Part 8 (2/2)

With this squadron he made an attack upon the then Dutch island of Tobago, with a recklessness which showed that no lack of courage prompted his equivocal conduct at the Texel. The next year he went out again and contrived to run the whole squadron ash.o.r.e on the Aves Islands. The account given by the flag-captain of this transaction is amusing as well as instructive. In his report he says:--

”The day that the squadron was lost, the sun having been taken by the pilots, the vice-admiral as usual had them put down the position in his cabin. As I was entering to learn what was going on, I met the third pilot, Bourdaloue, who was going out crying.

I asked him what the matter was, and he answered: 'Because I find more drift than the other pilots, the admiral is threatening me and abusing me, as usual; yet I am only a poor lad who does the best he can.' When I had entered the cabin, the admiral, who was very angry, said to me, 'That scoundrel of a Bourdaloue is always coming to me with some nonsense or other; I will drive him out of the s.h.i.+p. He makes us to be running a course, the devil knows where, I don't.' As I did not know which was right,” says the captain of the s.h.i.+p, rather navely, ”I did not dare to say anything for fear of bringing down a like storm on my own head.”[64]

Some hours after this scene, which, as the French officer from whom the extract is taken says, ”appears now almost grotesque, but which is only an exact portrayal of the sea manners of the day, the whole squadron was lost on a group of rocks known as the Aves Islands. Such were the officers.” The flag-captain, in another part of his report, says: ”The s.h.i.+pwreck resulted from the general line of conduct held by Vice-Admiral d'Estrees. It was always the opinion of his servants, or others than the proper officers of the s.h.i.+p, which prevailed. This manner of acting may be understood in the Comte d'Estrees, who, without the necessary knowledge of a profession he had embraced so late, always had with him obscure counsellors, in order to appropriate the opinions they gave him so as to blind the s.h.i.+p's company as to his capacity.”[65] D'Estrees had been made vice-admiral two years after he first went aboard s.h.i.+p.

FOOTNOTES:

[45] Martin: History of France.

[46] Martin: History of France.

[47] Ledyard, vol ii. p. 599; Campbell: Lives of the Admirals. See also letter of Sir Richard Haddock, Naval Chronicle, vol. xvii. p.

121.

[48] Hoste: Naval Tactics.

[49] See Map, p. 107.

[50] Martin: History of France.

[51] Brandt: Life of De Ruyter.

[52] Campbell: Lives of the Admirals.

[53] Troude: Batailles Navales de la France, year 1673.

[54] Ibid.

[55] Troude: Batailles Navales de la France, year 1673.

[56] Chabaud-Arnault: Revue Mar. et Col. July, 1885.

[57] Jurien de la Graviere: Guerres Maritimes.

[58] Memoires.

[59] See Map of Mediterranean, p. 15.

[60] Lapeyrouse-Bonfils: Hist. de la Marine Francaise.

[61] This movement, according to Clerk, was not made by the whole of a French line together, but in a way much more scientific and military.

A group of two or three s.h.i.+ps withdrew at a time, being covered by the smoke and the continued fire of the rest of their line. In time a second line was partly formed, which in its turn protected the s.h.i.+ps which had remained on the first, as they executed the somewhat exposed movement of falling back. In Plan V., Dutch s.h.i.+ps at b, b, b, are represented as thus withdrawing. English official reports of the eighteenth century often speak of French s.h.i.+ps acting thus; the English officers attributing to their superior valor a movement which Clerk more plausibly considers a skilful military manoeuvre, well calculated to give the defence several opportunities of disabling the a.s.sailants as they bore down on a course which impeded the use of their artillery. In 1812 the frigate ”United States,” commanded by Decatur, employed the same tactics in her fight with the ”Macedonian;”

and the Confederate gunboats at Mobile by the same means inflicted on Farragut's flag-s.h.i.+p the greater part of the heavy loss which she sustained. In its essential features the same line of action can now be followed by a defendant, having greater speed, when the ardor of the attack, or the necessities of the case, force the a.s.sailant to a direct approach. An indirect cause of a lee line falling farther to leeward has never been noticed. When a s.h.i.+p in that line (as at c) found itself without an opponent abeam, and its next ahead perhaps heavily engaged, the natural impulse would be to put up the helm so as to bring the broadside to bear. This advantage would be gained by a loss of ground to leeward and consequent disorder in the line; which, if the act were repeated by several s.h.i.+ps, could only be restored by the whole line keeping away.

[62] Davies: History of Holland.

[63] Martin: History of France.

[64] Gougeard: Marine de Guerre.

<script>