Nelson (20 page)

Horace already knew about convoy work but this voyage was unusually difficult. The outward journey was merely a matter of hard, dull and routine work. The ragged armada was ushered forward, shedding detachments at Oporto, Lisbon and Cadiz, and passing the capes of St Vincent and Trafalgar, where Nelson would eventually win glorious victories. On 9 January 1777 the
Worcester
anchored in the Bay of Gibraltar, near His Majesty’s ship
Levant
and eight Dutch and Spanish warships.

The next day Nelson went ashore with a letter Robinson wanted to be mailed to Josiah Hardy, the British consul at Cadiz. This was his first opportunity to study the famous gateway to the Mediterranean. To see the ‘apes’ (actually macaque monkeys) scurrying about the rock, or smell the fetid streets of a town humming with men of many hues, where soldiers and sailors jostled with babbling bartering traders; to walk quietly among the prickly pears and pink geraniums of Europa Point; or gaze upon gun-studded ramparts or the brilliant blue waters of the Mediterranean, which he now saw for the first time. Horace was hoping to meet his old messmate, Charles Boyles, who was stationed at Gibraltar, and carried a letter and parcel to deliver to him. Unfortunately, Boyles was nowhere to be found, and after the
Zephyr
sloop arrived on the 24th Nelson entrusted his mail to one of its officers.
⁶

It was not until 14 February that the winds permitted the
Worcester
to start the return leg of the voyage. With her went Lieutenant Henry Charles Bridges of the
Zephyr
, who had developed an eye problem, and a less willing passenger, the supercargo of an American prize taken by the
Levant
, with a box of papers from the same unfortunate vessel.

Off Cadiz the next day they endured the most perilous part of their journey. A number of ships had followed the
Worcester
from Gibraltar, but Robinson expected other homeward-bound merchantmen to join him at Cadiz. He had arranged with Consul Hardy that any ships waiting for convoy there should be ready to join the moment the
Worcester
appeared. But when the ship arrived on the morning of
the 15th and Robinson raised a signal to his fore-topgallant and fired a gun, nothing happened. The waiting merchantmen sat snugly in the bay refusing to budge. For six hours the
Worcester
lay off the port, slowly being enveloped by a savage gale at west-southwest. Robinson reduced sail, but his main yard was destroyed in the slings, and it took an hour to bring the broken spar down, clew up the main-topsail and unbend the mainsail.

For a while the ship was in a situation every seaman dreaded – crippled, with a hard squall driving it towards the shore. Indeed, a Spanish brig in a similar predicament was pounded to pieces against the rocks. Finding it impossible to work out to sea on either tack, Robinson signalled his convoy to follow him into the bay, and a local fishing boat eventually piloted them to a safe haven among the ships already secured there.

An embarrassed British consul redeemed himself by prompting the Spaniards to live up to their well-earned reputation for hospitality, and the courteous hosts provided the
Worcester
with various necessities, including timber for a new yard. Some of the convoy, loaded with perishables, were unable to wait and sailed on as soon as the weather improved, but the
Worcester
had thirty-two ships in company, eleven of them from Cadiz, when she put to sea again on 3 March. There were more reluctant passengers for Robinson to embark too, including four army deserters for delivery to Portsmouth.
⁷

For almost two weeks strong north winds and rain scourged the stubborn ships as they furrowed towards the English Channel. Robinson’s charges were repeatedly appealing for help, to supply a new bowsprit here or a mizzen mast there, or even a surgeon to splint a broken arm, but as the voyage drew to its close they became more unmanageable and aloof. Their masters knew that the Royal Navy often impressed seamen from homeward-bound merchant ships, and all but four of the convoy slunk away to Falmouth or other places on their own hock. It was six o’clock in the evening of 2 April that the
Worcester
itself anchored in Spithead.

Nelson had written to his brother William from the Gulf of Cadiz, informing him of his intention to travel to London at the first opportunity. With more than six years of sea time under his belt, and a spell as acting lieutenant to boot, he wanted to confront the final hurdles that divided him from the king’s commission, hurdles anticipated, and sometimes feared, by every midshipman. He would present himself for examination to a board of three post-captains.

At Portsmouth Captain Robinson took to his room, his rheumatism inflamed by the inclement rigours of his latest service, while his acting lieutenant climbed inside a coach bound for London, armed with the journals of his voyages and certificates of service from their various commanders. His destination was the Navy Office, then occupying an open space within the angle of Seething Lane and Crutched Friars. Lieutenants’ commissions were issued at the Admiralty, but the drudge of examining candidates was delegated to the Navy Board, partly because the ships’ books used to corroborate claims of service were stored in the junior office.

Nelson had prepared himself for the examination as best he could, but there were hidden problems in his candidacy. He had been eighteen on his last birthday, and a commissioned officer was supposed to be at least twenty. Although the books of recent ships had falsified his age, then and throughout life he looked younger than he was, and there was a possibility that some officious inquisitor might probe the matter. Then there were the necessary six years of sea time on His Majesty’s ships. Again, officially Nelson had been in the navy for slightly more than six years, but a year of the time he was supposed to have been with the
Triumph
had actually been spent in the merchant service. The examiners were entitled to see his sea journals, so Horace discreetly left behind any he had kept on the
Triumph
.

As for the substance of the examination, it would be a limited exercise. There would be no questions about naval warfare, nothing about strategy, tactics, combat training or leadership. Professional education in the navy had not yet got that far. The examiners would simply be interested in Nelson’s ability to handle a ship and in establishing that he was eligible for a commission.

Still, there was no telling how punitive the interrogation might be, for it depended upon the particular post-captains drafted into service. Lieutenants’ examinations were sometimes perfunctory indeed, especially if ‘interest’ was at work. Two of the three who tested James Anthony Gardner were ‘particular’ friends of the candidate’s family, and only ‘a few questions’ were needed to persuade them that ‘we need not ask you any more’. On the other hand, there were midshipmen in the service who had sailed into middle age because of their inability to pass the examination.
⁸

Horace appeared expectantly at the Navy Office in his best uniform
on Wednesday 9 April 1777. After a nervous interlude he was shown into a room, ‘somewhat alarmed’ according to the story later told by his brother William. And well might he be. The three men sitting resplendent across the table were Captains John Campbell and Abraham North, both strangers, and the comptroller of the Navy Board – Captain Maurice Suckling himself.

In an effort to deny the nepotism in Nelson’s unusually swift promotion, William later gave an attractive but fictitious account of what followed. He said that the comptroller kept his relationship to the candidate to himself. Only after the youth had answered the questions with increasing confidence and mastery, and exhibited his journals and certificates, did Captain Suckling rise to introduce his nephew. His fellow captains expressed their surprise that the comptroller had not mentioned the fact before. ‘No,’ replied Suckling righteously, ‘I did not wish the younker to be favoured. I felt convinced that he would pass a good examination, and you see, gentlemen, that I have not been disappointed.’
⁹

There can be little doubt that Nelson knew his business, and would have passed a fair examination, but William’s story is nonsense. Even if Campbell and North had not been told about the relationship between Suckling and his nephew, the clues to it were plain in the documents the boy offered for inspection. As his passing certificate records, Nelson presented journals he had kept on the
Carcass
,
Seahorse
,
Dolphin
and
Worcester
, as well as ‘certificates from Captains
Suckling
, Lutwidge, Farmer, Pigott, and Robinson, of his diligence, &c. He can splice, knot, reef a sail, &c. and is qualified to do the duty of an able seaman and midshipman.’ Given the modes of officer entry, it must have seemed highly probable that a candidate who began his career with Suckling was related in some way.

The comptroller put his name to a definite subterfuge, however, when he initialled Nelson’s passing certificate, which attested that the candidate ‘appears to be more than twenty years of age’. Suckling hardly rated this deception as unusual. In fact, his own former captain, Thomas Fox, had done him exactly the same favour when he had stood for lieutenant more than thirty years before.
¹⁰

Passing was one thing; getting a post to confirm the rank another. But Suckling had not allowed Lord Sandwich to forget Nelson, and recommended him again while he was out in the
Worcester
. On 10 April, the day after Horatio passed his examination, he was accordingly appointed lieutenant to the
Lowestoffe
, a frigate fitting at
Sheerness for the Jamaica station under Captain William Locker. Nelson was delighted, and not only on account of the employment itself. The American War of Independence was fully joined, and Jamaica held at least some promise of action and prize money. Eagerly he wrote to Captain Robinson, seeking his discharge from the
Worcester
(duly sent with best wishes), and even got the Admiralty to pay him a lieutenant’s rate for his acting service on that ship, including an allowance for a servant.
¹¹

Still excited five days later, Horace rushed a letter to William, then at Christ’s College, Cambridge, preparing for his Bachelor of Arts:

I passed my degree as Master of Arts on the 9th instant (that is, passed the Lieutenant’s examination) and received my commission on the following day, for a fine frigate of 32 guns. So I am now left in [the] world to shift for myself, which I hope I shall do, so as to bring credit to myself and friends. Am sorry there is no possibility this time of [us] seeing each other, but I hope that [a] time will come in a few years when we will spend some merry hours together.
¹²

William may have been far away, but other members of the family were in London to help Horatio celebrate his elevation to the ranks of officers and gentlemen. We have no information about where he stayed, but two uncles lived in the city. Captain Suckling had succeeded to a house in the parish of St George’s, Hanover Square, previously the property of his former admiral, the Honourable George Townshend, and his brother William, the collector of customs, was in Red Lion Square, not far from Gray’s Inn.
¹³

Some of the Nelsons were also in London to congratulate him, including his father, who arrived on 11 April. Horace’s brother, Maurice, newly ensconced with his uncle at the Navy Office, still resided in the city, as now did their sixteen-year-old sister Ann. After finishing school at the age of fourteen Ann had been apprenticed to Alice Lilly, a citizen of London and member of the Goldsmiths’ Company, on 5 April 1775. She was entitled to board, lodging and tuition for the seven years of her apprenticeship, and was registered with the Chamberlain’s Court. Once fully-fledged at twenty-one, she would command all the economic privileges that went with being a member of the Goldsmiths’ Company and a ‘freeman’ of the town – provided she had the means to establish herself in business.
¹⁴

Nelson had not seen Ann for more than six years, and, though he was proud of his sister now taking on the world, he must have recognised her vulnerability so far from home. Fortunately, her mistress seemed to be a responsible woman. In her forties, Alice Lilly, the daughter of a Wiltshire yeoman, had completed her apprenticeship and become a ‘freeman’ in 1754. Though a member of the Goldsmiths’ she was in fact a milliner by trade and had simply enrolled with the liveried company to obtain its benefits. Seven apprentices in millinery had successfully passed through her hands before Ann’s arrival. Some of the girls were relatives for whom Miss Lilly waived the premium, while others were the daughters of gentry, clergymen and merchants who paid considerable sums. When Ann joined Alice, she was established in a Capital Lace Warehouse at 9 Ludgate Street with Mary Lilly, a niece or cousin who had been her former apprentice. There, in a large terraced four-storey building with its upper floors lit by trios of plain, regular windows and a balustraded roof, Ann boarded with the other remaining apprentice, Sophia Vassmer, the daughter of a gentleman who was already two years into her training.
¹⁵

Given Horatio’s commitment to the family it is probable that he made at least one visit to Ludgate Street to cast a protective eye over his young sister. Legend has besmirched Ann’s reputation. She is supposed to have been seduced in London, given birth to an illegitimate son and forced to return home in disgrace. These stories of skeletons in the cupboard and a lost Nelson nephew, though repeated by several biographers, appear to be entirely misguided. It is true that Ann eventually forsook her apprenticeship, and with it the prospect of becoming a ‘citizen’ of London, but her motives were altogether more prosaic. On 5 February 1777 she and her fellow apprentice had been turned over to another mistress with their full consent. Mary Ann Jackson, a spinster of Ludgate Street and citizen and wheelwright of London, who acquired the Lilly business, was no more a wheelwright than Alice had been a goldsmith, and undertook to complete Ann’s training in millinery. It is possible that the transfer unsettled Ann and contributed to a decision to abandon her trade, but two legacies were the real root of it. One from Captain Suckling, worth £1,000, was paid in 1779, the same year that the nineteen-year-old Ann quit London and returned to Norfolk to care for her aged father.
¹⁶