Nelson: Britannia's God of War (20 page)

While he waited for his recovery, Nelson was examined for his wounds pension; he also pressed his youngest brother’s claims and commiserated with Weatherhead’s father. By late November he was preparing to go back to sea, on the new eighty-gun second-rate, HMS
Foudroyant
,
a ship named for Jervis’s last command as a captain. As she was not ready, he was moved into the seventy-four gun
Vanguard
, then fitting at Chatham, and directed Berry to take command. He was officially pronounced fit to serve on 13 December; five days later the
Vanguard
came out of dock.
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By the time Nelson returned to service, the very nature of the war had changed. The stakes had been raised, and the prospects of a negotiated settlement were much reduced. Intermittent attempts to secure peace with the French Directory had been under way at Lille since July, but Bonaparte’s triumph in Italy encouraged the French to continue a struggle they were winning. In mid-September the British envoy, Lord Malmesbury, was told to leave. He had arrived home just in time to hand the King the sword with which he dubbed Nelson. The symbolism was powerful: new times need new men, and no one would rise to the challenge of total war like Nelson.

*

Nelson’s return had coincided with a major change in the strategic situation. On 11 October Adam Duncan’s North Sea fleet, recently the infamous Nore mutineers, encountered the Dutch fleet off Camperdown. Without waiting to form a line of battle, and in no particular order, Duncan launched a two-column attack on the enemy, who were desperately seeking the sanctuary of their shallow coastal waters. The lighter Dutch ships were shattered in the resulting close-quarters fighting; many surrendered, including their admiral. When the news reached London two days later it was greeted with rapture, although the revellers who called at Nelson’s door to demand the windows be illuminated went away once they knew it was his house. Camperdown was the ideal riposte to the collapse of peace talks. It had been expected that the Dutch fleet would escort an invasion of Ireland, always a weak point in the British defence plan.
³¹
The destruction of the fleet ended this threat. On a broader canvas the victory decisively altered the balance of naval power in Britain’s favour.While the captured Dutch ships were small and badly damaged, some were used on the North Sea station
³²
where the enemy now had far fewer ships. This released British units for service in the Channel and the Cadiz station. Without  Camperdown it is unlikely the Admiralty could have found the ships for the reoccupation of the Mediterranean – the central event in Nelson’s life.

The politicians were not slow to exploit the triumph for public consumption.
Foreign Secretary Lord Grenville argued that Camperdown was the most important victory of the war in political terms. He advised Spencer:

Clearly French propaganda was having an effect. The country needed a more national, British message, not the limited, conventional celebrations accorded to earlier victories. It was all very well for the King to honour Howe on his flagship after the First of June, but it was hardly a public event.
³⁴
A better model was the Elizabethan pageant at St Paul’s after the defeat of the Armada in 1588. Once Spencer had accepted the idea of a public event the Prime Minister broadened it into a truly national naval pageant:

Two weeks later Pitt demonstrated the meaning of the new war. It was not, he declared, about trade, colonies or Empire, but about the very liberty and independence of the British people. The country had the wealth and power to fight for its survival, and it was a matter of honour to stand up to France, in the interests of Europe: every man should ‘be ready to sacrifice his life in the same cause’.
³⁶

The age of total war had dawned and Pitt was creating the fiscal means to wage such conflicts. The income or ‘war’ tax would limit British borrowing, helping to keep the interest rates markedly lower than France ever managed, and ensuring the City of London was at one with the government. Linking naval victory and the commercial hub of the empire with the symbols of success, loyalty and the Church went a long way towards the creation of a new national identity – and this identity would find its ultimate symbol in Nelson.

The ceremonial laying-up of the captured flags went ahead as Pitt had suggested on 19 December, with a grand service of thanksgiving at St Paul’s attended by the King and royal princes. The spacious
cathedral adapted to its new role as the national pantheon with ease, while the City of London, for which much of the naval activity of war was undertaken, must have been delighted by the obvious connection of State, Navy and City. The King was the central figure, his procession being led up the nave by Spencer, carrying the sword of state. George pointedly stopped to speak with Duncan. During Holy Communion the organist and choir played Purcell’s ‘I will give thanks unto thee, O Lord’, and naval officers marched through the choir screen carrying an impressive collection of captured enemy ensigns, each on a pole with a placard noting where it had been taken. There were French colours at the head and Dutch at the rear, but in the middle of the parade were those taken off Cape St Vincent. Two admirals escorted these trophies – Thompson and Waldegrave, supported by Nelson, who had been called to participate by Spencer. As the flags were passed to the Dean, Nelson stood on the very spot his coffin would occupy at the beginning of his funeral a mere eight years later. Both the event and the atmosphere met his idea of the heroic. This was how the state commemorated its greatest deeds and raised the spirit of the country in times of adversity. It was for just such a public demonstration of his fame that Nelson would lay his life on the line, over and over again. The pioneering event was not universally popular, of course – some saw the underlying French model, and did not enjoy the connection; others of a more radical stripe preferred outright condemnation of the minister who was raising taxes to pay for the war, and burnt effigies of Pitt across London.
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Nelson received the Freedom of the City of London on 28 December, rounding off a year in which he had reached flag rank and public fame, but lost an arm and a battle. He was already awaiting orders to go back to sea. The war was entering a new phase, one in which his unique abilities would be fully employed.