Types of Naval Officers, Drawn from the History of the British Navy

by A. T. Mahan

The cause of the mutinies of 1797 is not here in question. Suffice it to say that, in their origin, they alleged certain tangible material grievances which were clearly stated, and, being undeniable, were redressed. The men returned to their duty; but, like a horse that has once taken the bit between his teeth, the restive feeling remained, fermenting in a lot of vicious material which the exigencies of the day had forced the navy to accept. Coinciding in time with the risings in Ireland, 1796-1798, there arose between the two movements a certain sympathy, which was fostered by the many Irish in the fleets, where agents were in communication with the leaders of the United Irishmen on shore.

In the Channel and the North Sea, the seamen took the ships, with few exceptions, out of the hands of their officers. In the former, they dictated their terms; in the latter, after a month of awful national suspense, they failed: the difference being that in the one case the demands, being reasonable, carried conviction, while in the other, becoming extravagant, the Government's resistance was supported by public opinion. It remained to be seen how the crisis would be met in a fleet so far from home that the issue must depend upon the firmness and judgment of a man of adamant. It was no more than prudent to expect that the attempt would be made there also; and the watchfulness of the superior officers of the fleet soon obtained certain information of its approach, though as yet without proof adequate to the arrest of individuals. The policy of the admiral, broadly stated, was that of isolating ship from ship—divide et impera—to prevent concerted action; a measure effected to all practical purpose by his unremitting vigilance, and by the general devotion to his policy among his leading officers. On the other hand, evidence was not wanting that in the ships long under his orders his own character was now fairly understood, and obtained for him a backing among the seamen themselves, without which his severity alone might have failed.

The first overt sign of trouble was the appearance of letters addressed to the leading petty officers of the different ships of the Mediterranean fleet. These were detected by a captain, who held on to them, and sent to St. Vincent to ask if they should be delivered. Careful to betray no sign of anxiety, the admiral's reply was a general signal for a lieutenant from each ship to come to him; and by them word was sent that all letters should be delivered as addressed, unopened. "Should any disturbance arise," he added, "the commander-in-chief will know how to repress it."

Disturbance soon did arise, and it is significant to note that it appeared in a ship which, by taking the ground when leaving Lisbon, had not shared in the Battle of St. Vincent. In July, 1797, two seamen of the St. George had been condemned to death for an infamous crime. Their shipmates presented a petition, framed in somewhat peremptory terms, for their liberation, on the ground that execution for such an offence would bring disgrace upon all. The admiral refusing to pardon, the occasion was seized to bring mutiny to a head. A plot to take possession of the ship was formed, but was betrayed to the captain. The outburst began with a tumultuous assembling of the crew, evidently, however, mistrustful of their cause. After vainly trying to restore order, the captain and first lieutenant rushed among them, each collaring a ringleader. The rest fell back, weakened, as men of Anglo-Saxon traditions are apt to be, by the sense of law-breaking. The culprits were secured, and at once taken to the flag-ship. A courtmartial was ordered for the next day, Saturday; and as the prisoners were being taken to the court, St. Vincent, with a hard bluntness of speech which characterized him,—a survival of the frank brutality of the past century,—said, "My friends, I hope you are innocent, but if you are guilty make your peace with God; for, if you are condemned, and there is daylight to hang you, you will die this day."

They were condemned; but the trial ended late, and the president of the court told them they should have Sunday to prepare. "Sir," said the earl, "when you passed sentence, your duty was done; you had no right to say that execution should be delayed;" and he fixed it for eight the next morning. One of the junior admirals saw fit to address him a remonstrance upon what he termed a desecration of the Sabbath. Nelson, on the contrary, approved. "Had it been Christmas instead of Sunday," wrote he, "I would have hanged them. Who can tell what mischief would have been brewed over a Sunday's grog?" Contrary to previous custom, their own shipmates, the partners and followers in their crime, were compelled to hang them, manning the rope by which the condemned were swayed to the yardarm. The admiral, careful to produce impression, ordered that all the ships should hold divine service immediately upon the execution. Accordingly, when the bell struck eight, the fatal gun was fired, the bodies swung with a jerk aloft, the church flags were hoisted throughout the fleet, and all went to prayers. Ere yet the ceremony was over, the Spanish gunboats came out from Cadiz and opened fire; but St. Vincent would not mar the solemnity of the occasion by shortening the service. Gravely it was carried to its end; but when the flags came down, all boats were ordered manned. The seamen, with nerves tense from the morning's excitement, gladly hurried into action, and the enemy were forced back into port.

One such incident was far from ending the ordeal through which the admiral had to pass, and which was prolonged throughout the period of the Cadiz blockade. In May, 1798, when Nelson was sent into the Mediterranean to win the Battle of the Nile, the detachment committed to him was replaced by a dozen ships-of-the-line from the Channel, seething with the mutinous temper which at home had been humored rather than scotched. Immediately on their joining, request was made for a Court Martial on some men of the Marlborough, on board which two violent mutinies had occurred,—one on the passage out. St. Vincent, having known beforehand that this ship had been pre-eminent for insubordination, had ordered her anchored in the centre of the fleet, between the two lines in which it was ranged; and the Court met without delay. The remainder of the incident is quoted substantially from one of St. Vincent's biographers, for it illustrates most forcibly the sternness of his action, as well when dealing with weakness in officers as with mutiny in crews. The written order to the commander of the division of launches appears among the earl's papers, as does also a similar one in the case of a mutiny on board the Defence some months earlier. The ulterior object of parading these boats was kept profoundly secret. They appeared to be only part of the pageantry, of the solemn ceremonial, with which the wisdom of the great commander-in-chief providently sought to invest all exhibitions of authority, in order to deepen impression.

The object of the last mutiny on board the Marlborough had been to protect the life of a seaman forfeited by a capital crime. No sooner was one sentenced to die than the commander-in-chief ordered him to be executed on the following morning, "and by the crew of the Marlborough alone, no part of the boats' crews from the other ships, as had been used on similar occasions, to assist in the punishment,—his lordship's invariable order on the execution of mutineers. On the receipt of the necessary commands for this execution, Captain Ellison of the Marlborough waited upon the commander-in-chief, and reminding his lordship that a determination that their shipmates should not suffer capital punishment had been the very cause of the ship's company's mutiny, expressed his conviction that the Marlborough's crew would never permit the man to be hanged on board that ship.

"Receiving the captain on the Ville de Paris's quarter-deck, before the officers and ship's company hearkening in breathless silence to what passed, and standing with his hat in his hand over his head, as was his lordship's invariable custom during the whole time that any person, whatever were his rank, even a common seaman, addressed him on service, Lord St. Vincent listened very attentively till the captain ceased to speak; and then after a pause replied,—

"'Do you mean to tell me, Captain Ellison, that you cannot command his Majesty's ship, the Marlborough? for if that is the case, sir, I will immediately send on board an officer who can.'

"The captain then requested that, at all events, the boats' crews from the rest of the fleet might, as always had been customary in the service, on executions, attend at this also, to haul the man up; for he really did not expect the Marlborough's would do it.