It is now very rare: in ten years of systematic searching of second-hand book shops, in quest of old military and naval autobiographies, I have only come on three copies of the work. I trust that by this edition it may be brought once more to common knowledge.
The reader will find in it a most wonderful study of the life of a hunted man, “a sort of Nebuchadnezzar living on cabbage stalks,” as O’Brien styles himself, during his miserable lurking in the cliffs of the Vosges. Almost as interesting is the sketch of the gloomy existence of the thousand “refractory” British prisoners in the souterrains of the rock-fortress of Bitche. French writers have often denounced the Portsmouth pontoons, on which so many of their compatriots were forced to dwell. But they compare favourably with the underground dungeons in which Napoleon confined O’Brien and many another British sailor. In strong contrast with this part of the story is the short narrative of life in Verdun, where the détenus on parole seem to have been allowed as much, and even more, liberty than was good for them. Roulette tables and race meetings were demoralising luxuries for men suffering from enforced idleness. From other sections of O’Brien’s narrative the reader may obtain curious side-lights on many features of the Napoleonic régime in France—the ubiquity of the gendarme and his natural prey, the escaped conscript, the bare and squalid life of the peasantry, the estrangement between the military caste and the bourgeoisie. There are also glimpses of Germany during the existence of the Rheinbund, when the people were united in a sort of tacit conspiracy against the governments who had made themselves the tools of Bonaparte. Not least interesting are the final chapters, in which O’Brien, free at last, shows us how British naval ascendency was maintained in the Adriatic, and helps us to realise the truth of the saying that “wherever a boat could float Bonaparte’s power found its limit.” It was to no purpose that he called himself king of Italy, annexed Dalmatia and Illyria, and established his brother-in-law at Naples: three or four British frigates, based on the island stronghold of Lissa, dominated the whole seaboard, ransacked every estuary, and destroyed whatever naval force was sent against them—even though it was on paper twice their own strength. Hoste’s battle of 13th March 1811 was, as far as mere disparity of numbers goes, a victory that can be compared to St. Vincent alone among all the long list of British successes at sea.
I have ventured to cut short O’Brien’s narrative at the end of the Napoleonic war. It went no further in his own first draft, which (as I have stated in the succeeding biographical note) was compiled before 1815. When he published his two-volume book, in 1839, he subjoined to his narrative of captivity and naval service three long chapters, detailing his visits and rambles in England and Ireland during the years of his middle age, his cruise to Brazil and Chile in 1818-21, and his continental tour with his wife in 1827. In these 150 pages there is so little matter to interest either the historical student or the general reader, that I have thought it well to omit them. For O’Brien, as for so many other British soldiers and seamen, “the joy of eventful living” ended in 1815.
For this excision, and for certain other small cuttings, I think that I may appeal with a clear conscience for the pardon that editors are wont to demand.
C. OMAN.
Oxford, September 1902.
BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR
Donat Henchy O’Brien was born in County Clare during the month of March 1785. Of his odd combination of names, the first was one common in the sept of the O’Briens since the earliest ages: it has nothing to do with St. Donatus, as the casual reader might suppose, but represents the old Erse Donough or Donoght.[1] His second name came from his mother, a Miss Henchy, sister of Counsellor Fitz-Gibbon Henchy, a Dublin lawyer of some repute in his day. Of Donat’s father we find nothing more in O’Byrne’s Naval Biography than the characteristically Hibernian statement that “he was descended from one of the ancient monarchs of Ireland.”
Donat O’Brien entered the navy on 16th December 1796, when only eleven, starting even younger than the average of the midshipmen of those hard days. Apparently he owed his introduction to the service to Captain (afterwards Rear-Admiral) Edward Walpole Brown, whom he styles “his early patron.” His first vessel was the Overyssel (64), a Dutch line-of-battle ship which had been seized in Cork Harbour in 1795, where it was lying when Holland was forced to yield to France and to become her subservient ally. In this vessel he served for three years, under Captains Young and Bazely, mainly in the North Sea squadron. He was present in her at the surrender of the Dutch fleet in the Texel on 30th August 1799, during the futile campaign of the Duke of York. Later in the same year the Overyssel was engaged in the blockading of three Dutch men-of-war which had run into the port of Goeree. While in charge of an old merchant ship, which was to be sunk at the mouth of the harbour, for the more effectual shutting in of the fugitives, O’Brien was in great peril. The vessel was overset in a sudden gale, and he had a narrow escape from drowning, being saved at the last moment by a boat of the Lion cutter.