On the 1st of September the English preparations were completed. Cathcart had erected a battery of sixty-eight pieces, forty-eight of which were mortars. He then summoned the city, demanding the port, arsenal and fleet, on pain of burning the place. In his letter he prayed General Peyman to yield, and not force him to extremity against a place filled with non-combatants, women and children. Peyman, true to the trust confided in him by the Crown Prince, and sustained by the indignant citizens, answered the summons in the negative.
On the 2d of September, in the evening, the bombardment commenced, and a hail of shell, rockets, and other missiles fell upon the city. The best answer possible was made, but the English were so sheltered by their defences that their loss was nothing. It continued all night and part of the next day; and was then suspended to see if Peyman yet thought of surrender.
Hundreds of Danes had been killed, and many destructive fires had occurred. Many of the finest buildings were destroyed, and the whole of the male population who were not in the trenches were exhausted by the labor which they had undergone in trying to extinguish the flames. Peyman resolved to hold out still, and the bombardment was renewed on the evening of the 3d, assisted by the bomb-vessels of the English fleet. With a short interval it was continued until the morning of the 5th; a population of 100,000 being all this time exposed to a rain of missiles. The destruction was, of course, very great. About two thousands persons were killed, many of them old people and children, while some of the finest buildings and several hundred dwellings were destroyed. At last, having made an heroic defence, General Peyman, to save the rest of the city, determined to capitulate. By the articles agreed upon the English were to remain in possession six weeks, the time estimated as necessary to fit out the vessels which were to be taken away. The Danes saw this spoliation with helpless rage and anguish, and when they turned away, they had the sight of their half ruined city before their eyes.
The English fitted out, and carried off, sixteen ships of the line, about twenty frigates and brigs, and all the stores, rigging, timber, and ship-building tools from the dock-yard. The ships on the stocks, and the condemned hulks were burned. It took 20,000 tons of transport shipping to carry off the stores which were taken.
The casualties of both the British army and navy, in this expedition, amounted to only fifty-six killed, one hundred and seventy-five wounded, and twenty-five missing.
TRAFALGAR. OCTOBER 21ST, A.D. 1805.
The year 1805 was a momentous period in the history of Europe. Napoleon had long meditated the invasion of England, saying “Let us be masters of the Channel for six hours, and we are masters of the world.” A skillfully combined plan, by which the British fleet would have been divided, while the whole French navy was concentrated in the Channel, was delayed by the death of the Admiral designated to execute it. But an alliance with Spain placed the Spanish fleet at Bonaparte’s disposal, in 1805, and he formed a fresh scheme for its union with that of France, the crushing of the fleet under Cornwallis, which blocked the Channel ports, before Admiral Nelson could come to its support, and a crossing of the vast armament so protected to the British shores. The plan was to draw Nelson away in pursuit of the French fleet, which was then suddenly to return and crush the English Channel squadron.
Nelson, now in command of the Mediterranean and Cadiz fleet, had been searching diligently for the French Toulon fleet, and was much concerned that he could not find it.
In February, 1805 he had been down as far as Egypt, but found nothing there, and, half distracted with anxiety, steered for Malta. Soon after arriving there he received from Naples intelligence of what had, in reality, become of the French fleet.