by Roy Adkins
News that they were the centre of attention across the Continent filtered into Gibraltar, causing Ancell to sum up his feelings in a few lines of verse:
But as we’re actors – Europe the spectators,
I trust we shall perform in this great cause,
As men determined to maintain the right
Of George our King, and Britain’s fame and welfare.
Although the foe has made a hectoring boast,
That each discharge from land and sea we’ll find,
Two thousand shot and shells from guns and mortars,
Will constantly be show’ring on the garrison.9
Towards the end of August, much of Gibraltar’s shipping was gathered inside the New Mole, protected by a boom, and the seamen were busy removing the stores from each vessel, taking down masts and rigging, removing the guns and setting up a camp at Europa. Now that they were living ashore, the seamen were formed into a Marine Brigade, numbering around nine hundred men, under Captain Roger Curtis, who was given the rank of brigadier. Ancell described the men in a letter to his brother:
The seamen are in good spirits, and swear bitterly against the Dons ... You would smile to view the tars handling their firelocks, and march fully accoutred; the boatswain’s pipe, all hands aloft, brace the yards, tacks and sheets, &c. are no longer heard. The glittering beauties of the parade engage the attention, while whistling winds, and roaring billows are forgotten. Thus military equipped, they long for battle to perform their evolutions and manoeuvres, which on a parade might excite laughter, but amidst blazing cannon, and clouds of smoke, every awkward appearance will be hid.10
Including officers and the Marine Brigade, the garrison had about 7500 men, of whom more than 400 were in the hospital, even though the influenza epidemic had died out. Eliott estimated that nearly forty thousand French and Spanish troops were waiting to invade, and Ancell, whose estimate was even higher, reckoned that the opposing force was not just greater in numbers, but in health: ‘In the camp of Santa Roque is an army of 50,000 men, not worn out with the heavy toils of war, but healthful and vigorous, while our garrison deprived of all nourishment, and almost as feeble as old age for want of succour, can muster very few more than 5000 men and boys, including sick, wounded and disabled, to repulse the efforts of such a superior force.’11 The pace of preparations was being pushed to the limit, and over a thousand men were employed night and day at Willis’s, reinforcing all the batteries.
From the French camp, Houdan-Deslandes could see that ‘the English were working relentlessly on an epaulement that they wanted to withstand the firing from our new parallel. Every day we could hear the explosion of mines that they were carrying out in order to open up refuges in the interior of the mountain.’ On 2 September, he mentioned a religious service that took place in the presence of the Comte d’Artois and Duc de Bourbon:
a grand mass was celebrated at the Spanish hospital for the prosperity of our armies. The princes, the generals and a number of designated officers from the Spanish and French regiments assisted in this holy ceremony. A philosophical writer might be permitted to reflect on the spirit of the nations of Europe that wanted to interest the Supreme Being in their quarrels and vengeances. God is the father of everyone; everyone has an equal right to his goodness.12
After the mass, Houdan-Deslandes said, ‘their Royal Highnesses went to see the wounded Spaniards, who they treated with the sweetest affability’. Two days later, they visited the French invalids in the hospital at St Roque, and that same evening they must have watched as seven of the floating batteries sailed, with the assistance of sweeps, from Algeciras to the Orange Grove. Houdan-Deslandes thought that ‘they appeared to move perfectly, confounding their critics, and undoubtedly impressed the English, who saw them move with so much ease’.13 Ancell, though, was not impressed: ‘they had a very stiff breeze from S.W. but were two hours in performing the distance of four miles. They look very unwieldy, and lay deep in the water; three of them have two tier of guns.’14 As a precaution, the decision was taken to scuttle some of the shipping at the New Mole to help its survival during an attack.
The next day, 5 September, Drinkwater watched as the floating batteries began to take on supplies, ammunition and crews: ‘towards evening, about five hundred men, escorted by a body of cavalry, embarked from the pier, on board the battering ships. The singular mode of conducting them to the beach could not fail to attract our notice, and to cause in us some degree of surprise.’ Some were volunteers, but most were Spanish regular troops who may have needed some encouragement. The day after, Ancell noticed that ‘The tenth [and final] floating battery is roofed, and they have begun to rig her; a few days more, and then we shall fall to it ding-dong.’15
The officers for the floating batteries were now chosen, and Houdan-Deslandes said that they all envied them:
The Spanish and French officers whose duty it was to go on board were named and applauded. Each one had its captain, its staff, its crew. Forty gunboats and twenty mortar boats were completed and armed. Everything was ready for this day, which was already famous, when Gibraltar would finally be attacked by sea and by land, within sight of two Bourbons, under the orders of the conqueror of Minorca, and with new machines whose inventor ... must be added to those rare geniuses who add to discoveries each century ... Everyone was saying that Gibraltar would be forced to capitulate before the end of September; everyone believed it; and if there were any unbelievers, they didn’t dare show it.16
This was, he said, the biggest army that had ever gathered in Europe, and the attack would take place ‘in the presence of several famous admirals, and in the sight of more than 80,000 spectators’.17 These war tourists, who now outnumbered the French and Spanish soldiers, were jostling for viewing positions on the Spanish hills, and Picton described them in a letter to General Cornwallis as ‘multitudes of spectators of all ranks, and from various parts, as seemed to form, as it were, an endless succession of promiscuous groups, extending over all the adjacent eminences’.18
In the afternoon of 7 September, while the soldiers of the besieging army continued toiling on the advance works on the isthmus and the crews were stuck inside the floating batteries, the high-ranking French and Spanish officers, along with the royalty, were invited to a dinner hosted by the Comte de Crillon, the son of the Duc de Crillon:
Monsieur the Comte d’Artois and Monsieur the Duc de Bourbon came to dine with me in the French camp. After eating, the afternoon was filled in the most merry way, with a parade done very cheerily, and dances as well as singing rounds and verses by our grenadiers. For my own part, I was greatly entertained, and I believe that M. the Comte d’Artois has never laughed so much. The cheerfulness of our soldiers had spread to him, and there was something frivolous about it.19
Drinkwater was of the opinion that the Duc de Crillon was so engrossed in completing the alterations and repairs to the gun and mortar batteries on the isthmus that he had neglected to take precautions for their defence. They were piled high with construction materials, some guns were obstructed and others had been removed. Boyd suggested to Eliott that they should seize the opportunity to attack the Spanish positions with red-hot shot, and Ancell described how he took charge: ‘This morning [the 8th], Lieutenant-General Boyd took post on the grand-battery (having command of all the batteries) and the necessary arrangements being made from the rock-gun to the Old-Mole-Head, we began a furious cannonade of red-hot balls upon the enemy’s Mahon-battery (mounted with six pieces of ordnance) and other lines of approach, together with a supply of shells and carcasses.’20 The results were spectacular, as Drinkwater related: ‘The effect of the red-hot shot and carcasses exceeds our most sanguine expectations. In a few hours, the Mahon battery of six guns with the battery of two guns on its flank, and great parts of the adjoining parallel, were on fire; and the flames, notwithstanding the Enemy’s exertions to extinguish them, burnt so rapidly that the whol
e of those works before night were consumed.’21
Houdan-Deslandes said that the Comte de Crillon gave orders in every direction, and officers and soldiers alike tried to tear down and cut the fascines or fetch sea water, but the Rock kept firing:
Nothing could make them relent. Neither the sight of the dying, nor the groans of the wounded, nor the constant firing which became so fierce that we counted 20 shots per minute ... The firing of the besieged ... was inflamed by rage; it could not be extinguished by bravery. Red-hot shot increased the fire ... We saw several officers in shirt-sleeves, their bare arms black with smoke, their fronts covered with ash, who worked for hours on the blazing fortification and encouraged the men by this rare and powerful example.22
Boyd’s journal expressed admiration for the enemy’s valour: ‘[the red-hot shot] had the desired and glorious effect to set on fire their different advanced batteries, which was repeatedly put out by them, for braver men was never seen than the enemy were on the batteries that was on fire. They never flinched from shot or shells which fell among them as thick as hail.’23 Ancell likewise admired them:
The foe withstood our fire with intrepidity, until most of their works, and the thirteen-gun battery next the bay, were blazing in several places, and strewed over with mangled limbs and dead bodies. Several parties appeared upon the glacis, and in an undaunted manner, tore up the fascines. Some kept pouring of baskets of sand upon the parts that were on fire, and others running to the sea for buckets of water. Thus they stood, while showers of balls fell on every side, and many were observed to be knocked off the works. I assure you, it was a horrid scene of slaughter.24
The garrison’s gunners relished being able to take decisive action, particularly in defiance of the hostile crowd watching from a safe distance, and managed to destroy the new Mahon battery and badly damaged two batteries that had been rebuilt since the sortie – St Carlos and St Martin’s. Ancell could barely contain his excitement: ‘The most intoxicating joy gained possession of the soldiery, and every heart and hand was cheerfully employed; and while gazing crowds, who had taken post upon Andalusia’s hills, beheld the vollies of destruction that flew in showers, and the sad effects that were productive of the red-flaming balls, our men rejoiced, and made a pastime of the dire employ.’25 This was certainly not the magnificent spectacle that the tourists had come to see.
The Spanish guns retaliated furiously, and some casualties were inflicted on the British side. Drinkwater mentioned Major Philip Martin of the artillery, who had ‘a very fortunate escape from a twenty-six pounder, which shot away the cock of his hat close to the crown. I insert this anecdote, because it is commonly believed, that if a cannon-ball of this diameter pass so near the head of a person, it is generally fatal. The Major was considerably stunned with the wind of the shot, but experienced little further injury.’26
The French and Spanish forces immediately set about a rapid repair of the devastation, to the surprise and disappointment of the garrison. From sunrise the next day, a huge retaliatory attack was launched against the northern fortifications of the Rock, particularly Willis’s, which astonished Ancell: ‘Their sixty-four gun battery was an incessant volley the whole time, which lasted most of the day, and the distance being so short, their shot reached the walls almost as soon as you perceived the flash; the discharge was so quick that the balls rolled along the streets by dozens.’27 From the French side, Houdan-Deslandes commented: ‘Ever since sieges have taken place, nobody had ever carried out such a formidable bombardment against a fortress, in such an awesome manner ... The English did not reply with a single cannon shot. This mountain, which the previous day had rung out with the noise of cannonballs that were constantly belched out, kept a deathly silence and seemed uninhabited.’28
The garrison was preserving its ammunition, assuming that an attack by the floating batteries would come next. Instead, they were restocking the magazines and carrying out repairs, which were summarised in Boyd’s journal: ‘Our batteries at Willis’s, Prince’s, Kings and Queens Lines, suffers much by the enemies shot striking against the rocks above, which throws down such heaps of stones that the Lines &c. are almost daily choked up, for which we have about 600 men nightly employed to clear them and keep the avenues open, with necessary repairs.’29 Later on, battleships sailed from the Orange Grove and fired at the west side of the Rock, all the way down to Europa, and then returned, still firing. The next morning, 10 September, they repeated the process, but this time the garrison fired back and they suddenly withdrew. ‘We were afterwards informed,’ Drinkwater said, ‘that the discovery of a red-hot shot on board one of the ships was the immediate cause of this hasty manoeuvre.’30 This was a salutary lesson why warships were of limited use when attacking land fortifications.
The inhabitants were terrified, and Drinkwater watched them trying to protect their property and themselves: ‘Affairs seemed now drawing to a crisis, and as every appearance indicated that the attack would not long be deferred, the inhabitants, apprehensive of the consequences, were wonderfully active in securing themselves and their property.’31 Those who had homes or improvised accommodation in the town fled to the south and took refuge in caves, ‘which opportunity the soldiers do not miss, or let slip them,’ Boyd’s journal related, ‘for they rob, plunder, steal, break open houses and marauds in the same manner, though not with so much success, as they did at the begining of the siege’. Dennis Murray, a soldier in the 39th, seized the opportunity, but was caught. At his court-martial, he was found guilty of breaking into the Red Lion Wine House of Damian Stericho, a Genoese inhabitant, in order to steal a cask of brandy and other goods. Murray was hanged for the crime.32 There was certainly no heroic alliance between the civilians and military against a common enemy, but a basic instinct for self-preservation.
Orders had been given to the French and Spanish army detachments to be ready as soon as the wind changed, because a westerly or north-westerly wind was needed to propel the floating batteries towards Gibraltar. At about midday on the 11th, Houdan-Deslandes said, when ‘everyone was unhappy at the contrary winds, and all eyes were fixed on the weather vanes of the tents, everyone making heartfelt wishes for a change in the weather, the wind changed to the west’.33 Drums started beating in the camps, sounding the signal to go on board. While they waited their turn, in the French camp there was huge excitement, with dancing, singing and drinking everyone’s health.
When the garrison spotted what seemed to be signals for the start of the attack, orders were given for the furnaces to be lit for red-hot shot, but as the afternoon gave way to evening, Drinkwater thought that the first move would be made under the cover of darkness: ‘Thus prepared, we waited their appearance (for it seemed to be the general opinion, that the battering-ships would advance, and be moored in the night, and open with greater effect together at day-break).’34 What happened instead was that, during the night, soldiers came in close to the approaches to Landport and set fire to the wooden barricades at Bayside and Forbes, causing them to burn right down to the water’s edge. The intruders were driven off by musket fire, but it looked as if a ground assault was to coincide with the floating batteries, though Houdan-Deslandes later revealed that the reason for burning the barricades was to facilitate soldiers deserting from Gibraltar. In the distance, bands of music were heard playing all night, so the camp was obviously in high spirits, while the Spanish artillery bombardment also continued. The gunboats joined in after midnight, but only a few retaliatory shots were fired from the Rock. Instead, everyone was waiting for daylight, convinced that this would be the day for the grand assault.
Almost four weeks earlier, a letter from a soldier in Gibraltar to his father in London was published in the Newcastle Journal, saying that Eliott was sending dispatches to England to ask for urgent assistance:
The Spaniards are preparing to attack us in form with a numerous army and a large train of heavy artillery, and our men are greatly harassed and f
atigued with hard duty, and dispirited by being so long cooped up. Our brave Governor does all he can to encourage them to persevere, and to defend the place to the last moment. We are able I believe to hold out to the middle of September, but if we are not relieved by that time we must surrender ... I think that if we are effectually relieved by the 12th of September, the united force of France and Spain will not be able to take the place.35
It was now 12 September, and as daylight came there was both relief and disappointment that the expected array of floating batteries before the Line Wall had not materialised overnight. According to Houdan-Deslandes, there was similar disappointment in the French camp: ‘The wind was still favourable for mooring the floating batteries that everyone thought they would see in place in the morning ... There was grumbling. Impatience led to the rise of suspicions, undoubtedly false.’36 Instead, the Spanish batteries maintained their bombardment, concentrating on the Landport area, from where Ancell came off guard duty that morning:
crossing the Esplanade, I observed a soldier before me, lying on the ground, and his head somewhat raised; I ran to him, imagining the man had life, and lifted him up, when such a sight was displayed to my view that I think I shall never forget: a twenty-six pound ball had gone through his body, and his entrails as they hung out from the orifice were of a most disagreeable resemblance. The shot from the enemy was dropping on every side, and as I found his life was gone, I left him on the same spot ... A party of men buried him soon afterwards.37