The Old East Indiamen

by E. Keble Chatterton

But the need for naval seamen was so urgent, consequent on the wars, that the Admiralty had to go to even further extremities. They actually sent to sea a press smack with a naval officer on board, and this craft would cruise up and down the English Channel. On one occasion Captain Mawson of the Company’s ship Cardonell, homeward bound, was followed all the way from Portsmouth to the Downs by such a smack. And when the bigger ship brought up off Deal, Lieutenant Hutchinson, R.N., came aboard and used his best endeavours to take away every one of the Cardonell’s crew, with the exception only of the ship’s officers. The skipper of the merchantman naturally resented this very strongly, but offered to let Mr Hutchinson have most of his men provided the naval officer would supply him with others to take their place so that the ship might be safely brought to her moorings in the Thames. But it was no good. Hutchinson absolutely declined to make a compromise, and according to Mawson’s account behaved very rudely and, not content with the able seamen, carried off also the Cardonell’s second mate.

The only way in which this annoyance and danger could be overcome was for the Admiralty to issue what were known as “protections.” The holder of a protection was thus made immune from arrest by a press-gang. It was a document which gave the name of the man, his age, stature, stated whether he wore a wig or his own hair, and other particulars of identification. No man with this authorisation could be forced into his Majesty’s service, but it was valid only for three months or the period written thereon. There is preserved an original protection certificate in the archives of the Public Record Office, and it is a quaint document which must have been very keenly appreciated by its eighteenth-century owner. On the other hand, when the East India Company had lost some of their seamen by desertion, they would petition the Admiralty to allow naval men to be lent.

Every student of history is aware of the unfortunate friction which existed at this time between the officers of the Royal Navy and the officers of the Mercantile Marine. Happily in the present century this slow-dying spirit is almost extinct. In my volume, “King’s Cutters and Smugglers,” I showed what altercations used to arise, what petty jealousies existed between the officers of the Revenue cutters and those of his Majesty’s navy. The captains and officers of the East India Company were often indebted to the protection and assistance of naval officers, but the latter were often overbearing in the exercise of their duties, and despised any seaman who was not in the King’s navy. On the other hand, the East Indiamen’s officers most heartily disliked these gentlemen, and the insults from the press-gangs were too poignant to be forgotten easily.

As an instance, let us refer to the 14th of August 1734, when the East India Company complained to the Admiralty of what seems certainly a very high-handed action. It appears that the Company’s ship, the Duke of Lorrain, had arrived in the Downs on the previous Sunday, and her master, Captain Christopher Wilson, sent in a very indignant report to the Court of Directors to the effect that “the men of war at the Nore treated him more like an enemy than a Merchant Ship coming into Port in such weather as he had, it being very bad, they firing near Twenty Shott at his Ship, some of which came among the Rigging, might have been of dangerous consequence to the Ship, and to the Company who had a Cargo on board to the Value of Two hundred thousand Pounds. This action being what the Company did not expect from any of the Men of War, as the Captain of the Duke of Lorrain has assured the Court that he lowered his sails, and did what was safe to be done, they have commanded me to signify the same to you,” continued the Company’s letter to the Admiralty, “that so the Right Honourable the Lords of the Admiralty may be inform’d thereof.”

But if the East India Company thought it necessary sometimes to complain of the treatment at the hands of the Admiralty the former were none the less glad to have the assistance and protection of the navy in the time of war. There is a voluminous correspondence still preserved in which the Company write to the Admiralty asking for convoys of the East Indiamen both outward and inward bound. The French were very much on the qui vive, but unless the regular income of the East India Company were for the present to be stopped, and the entire Anglo-Indian trade suspended, the Company’s ships must go on their way. This could be done only with the assistance of his Majesty’s ships. In order to deal with this matter there was a special department of the Company designated the Secret Committee, which communicated with the Admiralty as to where the East Indian merchant fleet were to rendezvous and the convoy join them, the confidential signals to be employed, and so on. The following letter sent by the Company to the Admiralty on 12th December 1740 is typical:—

“Secrett Committee of the United East India Company do humbly represent to your Lordships That they do expect a considerable fleet of ships richly laden will return from the East Indies the next summer and do therefore earnestly beseech your Lordships That three or four of His Majesty’s ships of good force may be appointed to look out for and convoy them safe to England.”

These convoys took the East Indiamen sometimes even from the Thames down Channel as far as Spithead. Sometimes they picked the latter up only at the Downs, escorting them for several hundred miles away from the English coast out into the Atlantic. These merchantmen were similarly met at St Helena and escorted home, the men-of-war being victualled for a period of two months. Even if an East Indiaman were able to arrive singly and run into the Hamoaze (Plymouth Sound) on her way home, having successfully eluded hostile ships roving off the mouth of the English Channel, it was deemed advisable for her to wait at Plymouth until she could be escorted by the next man-of-war bound eastward to the Thames. There were plenty of French privateersmen lurking about the Channel, and, at any rate about the year 1716, there were also Swedish privateers on the prowl in the same sea ready to fall upon any East Indiaman going in or out of the Downs.

One notorious Swede of this occupation was La Providence, of 26 guns. She was commanded by Captain North Cross. The latter was an Englishman who had been tried and sentenced to death for some crime, but he had succeeded in making his escape from Newgate, and had fled the country. He had crossed the North Sea and had obtained from Sweden letters of marque to rove about as a privateer. His crew were a rough crowd of desperate fellows of many nations, and this ship was very fond of lying in Calais roads ready to get under way and slip across the English Channel so soon as an outward-bound East Indiaman was known to be in the Downs. Now, in the month of November 1717, the skipper of La Providence was lying in his usual roadstead, and tidings came to him concerning one of the Company’s ships then in the Downs.

The privateer was kept fully informed by means of those fine seamen, but doubtful characters, who lived at Deal. They were some of the toughest and most determined men, who stopped at nothing. For generations the men of Deal had been the most notorious smugglers of the south-east corner of England: and that was saying a great deal. They were a brave, fearless class of men, but brutal of nature and always ready to get to windward of the law, if ever a chance presented itself. They handled their open luggers with a wonderful dexterity, for which their successors are even yet famous. But they were lawless to their finger-tips. So on the present occasion when the East Indiaman was in the Downs, one of these Deal men sailed his little craft across the strong tides of Dover Straits and brought the information to the privateer. The messenger asserted that the East Indiaman had nearly £60,000 on board in cash, so Cross got under way, averring that he would get this amount or “Loose his Life in the Attempt.” Whether he succeeded in his attempt I regret I am unable to say. As far as was practicable these East Indiamen were wont, in those strenuous times, to wait for a convoy, but there were times when they could not afford to wait till one of his Majesty’s ships was at liberty. On those occasions the ships would wait till they numbered a small squadron, and then voyaging together would resolve to run all risks. There is on record the case of a French squadron consisting of a “64” and two frigates arriving off the island of St Helena, where the East Indiamen were wont to call. The Frenchmen had come here in order to fall upon the homeward-bound fleet who would soon be seen. But the longboat[B] of one of these merchantmen was fitted out, and under the command of a midshipman succeeded in getting to windward of the Frenchmen unperceived and was able to give the approaching English ships warning of the danger that awaited them. Six of the Company’s fleet fell in with the enemy and kept up a running fight for several days, until they anchored in All Saints’ Bay. Here the French blockaded them, but it was to no purpose, for these merchantmen succeeded in escaping and reaching England in safety.