'Captain Faulknor,' said Sir John Jervis, 'by your daring courage this day a French frigate has fallen into our hands. I have ordered her to be taken into our service, and here is your commission to command her, in which I have named her, Sir, after yourself,—the Undaunted.'
The ship in question was of course the frigate Bien Venu, which had been moored in the carénage under the walls of Fort Louis, and had been taken possession of by Faulknor's men after the fort had fallen.
In such exceptionally heroic circumstances was the name 'Undaunted' first introduced on the roll of the British fleet. It has remained there ever since to this day. A more happily chosen name in such a case there surely could be none—better name for British fighting ship there surely could be none.
'No language of mine,' wrote Sir John Jervis, in his despatch to the Admiralty that very afternoon, 'can express the merit of Captain Faulknor upon this occasion, but, as every officer and man in the army and squadron bears testimony, this incomparable action cannot fail of being recorded in the page of history.'
'The idol of the squadron,' 'the admiration of the whole army,' were other expressions that Jervis used in regard to Captain Faulknor.
Captain Faulknor, though, did more than storm and take Fort Louis. By the same act, with the same stroke, he brought about the fall of Fort Bourbon and the capture of the town of Fort Royal, 'rushed' by a column of the besieging troops simultaneously with the storming of Fort Louis. In addition, beyond that, it brought about the formal surrender to England of the entire island of Martinique. All collapsed like a house of cards. General Rochambeau, startled at seeing Fort Louis, his bulwark towards the sea, which covered the only way by which he might hope for relief, snatched abruptly from him, while his own garrison was thrown into a state of hopeless demoralisation by the rabble of fugitive soldiers, bolting before Faulknor's men, and flying in wild disorder for refuge to Fort Bourbon, despaired of making a further stand. He beat the chamade, and sent in a flag of truce. At half-past two that afternoon one of Rochambeau's aides-de-camp from Fort Bourbon appeared before the British outposts with a letter from the French Governor, offering to treat and asking for terms. Commissioners on each side were named, and two days were spent in discussing details, but the French position, with Fort Louis gone, was doomed. Within 48 hours of Captain Faulknor's hoisting the British flag on Fort Louis the terms of surrender were agreed on and ready for signature.
It was a great capture. Sixty-eight guns and 55 mortars and howitzers were taken in Fort Louis alone; and more than twice as many more came into our possession with the fall of Fort Bourbon, besides immense supplies of ammunition and stores, shot and shell, and a large number of prisoners. These last included four regiments of infantry, among them one of the most famous corps of the French army of the old régime, the 37th of the line, the Régiment de Maréchal Turenne. On their behalf, indeed, a special effort was made by the French commissioners in drawing up the terms of surrender, to save the credit of so famous a regiment. They demanded that it should keep its colours and arms on being shipped back to France with the rest of the army, on condition of taking no further part in the war, but the attempt failed, and the Régiment de Maréchal Turenne had to share the lot of the other regiments, except that its officers were allowed to keep their swords.[65] It went back to France to meet its end as a regiment under Napoleon in Russia, drowned almost to a man in the terrible catastrophe which sealed the doom of the Grande Armée at the passage of the Bridge of the Beresina.
On the afternoon of the 23rd the gates of the fort were delivered over to the charge of the British, the French being confined to quarters inside, and guards were mounted under the command of Prince Edward, afterwards the Duke of Kent, the father of Queen Victoria and grandfather of King Edward, who was in command of a brigade of the attacking troops, and had been present throughout the siege.
The colours taken at Martinique were sent home, and, by command of King George, were placed in St. Paul's Cathedral. They were carried through London in triumph, from St. James's Palace to St. Paul's, the Tower guns firing a salute, escorted by Life Guards, Grenadiers, and Foot Guards, with the band of the First Guards playing the procession along the streets, which were filled with cheering crowds. At St. Paul's they were received at the great west door of the cathedral by the Dean and Chapter, with a full choir. Where are those colours now? Not a rag, not a staff, remains. As was the fate of the captured flags won at Camperdown, at St. Vincent, and at Trafalgar, they were left to rot uncared for, and then at the time of the reaction in the years after Waterloo, the rags that were left were pulled down and bundled out of sight. What remained of the flags was thrown on a dust-heap and the poles were handed out among the vergers as broom and scrubbing-brush handles and for poking down rats' nests.
