Cochrane (11 page)

Leaving Surgeon Guthrie at the wheel, he sent half his men with blackened faces to climb stealthily up the
Gamo's
bows, hidden from view by the curve of the hull. Cochrane himself led the remaining score of men amidships, scaling the frigate's side and bursting on to the deck. In the confusion of smoke and musket-fire, one seaman fell dead at the rail, and Lieutenant Parker struggled on, wounded through chest and thigh. Cochrane's tall figure and red hair under a cocked hat was an unmistakable rallying point, as he watched the careful working out of his plan. The "cool determined conduct" of his men with fist and cutlass amidships had already engaged the attention of the Spaniards when the first black-faced devils came leaping and shrieking from the bows. Caught on both sides, the defence began to fall into confusion.

It was hard for the Spanish to use their full weight in such a skirmish on the crowded deck. Equally, it was unthinkable that forty-eight men should defeat three hundred. Cochrane, driven back to the rail, roared down to Guthrie, the only man left on the
Speedy,
since someone had to hold the wheel. The words were clearly heard by the Spaniards as he ordered the next wave of attackers to be sent across. Guthrie concealed his surprise and acknowledged the command. The men of the
Gamo
began to recoil from the apparent trap of an innocent brig crammed with Royal Marines. The heart seemed to go out of the Spanish resistance. Their captain and bosun were dead and over fifty more men had been killed or wounded in the carnage of the gun-deck as the
Speedy's
broadsides tore upwards through the planking. The men who had followed Cochrane aboard looked and fought like devils with cutlass and small arms. Leaderless and bemused, the superior Spanish force began to edge towards the stern of the
Gamo.
As they did so, there was a pause and the eyes of men on both sides turned to the mast. The Spanish colours had been struck, the flag coming slowly down. There was no longer even a pretext for resistance as the
Gamo
surrendered to the little brig alongside her. In fact it was one of the British seamen who, on Cochrane's orders, had slipped through the skirmish and lowered the Spanish flag.

The
Gamo
should have been able to blow the
Speedy
out of the water before the British ship came near enough to fire a shot. The Spanish troops should have been able to overwhelm the depleted crew of the brig as soon as she came alongside. A man who was so foolish as to lead forty-eight seamen on board an enemy ship with a crew of more than three hundred ought to have found himself and his men prisoners within a few minutes. As it was, Cochrane's main problem was how to cope with a prize of such magnitude. It was almost necessary to abandon the
Speedy,
since thirty of her crew were

needed to get the
Gamo
to Port Mahon, leaving hardly more than a dozen men to manage the brig. The Spanish seamen and crew were bundled into the frigate's hold,
263
still unwounded. Realising the puny power which had defeated them, it seemed as though they might try to overpower the British prize crew, whom they outnumbered almost ten to one. But Cochrane had thought of that too. He ordered the most powerful guns on the
Gamo,
the two
24
-pounder carronades from the bows, to be manhandled until they pointed down into the hold. Throughout the voyage British seamen with lighted tapers were stationed by the loaded guns to discourage thoughts of counter-attack by the prisoners. In this manner the
Speedy
returned to the British base on Minorca, escorting the prize which towered above her.
²¹

Cochrane's immediate superior, Captain Manley Dixon, wrote excitedly to the Secretary of the Admiralty on
9
June, describing "the very spirited and brilliant action", which Cochrane had led. Cochrane himself attributed success, in his official despatch, to Lieutenant Parker, Archibald Cochrane, and to the "exertions and good conduct of the boatswain, carpenter, and petty officers". Neither the Admiralty in general, nor St Vincent as First Lord, reciprocated this enthusiasm. St Vincent, assuming office with the new government of Henry Addington, was not likely to make the mistake of flattering a brash young commander whose recent court-martial had shown such disrespect for his superiors. The old man had a reputation to maintain, the scourge of rebellious officers and mutinous seamen alike. It was left to Captain Edward Brenton, who was ironically St Vincent's biographer, to proclaim after the war that, in single-ship actions, those of Cochrane "stand pre-eminent". Indeed, outside the Admiralty, the
Gamo
incident caught the public imagination. There was a steady procession of viewers to the public rooms in Lower Brook Street, where a new painting of the engagement by the fashionable marine artist Nicholas Pocock was proudly exhibited.
²²

Traditionally, Cochrane would be made post-captain and given command of the prize when it was enrolled in the Royal Navy. As for prize money, a xebec-class frigate, shared among so few men, even allowing for Admiral Lord Keith's portion, was a lucrative prospect. There was some astonishment, and then anger, when the Admiralty announced that the
Gamo
would not be bought for the navy. She was to be auctioned off as merchantman or hulk at a fraction of the price, perhaps little more than the costs of the prize court proceedings. As for Cochrane, he would have no frigate to command, so there was no need to promote him post-captain. Such a rank would be ludicrous for a man who was ordered to continue in command of a brig-sloop.

Other men took up Cochrane's case. His uncle, Alexander Cochrane, wrote two letters to St Vincent, soliciting his nephew's promotion. The Earl of Dundonald wrote later, criticising the effect that delay would have upon his son's seniority in the navy list. There was so much feeling on Cochrane's behalf that "it became almost a point of etiquette with the earl
not to make him a captain".
One of St Vincent's colleagues was reported to have said, "My lord, we must make Lord Cochrane 'post'." To which the old man growled, "The First Lord of the Admiralty knows
no must!
"
²³

Ignoring the official snub to himself, Cochrane fought determinedly for recognition of his second-in-command, Lieutenant Parker. Parker had continued to lead his men with exemplary courage, though a Spanish sword had run through his thigh and a musket ball had hit him in the chest. Cochrane vowed that Parker must be promoted and the Admiralty were equally resolute in their decision to ignore him.

Cochrane wrote direct to St Vincent on three occasions, urging Parker's promotion, before the First Lord replied that "the small number of men killed on board the
Speedy
did not warrant the application". If Cochrane had thought prudently about his future prospects in the Royal Navy he would have dropped the matter. Instead, he wrote to St Vincent, reminding him that his own earldom had been awarded for an action in which there was only one man killed on his flagship. The innuendo was calculated to heat the First Lord to apoplexy. He knew full well that his enemies swore the casualties had been light on the flagship because St Vincent kept well out of danger, leaving Nelson and the inshore squadron to do the fighting.
²⁴

Having infuriated the First Lord, Cochrane then turned upon the Commissioners of the Admiralty collectively. He wrote them a letter on
17
May, enclosing another for Evan Nepean, the Secretary to the Board, remarking bitterly to him, "if their Lordships judge by the small number killed, I have only to say that it was fortunate the enemy did not point their guns better". Nepean replied smoothly that it was "perfectly regular" for Cochrane to write to him, "but that it is not so for officers to correspond with the Board". Cochrane wrote back furiously, saying that he cared nothing for this but demanded to be "favoured with an answer" to his application on behalf of Parker. Nepean wrote a dismissive note, informing Cochrane that he had "nothing in command from their Lordships to communicate to you". Lieutenant Parker's recognition was to be delayed until Cochrane was in a position to extort it from the Admiralty.
²⁵

In the view of his brother officers, Cochrane had wrecked his career by this contretemps with men of political and professional influence. He and the
Speedy
were relegated to more humdrum tasks, indeed he admitted that his name was now "placed on the black list of the Admiralty, never again to be erased". The brig was downgraded to packet-escort or to run errands to Algiers. By a typical irony of war, it was in the North African port that she met the
Gamo
again. The Admiralty had deprived Cochrane and his crew of their expected reward by selling the frigate to the Algerians "for a trifle".
²⁶

Cochrane cared little whether or not his name was on the Admiralty "black list". He had out-fought the Spaniards and now he proposed to out-fight the Commissioners by much the same methods. It was not pure altruism, since the outrage to an innate sense of honour was almost equalled by the affront to his mercenary values. His country urged him to fight bravely, which he did, but he expected to be paid. Additional feats of bravery, in his view, merited additional financial reward. Close acquaintance with the "res angusta domi" had taught him the value of money, and the simple lesson that a price could be put upon acts of valour.

Lord St Vincent was unlikely to agree with Cochrane in public, but even he attacked privately "the frauds in the receipt of forfeited prize money". That Cochrane and his crew were robbed of some of their rewards is a matter of record. In one case they received nothing, and Cochrane was told that he was personally in debt for
£100
as the cost of proceedings. It was true that his ordinary seaman earned, through prizes, more than the pay of officers on other ships but that hardly consoled them for injustices done.
²⁷

In July
1801
the
Speedy
was packet-escort between Port Mahon and Gibraltar with little opportunity for taking prizes or for any sort of independent action. The letter bag was put aboard the brig at Port Mahon and she sailed in company with the packet-boat until they arrived off Gibraltar. There the bag was transferred to the packet-boat which sailed into Gibraltar alone and then returned. This extraordinary ritual had been ordered by the commandant of Port Mahon, a friend of the merchant who had the contract for carrying mails. The contractor knew that the packet-boat he had hired, for the lowest possible price, was far too unseaworthy to be entrusted with the mails. He had therefore reached a private agreement with his friends in the Royal Navy that the letter bag should go aboard the
Speedy
and be transferred off Gibraltar, so that it would look to the authorities there as if it had come all the way in the packet-boat.

Cochrane escorted the boat along the Mediterranean coast of Spain, keeping a wistful eye on any possible prizes. It was just beyond Alicante that he saw some small merchant vessels anchored in a bay. As soon as the
Speedy
turned inshore towards them, they weighed anchor and their captains ran them ashore to avoid capture. Not only would Cochrane have had to land his men on a hostile coast but he might have had to wait several hours until the tide had risen sufficiently to float any of the vessels off. "To have stopped to get them off would have been in excess of our instructions,'' he decided. "To set fire to them was not."

The
Speedy
dropped anchor in the bay, leaving the packet-boat and its crew waiting nervously offshore. The broadside of the little
4
-pounders boomed across the water and, to Cochrane's satisfaction, there was an explosion and a billow of fire from one of the vessels, which was carrying oil. Soon they were all alight and for many miles around the glow of fire filled the night sky.

On the following morning, as the
Speedy
sailed out of the bay, the top-sails of three splendid ships appeared on the horizon. "Spanish galleons from South America," said Cochrane instinctively. The day was only just dawning but there was enough light for the
Speedy
to give chase. As the sun bathed the sea with the brilliance of a Mediterranean summer, the shape of the three great ships grew clearer. They were the
Indomitable,
the
Formidable
and the
Dessaix,
three of the most powerful ships of the line in the French fleet. It was unusual for them to be so close inshore but they had been attracted by the light of the burning merchant vessels.

Even the
Speedy
could hardly take on three battleships at once, indeed most commanders would have hauled down the ensign and surrendered without further ado. A well-aimed broadside from the
Dessaix
would sink the brig in an instant. Cochrane decided that it might just be possible to outmanoeuvre the three battleships and escape to the open sea. He put the
Speedy
under full sail to take advantage of the wind and told his men to trundle the fourteen
4-
pounder guns overboard. They would be useless in any action against the three great ships and their weight would only slow the brig down. Then he ordered his men to the sweeps, the long oars which were worked by sailors to move a ship when becalmed or to give her extra speed in an emergency.

The three French ships had moved apart to block every way of escape. Cochrane's first concern was to manoeuvre the
Speedy
rapidly and unexpectedly so that she seldom faced
the menacing broadsides of the
battleships as their rows of guns towered above her. But by avoiding the broadsides he inevitably exposed the ship to the chase-guns in the bows or stern of the French battleships. As the shot ripped through the sails of the brig, fragments of wooden spars fell away and clattered on the deck.

So long as she remained pinned between the French battleships and the Spanish coast, the
Speedy
would inevitably be destroyed. But if she could gain the open sea, there was a chance that lightness and greater manoeuvrability would enable her to elude the French until darkness fell and she could escape. Cochrane ordered all the stores to be thrown overboard to lighten the ship still further, as the French men-of-war closed in. Then, under full canvas, he brought the little brig on a course between the
Dessaix
and one of the other ships. The French were taken aback at first, since they expected Cochrane to sail away from them rather than towards them, but the captain of the
Dessaix,
Christie Palli
ere, was in time to order a hasty broadside as the brig sped past. When the rolling gun-smoke thinned and cleared, the
Speedy
was still afloat and heading for the horizon.

Pallie
re immediately tacked in pursuit, while the brig dodged and turned to avoid capture. For an hour, the chase continued but with each salvo from the guns in the
Dessaix
¹
s bows more holes appeared in the tattered rigging of the
Speedy.
As she lost canvas, the
Dessaix
was soon within musket shot of her and then, overhauling her, turned broadside on and fired. It was as well for Cochrane and his men that the speed with which the battleship turned carried her too far, so that the heavier shot plunged into the sea just ahead of the
Speedy's
bows. But the full force of scattered grape-shot struck the rigging, cutting apart the sails until they hung in shreds, and tearing away spars and sections of the masts. Without guns or rigging, there was no more to be done. Cochrane ordered the colours to be hauled down.

He was escorted aboard the
Dessaix
and stood face to fac
e with his late adversary Pallie
re on the French quarterdeck. As was customary, he took off his sword and offered it to his captor. Palliere shook his head.