by Roy Adkins
In the wider picture there was a further complication. Through the British Secret Service it was known in London that plots existed to assassinate both Napoleon and Tsar Paul. Since government involvement with assassination of foreign heads of state would meet with international outrage, little evidence has survived as to the extent the British government was implicated and which members of the administration knew about it. A change of regime in Russia was likely to solve the problem posed by the Armed Neutrality without the need for bloodshed, and if an assassination attempt was imminent, Parker might have been instructed to stall as long as possible.
Even before he met up with Parker, Nelson at Plymouth was fretting at the delays. His own flagship was not yet ready to sail, and there was little he could do to speed up the repairs and loading of supplies. He spent much of his time on administration and writing letters, but this took its toll on his health, which was perhaps not as good as he had assured the Admiralty. On 28 January he wrote to Emma:My eye [left eye - he was blind in his right] is very bad. I have had the Physician of the Fleet to examine it. He has directed me not to write, (and yet I am forced this day to write [to] Lord Spencer, St. Vincent, Davison . . . &c., but you are the only female I write to;) not to eat anything but the most simple food; not to touch wine or porter; to sit in a dark room; to have green eyeshades for my eyes - (will you, my dear friend, make one or two? - nobody else shall) - and to bathe them in cold water every hour. I fear, it is the writing has brought on this complaint. My eye is like blood; and the film so extended that I only see from the corner farthest my nose.33
Emma did make some green eyeshades, and one was sewn, like a short peak, on to the front of his hat. Three days after writing this letter, he learned that Emma had given birth to his daughter, Horatia.
It took until 7 March for Nelson to make sure his ships were all in good order and then sail to Great Yarmouth to rendezvous with Parker. There was immediate friction between the commanders as Nelson took issue with Parker’s indecision, and this set the pattern for the whole campaign. Parker’s final instructions from the government were to attack the Russian fleet in the Baltic once Copenhagen had been dealt with, and under constant pressure from Nelson, they at last set sail. On 19 March, while rounding the northern tip of Denmark, the British diplomats who had been trying to negotiate a last-minute settlement joined the fleet. They reported that they had failed, and the only option was war with Denmark. To Nelson the situation was clear and he wanted to attack immediately.
At this stage very few people on board the ships knew what was going on, and bad weather was preventing the usual method of detailed communication - officers visiting each other’s ships. Just two days earlier Thomas Fremantle, captain of the Ganges, wrote to his wife: ‘We have since we sailed experienced a second winter; it has snowed every day since, and the ship’s company are hacking from morning to night with coughs; in other respects we are perfectly well but I have had no communication with the flag ship since we left Yarmouth . . . I am more at a loss to guess exactly our destination; we are certainly not in sufficient force to attack Copenhagen, and war is not declared against the Danes. A very little time will unravel this business as we are not at this time above forty leagues from Elsinore [just north of Copenhagen].’34 George Elliot, now a lieutenant on board the St George, mentioned that ‘we usually anchored at night on account of the snowstorms, and it took us nearly an hour at daybreak to shovel down the snow from our tops and yards before we could weigh. It was very trying to my Mediterranean skin and feelings. Towards the end of March it all at once cleared up and became fine weather.’35
Captain Fremantle next wrote to his wife about the delays:You find us almost in the same situation as we were in when last I wrote to you, except that we are a few miles nearer the [Cronborg] Castle, which the Danes are making as formidable as they can. Sir Hyde in his present disposition means to pass the Castle, and Lord Nelson with the Van Division of the fleet is to attack the floating batteries. I confess myself I think if we had had the good fortune to have undertaken this business a week ago we should have more probability of succeeding . . . if I were to give an opinion on this business, I should say the Danes are exceedingly alarmed, but delay gives them courage, and they will by degrees make Copenhagen so strong, that it may resist the attack of our fleet. The whole Coast is lined with Guns and Mortars, but yet I think if we pass the Castle in a day or two, we may succeed. Lord Nelson is quite sanguine, but as you may well imagine there is a great diversity of opinion . . . You will take into consideration that we are now not contending with Frenchmen, or Russians, but with people who have not been at war for 70 or 80 years, and consequently can never have seen a shot fired.36
The holdup in striking at Copenhagen was partly due to contrary winds but mainly to disagreement between Parker, Nelson and the senior captains as to the plan of battle or even whether to attack at all. As Fremantle mentioned, the Danes were using every last minute to strengthen their defences, but at least the interlude allowed the straggling British ships to catch up with the fleet. One ship that did not arrive was the warship Invincible. Sailing from Great Yarmouth, carrying troops and stores, this vessel struck a sandbank off Happisburgh on the Norfolk coast and gradually sank. Even though another ship took off some of the survivors, it was not possible to rescue more than a fraction of those on board. In all, over four hundred lives were lost in this shipwreck - more than the total number of British who would be killed in the forthcoming battle. For days afterwards bodies were washed up on the nearby beaches and cartloads were taken to a mass grave by Happisburgh church, although others were buried at various points along the coast.
The Danes may not have had much recent experience of war, but it was their capital city and in many cases their homes that were threatened by bombardment, so they were particularly determined to put up a strong resistance. Copenhagen was a small city straddling a deep-water channel that separated the large island of Zealand from the very much smaller island of Amager, the channel itself within the city walls providing a sheltered harbour. The walled city was barely 20 feet above water at its highest point, so the fortifications were too low to be secure against bombardment from the sea. To counter this, a line of warships, hulks and barges was anchored to the north-east of the city, on the edge of the channel, to keep the British ships away from the land. At the northern end of this line was the Trekroner fort, positioned at the tip of a shoal, while another line of ships and hulks protected the entrance to the harbour. All these vessels, fitted out as floating gun batteries, formed a rough V shape or arrow pointing northwards, with the Trekroner fort at the apex.
To the east of the channel was the large but invisible Middle Ground Shoal, but all the marker buoys had been lifted. The hurried Danish defences were backed up by gunboats that could move through the shallows, as well as boats to ferry powder and ammunition to the floating batteries. These defences looked very strong, but as the British well knew, the crews of the floating batteries had very little experience, and in fact many of them were recent conscripts from the streets of Copenhagen and the surrounding countryside. The British assessment was that the floating batteries were strong, but the men inside were the weak point. In both cases they were wrong: the ships and hulks were in poor repair, but the Danes made up for their inexperience with raw courage and a tenacious determination to fight to the last.
Almost due east from Amager was the Swedish coastal town of Malmö, separated from Copenhagen by the Sound, a stretch of sea strewn with treacherous shoals and the island of Saltholm. British ships approaching Copenhagen would have to steer a course out of range of both enemy shorelines, while keeping in deep water to avoid running aground. Despite concerted efforts in Britain to obtain detailed charts of the waters off Copenhagen, the fleet was desperately short of information.
On 30 March, the day after Fremantle had written to his wife, the fleet
Chart of the Copenhagen area in 1801
sailed south past Cronbor
g Castle at Elsinore. Here the ships had to pass through a channel between Elsinore in Denmark and Helsingborg in Sweden and could expect to come under fire from both sides. As the Swedes did not open fire, the British ships moved to that side of the channel. Traditionally regarded as a gateway to the Baltic, the channel was nowhere near as formidable as its reputation, and unless fierce fire was coordinated from both Danish and Swedish sides, ships could sail out of range of the guns. The British fleet had several bomb vessels with them - ships specially designed and rigged to carry one or two large mortars that could fire explosive shells, called bombs, over a greater distance than ordinary naval cannons. As they passed Cronborg Castle, out of all the British ships that opened fire it was the bomb vessels that did the damage. An anonymous officer aboard Fremantle’s ship, the Ganges, wrote a letter home:In my last, of the 30th March, I informed you of the intention of the Fleet to pass Elsineur [Cronborg] Castle the first fair wind: it came that very day. We weighed Anchor, formed the Line, and stood past it with all sail set: during the time we were passing, a very great fire was kept up by the Enemy, but not one of our Ships received a shot. The Swedes, very fortunately, did not engage us at all: we were not above a mile from their guns, as we kept their shore on board, to be out of the Danes’ gun-shot; in the mean time we had several Bombships firing on their Town; the shells which they fired killed 160 people ashore at Elsineur.37
The British anchored some 7 miles north of Copenhagen, within sight of the city but well out of range. Immediately they started to reconnoitre and take depth soundings close to the defences, although the Danes were vigilant and opened fire whenever possible. Midshipman John Finlayson on board the St George noted that ‘the night also of the 30th was employed by some of our most intelligent masters and pilots, several of whom we had brought from England with us, in sounding and laying down fresh buoys’. 38 One thing was obvious - the bombardment of Copenhagen was only feasible if the offshore defences were neutralised first. A plan of attack was finally decided upon. The fleet would divide in two, with Nelson (now in the Elephant) taking his ships south, keeping to the east of the Middle Ground Shoal. Once the wind was favourable, he would sail northwards on the west of that shoal to attack Copenhagen. Parker would stay to the north of the city to provide support and guard against enemy ships approaching from that direction. Another factor that had to be considered was the necessity for the British fleet to remain relatively unscathed, so that the Russian fleet could be attacked afterwards.
On the afternoon of 1 April Nelson took his ships south and anchored off the southern tip of the Middle Ground Shoal. After nearly seven weeks of constant frustration and delays, while the ice imprisoning the Russian fleet continued to melt, Nelson was finally poised to attack.
FIVE
WAR AND PEACE
A fleet of British ships of war are the best negotiators in Europe, they always speak to be understood, and generally gain their point.
Nelson, writing to Emma Hamilton before the Battle of Copenhagen1
The next morning, 2 April 1801, there was a favourable wind to take the British ships north past the floating batteries, but first the ships would have to sail between the Refshale Shoal and the Middle Ground Shoal. Neither shoal was visible or marked properly, and the pilots disagreed about the best course to steer. As Nelson struggled to make sense of conflicting advice from the pilots, the crews of the ships were getting ready for battle, and in the Monarch Midshipman William Millard noticed the surgeon’s station:As soon as reports had been delivered from all parts of the ship that every thing was prepared for action, the men were ordered to breakfast . . . Our repast, it may fairly be supposed, under these circumstances, was a slight one. When we left the berth [on the starboard side of the cockpit], we had to pass all the dreadful preparations of the surgeons. One table was covered with instruments of all shapes and sizes; another, of more than usual strength, was placed in the middle of the cockpit: as I had never seen this produced before, I could not help asking the use of it, and received for answer ‘that it was to cut off legs and wings [arms] upon’.2
As the midshipmen returned to their posts, Millard heard the banter between them and the surgeon’s assistants: ‘“Damn you, Doctor,” said one, “if you don’t handle me tenderly, I will never forgive you;” to which the mate answered, “By George, sir, you had better keep out of my clutches, or depend on it I will pay you off all old scores.” Some such compliments as these were passed with almost every one.’3
It was nearly ten o’clock by the time a pilot volunteered to guide the lead ship, the Edgar, up the channel to Copenhagen. The Edgar was followed by the Ardent, Glatton and Isis, but as the remaining ships also weighed anchor and prepared to follow, the Agamemnon, which should have been fifth in the line, ran aground on the Middle Ground Shoal. The navigable channel was not wide, and the shoals made it impossible to position the ships close to the Danish batteries. Because of these difficulties, Nelson had worked out a precise sailing order in advance, matching the fire-power of specific ships against what was known about the individual floating batteries. This was ruined at the outset, but he quickly improvised, ordering the Polyphemus to take the Agamemnon’s place. From the Monarch, which would be almost the last ship, Millard was impressed by the sight of the Edgar sailing into action: ‘A more beautiful and solemn spectacle I never witnessed. The Edgar led the van, and on her approach the battery on the Isle of Amak [Amager] and three or four of the southernmost vessels opened their fire upon her. A man-of-war under sail is at all times a beautiful object, but at such a time the scene is heightened beyond the powers of description. We saw her pressing on through the enemy’s fire, and manoeuvring in the midst of it to gain her station; our minds were deeply impressed with awe, and not a word was spoken throughout the ship but by the pilot and helmsmen.’4
The sailing order was further wrecked when the Bellona and then the Russell ran aground. Although the stranded ships did at least mark the edge of the shoal, they became added obstacles to be avoided. The whole process of deploying the British ships was already very slow, and some of the smaller ships took nearly all day to reach their proper positions, while others never made it at all. The wind was with Nelson’s ships, but once those commanded by Admiral Sir Hyde Parker to the north began to get under way to support the attack, they found the wind directly against them, and it was obvious that they would take a long time to reach the area of the battle. Nelson was kept busy organising the line to maximise his fire-power by hailing and signalling to the ships as they prepared to enter the channel. On board Nelson’s flagship, the Elephant, an army officer, Lieutenant-Colonel William Stewart, watched what was happening: ‘The Action began at five minutes past ten. In about half an hour afterwards,
Plan of the Battle of Copenhagen in 1801
the first half of our fleet was engaged, and before half past eleven, the Battle became general. The Elephant’s station was in the centre . . . our distance [from the batteries] was nearly a cable’s length [200 yards], and this was the average distance at which the Action was fought; its being so great, caused the long duration of it. Lord Nelson was most anxious to get nearer; but the same error which had led the two Ships on [to] the shoal, induced our Master and Pilots to dread shoaling.’5
Edward Riou, captain of the frigate Amazon, was in charge of five frigates that were stationed towards the northern end of the battle line. Normally frigates were considered too small and lightly armed to take part in battle, but Riou saw that where Nelson had reorganised the battleships to close the gaps left by the grounded vessels, the battle line did not extend as far north as was planned. Riou moved his frigates to lengthen the line northwards, which took some pressure off the northernmost battleships, but at great cost to the frigates.
On board the Monarch, stationed to the north of the Elephant with the Ganges anchored between them, Millard recorded the start of the battle: ‘We anchored about ten [o’clock], but not precisely in the station originally intended, for thi
s reason, that two of the ships stationed by Lord Nelson ahead of us never made their appearance [because they ran aground] . . . When the ship came to, I was on the quarter-deck, and saw Captain Mosse on the poop; his card of instructions was in his left hand, and his right was raised to his mouth with the speaking trumpet.’6 This picture remained in the young midshipman’s memory because it was the last time he saw his captain alive: ‘I returned to my station at the aftermost guns; and in a few minutes the Captain was brought aft perfectly dead. Colonel Hutchinson was with me, and was asked if he thought it right that the Captain should be carried below; he answered that he saw no sign of life, and it might only damp the spirits of the men. He was then laid in the stern walk, and a flag thrown over him. Colonel Hutchinson turned round and exclaimed with tears in his eyes, “Poor man! he has left a wife and family to lament him.”’7
This was not an auspicious start to the battle for the crew of the Monarch, and Millard commented: ‘I was conscious that employment was the surest mode to escape those unpleasant sensations which must arise in every one’s breast that has time for reflection in such a situation. I therefore pulled off my coat, helped to run out the gun, handed the powder, and literally worked as hard as a dray-horse.’8 Like many of the ships, the Monarch had an extra complement of soldiers on board in case they were needed for a ground assault on the harbour, but being at extreme musket range (about 200 yards) from the enemy, there was little they could do. Millard saw that they ‘were dressed in full uniform and stationed upon the poop and on the gangway where they kept up a fire of musketry, till they were mowed down so fast that they were ordered below to wait further orders. The remainder, in their working-jackets without accoutrements, were attached to [help with] the great guns.’9 Lieutenant-Colonel Hutchinson was their commanding officer, and to set an example he continued to pace the quarterdeck, resplendent in his full uniform, but, as Millard related, ‘This brave officer had, strictly speaking, no particular duty to do . . . he begged I would employ him if I thought he could do any good. I was at this time seated on the deck, cutting the wads asunder for the guns; and the Colonel, notwithstanding the danger attending his uniform breeches, sat himself down and went to work.’10