The manifest confusion of the enemy, added to their knowledge of his want of discipline, gave the British seamen a boundless confidence. His numbers were naught, and Jervis’s men could dismiss that vain show in the spirit of Alaric’s scoffing answer to the threats of the Romans, “The thicker the hay the better the mowing.” There were fine ships in the Spanish fleet, there was personal courage which might have been trained to efficiency, there were some officers who could have handled good instruments if they had had them. There was nothing else. Therefore as the naval historian, James, puts it with more than his usual liveliness, our seamen “rattled through the business, more as if it were a game of harmless sport, than one in which the hazard thrown was for life or death.”

It was half-past eleven when the Culloden opened fire, and by midday the head of the line had cut into the gap between the disorderly shoals of Spaniards. If it had stood on it would have passed, and the enemy would have been free to unite behind it. At 12.8 Jervis signalled the order to tack, and the Culloden came round to fall on the rear of the Spaniards who were huddled to windward heading to the north to pass our line as it went south. The Blenheim and Prince George tacked in succession to follow the Culloden. Tacking in succession was not only a slow movement, but if it had been carried out the fleet must have fallen behind the weather division of the Spaniards. To keep them permanently divided our line should have turned together, or should have begun to turn in succession from the rear. At about 1 o’clock the Spaniards had passed down our line to the rear. Their lee division made a feeble effort at 12.30 to break through the line ahead of the Victory, and join the ships to windward. Their road was barred, and they were headed off in confusion by her heavy fire. One only passed down the line to leeward—it was supposed she was the Oriente, 74—exchanged broadsides with the closing ship, the Excellent, and joined the main body. As she passed the rear she was fired into by our frigates which were in their station to rear and to leeward of the line, and returned their fire without doing them any harm.

So far there was nothing to show that the battle would differ very materially from many previous encounters of fleets passing in opposite directions. It would not have differed if literal obedience had been paid to the signal made by Jervis at 12.51—“To take suitable stations, and engage as arrive up in succession,” which implied that the ships were to continue following one another. But just before, or just at, or just after this moment,[4] Nelson made a movement which altered the whole character of the battle. He brought the Captain round on her keel, passed astern of the Diadem, the vessel next behind him, and ahead of the Excellent. Then he threw himself ahead of the Spaniards, who were trying to pass the rear of the line, and turned them off. He turned his ship from being the third from the rear into being the first of the van, for as he came round he fell on the enemy ahead of the Culloden. The Captain was hotly pressed, but was relieved first by the Culloden then by the Blenheim, which passed between her and the enemy, and pushed on. Other vessels turned and came up to press on the enemy. The rear ships of the line did not follow the example of the Captain till Jervis, who had tacked the Victory, and was standing to the north, ordered them to do so. All then fell on the retreating Spaniards, of whom four were taken. Meanwhile the enemy to leeward had worked to windward, formed a line, and came up to support the main body, falling into position to rear of it. Jervis called his ships together to cover his prizes, and the battle ceased at five o’clock. The circumstances of the capture of two of these prizes, the San Josef and San Nicolas, which were boarded and captured by Nelson, are famous, but the details belong to his biography.

St. Vincent was a famous victory, and, moreover, it was a most timely one. Therefore the joy it caused in England was thoroughly justified, and Jervis nobly earned his earldom. It may seem ungracious to make reservations, and yet some independence of judgment may be exercised even on Jervis. When we have fully recognised the political courage he showed in giving battle when he would not have been blamed for caution, and for the strength of mind which enabled him to scorn vain shows, we are free to ask whether the actual fighting of the battle on his part, and the use made of it, justify us in thinking him “a great captain.” I venture to suggest that they do not. But for the independence of Nelson the battle might well have ended in a passage on opposite tacks and an artillery duel. On the day following the battle he was in sight of twenty-three Spaniards, and he was content to cover his prizes. In his fleet only the Captain had been seriously injured, and the loss acknowledged was only 300 men. He is reported to have said that if the enemy came on he would have burnt his prizes—but why not burn them and attack? He was between the Spaniards and Cadiz, and could have forced on a battle. Their quality being what it was he could surely have destroyed them utterly. Much has been said of Rodney’s failure to follow up his victory on the 12th April 1782. We have heard a great deal of Howe’s weakness on the 1st of June. Everyone has laughed at Hotham, who was too much at ease in Zion, and has applauded Nelson’s impatience with his easy-going ways. Yet Jervis cuddled his prizes as tenderly as ever did Rodney, Howe, or Hotham. Four was a small part of twenty-seven. Still Nelson said nothing, and Jervis stands as a monument of energy. But Nelson was too busy glorying in his triumph, and claiming to have done more than the fine thing he actually had done, even at the expense of brother officers—(witness his acrid tone to Parker, who called his attention to the fact that the Captain had been early and well supported by the Prince George)—and Jervis was a bully. The Spaniards were allowed to reach Cadiz, and Jervis went to Lagos, where he began a new series of operations.

The battle of St. Vincent had ruined the left wing of the great combined Spanish-French-Dutch army of invasion. The French, though as resolute as ever to invade, were not ready so soon after the failure of Morard de Galle to make another attempt. For the rest of the year, therefore, the first part fell to the Dutch fleet. Since Holland had been overrun by the French armies at the close of 1794, and had established the Batavian Republic in February 1795, the Dutch had had many reasons to regret the change. Their French friends fleeced them at home, and England occupied their colonies and swept their trade off the sea.[5] Although the French had dragged Holland into war with England, the hostility of the Dutch was strong and spontaneous. They fretted under the dictation of the French, but they had an active hatred of England, which, after joining with Prussia to impose the rule of the Stadtholder on them by force in 1786, had dragged him into war with France, had failed to give him effective military support, and when the country was overrun by France had at once—on the 19th January—begun to embargo Dutch ships and cargoes lest they should fall into French hands. We acted with reluctance and under the pressure of necessity, but the Dutch, who lost the goods, attributed our action to greed and malignity.

Therefore they entered readily enough into schemes for invading England, but still with caution. They refused to ship French troops in the fleet they prepared in the Texel, being afraid of their allies. The French co-operation was dropped for this, and for other reasons. The French Government of the day was very jealous of its most famous generals, and at that moment of Hoche in particular. It would gladly have seen him sail in search of glory on any venture, the more desperate the better. The general, who perfectly understood the real meaning of all this tender care for his glory—ended by declaring that he would not play Don Quixote on the sea for the benefit of men who would gladly see him at the bottom of it. The combined Dutch and French army of invasion dwindled into a purely Dutch army, and finally disappeared altogether. Daendaels, the general who was to have commanded it, had an hereditary Dutch understanding of maritime things, and he saw that the preliminary to an invasion of England was the defeat of the English fleet in the North Sea. But it was not till October 1797 that the Batavian Republic ordered its naval forces to act.

The command of the English fleet in the North Sea was given to Adam Duncan, then vice-admiral, who was soon afterwards promoted to admiral. Duncan had been a follower of Keppel’s, was commonly known as Keppel’s Duncan, and was by common consent an excellent officer. He had been long unemployed, and it may be the case that he owed his appointment to the command in the North Sea, not only to his reputation as an officer and seaman, but to the fact that he was closely connected by marriage with Dundas, afterwards Lord Melville, who held the vitally important post of general manager of corruption, and distributor of patronage in Pitt’s ministry. When he took up his command he had but four ships of the line with him. It is true that he had the co-operation of a Russian squadron, but it was in a most inefficient state, and proved of small value. In fact it embarrassed our squadron, for it was in incessant need of stores and repairs, while the necessity to flatter the touchy vanity of our ally, the Russian Government, compelled us to treat it with much respect. Duncan had to struggle with even another and a worse defect, which is very exactly indicated in a letter written to him in August 1796, by Sir C. Middleton, afterwards Lord Barham, one of the Commissioners for the navy, who wrote: “My own wish is to have your force very strong, but I plainly perceive, from the many irons we have in the fire, that I shall be overruled. The same cause obliges us to employ your frigates on many extra services, and which I have charged the secretary to acquaint you with as often as it happens; but necessary as this information is for your guidance, I am afraid it is often forgot.”

The best ships were taken for the Brest blockade, the Channel, the Mediterranean. Duncan’s own flagship, the Venerable, 74, leaked continually, and was only kept in service by endless care. It is therefore not to be wondered at that in February 1796 two Dutch squadrons, commanded by Braak and Lucas, succeeded in escaping from the North Sea to the West Indies and the Cape. During the middle of 1797 Duncan’s troubles were enormously increased by the mutiny at the Nore, which will be dealt with in the next chapter.

On the 3rd October Duncan, who had been cruising for eighteen weeks, was compelled to return to Yarmouth for stores with the bulk of his fleet, leaving Captain Henry Trollope with the Russell, 74, Adamant, 50, and several frigates and smaller vessels to watch the Texel. On the 7th the Dutch came out under the command of Jan Willem de Winter, who had been trained as a naval officer, had gone into exile in 1786, had served in the French Republican armies, and was a general in the army as well as vice-admiral in the fleet. His fleet consisted of the

with twelve frigates and other small vessels.

The Dutch were sighted at once by our look-out vessels, and news was sent to Duncan, who left Yarmouth in pursuit. As De Winter was known to be heading to the south, and the wind was northerly, ranging from N.E. to N.W. and W. by N., Duncan stood over the North Sea from Yarmouth to the Texel, to put himself between De Winter and his port, and to gain the weather-gage, which gave him the means of forcing on a battle. The Dutch, well observed by our look-out vessels to whose crews they appeared to be somewhat awkwardly handled, stood over to Lowestoft, and then returned to their own coast. They were seen at about half-past eight on the morning of the 11th October by our fleet, which was coming down from the north with the wind at W. by N.

The ships with Duncan were—

with eight frigates and small vessels.

Elaborate comparisons have been made to show that one fleet was stronger than the other, but they are idle in view of the simple fact that some of the English did not come into action, and some of the Dutch got out of it sooner than was becoming. Physical obstructions and fortune played a part—and every man who wears a blue coat is not a hero.

As Duncan came down in pursuit his ships were scattered, the best sailors in front, the worst behind. It would have been possible to unite them all, only by causing the more advanced ships to lie to till the laggards came up. At eleven the advanced ships did shorten sail to unite the fleet. But the Dutch, who were in a line heading from S.W. to N.E., with their heads towards the Texel, were gradually drawing towards their own coast. Camperdown, in North Holland, was about nine miles from them. Delay on Duncan’s part would have given them a chance to slip off to the Texel. Therefore his plan for fighting the battle was not, and could not, be carried out. His intention was to form his fleet on the starboard line of bearing, which, with the wind at W. by N., would be a line from S.W. to N.E. parallel to the Dutch. Then he meant to act as Howe had meant to do on the 1st June, break through the enemy from windward to leeward, all along from van to rear. As the day wore on towards the early dark of October and the Dutch drew nearer the land, the impatience of Duncan, which was patent to his officers, grew beyond control. He renounced all attempt to form a line, ordered Onslow, who was to the south and leeward of him, to break through the enemy’s rear, and the whole fleet to break through. Then first Onslow, and next the admiral went down on the enemy, setting an example to the ships about them. Duncan, an old friend and correspondent of Clerk, was penetrated with his confidence that the proper policy for an English fleet was to break into the enemy’s formation and produce a mêlée. Moreover, we have his actions to prove how well he understood that whatever the fate of the English ships was to be, the country would be served if the Dutch were left in no condition to invade for the next six months.

The battle began at 12.40, and at 3 it ended. The two hours and a half while it lasted were the hottest hours of battle in the whole war. The Dutch were awkward in fleet manœuvres from want of practice, but they were more phlegmatic, more solid, better gunners, and better ropemen than the French. They reserved their fire till our ships were close, and their two first broadsides, as English officers experienced them confessed, “were terrible.” Onslow, who cut through the line astern of the Dutch between the Jupiter and the Haarlem, and Duncan, who cut the line behind the States General, were both heavily pounded, and so were the vessels which followed them. If there was final concentration of English ships on the Dutch centre and rear, there had been a preliminary concentration of Dutch ships on the English leaders. Three vessels lost more than a hundred men each. The Ardent, 64, which belonged to Duncan’s division and was closely engaged with the Vryheid, lost no less than 148 killed and wounded—more than a third of her crew. Her captain, Burgess, and her master, Don, were both slain. The total loss was officially stated to be 825, but the committee appointed to distribute a public subscription for the wounded and the families of the dead put it at 1040. The eleven Dutch ships taken were so shattered as to be of no further use. Admiral De Winter was taken prisoner. The ships in the Dutch van escaped too soon, after doing too little to help the others. On our side all did not come equally well into action. Captain John Williamson, of the Agincourt, had hung about the outskirts of the fight in a very feeble way. In 1779 he had been a lieutenant with Captain Cook, and had witnessed the murder of his commander from a launch, not only without attempting to save him, but without attempting to rescue his body. He was brought to a court martial and, though acquitted of cowardice, was sentenced to be put at the bottom of the list of post-captains for misconduct.

Nelson once complained that actions fought near home were more thought of than those fought far off. Camperdown is an exception to the rule—if rule there be. It was early half forgotten, and is much neglected among our battles. Yet it was a great deliverance from fear of invasion at the time, and the quality of the enemy we conquered must place it far above St. Vincent as a battle. At Trafalgar a far better appointed fleet than Duncan’s fought a much less formidable enemy, on the same method as he fought the Dutch. Much pedantry has been expended in inquiring whether both admirals did or did not alter their first plans—as if it could ever be a reproach to a leader of men that he adapted his actions to the circumstances. That Duncan did not waste time in forming the starboard line of bearing, and thereby give the Dutch an opportunity to slip away, is manifestly true—and to a plain man it appears that he did alter his plan. Nelson at Trafalgar may have done what he had meant to do all along, but he had Duncan’s battle to show the advantage of doing it. Yet Duncan is commonly spoken of to-day as a brave old fellow who blundered on a victory, and nobody has noted how little originality was required in 1805 to do what had been already done in 1797. I know of no reason why Duncan is not to be credited with sense enough to foresee, and intend, the consequences of his acts.