In the interior of this bay lay the Napoleonic squadron, under Admiral Brueys, in such fancied security that a large part of the crews was ashore, and some of the ships unprepared for a battle when the British appeared. It was anchored in line of battle, however, and consisted of thirteen ships of the line, the central one being the flagship Orient, having 120 guns, and probably the largest and most complete war-ship then afloat. On each side of her were the Franklin and the Tonnant, of 80 guns each, and none of the others were greatly inferior.
The British had also thirteen ships, but none was the equal of the best French, and one of them did not engage in the attack at all. Knowing nothing of the harbor, and aware that all his ships drew much water,—perhaps thirty feet,—Nelson had to make a long and very cautious detour, throwing the lead every moment and feeling his way in. It was then late in the afternoon, and half-past six before the Goliath, leading the column, got near enough to attract the French fire. Replying, but not halting, the Goliath, followed closely by the Zealous and Orion, made for the head of the line, and then with a daring unrivaled, for there was barely enough water to float their keels, these ships slowly turned around the foremost French vessel and dropped their anchors in the rear of the enemy’s line. The other ships, as they came up, ranged alongside the front of the French, and the deepening twilight resounded with such a roar of broadsides as never will be heard again.
In the darkness and smoke an English seventy-four, the Bellerophon, had engaged the monstrous Orient, and in a short time had been crushed; all her masts were swept out of her, two hundred of her people were killed and wounded, and she drifted out of action. But nearly the same fate had by that time overtaken the French Guerrière, for the Theseus had coolly placed herself where she could rake the anchored ship and tear her to pieces. The moment the Bellerophon drifted off, however, her place was taken by two newly arrived frigates, and the Orient presently found herself the target of three ships which slowly but surely were cutting her to pieces in spite of her tremendous resistance. Her admiral had been killed on her deck, where half her officers and men lay dead or wounded, when it was suddenly seen that she was on fire, and the whole battle was instinctively suspended to watch the magnificent spectacle, save where some still poured in shot and shell to prevent the French crew from extinguishing the flames.
Powerless either to save their ship or launch their boats, the remnant of the Orient’s crew could only fling themselves into the water and trust to the mingled boats of friends and foes to pick them up. The ships nearest slipped their cables, and tried to edge away out of danger as the flames enveloped the towering masts, burning with amazing fierceness in the tarred rigging and lighting up the desert for miles inland, while the hull became a furnace. Suddenly, at a quarter before ten, a volcano-like explosion tore the glowing old battle-ship asunder, a torrent of burning fragments was hurled aloft,—with how many dead heroes, no one knows,—and double darkness closed over the appalling scene. Then the black waves were lighted anew by the flash of cannon and musketry, and the battle went on until daylight before the last of the French vessels had been conquered, while two of them had managed to steal away. Of the other eleven one had been burned and sunk, three had gone ashore, where one burned, and the remainder had been crushed into surrendering. The English did not lose a single vessel, for even the dismantled Bellerophon could float, and their loss in men was far less than that of the French.
DRAWN BY WARREN SHEPPARD.
THE “THESEUS” ATTACKING THE “GUERRIÈRE.”
Historians tell us that this victory was the grandest naval success on record. Nelson himself said that victory was too weak a term—it was a catastrophe. It put an end at once to Napoleon’s campaign in Egypt, and to all his designs against India. It gave the command of the Mediterranean to England, emboldened Turkey and Russia to recover the Ionian Islands, gave Naples a chance to assert herself, and aroused Austria and Russia to resist by armies Napoleon’s aggressions, so that from this battle dates his downfall. Its influence soon reached the United States, and caused it to break through its neutrality and begin upon the sea that naval war with France of which we hear very little nowadays, but which gave to our own naval record such glorious incidents as Truxton’s battles in the Constellation with L’Insurgente and La Vengeance, and Captain Little’s capture, in the corvette Boston, of the French sloop-of-war Le Berceau.
Nelson remained in the Mediterranean for some years, by no means idle, and then did service of extraordinary value elsewhere, as at the battle of Copenhagen, which in a single remarkable conflict put an end to a northern conspiracy against England, and saved her a vast deal of trouble; but his final service was the most momentous of all, at any rate for the fortunes of Great Britain alone, and this was the winning of the battle of Trafalgar.
In 1805 Napoleon had prepared for another grand invasion of England, and with great skill had gathered a fleet of allied French and Spanish vessels, which was to protect and coöperate with the strong army he proposed to land along the Kentish shores. This fleet was commanded by Admiral Villeneuve, and assembled at Cadiz, where, in October, 1805, it was being watched by an English fleet, commanded by Nelson and Collingwood, consisting of thirty-three ships of the line; twenty-seven of these were present when, on the morning of the 21st, the allies, twenty-nine battle-ships strong, came sailing out, hoping to avoid battle if possible. This, Nelson was resolved, should not happen; and dividing his forces into two columns, he made at them in such a way as to strike their line (then off Cape Trafalgar) in the middle of its crescent. The wind was very light, and an hour or more elapsed before even the heads of the line struck the enemy, so that there was plenty of time to make every preparation, and there was constant instruction by signaling from Nelson’s flagship Victory. Then at the last moment, when the first gun was ready to be fired, there rose upon the signal halyards of the Victory the message that, received with ringing cheers, has been an inspiration to patriots the world around ever since since—