Commodore Sir Nathaniel Dance was offered a baronetcy, which he refused, but accepted a knighthood: and thus ended the last chapter in an incident that was the pride and subject of yarning among the men of the East India Company’s service for many a long day. It certainly shows the British merchant sailor at his best—ready for a fight, going into the engagement gallantly, and yet all the while remembering that his first duty is to his owners and to get ships and cargoes safely to port without unnecessarily wasting valuable time.

CHAPTER XV
AT SEA IN THE EAST INDIAMEN

The first decade of the nineteenth century had been very unfortunate for the East India Company. There had been the losses of those ships already mentioned, owing to disasters at sea. This meant not only the loss to the Company of the rich cargoes, but of the advances to the owners amounting to thousands of pounds. The French war had also not merely interfered with the coming and going of the merchant ships, but it had thrown the whole of Europe into such a state of bewilderment that commerce generally was paralysed, and therefore the trade in Indian goods to the different parts of the Continent was exceedingly curtailed. Notwithstanding all that had been done by the Act of 1796, and the superintendence which was exercised over the Company, the latter was anything but prosperous. It had been engaged in hostilities with the Mahrattas and other Eastern powers. The result had been the acquisition of vast territory which was shortly to be for the good of the British Empire. But the immediate result of all this was that the Company’s finances were in a crippled condition. Later on we shall see what a wholesale effect the abolition of the monopoly had on the Eastern trade, dating from the year 1813: but before we come to that I desire to give the reader a fair account of the conditions of life in the East Indiamen of the first part of the nineteenth century. We shall presently proceed to examine these in greater detail, but it will greatly assist the imagination if we look into contemporary accounts left behind by officers who put to sea in these craft.

And first of all let us take the account of that Captain Eastwick whom we introduced to the reader on an earlier page. This time he was proceeding to India, not in his capacity of mercantile officer, but as a passenger. Nevertheless his ripe knowledge and experience were of the greatest value to these East Indiamen, as will be seen. It was a tedious business in those days to get down to Portsmouth, where the wealthier passengers used to join the East Indiamen. Eastwick was taking out to India his sister-in-law on a visit to her brother-in-law, Colonel Gordon. The journey was made to Portsmouth by road, of course, and those who have motored along this Portsmouth road scarcely realise how tedious and risky the journey was in those days. In the month of January 1809 Eastwick and his sister-in-law set out on their journey with a good deal of luggage and jewellery, as well as a hundred pounds in money. They had to cross Hounslow Heath, which was then infested with robbers, and there was every probability of the post-boys being held up, the horses shot and the passengers relieved of their possessions. However, in the present case the journey to Portsmouth was made without adventure, where it was learnt that the Neptune East Indiaman would not sail for another ten days.

This was a vessel of 1200 charter tons, and one of the largest of the East India Company’s fleet, being employed for the voyage to Bombay and China, this being her sixth trip thereto. She was owned by Sir William Fraser, Bart., and commanded by Captain William Donaldson, under whom were a chief officer and three mates, a surgeon and a purser. After the Neptune and her fellow-ships of the Company’s fleet had at last got under way a storm came up—the reader will remember that this year, 1809, was notorious for its virulent weather—and as a result the Henry Addington, another East Indiaman of about the same size, got driven to the eastward round Selsey Bill and struck the Bognor Rocks to the north-eastward of the Bill, and it was only with difficulty that she got off and reached Portsmouth again. This storm had dispersed the whole of the Company’s fleet outward-bound, and the Neptune had found herself in the vicinity of the Channel Islands, where she was in extreme danger. Captain Donaldson ordered the second mate to go aloft and help to take in the foretopsail, but this the officer refused to do, and he was instantly “broke.”

Eastwick thereupon volunteered to fill his place, and this offer was gladly accepted temporarily, the Neptune eventually sailing across the English Channel once more and let go anchor on the Mother Bank (to the west of Ryde, Isle of Wight). Here the ship was refitted for a second attempt, and the second mate had his place now taken by a Mr Richard Alsager, who had lately been M.P. for Surrey. At length the Neptune was ready for sea once more, the heavy weather had given way to beautiful summer, and the wind was fair for making a quick passage down the English Channel: so on 21st June the East India fleet weighed anchor and proceeded, consisting of the Neptune, Henry Addington, Scaleby Castle and the True Briton. These ships were all pretty much of the same size, though the True Briton was of 1198 charter tons. So fine did the weather continue that when the fleet was two days out from England the captain of the Neptune gave a dance on board to the passengers of all the ships, and the following evening another dance was given by the captain of the Henry Addington. Fortunately the passengers were safely rowed across the ocean to the entertaining vessel, and back. But most people will agree with Eastwick’s criticism of this foolish proceeding. “I did not consider it prudent at such a season of the year to do these things at sea.”

So the voyage continued as far as Table Bay with everything in their favour. After rounding the Cape, the Neptune, the Scaleby Castle and the True Briton shaped a course for Bombay, but the Henry Addington was compelled to stay behind in order to repair a bad leak that had broken out afresh. This was doubtless a relic of the incident on Bognor Rocks. Whilst approaching Madagascar Captain Donaldson invited the other two captains to come on board and dine with him, and during the conversation the subject came up of the disagreeable weather met with during the south-west monsoon on going into Bombay. Eastwick offered that if no pilot were available he would take the squadron in, and this the three captains accepted. The next day they encountered just that experience which the reader will remember occurred to some of the first English sailors when bound to India. For a heavy clap of thunder—“so loud it sounded as though a hundred great guns were going off”—broke over the Neptune and an extraordinary flash of lightning took place, and so close that Eastwick declares he saw many electric balls darting into the water. The chief officer was on watch at the time, and came running aft. He announced that the ship had been struck in the foremast and that the lightning had knocked down four of the men. It took the crew afterwards sixteen hours to repair the damage, get up the new foretopmast, foretopgallant mast and yard, for the original ones had been rendered useless.