Rodney 28

Rodney 28

By one of the most ironical pieces of ill-luck--and the best

merited--which ever overtook any Administration, the news of the great

victory reached England just after Pigot had sailed. Orders were at once

sent off to stop him, but it was too late. He was out of sight of land

on his way to the West Indies before the messenger could reach the

port. There was nothing for it but to stick to their guns, to retort on

their adversaries that the country had heard the news of the recall with

indifference however loudly it cried out _after_ receiving the news of

the victory (which was perfectly true), and to protest the utmost

respect for the Admiral. To do it justice, the Whig Cabinet executed

itself with a reasonably good grace. Burke declared in his figurative

classical way that if there was a bald spot on the head of the Admiral

he would gladly cover it with laurels. A committee which had been

appointed to inquire into the miscarriages at St. Eustatius was

discharged. It was decided that Rodney should have a barony and another

pension of £2000. Sandwich, who being now in Opposition could afford to

be generous, declared that a barony was not enough. His own ancestor,

the Admiral Montague who helped to restore Charles the Second, and was

slain at Solebay, had received an earldom and more money for less than

had been done by Rodney. There was truth in his criticism, but the

Ministry cannot be accused of niggardly conduct if judged by the

standard of the time. Titles were less lavishly given for service then

than they had been before or have been since. Hawke, for example,

received no title at all for the battle of Quiberon, which relieved the

country from the fear of actual invasion. His barony was given him years

afterwards. It does not appear that Rodney thought himself shabbily

treated. He took his title from Rodney Stoke, but he did not close with

the offer of the Duke of Chandos. Lady Rodney did not like the climate

of Somerset, and the Admiral himself seems to have had no sentimental

feelings in the matter. He was content with Hampshire, which had always

been his country-quarters in England.

 

Rodney left the West Indies in July and reached Bristol, after a stormy

passage, in September. His reception at home consoled him, if unmeasured

popular applause was a consolation in such a case, for his summary

recall. The country had not had many opportunities of welcoming

victorious commanders in the course of this war. The good work done (and

it had been much) had not been of the brilliant kind, and had too often

ended in disaster. In Rodney’s case there was now no doubt. He had taken

a Spanish, a Dutch, and a French admiral--the last in the midst of a

great fleet and on board the finest three-decker in the world. More

liners had struck to him than to any English admiral since the elder

Byng scattered the Spaniards off Cape Passaro nearly seventy years

before. There was no shadow on this glory, and the nation gave way to

one of those bursts of enthusiasm over it and the man who bore it, in

which the phlegm of the English melts like “snaw off a dyke.” From the

day of his landing at Bristol till he retired from Court surfeited with

praise, he was surrounded by cheering crowds; and when the applause died

away it left a solid admiration and gratitude which endured to the end.

 

Rodney survived his triumphant return nearly ten years, but it is to be

feared that there was more glory than ease in the end of his life. The

lawsuits which sprang out of those unlucky transactions at St. Eustatius

followed him almost to the grave--they or their consequences, which were

pecuniary embarrassments. His gout too grew upon him, and before the

close had begun, according to a not improbable report, to affect his

understanding. Much of his time was spent at spas at home or abroad. In

1787, when there was again a prospect of war with France, he volunteered

to go on service, in spite of age and infirmities, if the King had need

of him. The offer was acknowledged with fitting courtesy by Pitt, but it

could not have been considered more than a sign of the veteran’s

goodwill. In 1789 he had again to write to Pitt. The King’s first

publicly known attack of madness had just occurred, and Rodney had taken

what he believed to be the right side for one who was “bred a

Royalist”--he had in fact acted with those who wished to give the

regency without limitations to the Prince of Wales. Immediately

afterwards he was informed that his son, Captain John Rodney, was likely

to be refused a guardship appointment as a punishment for his own

Parliamentary action. He wrote to the Prime Minister in very natural

indignation--and indeed such an act done on such a motive would have

been sufficiently ignoble, though perfectly in keeping with the practice

of the time. It does not seem, however, that, as a matter of fact,

Captain John Rodney ever wanted for commands.

 

The Admiral died on May 23rd, 1792, in his eldest son’s house, the

corner house of Prince’s Street and Hanover Square, of gout. He had

fainted with pain, and when he revived for a moment Sir Walter Farquhar,

his doctor, asked him if he did not feel better, to which he replied, “I

am very ill indeed,” and so “expired without a sigh or a struggle.”

 

If we look, as it is fair to look, to the importance of the great

victory which he won in 1782, there can be no difficulty in assigning

Rodney his place among English admirals. He ranks next to Blake and to

Nelson. From the time that the admiral of the Commonwealth defeated

Tromp in the three days’ battle which raged from Portland to Calais, no

victory of equally vital consequence had been won. Until Trafalgar,

which finally ruined Napoleon’s efforts to cross us at sea, no such

other was to be won. It may even, in a sense, be said with accuracy that

of the two the fight off Dominica was more important than Trafalgar. If

Villeneuve had never left Cadiz, the immense superiority of the English

fleet would not have been diminished in the least. Napoleon had broken

up the camp at Boulogne and marched into Germany before Trafalgar was

fought. He had renounced his intention of invading England already; and

Trafalgar, though a magnificent victory, was valuable rather as proving

to us and to the world that England was safe than as adding to our

existing safety. Moreover, it may be very reasonably doubted whether,

without the encouraging example set by Rodney, our admirals of the

Revolutionary War would have manœuvred as boldly as they did. The

influence of that day is felt at once if we pass from any of the battles

fought before it to Howe’s victory on June 1st. Howe was by nature a

circumspect man. He had expressly stated after reading Clerk of Eldin

that, though it was all very ingenious, he for his part meant to keep to

the old way. Yet, as a matter of fact, he departed widely from the old

way, and won such a victory as would not have been possible if he had

stuck to it. The deduction that he was led by the example of Rodney is

irresistible. Indeed the battle of April 12th was a turning-point in the

history of naval warfare. From that time forward we hear nothing more

of the pedantic old fighting orders. Admirals manœuvred to beat the

enemy, and not to keep their own line intact.

 

A man who commanded on so great an occasion must for ever receive his

share of honour. Yet the devil’s advocate asks whether the occasion was

not greater than the man, and it cannot be denied that he has a case. As

Rodney himself said afterwards, with rare honesty and self-knowledge,

the victory was largely won by accident. It was not thought out and done

on a plan. His orders show that the Admiral meant to fight on the old

method. He departed from it because the wind had disordered the enemy

for him. He did not deliberately break the enemy up as Howe did on June

1st, as Nelson did at Trafalgar. He himself never showed any particular

pride in his great victory. Whatever evidence there is goes to prove

that he wished to be judged, not by the battle he won, but by the plan

he laid to defeat Guichen on April 17th, 1780. That battle, he felt,

would have been won by headpiece and not by luck. It was a very just

distinction, and Rodney’s glory will not be really affected if he is

judged by the test he preferred. The plan of battle for the 17th was a

good one, and shows that he was a tactician, though it also shows his

limitations. As a tactician his glory is that he endeavoured to use the

old tactics with intelligence. But he was not an innovator.

 

As a commander he ranks much higher. He could take the great line,

looking to what was for the best when the war was considered as a whole.

His watch was vigilant; his pursuit was close. He could select from

among the objects to be attained the most important, and could refuse to

be drawn off by the less vital. His measures were not uniformly well

taken, and for one interval of his life his spirit was dimmed; but, on

the whole, he was an energetic leader, differing in kind from such a man

as Arbuthnot, and in degree from such an officer as Hughes, the very

valiant, very tough, but, alas! very commonplace admiral who was pitted

against Souffren in the East Indies. Perhaps the most really honourable

to him of all his feats was the destruction of Langara’s squadron. He

had an overwhelming superiority of numbers, no doubt, but the

determination to pursue through the night and the storm on to a lee

shore, the resolution to run the risk for a sufficient object, were

worthy of his old leader Hawke--and more than that no man can say.

 

Personally Rodney was a very complete example of that aristocracy which

governed England through the eighteenth century--with much selfishness

and much corruption, no doubt, yet in the main with a high spirit, with

foresight, with statesmanship, and with glory. It would be absurd to say

that he was indifferent to place or money. He desired them both, and

avowed the desire frankly. He was not, in a favourite modern phrase,

sympathetic. There was about him a certain irritable promptitude to

assert his own dignity, and one gathers that he rather enjoyed inspiring

fear. Yet, like many men who are proud in place and office, he was kind

to those who were dependent on him--to his children, to his wife, and to

such friends as Gilbert Blane. He had that sense of the becoming in

manners which rarely fails an aristocracy. Whatever he may have said to

Douglas or of Hood in private, he gave them their praise before the

world in full measure. But the great redeeming quality in Rodney and in

all that aristocratic class to which he belonged was this, that they did

combine with their self-seeking a very high public spirit. They would

intrigue for place, and would in matters of detail allow the interest of

“the connection” to go before the good of the State; but when they spoke

for their country to the foreigner, then they thought only of the

greatness of England. For that greatness Rodney fought and would

willingly have died. For it, and at a time of dire need, he, at the head

of a force he helped to perfect, did a very great thing. For that his

name should never be forgotten by Englishmen.

 

THE END

 

_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_.

 

* * * * *

 

MESSRS. MACMILLAN AND CO.’S PUBLICATIONS.

 

ENGLISH MEN OF ACTION SERIES.

 

Crown 8vo, cloth. 2s. 6d. each.

 

_GENERAL GORDON._ By Colonel Sir WILLIAM BUTLER.

 

_SPECTATOR_:--“This is beyond all question the best of the