The French and Spanish fleet comprised thirty-three ships of the line, of which eighteen were French and fifteen Spanish; the British had only twenty-seven, but among these were seven three-deckers as against four on the side of the allies. It had the additional advantage of superior discipline and equipment, to say nothing of the genius of its commander. The British fleet advanced in two divisions, Nelson leading the weather division of twelve, and Collingwood the lee division of fifteen ships. According to Nelson's plan Collingwood was to attack the rear of the enemy's line, while he himself cut off and paralysed the centre and van. Both divisions advanced without regular formation, the ships bearing down with all the speed they could command and without waiting for laggards. Collingwood in the Royal Sovereign, steering E. by N., broke through the allies' line twelve ships from the rear, raking the Santa Ana, Alava's flagship, as he passed her stern, with a broadside which struck down 400 of her men. For some fifteen minutes the Royal Sovereign was alone in action; then others of the division came up and successively penetrated the line of the allies, and engaging ship to ship completely disposed of the enemy's rear, their twelve rear ships being all taken or destroyed.
Meanwhile, Nelson in the Victory, who had reserved to himself the more difficult task of containing twenty-one ships with twelve, held on his course, advancing so as to keep the allied van stationary and yet to prevent the centre from venturing to help the rear. He designed to pass through the end of the line in order to cut the enemy's van off from Cadiz, but, finding an opportunity, changed his course, passed down the line and attacked the centre. He passed through the line of the allied fleet, closely followed by four other ships of his division, and the five British ships concentrated their attacks on the Bucentaure, Villeneuve's flagship, the gigantic Spanish four-decker, the Santísima Trinidad, which was next ahead of her, and the Redoutable, which supported her. The centre of the allies was crushed and the van cut off from coming to the help of the rear, which was being destroyed by Collingwood.
Before the battle ended, the naval force of France, and with it Napoleon's projects of invasion, were utterly and hopelessly ruined. Eighteen prizes were taken, and, though many of these were lost in a gale, four ships which escaped were afterwards captured, and the remainder lay for the most part shattered hulks at Cadiz. By this battle the supremacy of Great Britain at sea was finally established. Nelson, who, during the ship-to-ship engagement which followed his penetration of the enemy's line, was mortally wounded by a sharp-shooter from the mizzen-top of the Redoutable, died before the battle was over, though he was spared to hear that a complete victory was secure. His death is among the heroic incidents of history, and his last achievement, both in its conception and its results, was the fitting climax of his fame. The plan for the battle which he drew up beforehand for the instruction of his captains, and the changes which he made in it to meet the conditions of the moment are alike worthy of his supreme genius as a naval tactician. His arrangements were carried out by men who had learned to love and trust him, and who were inspired by the fire of his spirit, and hence it was that the allied fleet of France and Spain perished at the "Nelson touch".[29]
Very different were the fortunes of war in central Europe, where Napoleon himself commanded the "army of England". It was not until the end of August that Napoleon knew that Villeneuve would be unable to appear in the Channel, but no sooner did he abandon his project of invasion in despair than he resolved on a campaign scarcely less arduous, and gave orders for a grand march into Germany. Pitt, as we have seen, had successfully negotiated an alliance with Russia and Austria, whose armies were converging upon the plains of Bavaria and were to have been reinforced by a large Prussian contingent. Unhappily, they had not effected a junction when Napoleon crossed the Rhine near Strassburg and the Danube near Donauwörth, while he detached large forces to check the advance of the Russians and the approach of reinforcements expected from Italy. One of these movements involved an open violation of Prussian territory, but he could rely on the well-tried servility of Frederick William. The first decisive result of his strategy was the surrender of Mack at Ulm, with 30,000 men and 60 pieces of ordnance. This event took place on October 20, the very day before the battle of Trafalgar, and opened the road to Vienna, which the French troops entered on November 13, occupying the great bridge by a ruse more skilful than honourable, during the negotiation of an armistice. Vienna was spared, while Napoleon pressed on to meet the remainder of the Austrian army, which had now been joined by a larger body of Russians near Brünn. The allies numbered about 100,000 men; Napoleon's army was numerically somewhat less, but possessed the same kind of superiority as the British navy at Trafalgar. The result was the crushing victory of Austerlitz on December 2, followed by the peace of Pressburg, between France and Austria, signed on the 26th. The principal articles of this treaty provided for the cession of Venetia, Istria, and Dalmatia to the kingdom of Italy, and the aggrandisement of Bavaria and Würtemberg, whose electors received the royal title as the price of their sympathetic alliance with France. Russia withdrew sullenly, having learned the hollowness of her league with Prussia, which had basely temporised while the fate of Germany was at stake, and whose minister, Haugwitz, suppressing the ultimatum which he was charged to deliver, had openly congratulated the conqueror of Austerlitz.
Great Britain had had no direct share in the conflict in Southern Germany and Moravia; she had, however, joined in two expeditions, the one in Southern, the other in Northern Europe. In spite of a treaty of neutrality between France and the Two Sicilies, ratified on October 8, an Anglo-Russian squadron was permitted to land a force of 10,000 British troops under Sir James Craig, and 14,000 Russians on the shore of the Bay of Naples. These troops effected nothing, and the violation of neutrality was, as we shall see, destined to involve the Neapolitan monarchy in ruin. The expedition to North Germany was planned on a larger scale. Hanover had been occupied by France since June, 1803. Its recovery was attempted by an Anglo-Hanoverian force under Cathcart, which was to have been supported by a Russian and Swedish force acting from Stralsund. The co-operation of Prussia was also expected. In order to secure this alliance the British government offered Prussia an extension of territory so as to include Antwerp, Liège, Luxemburg, and Cologne, in the event of victory. In November the expedition landed. In December Prussia had definitely given her protection to the Russian troops in Hanover and offered it to the Hanoverians. Pitt computed that at the beginning of the next campaign nearly 300,000 men would be available in North Germany. But the vacillation of Prussia ruined all. On December 15 Haugwitz signed the treaty of Schönbrunn, by which Prussia was to enter into an offensive and defensive alliance with France and was to receive Hanover in return for Ansbach, Cleves, and Neuchâtel. Frederick William could not yet stoop to such a degree of infamy, and therefore, instead of ratifying the treaty, resolved on January 3, 1806, to propose a compromise, which involved among other provisions the temporary occupation of Hanover by Prussia. In consequence of this determination he sent, on January 7, a request for the withdrawal of the British forces, which were accordingly recalled.[30]
THE DEATH OF PITT.
The collapse of his last coalition was the death-blow of Pitt, cheered though he was for the moment by the news of Trafalgar. The fatal consequences of Austerlitz were reported to him at Bath, whence he returned by easy stages to his villa at Putney in January, 1806. His noble spirit was broken at last by the defection of Prussia, and after lingering a while, he died on the 23rd of that month, leaving a name second to none among the greatest statesmen of his country. His sagacious mind grasped the advantage to be gained by freeing trade from unnecessary restrictions, and anticipated catholic emancipation, parliamentary reform, and the abolition of slavery. He gave the nation, in the union with Ireland, the one constructive measure of the first order achieved in his time, and only marred by the weakness of more pliable successors in a lesser age. His dauntless soul, which bore him up against the bitterest disappointments, the desertion of friends, and the depression of mortal disease, inspired the governing classes of England to endure ten more years of exhausting war, to save Europe (as he foretold) by their example, and to crown his own work at Waterloo. His lofty eloquence, which has been described as a gift independent of statesmanship, was indeed a product of statesmanship, for it consisted in no mere witchery of words, but in a luminous and convincing presentation of essential facts. He may have been inferior to his own father in fiery rhetoric, to Peel in comprehensive grasp of domestic policy, and to Gladstone in the political experience gained by sixty years of political life, but in capacity for command he was inferior to none. If he was not an ideal war minister, he was not a war minister by his own choice; his lot was cast in times which suppressed the exercise of his best powers; and he was matched in the organisation of war, though not in the field, against the greatest organising genius known to history. He must be judged by what he actually did and meditated as a peace minister; his conduct of the war must be compared with that of those able but not gifted men who strove to bend the bow which he left behind him; and we must assuredly conclude that none of his colleagues or rivals was his peer either in powers or in public spirit.
FOOTNOTES:
[13] Buckingham, Court and Cabinets, iii., 242; Lewis, Administrations of Great Britain, p. 225.
[14] Buckingham, Court and Cabinets, iii., 282-90; Pellew, Life of Sidmouth, ii., 113-31; Stanhope, Life of Pitt, iv., 20-39.