Rodney 22

Rodney 22

Rodney was now to have an opportunity of vindicating himself in another

and far more effectual way. Early in December he was summoned by the

King to consult on the measures to be taken to check the victorious

progress of the French in America. On what from this year forward it is

strictly accurate to call the coast of the United States, the war had

gone steadily against England for months. At the close of the campaign

season in the West Indies, Grasse had sailed for America at the same

time as Hood. There he in combination with Washington and Rochambeau

carried out the operations which culminated in the surrender of

Cornwallis at Yorktown. It is just possible that if Hood had commanded

for us at sea, the army under Cornwallis might have been saved, but our

admiral was Graves, a thoroughly commonplace and pedantic officer. He

was out-manœuvred by Grasse, and his retreat from the Chesapeake

after a miserably feeble fight with the Frenchman, which was bitterly

criticised by Rodney, left Cornwallis helpless in the midst of an enemy

four times as numerous as his own army. The surrender of Yorktown

followed on October 17th, 1781.

 

The news reached England in the following month. It convinced all men,

even the King, that the independence of the colonies must be recognised

at last, but it also showed that the war had entered on a new phase.

Freed by the success of their allies from the necessity of helping the

Americans, the French would now be at liberty to devote themselves to

that attack on our West Indian possessions which had always been the

ultimate object of their war policy. It was a matter of course that

Grasse, the hurricane season being over in the West Indies, and his work

on the mainland done, would hurry back to Martinique. It was known that

a great armament was preparing at Brest to sail under Guichen, Rodney’s

old antagonist, which was to reinforce Grasse. Then the whole force in

combination with the Spaniards from Havannah was to attack Jamaica. A

determined effort must be made to defeat this plan, or the war would end

in disaster at sea as it had done on land.

 

Throughout November the Admiralty was at work preparing reinforcements

for Hood, who was already outnumbered, and would be mewed up in port by

an overwhelming force if Guichen reached the Antilles before our own

ships. Early in December the danger had become so pressing that it was

decided not to wait till all our reinforcements were ready, but to send

part on as soon as they could be made ready. The King summoned Rodney to

an audience and received from him the assurance that he would not waste

a day in getting to sea. From the King’s cabinet the Admiral hastened to

Portsmouth to hoist his flag on the _Formidable_ and again take up the

reins.

 

Until the January of the following year Rodney was at work, first at

Portsmouth and then at Plymouth (which in a moment of exasperation he

most unjustly called a “horrid port”), superintending the fitting out of

the squadron, collecting men, driving on the laggard dockyard officials,

beating down the ill-will of port admirals who were sulky at real or

imaginary intrusions on their authority. With this kind of opposition

Rodney, well supported as he was now by the Admiralty, kept no measure.

It was instantly crushed; and as for the dockyard officials, what orders

could not do was effected by the crack of the whip. The Admiral could

declare with pardonable pride that he had forced more work out of the

yard in a month than it had done in a year before. All this drive was of

course augmented by the usual torrent of applications for places or

promotion from candidates and their friends. Some of these could be

neglected or refused, but to others attention must be paid. One of these

came from Sandwich on behalf of a Lord Cranstoun who “is greatly

patronised by the Lord Advocate.” It is highly probable that if Sandwich

had been divinely informed that the end of the world would occur in an

hour, the ruins of the universe would have fallen on him placidly

penning a request to somebody to find a place for somebody who was

protected by somebody of importance. Nothing could be done for Cranstoun

for the moment, but Rodney was not quite satisfied with Symonds the

captain of the _Formidable_, and he decided to take the Scotch _protégé_

of the Lord Advocate with him as a volunteer, and to give him the

command of the flag-ship as soon as a place could be found for the other

officer.

 

Two appointments were made at Rodney’s own request which must not be

passed over. Gilbert Blane was named Physician to the Fleet. This was

not only an excellent administrative measure, but a well-deserved reward

for past services. Since the end of 1779 Blane had sailed with Rodney,

and had used his influence to introduce a number of sanitary reforms by

which many hundreds of stout and well-trained seamen were preserved from

fever and scurvy for the day when England’s need for stout and

well-trained men was great indeed. Cleanliness and good food had been

his favourite prescriptions, and to them was due the excellent general

health of our squadrons in the West Indies. The second appointment was

that of Sir Charles Douglas as Captain of the Fleet--an officer who was

occasionally appointed to help an admiral in command of a very large

force. He corresponded to the chief of the staff in an army. Douglas

would be entitled to especial notice in a life of Rodney if only because

of the claim made on his behalf by his son Sir Howard, the gunner--that

he inspired his admiral at the great and critical moment of the battle

of April 12th. But Sir Charles Douglas would be a notable man if no such

claim had ever been made. It may be said of him that he did for the

gunnery of the fleet what Blane did for its health. To him is due the

use of the lock for firing cannon in place of the old port fire and

powder horn--a change which diminished the risk of explosions and

increased the accuracy of our practice. He also improved the

construction of gun carriages so as to enable the cannon to be trained

farther fore and aft, whereby the range of fire was materially

increased. These reforms, be it noted, were made on his own initiative,

and frequently at his own expense. They were adopted by other captains

on his example. These two Scotchmen were admirable types of those

officers who, on blue water and in the presence of the enemy, by their

own efforts perfected the old sailing navy. It is not the least of

Rodney’s services that he saw the merits of both and used them.

 

While he was completing his staff and fitting his ships for sea the wind

had settled in the south-west, and had imprisoned him at Plymouth. It

was some consolation in this trial that the wind which kept him in

Cawsand Bay would also keep Guichen in Brest. But before the end of

December the fear that the Frenchman might head him in the race to the

West Indies had been removed by means more glorious to us than the help

of our old allies the storms. Guichen did put to sea with his convoy,

but soon after he was out he fell in with Kempenfelt, who was cruising

off the mouth of the Channel. It was a wild and misty day. By a piece of

mismanagement, which does little credit to his reputation as a

tactician, Guichen was to leeward of his convoy. A sudden lifting of the

mist revealed him to Kempenfelt, who was to windward. The English

admiral swooped on his prize before the transports could run under their

convoy’s lee. Fifteen of them, laden with troops and stores, were

captured. The others scattered in terror and were lost in the mist.

Guichen returned to Brest, and in deep humiliation resigned his command.

 

When Kempenfelt’s destruction of the reliefs for the West Indies was

known, the Ministry, seeing that there was now no fear of a meeting with

a superior force on the way, urged Rodney to put to sea with the ships

which were actually ready, and leave the rest to follow. In words which

ring like the famous appeal to Radetzky--“Austria is in thy camp,”

Sandwich solemnly reminded him that “the fate of this Empire is in your

hands.” Rodney answered the appeal. The instant that the wind, shifting

a little to the north, ceased to blow directly into Plymouth Sound--then

unprotected by its breakwater--he put to sea with four ships of the

line, and began to fight the winds for a passage out to the ocean. The

week which followed was a better test of the quality of the Admiral’s

nerve, and the seamanship of the little squadron round him, than a

battle with Souffren himself could have been. Rodney was now sixty-four,

an older man then than he would have been at the same years now. His

gout had returned on him so cruelly at Plymouth that he had been

compelled to leave the very signing of his letters to Sir Charles

Douglas. The wind was blowing straight in his teeth with undeviating

fury. But he fought on doggedly, and at last, after a week of struggle,

seamanship prevailed. On January 17th, 1782, the squadron weathered

Ushant in sea which made a clean breach over such mighty three-deckers

as the _Formidable_ and the _Namur_. From the open sea he sent back a

frigate with the news to Sandwich, and then pressed on, accompanied by

storms, to the West. On February 19th he anchored in Carlisle Bay in

Barbadoes. From thence he sailed to join Hood off Antigua, and was again

in command of the West Indies.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER XI

 

TO APRIL 12TH

 

 

When the Admiral and his second in command met off Antigua it was

manifest that the crisis of the war was fast approaching in the West

Indies. Since Grasse had returned from the coast of North America the

French had possessed a considerable superiority of force, and had used

it to complete their conquest of the English islands. The bolder and

more efficacious policy would have been to seek out Hood and crush him

before reinforcements arrived from England. But this was at no period in

the war the line taken by any French commander except Souffren. Grasse

followed the traditional rules and attacked the islands. Before his

arrival Bouillé had retaken St. Eustatius by a dashing surprise. When

the French admiral and the governor of Martinique had again joined they

fell upon St. Kitts, which lies between St. Eustatius and Antigua. A

naval force of twenty-nine sail of the line conveyed Bouillé’s soldiers,

and the expedition landed in January. It was far too strong to be

resisted by the small English garrison under General Fraser--the more

because the planters, being thoroughly sulky since the confiscation of

their goods at St. Eustatius, refused to give him any help. He retired

with his soldiers to Brimstone Hill, and fortifying himself there, held

out in the hope that relief would come.

 

The news of the attack reached Hood at Barbadoes, and he saw at once

that honour and interest alike required that an effort should be made.

He shipped a small force of soldiers under General Prescott and sailed

for St. Kitts. The manœuvring and fighting which followed make what

Cortes would have called a _muy hermosa cosa_--a very pretty piece of

work. The French were stronger by seven sail of the line, but Hood had

decided to attack them where they were anchored near the Basseterre Bank

to cover the troops on shore. His plan was defeated through the gross

misconduct of the officer of the watch of one of our frigates, who threw

his vessel right across the bows of the leading liner, and caused a

collision which entailed a waste of invaluable time. The approaching

English fleet was seen by Grasse, who got up anchor and stood to sea. By