- Author
- Payne, Alan
- Subjects
- History - general
- Tags
- None noted.
- RAN Ships
- None noted.
- Publication
- December 1979 edition of the Naval Historical Review (all rights reserved)
In the action which followed six ships of the line were captured, while a seventh, the Vengeur, was sunk by gunfire – a most rare event in the days of sail. One of the six French ships surrendered to the Russell. As there appears to be no official account of the Russell’s part in the action, the only record available is from James’ Naval History: ‘The Russell hove to windward of, and commenced cannonading, her proper opponent, the Temeraire, about the same time as the Leviathan opened her fire. At 10 a.m., or thereabouts, the Russell’s fore topmast came down; and at 11 a.m. the Temeraire, observing the ships of her van in the act of wearing, made sail to leeward, and was followed through the line by the Russell. The French ship, not being greatly damaged in her masts and rigging, was able to haul up a little to starboard; while the Russell, having her fore topmast hanging through the top, could not trim her sails in any other direction, and therefore brought on the starboard tack, the same on which she had commenced the action.
‘The Russell now found herself to leeward of the three French van-ships. Of these, the America was fully employed with the Leviathan, and was also without any masts; but the Trajan and Eole, having no particular opponents, and being in a perfect state aloft, poured each her broadside into the Russell, and then hauled to the wind and got clear. After she had returned this salute, the Russell passed on to the assistance of the Leviathan, and fired two raking broadsides into the America; the fate of which ship, however, as far as effective opposition went, had already been decided by her first opponent. The Russell then accompanied the Leviathan to the new line forming astern of the admiral, and at about 2 hr. 30 min. p.m. in compliance with the signal to stay by prizes, stood for and again fell in with the America; who then prudently hauled down her colours, and was quietly taken possession of by the Russell. The damages of the Russell, beyond what have been detailed were not material; and her loss amounted to eight seamen and marines or soldiers killed and 26 wounded.‘
The casualties suffered by the Russell were about average for the fleet, but three ships had relatively high casualties – Marlborough, Brunswick and the Queen, and in the two former ships both captains died of their wounds. The casualties in the French ships were exceptionally heavy and amounted to over a thousand in the seven ships captured or sunk. In the days of sail losses were almost invariably on one side as in the First of June and all other major naval battles of that period. Wooden ships were very hard to sink and almost immobile when dismasted, so that the victorious side had every advantage in saving his own ships from the carronade of the enemy.
There was a persistent legend in the British fleet that Le Jacobin had been sunk and had, in fact, gone down fighting with her lower deck under water, but still firing her upper deck guns. This was not true and Lord Howe never claimed it was. The French had fought with great courage and could not accept the fact that Howe’s fleet had suffered no more than damage and casualties. ‘The French monsters were so persuaded their fire must sink our ships, that nothing could convince them they had not sunk several,‘ wrote Lady Mary. ‘The officers of the Impetueux, prisoners on board our ships, assured Captain Payne they had seen with their own eyes a ship, painted red and black, which had particularly troubled them by sticking close to them, go to the bottom, and no declaration of Jack Payne’s that he and his Russell were both above water, could make them credit his assertion. As so many declared themselves eyewitnesses of this fact, Payne and his ship must henceforth be considered as revenants, for at Portsmouth they or their ghosts certainly are at this moment.‘
In a letter home about the battle Captain Collingwood wrote, ‘Our condition did not admit of further pursuit, indeed to take possession of what we had got required exertion.‘ Perhaps the best indication of the state of the British Fleet after the action is given by Lord Howe in his private journal; ‘. . . the enemy stood away large to the northward; leaving seven of their dismasted ships in our possession, one of which sank while the prisoners were removing, and many of the crew perished with the ship. The Marlborough and Defence were totally dismasted; and the Brunswick, having lost her mizzen mast, and drifted thereby to leeward of the enemy’s re-assembled ships, she bore up and arrived a few days after at Spithead. The damage in the masts and rigging of the ships was so considerable, that the 2nd and 3rd of the month were employed in securing what were left of the wounded masts; fixing jury-masts where requisite, and removing the prisoners as well as taking the six prizes in tow.’ Howe maintained that the fleet was in no condition to give chase to the French fleet and it is quite obvious that to have given chase in any force would have required burning the six prizes.
Captain Brenton in his Naval History is adamant that both the convoy and the remnants of the French fleet could have been destroyed. Brenton is unfortunately a very biased historian and often quite unreliable. By an odd coincidence Brenton got to know Admiral Villaret-Joyeuse well as the admiral had been brought home from Martinique in 1808 as a prisoner in the ship commanded by Captain Brenton, who developed a very high opinion of the French admiral and to a great extent adopted his point of view that Lord Howe had not won such a brilliant victory after all.
The Admiral told Brenton that it was on the direct orders of Robespierre that he had taken his fleet to sea and he was ordered not to let the convoy fall into the hands of Lord Howe, ‘If he did so, his head should answer for it under the guillotine.‘ He was also ordered to take along an officer who would in later years be called a Political Commissar. It is therefore not altogether surprising that the French admiral should have had a very jaundiced point of view about the battle, which he lost even though he did save the convoy. He told Brenton that he only gave battle when he knew that the convoy was near at hand, and that it would fall a prey to the British fleet unless that fleet was disabled by action, or busied in securing prizes: for he had made up his mind to the loss of a few ships; ‘What did I care,‘ he said, ‘for half a dozen rotten old hulks which you took.‘ The admiral added bitterly that, while Howe had ‘amused himself refitting his captures,‘ he himself had ‘saved his convoy – and his head.‘ At the time a great naval victory was just what England required. It is true that it could have been a more complete victory, but it set the standard for British naval superiority for the next twenty years of war.
Captain Collingwood’s statement that the British fleet was in no condition to pursue the defeated French fleet would appear to be quite reasonable, but there was none the less a strong opinion in the fleet that the victory should have been made complete. It clearly would have been prudent to send all available forces to the Ushant area to intercept the convoy and to reinforce Admiral Montagu’s squadron. It would seem that this was in fact Lord Howe’s original contention. But there seems no doubt that the Captain of the Fleet decided to take matters into his own hands by influencing Lord Howe to the contrary opinion.
There are several versions of what happened and this particular one is taken from the memoirs of Vice Admiral Sir William Dillon, who took part in the action as a midshipman. ‘Many years afterwards, I heard from the best authority that the Captain of the Fleet, Sir Roger Curtis, who had been selected by Lord Howe to assist him in his naval duties, when consulted by his Lordship after the action, replied, ‘You have gained a victory. Now make sure of it. If you renew the action who knows what may be the result? Make sure of what you have got. Your Lordship is tired. You had better take some rest, and I will manage the other matters for you.’ Lord Howe accordingly went below, to bed I believe, leaving the Captain of the Fleet to make signals as he thought necessary.‘ There seems little doubt that if Curtis had not been Captain of the Fleet, the battle might well have been a far greater success. But one thing is clear. Lord Howe was exhausted and he was far too old for such a strenuous task, he was in fact 69.
His second in command. Admiral Graves, was the same age.
There is no doubt that it was at the particular insistence of Sir Roger Curtis that Captain Molloy was to lead the van of the action of the 29th and that Lord Howe would have preferred Captain Payne or another reliable officer to lead the van. ‘You have mistaken your man, I have not‘ was Howe’s comment at the time. On the 1st June, when Caesar hauled up instead of going through the line, Lord Howe tapped Curtin on the shoulder and pointing to the Caesar, said, ‘Look, Curtis, there goes your friend; who is mistaken now?‘
The general impression of the fleet at the end of the action was that the other five dismasted French ships should not have been allowed to escape, which they did under spritsails, or towed by frigates. A total of twelve French ships of the line had been dismasted compared to the two British. There happened to be an independent witness to the fact that Curtis had dissuaded his commander-in-chief from pursuing the enemy. Many years later the Honourable Sir Robert Stopford, who had been in command of the frigate Aquilon at the battle wrote: ‘Having observed the Marlborough dismasted in the course of the action, and surrounded by the enemy’s ships, I bore down and took her in tow, which bringing me very near the Queen Charlotte, I went on board for orders: the cool, collected manner in which I was received by Lord Howe, and the desire he expressed to get the ship to rights to continue the action, showed that such was his intention; and for the purpose of exonerating Lord Howe’s memory from the charges I have heard alleged against him on that occasion, for not following up his victory, I think it right to state, that when standing on the Queen Charlotte’s poop close to Lord Howe, Sir Roger Curtis came in haste, and apparent perturbation, exclaiming, ‘I declare to God, my Lord, if you don’t assemble the fleet, they will turn the tables upon us.’ I must confess that I did not see anything to warrant such an exclamation, excepting a French ship passing under the Queen Charlotte’s stern, and firing a few guns into her. The admiral and Sir R. Curtis then retired to another part of the poop, and nothing more was done.‘