stirring feelings of these men’s cheers.’8
After the Battle of Trafalgar Midshipman Edward Polwhele of the Tonnant wrote to his father, at Helston in Cornwall, in admiration of the cheering men:
I leave you to guess what must be the feelings, the resolution, of a person in the capacity of an officer, when he hears men (as I heard) on their way to the surgeon, one in particular, with all his bowels hanging out, encouraging his gunmates, and huzzaing along the decks as he passed below. The only thing that affected me was some of my messmates wishing me well and shaking hands, which was a sort of thing I thought … might be dispensed with, as it only tended to cloud and not exhilarate the spirits.9
Seeing a potential enemy and raising an alarm could occur at any time, something Midshipman James Scott discovered on the first occasion he heard the signal to prepare for battle:
For the first time my slumbers were invaded by the sound of the hollow drum beating to quarters. My eyes were scarcely unclosed, when I heard the hurried cry of ‘Turn out – turn out!’ ‘Bear a hand there, – move up, men!’ At the same time another mid … getting under my hammock, nearly capsized me, roaring in my ears, ‘Turn out! don’t you know an enemy is nearly alongside?’ The bustle between decks, and the anxiety of every one to ascend the ladder, produced something like a certainty in my mind that we were about to have a brush with Johnny Crapaud [the French], and it was confirmed by the flash and dinning report of one of our main-deck guns at the moment of my stepping over the coamings of the hatchway. The hurry and bustle of the scene gave me no time for reflection until I got on the main-deck, where, all bearing evidence of hostile preparation, I began to have some idea that actual fighting was no joke.10
The vessel proved to be an English merchantman, but Scott had gained valuable experience: ‘This false alarm was of some advantage to me, for I experienced all the serious feelings that would have attended me, had a conflict actually taken place, and I felt a confidence (hitherto doubtful,) that I should do my duty when called upon.’11
Once orders were given to clear for action, preparations were much the same for a fight against a single ship as for a full-scale battle. The aim was to get everything ready for firing the cannons, as well as to reduce the effects of damage from incoming shot. On the upper decks the men’s tightly rolled hammocks were lashed into netting above the sides of the ship to provide protection from missiles, and on the open decks netting was rigged as an obstacle to boarders and spread above the main deck to try to prevent debris from falling on the men. Midshipman Dillon said that while they were chasing the French, ‘a splinter netting was fitted over the quarter deck to receive the [pulley] blocks that might be shot away aloft, and a cask of water was hoisted into the main top, to be prepared for fire’.12 When part of a mast was shot away in battle, the wood, sails and rigging raining down on the men below could have a combined weight of many tons. This netting would not hold such a lethal weight, which formed a heavy, tangled obstacle that had to be cleared from the deck. Instead, iron chains were fixed between the masts and the yards, to stop the yards and sails falling if the rigging was shot away.
On those decks above the water-line, the bulkheads were removed, along with any other partitions, to provide the maximum amount of room to load and fire the guns, as well as give an unobstructed view of each gun deck. This meant that the captain and officers lost their cabins for the duration of the battle (or the exercise, as Wybourn complained). Any other obstructions, such as the officers’ furniture, and chests, boxes and bags containing the belongings of the seamen, were also removed, either to the hold or into boats that were lowered and towed behind the ship, so as to avoid the hazard of them being smashed into splinters by cannonballs. Anything else at risk of producing splinters was also removed, such as animal pens and cages. Items were simply thrown overboard if there was no time to
stow them out of the way, as William Richardson described on one occasion off Brest: ‘We saw the enemy’s fleet in the outer roads at anchor, all ready for a start to sea; and it falling little wind we in the evening brought our fleet to anchor. As an engagement was expected to take place next morning, every ship prepared for battle; the ocean was soon covered with tubs, stools, and other lumber thrown overboard to be clear of the guns.’13
Even during the slow approach to the enemy at Trafalgar much was jettisoned while the ships cleared for action, and Captain Harwood of HMS Belleisle noted in his journal: ‘Made all sail, bearing down on the enemy. Threw overboard unavoidably, in clearing for action, butts in packs 7. Ditto., cut for grog and topsail halliard tubs, 2. Ditto., cut for cook’s tubs, 3. Puncheons and harness casks, 2;some beef and pork in harness tubs, iron hoops, 6 parcels, 10 in each; biscuit bags from the different berths, 90 in number.’14 It was not uncommon after a battle for an officer or seaman to find that he only had left the clothes he was wearing because his box or bag of personal items had been discarded.
Animals were shifted from the ship because they were otherwise likely to add to the confusion. Goats, sheep, chickens, pigs and even cows were stowed in the boats towed behind the warships, but if time was short, the animals might be thrown overboard to fend for themselves. At the Battle of the Nile, when the British fleet sailed straight into the attack as soon as the French ships were sighted, the logbook of HMS Zealous records, ‘Cleared ship for action, and hove overboard ten bullocks.’15
While animals thrown overboard inevitably drowned, those on board or towed behind in the boats were as likely to be wounded or killed in battle as the seamen. Major Thomas Oldfield of the marines told his sister that on board the Theseus during the Battle of the Nile, ‘Beatty and myself had one shot which knocked the plank from under us. Most of our poultry were killed, and the arm-chests beat to pieces.’16 James Gardner recalled a running fight to protect a convoy off the coast of Spain in 1782. He was in the Panther, which was not expected to take part in the fighting, and so they had not dealt with the animals beforehand. Gardner was near a midshipman who was struck in the leg by a cannonball: ‘It was a spent shot that killed him, and weighed 28 pounds, and what was remarkable, it took off at the same time the leg of a pig in the sty under the forecastle.’17 Livestock were at times kept in the larger ship’s boats, which served as ready-made pens, and Gardner said that the sheep were still in one boat on the upper deck, in a very exposed position:
One of our poor fellows was cut in two by a double-headed shot on the main deck, and the lining of his stomach (about the size of a pancake) stuck on the side of the launch, which was stowed amidships on the main deck with the sheep inside. The butcher who had the care of them, observing what was on the side of the boat, began to scrape it off with his nails, saying, ‘Who the devil would have thought the fellow’s paunch would have stuck so? I’m damned if I don’t think it’s glued on!’18
Waiting for a battle to start was a nerve-racking time for everyone, especially for first-timers. Marine Lieutenant Samuel Ellis of the Ajax at Trafalgar commented on how the seamen prepared for battle as they approached the enemy line:
I was sent below with orders, and was much struck with the preparations made by the bluejackets, the majority of whom were stripped to the waist; a handkerchief was tightly bound round their heads and over the ears, to deaden the noise of the cannon, many men being deaf for days after an action. The men were variously occupied; some were sharpening their cutlasses, others polishing the guns, as though an inspection were about to take place instead of a mortal combat, whilst three or four, as if in mere bravado, were dancing a horn-pipe; but all seemed deeply anxious to come to close-quarters with the enemy.19
After suffering a false alarm, Midshipman James Scott admitted that he was still afraid before his first battle:
There are few things to be compared to the interest created by the chase of an enemy, but now that the hubbub was over, and the time was absolutely come when we were to smell powder and feel its effects in right good ernest, no Bang-bang without its tell-tale bullet, I began to consider the possibility of my being minus a leg or an arm before night, even if I was so fortunate as to retain my head upon my shoulders. I confess a comical sensation seized me, and the stillness that reigned as we approached the muzzles of the enemy’s guns, was productive of no very consolatory or reassuring cogitations. The interval of suspense, though short, was sufficiently protracted to convince me that fighting, however fascinating à la distance to a young and ardent mind, as leading to honour and renown, is quite another affair when brought to that precise minimum of time, that ere the warm blood can pursue its appointed course of action through the mazes of the throbbing heart, the angel of death may have done his work, holding in his grasp some beloved companion or well-known form. The coming conflict then assumes an aspect that must ever appear formidable and awful to a young beginner.20
Food was a problem before battles, as the fire in the galley had to be extinguished. At the Battle of the Glorious First of June, they had been preparing to fight for three days, and Midshipman Dillon commented: ‘His Lordship [Howe] knew that John Bull did not like fighting with an empty stomach; but it was a sorry meal, scarcely deserving the name. We had not had much time for a fire in the range for cooking since the 28th of last month [May]. All the tables and conveniences were stowed below; all the partitions taken down; nothing to be seen on the decks but powder, shot, ramrods and instruments of destruction.’21 After Trafalgar, William Pryce Cumby, first lieutenant of the Bellerophon, described to his son their battle meal: ‘At eleven o’clock finding we should not be in action for an hour or more we piped to dinner which we had ordered to be in readiness for the ship’s company at that hour thinking that Englishmen would fight all the better for having a comfortable meal, and at the same time Captain Cooke joined us in partaking of some cold meat &c on the rudder head, all our bulkheads, tables &c being necessarily taken down and carried below.’22 Also at Trafalgar, the Irish seaman John Brown in the Victory said that after Nelson had gone round the decks to encourage everyone, they had a rudimentary meal: ‘So we piped to dinner and ate a bit of raw pork and half a pint of wine.’23
While it is the large battles between two opposing fleets, such as Trafalgar and the Nile, that are most remembered today, the overwhelming majority of conflicts were on a much smaller scale, quite commonly duels between warships like frigates. The fighting between fleets usually only involved line-of-battle ships, but the number of enemy ships captured and destroyed in these major battles was insignificant compared with the number taken in smaller actions, frequently merchantmen or privateers. The large battles reduced the enemy’s capacity for warfare, while the majority of British naval ships destroyed enemy trade, so reducing their capacity for continuing the war and (of much more importance to warship crews) providing prize-money and occasional loot. The number of men involved in individual and large-scale battles varied from around a few hundred to many thousand. At the Battle of the Nile in 1798 just over 8000 men and officers took part on the British side, on board fourteen battleships, while at the Battle of Trafalgar in October 1805, around 17,000 men in twenty-seven battleships were on the British side – equivalent to the population of the city of Leicester at the time.
Just before the large-scale battle called the Glorious First of June, William Dillon watched the two fleets drawing closer. ‘How shall I describe it?’ he wrote. ‘A scene of magnificence and importance, not of common occurrence, and not often equalled on the ocean – upwards of 50 sail of the line viewing each other, and preparing to pour out their thunder destructive of the human species, which would decide the fate of either fleet, and probably that of the nation.’24
Naval battles were all about firing cannons (guns) and carronades (powerful, large-calibre guns, but with a shorter range). In simple terms, a gunpowder cartridge was exploded inside a cannon, which fired whatever had been rammed down the muzzle on top of it.
Solid iron cannonballs – shot – were the main type of missile, and different-sized cannons fired shot of varying weights. A 32-pounder gun, for instance, fired a cannonball weighing 32 pounds, which measured around 6.4 inches diameter. Other missiles could be fired from cannons, even scrap metal. Double-headed shot – two solid lumps of iron linked by a bar or a chain – was fired in order to cripple a ship’s rigging and sails. Grape-shot was a collection of iron balls tied up in a canvas bag, and canister comprised a tin filled with musketballs or slightly larger shot. Both these missiles disintegrated on firing, showering the enemy’s crew with bullet-like projectiles. On board HMS Macedonian in the battle against USS United States in October 1812 (which the British lost), Samuel Leech observed the devastation of the different kinds of incoming shot:
Grape and canister shot were pouring through our portholes like leaden rain, carrying death in their trail. The large shot came against the ship’s side like iron hail, shaking her to the very keel, or passing through her timbers, and scattering terrific splinters, which did a more appalling work than even their own death-giving blows … grape shot is formed by seven or eight balls confined to an iron and tied in a cloth. These balls are scattered by the explosion of the powder. Canister shot is made by filling a powder canister with balls, each as large as two or three musket balls; these also scatter with direful effect when discharged.25