Nelson (118 page)

The army was staying, but a number of other important people took leave of the islands with Nelson that January 1797, among them Sir Gilbert Elliot and Pozzo di Borgo, his former secretary of state, both of whom found berths on
La Minerve
with Nelson and Cockburn. General De Burgh was left ‘without any instructions whatsoever’ and ‘in a situation rather unprotected’, as he put it.
⁹⁵

On the 29th the general and Fremantle, who shouldered the awesome responsibility of protecting Elba in a friendless desert, saw the convoy of warships and transports sail away into the Mediterranean. To avoid enemy squadrons Nelson divided his forces.
La Minerve
and the
Romulus
(Captain George Hope) reached Gibraltar on 9 February, after poking into St Fiorenzo, Toulon and Cartagena along the way. They captured two Spanish feluccas and discovered that their battle fleet was at sea. Macnamara’s
Southampton
conducted the store ships
Dolphin
and
Dromedary
south rather than north of Corsica, while the
Dido
and
Sardine
were given the tough job of managing thirteen transports and merchantmen.
⁹⁶

The convoy got through safe, and Nelson knew that his commander-in-chief was advancing from the Tagus to cover him west of Gibraltar, but his mission had not been a complete success. In fact it had been botched from the beginning. Jervis had received orders to evacuate Elba but not De Burgh, who lacked the courage to act without them, while Elliot, fired by an agenda of his own, had merely encouraged the general’s folly. Two months further on and there were still people isolated in Elba, waiting to be removed. Nelson had spent a lifetime in public service, and probably shrugged resignedly. He had done his best and preserved good relations between the military, naval and political arms in a difficult situation.
⁹⁷

His mind, in fact, was beginning to stray from the Mediterranean. Far, far away the shores of his native land and perhaps the face of a long-suffering wife occupied more of his thoughts. The war, he was sure, was ending, and the possibility of a long life on half-pay troubled him. He had wondered how the government might react to a petition for a pension, and at the end of December rallied the support of political friends. Drake, Trevor, Hamilton and Elliot all replied fulsomely to his requests for testimonials. In January he also asked Mrs Pollard to shop for ‘such pretty things’ as a ‘most elegant woman’ might like.
⁹⁸

Lives are full of turns, however, Nelson’s as much as any other. Just as the war in the Mediterranean fizzled to an ignominious conclusion and the commodore contemplated a hiatus in his career, he steered into the dazzling, blood-pumping glory he had longed for since boyhood. He had once said that a sea officer had to wait for the ‘happy moment’ that might transform his career. His own was about to come.

Nobly, nobly Cape Saint Vincent to the North-west died away;
Sunset ran, one glorious blood-red, reeking into Cadiz Bay;
Bluish mid the burning water, full in face Trafalgar lay;
In the dimmest North-east distance dawn’d Gibraltar grand and gray;
‘Here and here did England help me: how can I help England?’ – say, . . .

Robert Browning,
Home Thoughts from the Sea

N
ELSON
remained only a day in Gibraltar. The Spanish fleet, he now knew, had left Cartagena and passed through the straits a few days before, heading west. Three of their ships which had detoured to land supplies for their lines at Gibraltar were still at the head of Algeciras Bay, their glasses doubtless trained upon the British newcomers. Nelson wanted to press on to report to Jervis, and to take part in the major battle he was sure lay ahead.

He achieved something at Gibraltar, though. Culverhouse, Hardy and the prize crew of the
Santa Sabina
were prisoners on one of the Spanish men-of-war, and Nelson speedily arranged for their exchange. There was an emotional reunion between Nelson and officers who had sacrificed their freedom to save his. What was more, Culverhouse and Hardy were full of information about the state of the Spanish fleet, which they had observed from within. On 11 February the
Romulus
was still undergoing repairs and the weather was bad, but the commodore ordered Cockburn to get
La Minerve
underway. It was imperative that he reach Jervis. Two of the Spanish ships still in
the bay were sail of the line, and they were waiting for Nelson to make a run for it. He took the risk.

As
La Minerve
worked out of the bay that afternoon, plunging through stubborn eddies, the big Spanish ships made after her, aided by a steady easterly wind. Anxious spectators from the town and garrison of Gibraltar scrambled to high points to witness the grim chase. Once the brazen British frigate got into the strait she caught the breeze and made proudly for the open sea, but one of the pursuers went after her so determinedly that on board
La Minerve
Sir Gilbert Elliot prepared to pitch his papers overboard rather than allow them to be captured. His aide, Colonel John Drinkwater, nervously asked Nelson if there would be a battle. Maybe, replied the commodore calmly, glancing up at his broad pendant, but ‘before the Dons get hold of that bit of bunting I will have a struggle with them, and sooner than give up the frigate I’ll run her ashore’.
¹

Cockburn, studying the advancing Spaniard through his glass, reckoned she was gaining on them, but after ordering studding sails to be set to increase speed he joined the other officers filing into the captain’s cabin for dinner. They sat down a little after three, but almost immediately started to the cry ‘Man overboard!’ Lieutenant Hardy was soon being lowered in a jolly boat with some men to look for the missing sailor, Able Seaman William Barnes, but the fellow had drowned, and the rescue party was forced to pull back for the ship empty-handed. But the current was against them, and Hardy was gripped with the realisation that after only a day at liberty he was in danger of being recaptured by the oncoming Spaniard.

The leading enemy ship was still three miles astern, but time was precious. On the quarterdeck of
La Minerve
Nelson did not hesitate. ‘By God, I’ll not lose Hardy!’ he cried. ‘Back the mizzen-topsail.’
La Minerve
’s pace slackened, and Hardy’s weary search party redoubled their efforts at the oars and successfully regained their ship. The whole episode had lasted about an hour, but it sealed the bond between Nelson and Hardy. Now both had endangered themselves to protect the other.

As it happened, the advancing Spanish ship profited little from the delay. Apparently the sight of
La Minerve
backing sail disconcerted her officers. Perhaps they believed that more British ships had appeared in the offing, visible to the frigate but beyond their own horizon. Anyway, the oncoming ship of the line shortened sail and hesitated, waiting for her lagging consort to approach. Using every minute, the
British were able to rescue Hardy and continue their flight, and after dusk lost their pursuers altogether.

Fog as well as night shrouded
La Minerve
as an easterly wind, known as a levanter, took her into large Atlantic swells. Then suddenly, in the early hours of the 12th, large shapes loomed like spectres in the murk about them. Two were fairly close, one on either flank. The British had sailed into a squadron of ships, perhaps even a fleet, but which fleet? As Cockburn and Nelson strained eyes and ears, they realised that the signals were unfamiliar. Mysterious flashes stabbed through the darkness, muffled guns boomed dolefully in the fog, and voices were heard – Spanish voices. Nelson had actually sailed into the main Spanish battle fleet. Lumbered with a valuable convoy for Cadiz, it had been pushed west by the levanter, and was now fighting its way back to the coast. However, at the time nothing seemed certain, and Commodore Nelson speculated that he might have blundered into a detached squadron or a convoy bound for the West Indies. For a while the British frigate could only slip anxiously along, making no sudden moves but gently extricating herself from the ships around her as anonymously as possible. Nelson went to see if Elliot was awake, but the ex-viceroy was sleeping soundly in his cot, worn out by the earlier adventure. Nelson let him alone. In the morning, when Sir Gilbert made his appearance, the Spaniards had gone and the adventure had passed him by as if it had been an illusion.

On the morning of 13 February, Nelson found a very different fleet. It was sheltering under the lee of Cape St Vincent, the Portuguese peninsula jutting out into the Atlantic, and strategically placed between Lisbon and the Strait of Gibraltar. There were fifteen ships of the line under the command of Sir John Jervis, and they were waiting to intercept the very Spanish men-of-war Nelson had seen in the fog.

The features of the craggy British admiral must have cracked into a smile at the sight of Nelson’s broad pendant flying above the oncoming frigate. You could send that fellow to the other side of the Mediterranean, but if a battle was afoot he would be there.

Jervis knew about the Spaniards. Four days before he had heard that a large fleet had passed the Rock of Gibraltar, and from subsequent reports learned that it had been driven into the Atlantic. He was riding off Cape St Vincent in search of it, determined to give battle.

His fleet was not in the best shape to fight, for it had suffered severely in Gibraltar during furious winter gales. The
Courageux
had broken to pieces on the shores of the Barbary Coast with a loss of four hundred and sixty men, and the
Zealous
was swept onto a reef in Tangier Bay. The poor
Gibraltar
ran twice upon Cabrita Point in Algeciras Bay, and had to go home for repairs. Retreating to the Tagus, which a treaty between Britain and Portugal made available, Jervis had fared no better. The
Bombay Castle
was wrecked upon a sandbank, and the
Culloden
, the wounded
Gibraltar
and the
St George
all took the ground. By the time Nelson returned, Jervis had been reinforced by five sail of the line under Rear Admiral Sir William Parker, but could still deploy only fifteen capital ships.

Yet the old commander-in-chief knew how badly his country needed a victory. Since France and Spain had signed the treaty of San Ildefonso the previous year, Britain was facing a combination of the second and third naval powers. The King of Spain, Charles IV, was said to be a fool and easily manipulated by the French, who set great store in invading England and eliminating the most durable of their foes. In December 1796 France had tried forcibly to enter Britain through the back door by sending an expeditionary force to Ireland, but the discontented Catholic peasantry failed to rise in support, and bad weather drove the French from Bantry Bay before they could even land. Nonetheless, French ambitions remained, and Jervis realised that the Spanish fleet probably figured in any new plans to humble Britain. If the Spaniards got to Brest and reinforced the main French fleet, their united force would constitute a serious threat to England’s defences. The fire inside Jervis flickered furiously. Whatever the odds, he would fight the Spaniards and do what damage he could.

He was a man of Nelson’s heart and mind. Jervis knew that ship for ship the British were superior to the Spaniards, and that only a close-range engagement could exploit those advantages to the full. In the admiral’s book ‘nothing’ would be ‘more unfortuante to the success of His Majesty’s arms’ than ‘a distant cannonade’. He wanted something decisive. When Nelson arrived in the fleet, and brought Hardy and Culverhouse to the
Victory
to report, it must have reinforced the admiral’s determination to fight and his belief in the ability to win. Shortly the
Bonne Citoyenne
arrived with intelligence that the Spanish fleet was only twenty miles to the southeast, and, deducing that it was making for Cadiz, Jervis got underway to intercept them.
²

Leaving Elliot and his suite to transfer to the
Lively
frigate,
Commodore Nelson returned to the
Captain
and ordered Lieutenant Noble to run his broad pendant to the masthead. The old company rejoiced to see him, and Nelson was pleased to find that it had been kept in good shape by his new flag captain, Ralph Willett Miller, who had assumed command at Gibraltar in December. Indeed, one division of the ship was just completing exercising the great guns as Nelson’s barge came alongside. Her commodore and officers intact, the ship took its place in a fleet alive with expectation. Jervis bade his ships keep close order during the night as they stood to the southeast with a southwesterly breeze from starboard and the darkness and fog thickening about them. Occasionally the distant thud of Spanish signal guns emerged out of the gloom, and a Portuguese frigate came up with word that the enemy was fifteen miles to windward. On the British ships officers hung about their quarterdecks focusing night glasses over the black water.
³

The morning of 14 February – St Valentine’s Day – was dark and misty. It found the British several miles southwest of Cape St Vincent, steering sedately south-southeast, close-hauled on the starboard tack. The ships of the line described two compact parallel lines, with the smaller vessels thrown out on the flanks. Hidden in the haze, ahead and to starboard, sailed the Spanish fleet. For some time the easterly levanter had forced it out to sea, but after the wind swung round to the west the admiral, Teniente General (Vice Admiral) Jose de Cordoba y Ramos, had set a course east-southeast for Cadiz. Unwittingly, as the Spaniards pressed through patches of haze towards their destination they converged with the predatory British fleet.

It was five-forty before the British began to see them slipping in and out of the mist several miles ahead. In the van of the British ships, Captain Thomas Troubridge’s
Culloden
signalled strange sails seven or eight miles to windward, and shortly afterwards they were seen from Nelson’s
Captain
and the muffled report of two signal guns heard. Before long the
Bonne Citoyenne
sloop was fading into the mist on a mission of reconnaissance.