Part 5 (1/2)
The immediate dispute is of slight present interest, except as an historical link in the fighting development of the British Navy; and only this historical significance justifies more than a pa.s.sing mention. In 1778 men's minds were still full of Byng's execution in 1757, and of the Mathews and Lestock affair in 1744, which had materially influenced Byng in his action off Minorca. Keppel repeatedly spoke of himself as on trial for his life; and he had been a member of Byng's court-martial. The gist of the charges against him, preferred by Palliser, was that he attacked in the first instance without properly forming his line, for which Mathews had been censured; and, secondly, that by not renewing the action after the first pa.s.s-by, and by wearing away from the French fleet, he had not done his utmost to ”take, sink, burn, and destroy.” This had been the charge on which Byng was shot. Keppel, besides his justifying reasons for his course in general, alleged and proved his full intention to attack again, had not Palliser failed to come into line, a delinquency the same as that of Lestock, which contributed to Mathew's ruin.
In other words, men's minds were breaking away from, but had not thrown off completely, the tyranny of the Order of Battle,--one of the worst of tyrannies, because founded on truth. Absolute error, like a whole lie, is open to speedy detection; half-truths are troublesome.
The Order of Battle[50] was an admirable servant and a most objectionable despot. Mathews, in despair over a recalcitrant second, cast off the yoke, engaged with part of his force, was ill supported and censured; Lestock escaping. Byng, considering this, and being a pedant by nature, would not break his line; the enemy slipped away, Minorca surrendered, and he was shot. In Keppel's court-martial, twenty-eight out of the thirty captains who had been in the line were summoned as witnesses. Most of them swore that if Keppel had chased in line of battle that day, there could have been no action, and the majority of them cordially approved his course; but there was evidently an undercurrent still of dissent, and especially in the rear s.h.i.+ps, where there had been some of the straggling inevitable in such movements. Their commanders therefore had uncomfortable experience of the lack of mutual support, which the line of battle was meant to insure.
Another indication of still surviving pedantry was the obligation felt in the rear s.h.i.+ps to take post about their own admiral, and to remain there when the signals for the line of battle, and to bear down in the admiral's wake, were flying. Thus Palliser's own inaction, to whatever cause due, paralysed the six or eight sail with him; but it appears to the writer that Keppel was seriously remiss in not summoning those s.h.i.+ps by their own pennants, as soon as he began to distrust the purposes of the Vice-Admiral, instead of delaying doing so till 7 P.M., as he did. It is a curious picture presented to us by the evidence. The Commander-in-Chief, with his staff and the captain of the s.h.i.+p, fretting and fuming on the _Victory's_ quarter-deck; the signals flying which have been mentioned; Harland's division getting into line ahead; and four points on the weather quarter, only two miles distant, so that ”every gun and port could be counted,” a group of seven or eight sail, among them the flag of the third in command, apparently indifferent spectators. The _Formidable's_ only sign of disability was the foretopsail unbent for four hours,--a delay which, being unexplained, rather increased than relieved suspicion, rife then throughout the Navy. Palliser was a Tory, and had left the Board of Admiralty to take his command. Keppel was so strong a Whig that he would not serve against the Americans; and he evidently feared that he was to be betrayed to his ruin.
Palliser's defence rested upon three princ.i.p.al points: (1), that the signal for the line of battle was not seen on board the _Formidable_; (2), that the signal to get into the Admiral's wake was repeated by himself; (3), that his foremast was wounded, and, moreover, found to be in such bad condition that he feared to carry sail on it. As regards the first, the signal was seen on board the _Ocean_, next astern of and ”not far from”[51] the _Formidable_; for the second, the Admiral should have been informed of a disability by which a single s.h.i.+p was neutralizing a division. The frigate that brought Keppel's message could have carried back this. Thirdly, the most damaging feature to Palliser's case was that he a.s.serted that, after coming out from under fire, he wore at once towards the enemy; afterwards he wore back again. A s.h.i.+p that thus wore twice before three o'clock, might have displayed zeal and efficiency enough to run two miles, off the wind,[52] at five, to support a fight. Deliberate treachery is impossible. To this writer the Vice-Admiral's behaviour seems that of a man in a sulk, who will do only that which he can find no excuses for neglecting. In such cases of sailing close, men generally slip over the line into grievous wrong.
Keppel was cleared of all the charges preferred against him; the accuser had not thought best to embody among them the delay to recall the s.h.i.+ps which his own example was detaining. Against Palliser no specific charge was preferred, but the Admiralty directed a general inquiry into his course on the 27th of July. The court found his conduct ”in many instances highly exemplary and meritorious,”--he had fought well,--”but reprehensible in not having acquainted the Commander-in-Chief of his distress, which he might have done either by the _Fox_, or other means which he had in his power.” Public opinion running strongly for Keppel, his acquittal was celebrated with bonfires and illuminations in London; the mob got drunk, smashed the windows of Palliser's friends, wrecked Palliser's own house, and came near to killing Palliser himself. The Admiralty, in 1780, made him Governor of Greenwich Hospital.
On the 28th of July, the British and French being no longer in sight of each other, Keppel, considering his fleet too injured aloft to cruise near the French coast, kept away for Plymouth, where he arrived on the 31st. Before putting to sea again, he provided against a recurrence of the misdemeanor of the 27th by a general order, that ”in future the Line is always to be taken from the Centre.” Had this been in force before, Palliser's captains would have taken station by the Commander-in-Chief, and the _Formidable_ would have been left to windward by herself. At the same time Howe was closing his squadron upon the centre in America; and Rodney, two years later, experienced the ill-effects of distance taken from the next ahead, when the leading s.h.i.+p of a fleet disregarded an order.
Although privately censuring Palliser's conduct, the Commander-in-Chief made no official complaint, and it was not until the matter got into the papers, through the talk of the fleet, that the difficulty began which resulted in the trial of both officers, early in the following year. After this, Keppel, being dissatisfied with the Admiralty's treatment, intimated his wish to give up the command. The order to strike his flag was dated March 18th, 1779. He was not employed afloat again, but upon the change of administration in 1782 he became First Lord of the Admiralty, and so remained, with a brief intermission, until December, 1783.
It is perhaps necessary to mention that both British and French a.s.serted, and a.s.sert to this day, that the other party abandoned the field.[53] The point is too trivial, in the author's opinion, to warrant further discussion of an episode the historical interest of which is very slight, though its professional lessons are valuable.
The British case had the advantage--through the courts-martial--of the sworn testimony of twenty to thirty captains, who agreed that the British kept on the same tack under short sail throughout the night, and that in the morning only three French s.h.i.+ps were visible. As far as known to the author, the French contention rests only on the usual reports.
[Footnote 38: _Ante_, pp. 61, 62.]
[Footnote 39: Testimony of Captains Hood, Robinson, and Macbride, and of Rear-Admiral Campbell, captain of the fleet to Keppel.]
[Footnote 40: See note on preceding page.]
[Footnote 41: A vessel is said to be on the port tack when she has the wind blowing on her port, or left side; on the starboard tack, when the wind is on the right side. Thus with an east wind, if she head north, she is on the starboard tack; if south, on the port.]
[Footnote 42: See also note; _post_, p. 200.]
[Footnote 43: Twenty-two degrees.]
[Footnote 44: Column and line ahead are equivalent terms, each s.h.i.+p steering in the wake of its next ahead.]
[Footnote 45: Forty-five degrees.]
[Footnote 46: Chevalier says, p. 89, ”The English pa.s.sed out of range”
of these s.h.i.+ps. As these s.h.i.+ps had the wind, they had the choice of range, barring signals from their own admiral. In truth, they were obeying his order.]
[Footnote 47: This evidence of the captains of the _Ocean_ and the _Elizabeth_ contradicts Palliser's charge that his s.h.i.+p was not adequately supported.]
[Footnote 48: It was actually quite equal, but this was due to an accidental explosion on board the _Formidable_.]
[Footnote 49: Chevalier. Probably later by the other times used in this account.]
[Footnote 50: The Order of Battle was const.i.tuted by the s.h.i.+ps ”of the line” ranging themselves one behind the other in a prescribed succession; the position of each and the intervals between being taken from the s.h.i.+p next ahead. This made the leading vessel the pivot of the order and of manoeuvring, unless specially otherwise directed; which in an emergency could not always be easily done. Strictly, if circ.u.mstances favoured, the line on which the s.h.i.+ps thus formed was one of the two close-hauled lines; ”close-hauled” meaning to bring the vessel's head as ”near” the direction of the wind as possible, usually to about 70 degrees. The advantage of the close-hauled line was that the vessels were more manageable than when ”off” the wind.]
[Footnote 51: Evidence of Captain John Laforey, of the _Ocean_.]
[Footnote 52: ”I do not recollect how many points I went from the wind; I must have bore down a pretty large course.” Testimony of Captain J. Laforey, of the _Ocean_, on this point.]
[Footnote 53: ”During the night (of the 27th) Admiral Keppel kept away (_fit route_) for Portsmouth.” Chevalier, ”Marine Francaise,” p. 90.