On May 15th Nelson’s fleet reached Madeira, and a frigate was sent on to Barbadoes, to have Admiral Cochrane’s vessels ready for a junction. He, himself, with the main fleet, did not arrive at Barbadoes until June 4th. All this time he had many qualms about his course in leaving his station, and, upon his arrival, was met by many conflicting reports.
But he soon learned that the French had gone north again. (At this time he was thought by Napoleon and the French authorities to be still in European waters.) Nelson’s swift movements had quite outstripped the Emperor’s calculations.
Nelson left the West Indies again, with eleven sail-of-the line, and cautiously pursued the large fleet in advance of him, in hopes that better tactics would enable him to reach the shores of Europe before them; and, at any rate, by his presence there he had stopped the career of victory of the French, in the West Indies. He said to his Captains, “My object is partly gained. * * * * We won’t part without a battle. I think they will be glad to let me alone, if I will let them alone; which I will do, either till we approach the shores of Europe, or they give me an advantage too tempting to be resisted.”
The French Admiral Villeneuve’s orders as to his proceedings in the West Indies are interesting, as well as the events which followed his arrival there, but he was ordered to return soon, and to carry out a project, as the ultimate object of the assembling of his allied fleet, which was, in the eyes of Napoleon, infinitely more important than the capture and pillage of the English West India Islands. In returning to Europe Villeneuve was only obeying the Emperor’s orders, although the latter blamed Villeneuve for not carrying out his orders in full, attributing his hasty leaving the islands, to fright.
Afterwards, at St. Helena, he acknowledged that Villeneuve was a brave man.
On the way to Europe the French fleet made one or two important captures and re-captures, and came off Cape Finisterre about the latter part of July.
And now let us follow Lord Nelson for a time.
He quitted Antigua on June 13th, having received information that the enemy’s fleet was seen steering north, but he had no very definite information, and had to rely on his own intuition. On July 17th he sighted Cape St. Vincent, having sailed about 3500 miles on this one passage.
There seems to be no doubt that Napoleon intended to attack Ireland, or at least effect a landing there, and the best military and naval minds considered that Villeneuve’s voyage to the West Indies was principally intended to draw off the British naval force from the Channel, to admit of an attack upon Ireland, a preliminary step in Napoleon’s plan.
