THE BOY’S BOOK OF THE SEA

BY ERIC WOOD

Author of “The Boy’s Book of Heroes,” “The Boy Scouts’ Roll of Honour,” etc., etc.

WITH FOUR COLOUR PLATES AND TWELVE ILLUSTRATIONS IN BLACK-AND-WHITE

NEW YORK FUNK AND WAGNALLS COMPANY

List of Illustrations

THE BOY’S BOOK OF THE SEA

NAVAL WARFARE—OLD AND NEW

Trafalgar and Modern Fights in the North Sea

NOT the least remarkable of the changes which have taken place during the last hundred years—it is less than that, really—are those which have come to pass in the sphere of warfare; and the accounts of the battles here given show how different naval fighting is to-day from what it was in Nelson’s time. Then wooden ships, now steel leviathans; then guns that fired about 800 yards, now giant weapons that hit the mark ten miles off; then close fighting, boarding, hand-to-hand conflicts, now long-range fighting, with seldom, if ever, a chance to board. Then shots that did what would be considered little damage beside that wrought by the high-explosive shells which penetrate thick armour-plate, and which, well-placed, can send a ship to the bottom. Then none of those speeding death-tubes, the torpedoes, which work such dreadful havoc with a floating citadel; then casualties in a whole battle no more than those suffered by a single ship nowadays. And so one could go on, touching on wireless telegraphy, fire-control—that ingenious

system which does man’s work of sighting the guns—aircraft and submarines, which constitute so serious a factor in present-day warfare. But the story of[2] Trafalgar, that well-fought battle against a noble foe who is now a gallant ally, and those of the North Sea, 1914 and 1915, will show the revolutions in modern naval warfare.

Nelson had determined to meet and beat Villeneuve, in command of the allied French and Spanish fleet, which left Cadiz at the end of September, 1805. The French admiral did not know how near Nelson was. To-day the means of communication are vastly different, and battleships are able to discover the proximity of their foes much more easily than in those other days. It is one of the great changes in naval warfare. So it was that the allied fleets were dogged until Nelson decided it was time to strike.

On the 21st the rival fleets met. The English fleet was in order of battle—two lines, with an advanced squadron of eight fast-sailing two-deckers. Nelson, in the Victory, led one column, Collingwood, in the Royal Sovereign, the other.

About half-past eight Villeneuve ordered his fleet to draw up in such array and position that, if necessary, they could make for Cadiz; but the manœuvre was badly executed, and the fleet assumed a crescent-shaped formation, into which the English columns were sailing.

Nelson was longing for the fight; so were his men. But, although the officers on board the Victory were eager for the fight, they would have been content to forgo the honour of opening the fight in favour of some other ship, fearing lest Nelson should be killed.

Nelson was asked: “Could not the Temeraire take the foremost place of the column?”

Nelson replied:

“Oh, yes, let her go—if she can!”

Captain Hardy hailed the Temeraire to give her instructions; but, meanwhile, Nelson was moving[3] about the decks giving orders that made the Victory leap forward and hold her place in the vanguard.

“There!” he said to Hardy, as he came back. “Let the Temeraires open the ball, if they can—which they most assuredly can’t! I think there’s nothing more to be done now, is there, till we open fire? Oh, yes, stay a minute, though. I suppose I must give the fleet something as a final fillip. Let me see. How would this do: ‘Nelson expects that every man will do his duty?’”

Hardy suggested that “England expects” would be an improvement. Nelson agreed. The order was given; and the message was soon fluttering in the breeze.

What shouts of enthusiasm greeted the signal in Trafalgar’s Bay! Every man took it as a message to himself, and forthwith vowed to do what was expected of him.

“Now,” said Nelson. “I can do no more. We must trust to the great Disposer of events and the justice of our cause. I thank God for this opportunity of doing my duty!”

For all his apparent good spirits the Admiral had a foreboding of impending ill, and when Captain Blackwood left him to take up his place on the Euryalus, the Admiral gripped him by the hand and said:

“God bless you, Blackwood! I shall never see you again.”

The battle was opened by the French ship Fougueux, which fired upon the Royal Sovereign.

“Engage the enemy more closely,” was now Nelson’s signal, and the English closed in upon the foe. Collingwood broke through the enemy’s line astern the Santa Anna. He reserved his fire until he was almost at the muzzles of their guns, then, with a roar, his port broadside was hurled at the Santa Anna, and four[4] hundred men fell killed and wounded, and fourteen of the Spaniard’s guns were put out of action.

The starboard guns spoke to the Fougueux at the same time. Owing to the dense smoke and the greater distance, the damage done was not so great.

“By Jove, Rotherham!” cried Collingwood to his flag-captain. “What would Nelson give to be here?”

“And,” says James in his Naval History, “by a singular coincidence Lord Nelson, the moment he saw his friend in his enviable position, exclaimed: ‘See how that noble fellow Collingwood carries his ship into action.’”

Collingwood now pressed still closer on the Santa Anna, and a smart battle began between the two great ships, till four other ships bore down upon the Royal Sovereign, so that she was very soon the centre of a ring of fire. So close were the ships, and so continuous was the fire, that often cannon-balls met in mid-air, though more frequently they fell on board and did much damage. Badly aimed shots often passed over the Royal Sovereign, and found their mark on the decks of French or Spanish vessels. Presently the four new-comers veered off when they noticed that other British ships were bearing down upon them.

With a roar the British Belleisle sent a broadside into the Santa Anna as she passed; and then Collingwood was alone with his foe. For over an hour the duel raged, and the Royal Sovereign, although she carried a dozen guns fewer than the Santa Anna, suffered less. Battered, mastless, with hundreds of men lying in pools of blood, the Santa Anna still fought on, refusing for a long time to strike her colours. At last, however, there was nothing for it but to give in, and the Spanish flag fluttered down the mast.

When the battle began the foe opened fire at the[5] Victory, which they knew was Nelson’s flagship. The English Admiral had made sure that he should not be lost sight of, for he had hoisted several flags lest one should be carried away. The Victory’s maintopgallant sail was shot away, and broadsides were hurled at her, but still she kept on.

Nelson wished to encounter Villeneuve, and, despite a raking fire poured in upon him by the Santissima Trinidad, he kept on his way, taking the Victory into the thick of the fight. He refused to have the hammocks slung higher lest they should interrupt his view, although they would have afforded shelter from the enemy’s fire. Men dropped all about the ship, shots ploughed up the deck or bored their way through the sides, yet the gallant Victory held on her way for the Bucentaure, which Nelson knew carried Admiral Villeneuve.

Eight ships, however, surrounded her, and made it impossible for the Victory to be brought alongside. These, belching forth their heavy fire at her, smashed her wheel, hurled her mizzen-mast overboard, shattered her sails. The wind had dropped, too; the Victory was almost at a standstill, and it was impossible to bring a gun into action.

Pacing his quarter-deck Nelson waited for his time to come. While doing so, a shot passed between him and Hardy, bruising the latter’s foot, and tearing the buckle from his shoe. Both stopped in their promenade, looking anxiously at each other.

“This is too warm work to last long, Hardy,” said Nelson.

“The enemy are closing up their line, sir,” said Hardy. “See! We can’t get through without running one of them aboard!”

“I can’t help that,” said Nelson, “and I don’t see[6] that it matters much which we tackle first. Take your choice. Go on board which you please.”

Villeneuve on the Bucentaure was therefore given a treble-shotted, close-range broadside, which disabled four hundred men and put twenty guns out of action, and left the ship almost defenceless.

Then, porting his helm, Nelson bore down on the Redoutable and the Neptune. The latter veered off, but the former could not escape the Victory, which she therefore received with a broadside. Then, fearing that a boarding party would enter her, the lower deck ports were shut. Meanwhile the Temeraire had fastened on to the Redoutable on the other side, and the most momentous episode in that great day’s work took place. In it we can see the difference between the naval fighting of a century ago and that of to-day, the latter being fought at long range, with no attempt at boarding.

The Victory’s guns were depressed so that they should not do damage to the Temeraire, and broadside after broadside was poured into the Redoutable, which made a brave show. The two ships were almost rubbing sides (now we fight at eight-mile range or more!), and men stood by the British guns with buckets of water in their hands, which, immediately the guns were fired, they emptied into the hole made in the Redoutable’s side lest she should catch fire, and so the prize be lost.

In the Redoutable’s top riflemen were posted, and throughout the fight picked off man after man—a practice which Nelson himself abhorred. It was from one of these snipers that the great Admiral received his death-wound.

While pacing the poop deck, Nelson suddenly swung round and pitched forward on his face. A ball had entered in at the left shoulder, and passed through his backbone.

[7]Hardy, turning, saw three men lifting him up.

“They have done for me at last, Hardy,” Nelson said feebly.

“Oh, I hope not!” cried Hardy.

“Yes,” was the reply; “my backbone is shot through!”

The bearers carried him down the ladders to the lower deck. On the way, despite his awful agony, Nelson had thoughts for nothing but the battle; he ordered that new tiller ropes should be rigged to replace those which had been shot away at the moment the Victory had crashed into the Redoutable. Then, that they might not recognise him, he covered his face and stars with his handkerchief.

They carried him into the cockpit. We will leave him, and return to the conflict.

The men in the Redoutable’s top still kept up their galling fire, as also did the guns of the second deck, and in less than fifteen minutes after Nelson had been shot down, no fewer than fifty of the Victory’s officers and men had met a like fate.

Then the French determined to board. As it was impossible to do this by the bulwarks, they lowered their main yard and turned it into a bridge, over which they scrambled on to the deck of the Victory.

“Repel boarders!”

It was a cry like that of a wild beast, and it brought the lion’s whelps from the lower decks. They hurled themselves at the venturesome Frenchmen. With pistol and pike, cutlass and axe, the English fought with the ferocity that had made them so dreaded in the past; when other weapons failed they fought with bare fists, hurling the trespassers overboard.

It cost the Victory thirty men to repel that attack. But it cost the Redoutable more; and very soon not[8] a Frenchman was left alive on the decks of Nelson’s ship.

As we have said, while the Victory was engaging the Redoutable on one side, the Temeraire was tackling her on the other, the three ships hugging each other with muzzles touching muzzles. Soon after the attempt to board the Victory, the Temeraire lashed her bowsprit to the gangway of the Redoutable so that she could not escape. Then she poured in a raking fire until the Frenchman was compelled to surrender, though not before she had twice been on fire, and more than five hundred of her crew had been killed or wounded.

Some of the Temeraire men then turned to deal with the Fougueux, which had attacked her during the fight with the Redoutable.

Captain Hardy was too busy with the Redoutable to do much; but Lieutenant Kennedy quickly set a party to man the starboard batteries. With these they opened fire at about one hundred yards, and crash! the Fougueux’s masts fell, her wheel was smashed, her rigging shattered, and she was so crippled that she ran foul of the Temeraire, whose crew lashed their foe to them, and Kennedy, with a couple of middies and fewer than thirty seamen and marines, rushed aboard her.

Five hundred Frenchmen were still fresh for battle on the Fougueux, but the Britishers did not hesitate. With a bound they were on the enemy’s deck, and, slashing and hacking at the crowd that came up against them, drove them back and still back. Dozens were killed and others leapt overboard to escape the whirlwind that had fallen upon them. The remainder scuttled away below, the English clapped the hatches on them, and the ship was won.

“Kennedy, with a couple of middies and fewer than thirty men, rushed aboard”

Meanwhile the Victory had been pouring a heavy[9] fire into the Santissima Trinidad on one side and the Redoutable on the other. Through and through the former was raked, her deck swept clear of men, until the Spaniards dived overboard and swam off to the Victory, whose crew helped them aboard.

The Belleisle, which had hurled her broadside into the Santa Anna early in the conflict, had been pounced upon by about half a dozen ships of the enemy, which poured in a deadly fire, battering her sides, tearing her rigging to pieces, and twisting her mizzen-mast over the aft guns, putting them out of action. Sixty men also had been sent to their account, but the rest fought on with British courage.

The Achille bore down upon her and attacked her aft, the Aigle, assisted by the Neptune, fell on her starboard, aiming at her remaining masts and bringing them down.

“Crippled, but unconquered,” masts gone by the board, nearly all the guns useless, men mostly killed or wounded, the Belleisle’s few remaining men stood to their three or four guns and hurled defiance at the foe. Pounding away for all they were worth, not a man flinched—except at the thought that the flag had been shot away. They fastened a Union Jack to a pikehead, waved it defiantly, yelled out a cheer of determination, and fought on again, keeping their ship in action throughout the battle, refusing to strike the pikehead flag.

The English Neptune assailed the Bucentaure, and brought her main- and mizzen-masts down; then the Leviathan came up, and at a range of about thirty yards gave the French flagship a full broadside which smashed the stern to splinters. The Conqueror completed the work thus begun, and brought down the flag.

A marine officer and five men put off from the[10] Conqueror to take possession. Villeneuve and two chief officers at once gave their swords to the officer, who, thinking that the honour of accepting them belonged to his captain, refused the weapons, put the Frenchmen in his boat, pocketed the key of the magazine, left two sentries to guard the cabin doors, and then pulled away to rejoin his ship. For some time the little boat searched for the Conqueror, which had gone in quest of other foes. Eventually, however, the boat was picked up by the Mars, whose acting commander, Lieutenant Hennah, accepted the surrendered swords, and ordered Villeneuve and his two captains below.

The Leviathan next tackled the Spanish San Augustino, which opened fire on her at a hundred yards. The Leviathan replied with fine effect, bringing down the Spaniard’s mizzen-mast and flag. Then she lashed herself to her foe. Clearing the way for boarders by a galling fire, the English captain sent across his boarding party. A hand-to-hand fight took place, and the Spaniards were steadily but surely forced over the side or below, and at last the ship was won.

The French Intrépide, seeing the plight of her ally, now bore down on the Leviathan, raking her with fire as she came, and getting her boarders ready for attack. They did not board, for the Africa pitted herself against the Intrépide, and smaller though she was got the best of it, and the Frenchmen were compelled to strike their flag.

Meanwhile the Prince and the Swiftsure were engaged with the Achille, into which many English ships had sent stinging shots, bringing her masts to the deck, and making the ship a blazing mass. Unable to quench the flames, the crew began cutting the masts, intending to heave them overboard.

The Prince, however, gave her a broadside which[11] did the cutting, and sent the wreckage down into the waists. The whole ship immediately took fire. The Prince and the Swiftsure, ceasing fire, sent their boats to save the Frenchmen. It was a noble but dangerous act, for the heat discharged the Achille’s guns, and many of the would-be rescuers perished as a result. Blazing hulk though she was, the Achille kept her colours flying bravely, her sole surviving senior officer, a middy, refusing to strike. The flames reached her magazine, and with colours flying she blew up, carrying all her remaining men heavenwards.

Meantime, Nelson lay dying in the cockpit of the Victory in agony, yet rejoicing that he was victorious. The rank and file were kept ignorant of his condition, though the Admiral himself knew that the end was near, and urged the surgeons to give their attention to others. “He was in great pain, and expressed much anxiety for the event of the action, which now began to declare itself. As often as a ship struck the crew of the Victory hurrahed, and at every hurrah a visible expression of joy gleamed in the eyes and marked the countenance of the dying hero.”

Every now and then Nelson asked for Hardy. “Will no one bring Hardy to me?” he cried; and when at last Hardy came, the two friends shook hands in silence.

“Well, Hardy, how goes the day with us?” asked Nelson presently.

“Very well, my lord. We have got twelve or fourteen of the enemies’ ships, but five of their van have tacked, and show an intention of bearing down on the Victory. I have therefore called two or three of our fresh ships round us, and have no doubt of giving them a drubbing.”

“I hope none of our ships have struck, Hardy?”

“No, my lord; there is no fear of that.”

[12]“Well, I am a dead man, Hardy, but I am glad of what you say. Oh, whip them now you’ve got them; whip them as they’ve never been whipped before!”

Hardy then left him for a time, returning somewhat later to report that some fourteen ships had been taken.

“That’s well,” cried Nelson, “though I bargained for twenty. Anchor, Hardy, anchor.”

Hardy suggested that Admiral Collingwood might now take over the direction of affairs.

“Not while I live, Hardy!” said Nelson. “Do you anchor.”

“Shall we make the signal, sir?”

“Yes,” answered Nelson. “For if I live, I’ll anchor.”

For a little while Hardy looked down at his admiral.

“Kiss me, Hardy,” said Nelson; and Hardy kissed him. “Don’t have my poor carcass hove overboard,” whispered Nelson, as Hardy leant over him. “Get what’s left of me sent to England, if you can manage it. Kiss me, Hardy.”

Hardy kissed him again.

“Who is that?” asked the hero.

“It is I—Hardy.”

“Good-bye. God bless you, Hardy. Thank God, I’ve done my duty.”

Then Hardy left him—for ever.

Nelson was turned on to his right side, muttered the words that he would soon be gone. Then, after a little silence, he sighed and struggled to speak, but all he could say was:

“Thank God, I have done my duty!”