The War of Wars (90 page)

Moreover the whole country remained mired in a guerrilla war of unbelievable ferocity on both sides. After the surrender at Bailen the Spaniards had landed 10,000 Frenchmen to die of starvation on a remote island. Other Frenchmen who were captured were often crucified, boiled or buried alive. Goya’s gruesome etchings of the disasters of war give an idea of the methods employed, with people being impaled on stakes or on trees. The French responded with mass executions by firing squad or hanging, and by raping as a matter of course to sustain the carnal appetites of the troops stuck in this hostile, barren land. The cruelty and suffering in Spain awoke the indignation not just of the British but of people across Europe, whether Napoleon’s subjects or not. It also tied down some 300,000 French troops. It seemed that a barbarous but brave people had at last found the courage to resist the Napoleonic steamroller.

The British could not just act the part of spectators. Castlereagh and Canning were determined to stand up to Napoleon. The guerrilla struggle in the Peninsula also kindled sparks of resistance elsewhere in Europe. Everywhere Napoleon began to be denounced as a tyrant rather than a liberator. The German philosopher Fichte issued an ‘Address to the German People’ in late 1807 which stoked feelings of
latent nationalism. In Prussia, Stein, a liberal nationalist who had been appointed by the Kaiser to run his truncated state, was hunted down by the French and forced to flee to Austria.

The Spanish resistance also encouraged the sputtering anti-French insurrection in Calabria, which had continued from 1806, although this was finally more or less crushed by the new King of Naples, Joachim Murat (far more ruthless and effective militarily than Joseph Bonaparte) by the end of 1811. In the Tyrol, with Austrian backing, anti-Bavarian anti-French guerrillas rose up in May 1809 seizing control of the capital of Innsbruck and forcing its garrison of 6,000 to surrender. They were led by a huge innkeeper called Hofer. But after terrible atrocities had been committed by both sides, the insurrection dwindled away by 1810. There was a smaller uprising in Westphalia.

In Britain at last Wellesley won the argument and on 6 April 1809 he was authorized to lead a new expeditionary force on the Peninsula; General Beresford had already been sent to Portugal to organize Portuguese resistance. On 14 April Wellesley embarked, and his old ill-fortune with sea travel returned. Sailing into a gale, the captain told him the ship was sure to founder. ‘In that case’, replied Sir Arthur in one of the curt soundbites that were increasingly becoming his trademark, ‘I shall not take off my boots.’ He had been given a second chance to resume his controversial career.

As Sir Arthur sailed off to Spain, Thomas Cochrane, that even more peppery, fiery and bizarre commander, was about to reach the climax of his own career. Since the stinging defeat at Trafalgar in 1805, Napoleon had not been idle at sea: he had thrown himself into a programme of naval building and in 1809 for the first time in four years, appeared seriously to be threatening Britain with invasion once again. He had constructed fourteen new ships of the line at the superb new dockyard in the Scheldt estuary, while ten more were being built at Antwerp and Flushing. Others were being made in French dockyards.

The French fleet was now located at Aix Roads. Although not doing mischief at sea, this was a seemingly impregnable anchorage, close to the French frontier with Spain. From there it could threaten the British sea lines of communication with the expeditionary army in Portugal. It was also liable to emerge to attack merchant shipping with the West Indies, if not the West Indies themselves, where the British had just captured Martinique once again. West Indian trade was a lifeline to Britain while the Continental System was in force. The Aix anchorage, with its long and treacherous approaches, was much more difficult to blockade closely than Brest, and rough weather in the Bay of Biscay always threatened to force British flotillas to stand well out to sea.

It appeared that Napoleon was regaining his confidence at sea. The Admiralty would have none of it and ordered Admiral Lord Gambier, the commander who had so brutally bombarded Copenhagen, to attack the French with fireships: ‘The enemy’s ships lie much exposed to the operation of fireships, it is a horrible mode of warfare, and the
attempt hazardous, if not desperate; but we should have plenty of volunteers in the service. If you mean to do anything of the kind, it should be done with secrecy and quickly, and the ships used should be not less than those built for the purpose – at least a dozen, and some smaller ones.’

Gambier, however, was simply too cautious a man for this kind of warfare, although he had been commander of the seventeen-strong fleet when the British had bombarded Copenhagen in 1807 with appalling results for that beautiful city. Gambier was a dedicated tractarian Christian who distributed fundamentalist pamphlets to his crew, fiercely opposed alcohol, and refused the common practice of allowing women on board in port. He was known as ‘dismal Jimmie’ by his men. He was fully in the tradition of St Vincent, a new type of Admiralty bureaucrat, determined to bring greater morality on board ship, espousing middle-class values and despising old-style aristocratic pretensions of the kind Cochrane personified.

Gambier’s religious concerns seemed doomed from the start. As one contemporary chaplain wrote: ‘Nothing can possibly be more unsuitably or more awkwardly situated than a clergyman in a ship of war; every object around him is at variance with the sensibilities of a rational and enlightened mind . . . The entrance of a clergyman is, to a poor seaman, often a fatal signal . . . To convert a man of war’s crew into Christians would be a task to which the courage of Loyola, the philanthropy of Howard, and the eloquence of St Paul united would prove inadequate.’

The poet Thomas Hood mocked the Admiral:

Oh! Admiral Gam – I dare not mention bier,
In such a temperate ear;
Oh! Admiral Gam – an Admiral of the Blue,
Of course, to read the Navy List aright,
For strictly shunning wine of either hue,
You can’t be Admiral of the Red or White.

Gambier’s intense religious beliefs did not prevent him being a good commander, but as he so patently was not – he was cautious and
indecisive – they merely grated on the officers beneath him, none more so than Admiral Eliab Harvey, the celebrated captain of the
Temeraire
at Trafalgar. Harvey detested his superior. The bad blood between these two senior commanders of the fleet further demoralized it.

With Gambier in a mire of uncertainty off Aix Roads, the Admiralty conceived of an extraordinary idea. The one officer with close knowledge of Aix Roads from his tour of duty three years before was Thomas Cochrane, who had long suggested invading the anchorage with fireships. Here at last was a use for this tiresome but fearless seaman.

Cochrane was ordered immediately to report to Whitehall. Where once Cochrane had striven desperately to gain an audience with Lord St Vincent, he was now received warmly, even effusively, by the new First Sea Lord, Lord Mulgrave, a red-faced Tory just appointed to office, who was a connoisseur of the arts and displayed an enviable unflappability towards all events, good and bad. Mulgrave was to the point, welcoming him and informing him that in spite of Gambier’s reservations, twelve transports were being converted for use as fireships. ‘You were some years ago employed on the Rochefort station and must to a great extent be acquainted with the difficulties to be surmounted. Besides which, I am told that you then pointed out to Admiral Thornburgh some plan of attack, which would in your estimation be successful. Will you be good enough to detail that or any other plan which your further experience may suggest?’

Cochrane was immediately interested, and launched into his own pet project for building ‘explosion ships’ to add to the fireships. Even Cochrane was taken aback by how seriously, he, a mere captain, was being taken by the First Sea Lord. Now came the shock: Mulgrave told Cochrane that he was to command the expedition.

At this Cochrane was aghast: he knew the fury that giving command of so major a venture to so junior a captain would arouse not just in Gambier, but all the senior captains serving with him. He was deeply sceptical of the Admiralty’s motives.

It was now clear to me why I had been sent for to the Admiralty, where not a word of approbation of my previous services was uttered. The Channel fleet had been doing worse than nothing. The nation was
dissatisfied, and even the existence of the ministry was at stake. They wanted a victory, and the admiral commanding plainly told them he would not willingly risk a defeat. Other naval officers had been consulted, who had disapproved of the use of fireships, and, as a last resource, I had been sent for, in the hope that I would undertake the enterprise. If this were successful, the fleet would get the credit, which would be thus reflected on the ministry; and if it failed, the consequence would be the loss of my individual reputation, as both ministry and commander-in-chief would lay the blame on me.

Mulgrave brushed aside his objections: ‘The present is no time for professional etiquette. All the officers who have been consulted deem an attack with fireships impracticable, and after such an expression of opinion, it is not likely they would be offended by the conduct of fireships being given to another officer who approved of their use.’

Cochrane argued that any senior officer could command the expedition as effectively as he: ‘The plan submitted to your Lordship was not an attack with fireships alone, and when the details become known to the service, it will be seen that there is no risk of failure whatever, if made with a fair wind and flowing tide. On the contrary, its success on inspection must be evident to any experienced officer, who would see that as the enemy’s squadron could not escape up the Charente, their destruction would not only be certain but in fact easy.’

Mulgrave promised to think the matter over. The following day he summoned Cochrane: ‘My Lord, you must go. The Board cannot listen to further refusal or delay. Rejoin your frigate at once. I will make you all right with Lord Gambier. Your confidence in the result has, I must confess, taken me by surprise, but it has increased my belief that all you anticipate will be accomplished. Make yourself easy about the jealous feeling of senior officers. I will so manage it with Lord Gambier that the amour propre of the fleet shall be satisfied.’ To Gambier and the officers of the fleet, a single instruction was sent selecting Lord Cochrane ‘under your Lordship’s direction to conduct the fireships to be employed in the projected attack’. For once, military considerations had overridden political ones in the Admiralty.

Cochrane’s head was swimming with the opportunity offered as his carriage galloped back with all speed to Plymouth to join the twelve transports and to meet up with William Congreve, the inventor of a new type of explosive rocket, who was to take part in the attack. They set off to join the Channel Fleet where Cochrane went aboard Gambier’s flagship to witness an extraordinary scene.

Harvey, incensed by news of Cochrane’s appointment, was giving vent to his spite. As the embarrassed young Cochrane stood by, the veteran seaman hurled a stream of invective upon the self-righteous Admiral. Cochrane recalled that Harvey’s ‘abuse of Lord Gambier to his face was such as I had never before witnessed from a subordinate. I should even now hesitate to record it as incredible, were it not officially known by the minutes of the court-martial in which it sometime afterwards resulted.’

The young captain stood by in embarrassment and afterwards sought out Harvey to apologize to him:

Harvey broke out into invectives of a most extraordinary kind, openly avowing that he never saw a man so unfit for the command of the fleet as Lord Gambier, who instead of sending boats to sound the Channels, which he (Admiral Harvey) considered the best preparation for an attack on the enemy, he had been employing, or rather amusing himself, with mustering the ships’ companies, and had not even taken the pain to ascertain whether the enemy had placed any mortars in front of their lines; concluding by saying, that had Lord Nelson been there, he would not have anchored in Basque Roads at all, but would have dashed at the enemy at once. Admiral Harvey then came into Sir Harry Neale’s cabin, and shook hands with me, assuring me that he should have been very happy to see me on any other occasion than the present. He begged me to consider that nothing personal to myself was intended, for he had a high opinion of me; but that my having been ordered to execute such a service, could only be regarded as an insult to the fleet, and that on this account he would strike his flag so soon as the service was executed. Admiral Harvey further assured me that he had volunteered his services, which had been refused.

That provoked this exchange.

Cochrane began: ‘The service on which the Admiralty has sent me was none of my seeking. I went to Whitehall in obedience to a summons from Lord Mulgrave, and at his Lordship’s request gave the board a plan of attack, the execution of which has been thrust upon me contrary to my inclination, as well knowing the invidious position in which I should be placed.’

Harvey replied: ‘Well, this is not the first time I have been lightly treated, and that my services have not been attended to in the way they deserved; because I am no canting Methodist, no hypocrite, nor a psalm singer. I do not cheat old women out of their estates by hypocrisy and canting. I have volunteered to perform the service you came on, and should have been happy to see you on any other occasion, but am very sorry to have a junior officer placed over my head.’

Cochrane responded: ‘You must not blame me for that. Permit me to remark, that you are using very strong expressions relative to the Commander-in-Chief’.

‘I can assure you, Lord Cochrane, that I have spoken to Lord Gambier with the same degree of prudence as I have now done to you in the presence of Captain Sir H Neal.’

‘Well, Admiral, considering that I have been an unwilling listener to what you really did say to his Lordship, I can only remark that you have a strange notion of prudence.’