by Dudley Pope
Hamilton, realizing that speed was now essential if they were to live, let alone succeed, cast off the rope linking the pinnace with the boats astern, roused his seamen into giving three cheers, and ordered them to pull at their oars with every ounce of energy they possessed. He steered direct for the Hermione—he could ignore the guard boats because they were small and their single cannons would do no harm, except to their owners, since the flash of firing blinded them for several seconds. Hamilton had assumed—although this present situation was not specifically covered in his orders—that the rest of his boats would follow him in a mad dash to get alongside the Hermione. Every second’s delay in achieving this meant more Spaniards on deck, wider awake and better armed.
But glancing astern a few moments later he was angered to see from the flashes of musket fire that some of his boats—he could not see how many—were wasting time attacking the guard boats, forgetting their main, indeed their only objective, the Hermione, and endangering the whole attack.
In fact two boats were involved—the launch commanded by Lt Wilson, whose twenty-four men were supposed to cut the anchor cable and board at the bow to secure the fo’c’sle; and the Boatswain’s red cutter, whose sixteen men, intended to board on the larboard quarter, were vital in helping to capture the quarterdeck, from where the ship could be steered.
But Hamilton could do nothing about these errant idiots: there was no drawing back at this stage and the pinnace, apparently alone, sped through the darkness towards the objective. Suddenly the silhouette of the Hermione seemed to spring to life as red flashes rippled along the side and the men in the pinnace heard the thunder of the guns and the sigh of shot passing overhead. Fear, for they were helpless to retaliate, lent strength to the oarsmen as the pinnace surged on; then they realized the shot were not landing anywhere near them.
They could see the Hermime’s bulk huge—her bulwarks were twenty feet above the waterline—as the spurts of flame from the larboard side guns bathed her in momentary flashes of red light and silhouetted the great masts and yards which towered overhead, stark like massive trees stripped of their leaves by a winter gale. The smoke from the frigate’s guns began to roll down towards them like banks of sea mist—towards them: not only was there a breeze, however slight, but it was fair for getting the Hermione out to sea, although because she had her stern to the entrance she would have to be turned.
Hamilton ordered the coxswain to steer the pinnace close round the frigate’s larboard bow, under the bowsprit and jibboom which stuck out like the questing neck of some prehistoric monster. By now the men were almost deafened by the confused medley of noise: shouts in Spanish were punctuated by heart-stopping crashes of the Hermione’s 12-pounders and the rumble as the gun carriages recoiled across the deck; muskets popped in an almost ludicrous descant to the thunder of the shore batteries.
Then the pinnace was right under the Hermione’s larboard bow and turning fast; only a few more yards and they would be at the starboard gangway: the men braced themselves, ready to scramble up the side of the frigate by whatever means presented itself. Suddenly the launch lurched and stopped.
‘We’re aground, sir!’ shouted the Coxswain. They were only a few yards from the Hermione’s stem and she drew more than fifteen feet forward, so Hamilton knew this was nonsense: the pinnace’s rudder had obviously caught in the frigate’s anchor cable or the rope of the anchor buoy.
‘Unship the rudder!’ he ordered.
By the time this was done the pinnace had drifted back right under the frigate’s bulging, apple-cheeked bow and the starboard side oars were jammed against the hull. There was no time—or point—in trying to get the boat further aft to board at the gangway, particularly since Hamilton realized that despite the turmoil going on in the frigate the pinnace had apparently not been spotted by the Spaniards.
Overhead, slung from the cathead, was a huge anchor still covered with reeking mud, showing it had been weighed a short while earlier. That meant there would be only one cable for Lt Wilson’s men to cut.
Hamilton sprang up on to the bends—some extra thick planks which ran round the ship’s side—and then scrambled on to the fluke of the anchor, followed by several of his men. But his feet slipped on the mud and he fell sideways, just managing to grab the lanyards of one of the foremast shrouds to avoid plunging into the sea. In his struggles one of the pistols tucked in his belt went off, fortunately without wounding him.
By now Gunner Maxwell and the rest of the pinnace’s men had swarmed over the bulwarks on to the fo’c’sle—to find only two Spaniards there who, bewildered for the few moments of life left to them by the sudden appearance of the enemy, were quickly cut down.
Captain Hamilton and Maxwell ran to the break of the fo’c’sle and looked aft. They could hardly believe their eyes and realized why the two Spaniards now lying dead behind them had been so surprised: apart from a few men by the wheel, the whole of the upperdeck—fo’c’sle, both gangways, quarterdeck and poop—was deserted. All the Spaniards were at the guns down on the maindeck—from where they stood by the belfry at the after end of the fo’c’sle the two Britons could see dozens of them only a few feet below. Gun after gun on the larboard side fired and sprang back in recoil, and hurriedly the Spaniards sponged out the barrels, rammed home cartridges, wads and shot, and fired again. But from the elevation of the guns Hamilton could see at a glance that whatever the Spaniards were blazing away at was several hundred yards away. The ‘targets’, he discovered later, were two British frigates which—in the Spaniards’ imagination—were sailing into the lagoon. None of them realized that British boats were staging a cutting-out expedition and nineteen men were already on board.
Shouting to Maxwell to follow with his men, Hamilton dashed aft along the starboard gangway, heading for the quarterdeck: from there, with the wheel in British hands, he could control the ship, unless the Spaniards had the wit to run below and cut the tiller lines.
But even as the Britons ran aft the few Spaniards on the quarterdeck recognized them as the enemy and advanced along the gangway towards them. Within a few seconds there was a confused mêlée with pistols firing, cutlasses clashing with pikes, tomahawks with musket barrels. And below them on the maindeck the frigate’s 12-pounders continued to thunder away.
While the pinnace’s boarders tried to drive the Spaniards aft towards the quarterdeck, a second British boat arrived alongside: this was the gig, commanded by the Surgeon, John M’Mullen, who with his sixteen men promptly climbed on board over the larboard bow. Finding the fo’c’sle clear except for the two dead Spaniards, M’Mullen sent the four topmen scrambling up the foremast to loose the topsail and then, as ordered, led the rest in a dash along the larboard gangway for the rendezvous on the quarterdeck, which they found deserted.
At that moment he was joined by Captain Hamilton, who had fought his way clear of the Spaniards battling with the Gunner’s men on the starboard gangway. But M’Mullen’s fighting spirit was fully roused and before Hamilton could stop him he had led his men off in a wild dash forward along the starboard gangway to help the Gunner’s party by attacking the Spaniards in the rear. The purpose of the quarterdeck rendezvous was completely forgotten and Hamilton was left standing alone by the wheel, unarmed except for two discharged pistols and a sword.
The Spaniards at the gangway, sandwiched between the Gunner and the bloodthirsty Surgeon, fought desperately, and while slowly retreating before M’Mullen’s men they drove Maxwell’s group back towards the fo’c’sle.
Hamilton’s situation in the meantime was both ludicrous and desperate: he was the only man on the quarterdeck of a frigate whose entire maindeck was in enemy hands and whose guns were busy firing away into the night. Only two of his six boarding parties were actually on board, and both those were scrapping on the gangway. Where were the other four parties? They comprised another sixty-seven men, apart from the vitally-important axemen who were to cut the cables. Were they still messing about with the guard boats
, or had they been blown out of the water? Either way, Hamilton must have thought his attack would fail.
But he had no time to make other plans—or even to despair: four Spaniards suddenly appeared out of the smoke heading straight for him. Within a few seconds one had stabbed him in the left thigh with a cutlass, another jabbed him in the right thigh with a pike, and a third hit him across the head with a musket, smashing the butt. Hamilton collapsed, hitting his head on a hatch coaming as he fell. The Spaniards were just going to finish him off when two or three British seamen arrived in time to drive them off.
The seamen picked up Hamilton, who quickly regained consciousness and then set to helping his rescuers try to guard the quarterdeck from another group of Spaniards who, realizing at last that the ship had been boarded, had swarmed up the quarterdeck ladder from the maindeck below.
A sudden burst of cheering—British cheering—heralded the arrival of more boarders: at last the black cutter’s crew, under the command of Lt Hamilton, had managed to get on board. Their tardiness was not the result of chasing off into the night after the guard boats: the Lieutenant had, as ordered, got his cutter alongside and, at the head of his men, scrambled up the battens on the ship’s side forming the steps to the break in the gangway.
However a Spaniard—one of the group caught between the Gunner’s and Surgeon’s men—had darted across to give him a smart blow on the head, so that he had toppled backwards and fallen into the cutter, knocking down the rest of the boarders who had been following him up the ship’s side. With the Lieutenant sprawled on top of a pile of his men in the bottom of the boat, too dazed for the moment to do anything, the cutter’s crew concluded from the noise of the fighting on the gangway, and their officer’s precipitate return, that the opposition was too strong at that point, and shoved off, rowing round the ship looking for a more promising place to board. They reached the starboard side to find the musket fire too hot for them and then went back to the larboard side, which by then was comparatively clear because the Spaniards had driven the Gunner’s party to the fo’c’sle, though they were themselves trapped there by the Surgeon’s men behind them.
Swiftly Lt Hamilton, followed by Lt du Pin and his Marines, scrambled on board and headed for the quarterdeck, where they found Captain Hamilton and his rescuers trying to stop the Spaniards coming up the ladder from the maindeck. Hamilton ordered them to keep the quarterdeck clear and du Pin, forming up his Marines, began firing volleys down at the Spaniards on the maindeck below.
By this time the Gunner’s and Surgeon’s parties had finally mopped up the Spaniards on the fo’c’sle—the Gunner being dangerously wounded in the process—so that the whole of the upper-deck was free of the enemy. But the Spaniards, still in complete control of the maindeck below, were busy firing muskets up through the hatches at any Briton who showed himself.
Lt Wilson’s launch with twenty-six men and responsible for cutting the bow cable, the Boatswain’s red cutter with seventeen men, and the Carpenter’s jolly-boat with eleven, charged with cutting the stern cables, still had not arrived, so that in fact the fifty-four Britons then on board were fighting 365 Spaniards, who were all now concentrated on the maindeck (the rest of the ship’s company were in the guard boats or on leave).
Captain Hamilton, dazed and bleeding from his several wounds, decided the next move was to clear the maindeck of the enemy. This was hardly an easy task, even though at this time he had no idea that the Spaniards outnumbered him nearly seven to one.
Mustering the three boats’ crews on the quarterdeck, Hamilton ordered every man with a musket or pistol to reload while those without firearms stood ready. He then told them to fire a volley at the same moment down the after hatch into the midst of the Spaniards crowded on the maindeck below. Before the enemy had time to recover from the murderous hail of shot, the British seamen and Marines, yelling and whooping, leapt down the hatch and immediately began slashing and jabbing with their cutlasses, pikes and tomahawks.
This attack cut the Spanish force into two sections: sixty or more were trapped aft of the hatch, and a dozen British seamen drove them back towards the Captain’s cabin. Finally the Spaniards retreated into the cabin and surrendered, whereupon they were swiftly disarmed and locked in.
The rest of the British seamen and Marines were in the meantime battling their way forward, fighting the main mass of the frigate’s crew, but the Spaniards were putting up a desperate resistance, making each gun on either side a partial barricade, because the centreline was blocked with masts, hatchways, pump wells and handles. Here the British began to lose men—a quartermaster, John Mathews, and a quarter-gunner, Arthur Reed, collapsed dangerously wounded; Henry Miller, one of the Carpenter’s crew, fell to the deck badly hurt.
By this time the Carpenter finally had arrived alongside the frigate in the jolly-boat and, leaving three men to cut the stern cables, led the other seven on board. Two of them scrambled up to loose the mizen topsail while the rest joined in the battle on the maindeck. It did not take long for the trio of axemen in the boat to slice through the stern cables and within a few minutes the frigate was held only by the bow cable. Cutting this was the task of Lt Wilson’s launch, which had not yet put in an appearance.
The Spanish gunners in the fortresses on shore had by then worked out what had happened. Training their guns on the frigate, they opened fire with round shot and grape. They soon found the range and shot began crashing into the ship’s side and slicing through the rigging. The heavy mainstay was cut through, leaving the mainmast in a dangerous state. Grapeshot spattered the ship—one ricocheted to hit Captain Hamilton’s shin, inflicting his fourth wound so far.
With the frigate still held forward by her anchor, she was in grave danger of being pounded to pieces by the guns of the fortresses. The Spaniards, fighting for every inch of the forward part of the maindeck, naturally stopped any of the British getting into the cable tier and cutting the anchor cable from inboard, since the bitts to which it was secured and the hawse hole through which it passed, were of course at the forward end of this deck.
Fortunately at this moment Lt Wilson, having finished his almost childish fight with the guard boat, arrived with his launch and went alongside at the Hermione’s bow where the three axemen immediately began chopping away at the cable. Wilson was ordered to send up his boarders, who were urgently needed to help deal with the Spaniards on the maindeck—but keep the boat’s crew and be ready to tow the ship round. Captain Hamilton then sent some men down to the other boats with instructions to help the launch, and they were joined by the Boatswain’s red cutter, the last to arrive alongside.
The Hermione, held by the anchor, was lying head to wind. There was little enough room to manoeuvre under sail in daylight; in the darkness it was out of the question. But once the anchor cable was cut the boats could tow her bow round and, with the wind blowing down the channel, she could sail out under her topsails, which had already been let fall.
A man sent to look down from the fo’c’sle had already reported to
Captain Hamilton that the axemen were hard at work on the cable. The stalwart Gunner, despite his wounds, was at the wheel, helped by two seamen and ready to steer the ship out of Puerto Cabello. Other men stood by at the sheets, halyards and braces, waiting for the moment when the topsails began to draw. On the maindeck, however, there was still bitter fighting. (See Plate II, page 273.)
Finally shouts from the fo’c’sle told Hamilton the cable had been cut: at last the Hermione was free of her anchor, and the Surprise’s boats began to tow her round. Navigationally, at least, Hamilton was for the moment in complete command, since his men controlled the upperdeck; but would the Spaniards be able to fight their way up again? He was in the position of a coachman who dare not leave the reins even though his passengers were trying to murder each other.
A few minutes later the ship had been towed round enough for the sails to start drawing: sheets, halyards and braces were hauled home, and the Gunner felt
the wheel react as the water began to swirl past the rudder. The shore batteries were still keeping up a heavy fire while the boats, their task of towing completed, hooked on astern so that they in turn could be towed. The frigate’s topsails now filled, and at once she came to life. She rolled slightly in the breeze, and for a few moments the movement exposed her hull below the waterline: just long enough for a shot from a shore battery to crash home and, as she came on to an even keel again, water began to flood in through the hole.
Some of the boarders had to break off the fight to work the pumps, but the clanking of the pumphandles combined with the movement of the ship was a turning point in the battle: the Spaniards realized that the frigate was now under way and, for all they knew, in danger of sinking. Several of them leapt out through the gun ports, preferring to risk the long swim to the shore.
At that point Antonio, the Portuguese Coxswain of the Surprise’s gig, who understood Spanish, ran up to the quarterdeck to warn Captain Hamilton that some Spaniards, trapped on the lowerdeck, were planning to blow up the ship. Lt du Pin was sent with some Marines to fire a few shot down the hatchway and dissuade them from any such idea.
Finally, almost exactly one hour after Captain Hamilton had first scrambled on board, the Hermione was sailing out of the entrance of Puerto Cabello heading for the open sea with the boats in tow. The Spaniards still fighting at the forward end of the maindeck then realized their position was hopeless and surrendered.
With the fighting over, Captain Hamilton was able to devote his whole attention to sailing the ship. Seamen were soon at work securing the mainmast, which, with the main and spring stays cut, was in danger of going over the side, particularly if the ship started pitching. The Carpenter set men to work plugging the shothole below the waterline, and the rest of the boarders guarded the prisoners and tried to make the wounded comfortable. A Red Ensign was run up with the red and gold flag of Spain beneath it.