Cochrane

by Donald Thomas

  An attempt to form a national war cabinet failed when Pitt refused to join Addington. None the less, dramatic plans were devised for continued government of the country after Buonaparte's army should have landed. The King and the Prime Minister would move to Chelmsford or Dartford, to direct the counter-attack against French beach-heads in either Essex or Kent. The Queen would be evacuated to Worcester with the duplicate bank books and the crown jewels. The press would be controlled by the Secretary of State, and acts of government would be issued from London by the Privy Council.9

  England's ultimatum embodied demands for the ten-year occupation of Malta, thus ensuring its own rejection. Lord Whitworth, after a final row with Buonaparte at a Tuileries reception, demanded his passports and left Paris on 12 May. The French ambassador left London at dawn four days later. On 18 May, war was declared. The revelations of Lord St Vincent's Commissioners of enquiry led to prosecutions for over-charging, or not building H.M.S. Ajax to specifications. But after all the apprehension, these one-day trials made little impact on a public whose fearful preoccupation was with the enemy across the water.10

  As early as 8 March the press gangs had been out at Portsmouth, Gosport, Cowes, and on the Thames. "Every merchant ship in the harbour and at Spithead was stripped of its hands, and all the watermen deemed fit for His Majesty's service were carried off," The Times reported three days later. Six hundred men were pressed on that occasion, leaving merchant ships to be manned by foreign nationals who were, in theory, immune from conscription. The press on the Thames gathered in a thousand more sailors, but the United States consul, G. W. Erving, was soon at the Admiralty, protesting at the number of American sailors pressed into the Royal Navy. Their Lordships agreed reluctantly that all men who could produce "satisfactory testimonials of their being citizens of America" were to be discharged. But proof of citizenship was a fruitful topic of discord between America and Britain. When United States citizens were still held on Royal Navy ships, the Lords of the Admiralty ingenuously explained that they had not been released because they had been heard to express "a wish that they may have the opportunity of meeting the common enemy". In fact, their Lordships found it hard to adjust to the idea, after quarter of a century, that those who looked and spoke like Englishmen, and in some cases were English-born, were not fair game for the press gang.11

  When war was declared, Cochrane wrote to St Vincent, seeking command of a ship to "operate inshore and harass the French coast in the Atlantic", as the Speedy had done the Spanish coast in the Mediterranean. St Vincent replied that no ships were available. He had not forgotten the tall young captain with his slow, insolent manner and his expressed contempt for governments and their servants. He had made Lieutenant Beaver the laughing stock of the flagship. He had reminded St Vincent of the rumours which alleged that his lordship had led from the rear in the great battle which won him his title. He had taunted the Admiralty Board with suggestions that they would have been better pleased with the Gamo if the Speedy's casualty list had been longer. By St Vincent's standards, the contemptuous young Scot had yet to learn the lessons of naval discipline.12

  Cochrane listed the ships in preparation and sent it to the First Lord. St Vincent replied coldly that they were promised elsewhere. Cochrane sent a second list of ships just under construction. They could hardly have been promised yet. St Vincent wrote angrily that they were all too large for a junior captain to command. But Cochrane was not without sympathisers. The Earl of Dundonald wrote to St Vincent on his son's behalf, and received a dull answer. The Marquis of Douglas wrote. "I have not forgot Lord Cochrane," replied the First Lord, "but I should not be justified in appointing him to the command of an 18-pounder frigate when there are so many senior captains of great merit without ships of that class."13

  Cajoled by these protesters, St Vincent meditated his revenge. Cochrane himself was pacing the famous "waiting room" of the Admiralty, among other hopeful commanders, demanding audience with the First Lord. At length, St Vincent received him and Cochrane, in his slow deliberate lowland manner, played what seemed to be the winning card.

  "If the Board is evidently of the opinion that my services are not required, it will be better for me to go back to the College of Edinburgh and pursue my studies, with a view of occupying myself in some other employment."14

  Cochrane later recalled, "His lordship eyed me keenly, to see whether I really meant what I said." But there was no doubt that the preposterous young captain, who dared to address the First Lord in a tone bordering on contempt, was in earnest. St Vincent knew that to send Cochrane back to Edinburgh was, effectively, to dismiss him from the Royal Navy without charge or trial. He could well imagine the storm which would break over their Lordships' heads in that event. As Cochrane recalled, St Vincent's displeasure was visible in his face as he dismissed the young captain.

  "Well, you shall have a ship. Go down to Plymouth, and there await the orders of the Admiralty."15

  Cochrane went straight to Plymouth. Almost at once he was informed that his new ship was ready for him, and that the Admiralty had appointed him to command H.M.S. Arab. He dreamt, as he later recalled, of "a rakish craft, ready to run over to the French coast, and return with a goodly batch of well-laden coasters". With this in mind, he toured the dockyard in search of her and was finally led to the place where she lay. His first recorded observation on seeing her was, "She will sail like a haystack."16

  H.M.S. Arab was not a warship at all but a battered old collier. With the coming of war, some enterprising businessman had bought her, almost from the scrapyard, in order to hire her out at £400 a month to an Admiralty which was hard-pressed to find ships. Cochrane may have seen himself getting the better of St Vincent, but he had been deftly snared. He had demanded a ship and orders. Now he had got both. His supporters would hear of his new command and, never having seen H.M.S. Arab, would relax their efforts.

  It was apparent that there could be no question of getting the Arab to sea in her present state. She had been stripped down to her "bare ribs". Indeed, he found it was impossible to refit her at all except by using old timbers scavenged from other hulks recently broken up. When he had done the best he could with her, he was ordered to take her out on trials, round Land's End, into St George's Channel, and then back to Plymouth. This was his first voyage for many months and, at the sight of several ships which looked like possible prizes, he set a course to intercept them. But the Arab handled, according to her appearance, like an overladen tub. While her new captain fulminated on his little quarterdeck, the ancient collier wallowed at a humiliating and increasing distance from the quarry she was intended to pursue.

  Despite this, when the Arab returned from her trials she was given immediate orders to join the flotilla of ships, under Lord Keith's general command, which was endeavouring to blockade Napoleon's invasion force in Boulogne. This was proving less easy than the Admiralty had hoped. Boulogne harbour was dry at low tide and its principal channel of navigation was the course of the little river Liane which ran through it. The original intention had been to sink block-ships in this channel and so avoid the necessity of a full-scale blockade. But as Captain Crawford observed, watching these futile attempts from the deck of the Immortalite, it was almost impossible to get a favourable wind and tide so that the block-ships would be in the right positions for scuttling. After a month of "calms and contrary winds" the ingenious idea was abandoned and the entire squadron settled down to the dreary weeks of a conventional blockade.17

  There was no lack of excitement on board the Arab, though it was not of the kind which Cochrane had envisaged. The problem with the vessel, as with most colliers of the day, was that she would sail quite well but only in one direction. With the wind behind her, there was no difficulty in crossing from Ramsgate and the Kent coast to Boulogne. But nothing, it seemed, would persuade her to sail back against the wind. While the other ships of the blockade force prudently withdrew, Cochrane and his crew were left struggling with their ungainly cra
ft, endeavouring by rigging and sweeps to sail or row her out of danger, until the tide changed and began to carry them clear of the French coast.

  As Lord St Vincent's revenge, the Arab could hardly have been improved upon. Most forms of offensive action were out of the question while, as Cochrane remarked, the first strong wind from north or north-west was going to wreck the vessel on the French shore. No one who knew anything about ships or their handling would have ordered a collier to take part in the Boulogne blockade, as he complained to Lord Keith. His complaint was forwarded to the Admiralty, where Cochrane imagined it would cause considerable satisfaction.

  There was, however, one method of dealing with their Lordships which might still prove effective in getting the Arab removed from the Boulogne blockade. The time had come to stage an international incident in the Straits of Dover, choosing the United States as the opposing party. There was a special reason for the choice. The

  American ambassador in London, occupying the residence in Wim-pole Street, was James Monroe, who had already served as congressman, senator, and governor of Virginia. Later and better known as President Monroe, he had shown strong sympathy with revolutionary France during his period as envoy there and was almost the last man alive to tolerate interference with American shipping on the high seas.

  By great good fortune, Cochrane was able to manoeuvre the Arab with sufficient speed to intercept the United States merchant ship Chatham, bound from New York to Amsterdam. In his most outrageous manner, he stopped and boarded the Chatham in the Dover Straits. He informed her master, Captain Chur, that there was a British blockade of the river Texel and that, consequently, the Chatham must turn back. Chur was surprised at the news, which was natural enough since Cochrane had just invented this particular "blockade" for his own purposes. Indeed, when the American captain seemed about to ignore the warning and sail on, Cochrane advised him that if he did so he would be sunk. The Chatham dropped anchor in the Downs, and Chur sent an anxious message to Wimpole Street.

  Monroe's enemies found him lacking in certain of the finer intellectual qualities, but he was ideally qualified to blast their Lordships of the Admiralty with his protests over this outrage. He accused them of allowing the Chatham to be "impeded in her voyage" and her captain to be threatened by Cochrane. "I am led to presume that this is some mistake," he added, in describing the alleged blockade. The Admiralty hastily admitted that Cochrane's action was "unauthorised". They had no wish to add an American war to all their existing commitments. As a general precaution, the Arab and her commander were sent to protect fishing fleets beyond the Orkneys. In these lonely northern waters, where the collier now patrolled, there were no prizes, no signs of the enemy, and not even a fishing fleet to protect. Cochrane's punishment by the Admiralty was by no means over. For more than a year he endured this "naval exile in a tub, regardless of expense to the nation". Lord St Vincent was content, noting in Cochrane's case, "not to be trusted out of sight", and adding for good measure, "mad, romantic, money-getting, and not truth-telling". Admiral Keith hastened to support the First Lord and, temporarily forgetting the prizes which he had enjoyed through Cochrane's efforts, reported the young post-captain as "wrong-headed, violent and proud".18

  The cruise of the Arab, from 5 October 1803 until 1 December 1804 was described by Cochrane as "a blank in my life". It was fortunate for him that political life at Westminster had been somewhat more eventful. William Pitt and Charles James Fox, the two dominating figures of the opposition, had privately agreed to bring down the Addington government. One of the unlikely targets which they chose was Lord St Vincent, the very symbol of the fight against naval corruption. While Pitt led the attack in the House of Commons, newspapers like the True Briton and pamphlets such as Francis Blagdon's Naval Administration: A Letter to the Earl of St Vincent, accusing him of "incapacity" and "misconduct", maintained a shrill denunciation before the general public. Another of Blagdon's pamphlets, Audi Alteram Partem, went further, assuring its readers that St Vincent had paid £3000 out of public funds in an attempt to get the earlier pamphlet suppressed. St Vincent may be an unsympathetic figure but it is only fair to add that when the proposition for suppressing the first pamphlet was put to him, he replied characteristically that he "would not give sixpence to suppress or stop the circulation of that, or of all the pamphlets in the world".19

  When the renewed war had broken out with France, Addington had tried to induce Pitt to serve under him. Attacked on all sides during the spring of 1804, he gave up the struggle to govern alone and reconciled himself to serving under Pitt. His administration resigned on 10 May 1804, Pitt becoming Prime Minister for the last time in his life. Addington was created Viscount Sidmouth when, in 1805, he became President of the Council in the new ministry. Indeed, Pitt's government contained six of Addington's twelve colleagues who, a few weeks before, had sworn that Pitt was a danger to his country and the curse of its politics. Sheridan, surveying the Treasury Bench across the floor of the Commons, remarked scornfully, "The six new nags will have to draw not only the carriage but those six heavy cast-off blacks along with it."20

  There was no place for St Vincent in the new administration. He had stirred up too much mud in the murky depths of naval affairs and had been the main target in Pitt's attack on the Addington government. Worse still, libel actions against Blagdon and others had been begun on his behalf by the former ministry. The new Attorney-General was obliged to continue them, thus putting Pitt and his colleagues in the invidious position of prosecuting men who had written at their own instigation while they were in opposition. For St Vincent there could be no hope. He was replaced as First Lord of the Admiralty by Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville, later to be impeached for fraud.

  Melville, although over sixty, was described by his acquaintance

  Joseph Farington the painter as "very hearty & has great spirits

  He drank wine liberally". For better or worse, he was a total contrast to the grim figure of St Vincent. Melville disliked formal interviews with officers and conducted virtually all his business by correspondence. "The intercourse I had with Naval Officers was at my dinner table." Dinner parties were, for the new First Lord, the prime source of information about the navy and the war. Melville had been a loyal colleague of Pitt, rewarded by simultaneous incomes as Treasurer of the Navy, President of the Board of Control, and other offices. Sheridan suggested that in a time of national crisis, decency required the surrender of at least one sinecure, but Melville could not see it.21

  The favours shown to him, he showed to others in turn. When the Duke of Hamilton wrote, complaining that one of the most promising Scottish seamen, young Lord Cochrane, was exiled on a collier somewhere between the Orkneys and Greenland, Melville took notice. The Duke, at least, was not a man to be ignored, however much the other members of the Board of Admiralty might wish the exile to continue. When Cochrane returned from fifteen months of desolation, he learnt that Melville had given him a command: the Pallas, a new fir-built frigate of thirty-two guns.

  The appointment occurred just in time. Though St Vincent was out of office, the work of his Commission continued with the appearance of a ioth Report. Lord Melville was accused of "malversation", as it was quaintly termed, or embezzlement on a grand scale, as Treasurer of the Navy. The crimes alleged against him covered a period as far back as 1782. He was obliged to resign as First Lord and was impeached before the House of Lords on a motion of the Commons. A year later, he was acquitted, though this would have been too late to do Cochrane any good.22

  The Pallas was precisely the "rakish" craft of which he had dreamed. She was 667 tons with thirteen guns in a graceful curving line on each side of her main deck, as well as half a dozen chase-guns. But despite this, there was no rush of volunteers to serve under Cochrane. It was a long time since men had heard of any prizes taken by him and they had no intention of going to sea with a booby who had forgotten that war was, in the first place, a matter of cash. Having no better alternative, Co
chrane resorted to the press gang. When two constables got in the way, his men beat them up in a running fight. A summons was issued for Cochrane's arrest on charges of assault. In turn, Cochrane brought an action against the Mayor of Plymouth for assault upon men employed in the King's service. He lost the case.

  But when the Pallas sailed out of Plymouth on the grey winter sea of 21 January 1805, the mood of the conscripted men began to change. As compensation for his exile in the Arab, Melville had allowed Cochrane to cruise for several weeks off the Azores before joining convoy duty in the Atlantic. During those few weeks, the plunder of the trade between Cadiz and the West Indies was to be his for the taking. As the captured vessels, under prize crews from the Pallas, dropped anchor in the Hamoaze, the papers reported Cochrane's new wealth with pop-eyed incredulity.

  February 24 - Came in the Caroline from Havannah with sugar and logwood, captured off the coast of Spain by the Pallas, Captain Lord Cochrane. The Pallas was in pursuit of another with a very valuable cargo when the Caroline left. . . .

  March 7 - Came in a rich Spanish prize with jewels, gold, silver, ingots, and a valuable cargo, taken by the Pallas, Captain Lord Cochrane. Another Spanish ship, the Fortuna, from Vera Cruz, has been taken by the Pallas, laden with mahogany and logwood. She had 432 000 dollars on board, but has not yet arrived.