At this juncture Lieut. Watson, first-lieutenant of the Calliope, gallantly succeeded in dragging one of his boats across the rafts, and launched her on the other side. He then took on board some of the little party on shore, who seeing a body of Chinese crowding upon the deck of the Cambridge, had continued firing upon them. The boat instantly pulled off to the Cambridge, under the command of Lieut. Watson, having with him Mr. Browne, the master of the Calliope, Capt. Hall, and Mr. Galbraith, of the Nemesis, together with Mr. St. Leger, and about nine or ten men.
The Chinese were so alarmed at the sudden attack upon all their defences at once, and at the capture of the fort, as well as at the loss they had already sustained on board, that they offered little or no resistance; most of them jumped overboard on the starboard side as the boarding party climbed up on the port side.
Many of the Chinese must have been drowned in attempting to swim on shore, as there were no boats at hand to pick them up, and their own redoubtable war-junks had already made the best of their way up the river, for fear of meeting the same fate as the Cambridge. A number of dead and wounded were found upon the decks, strong evidence of the well-directed shot of our ships. She mounted altogether thirty-four guns of English manufacture; and it was rather surprising to see how well the Chinese had prepared for action, the guns being in perfect order, fire-buckets distributed about the decks, and everything very clean and well-arranged.
It now became a question whether she was to be blown up or retained as a prize; but it was decided by Captain Herbert, that she should be set on fire and destroyed, principally with a view to strike terror into the Chinese, far and wide, by the explosion; and partly, also, because she was an old and useless ship. Preparations, therefore, were at once made by Lieutenant Watson, with this object. The wounded were all carried on shore, and every part of the ship was searched with great care, to ascertain that there were not any Chinamen remaining concealed. The few stores found on board were of very little value, and at five o'clock she was set on fire.
Slowly the flames spread throughout the ship, gradually bursting out of every port; little more than an hour sufficed for the fire to reach the magazine, and then she suddenly blew up, rending the atmosphere, and making every object around her tremble with the explosion. The sparks of fire and burning timbers were thrown far and wide in every direction; and, as it was by this time dark, they served to spread the alarming intelligence even among those who were scarcely near enough to hear the explosion. Several houses took fire at a considerable distance from the spot, by the falling of the burning fragments which were carried through the air. The lower part of the hull of the Cambridge went down in deep water.
Thus ended the tragedy of the day; and, following as it did only twenty-four hours after the capture of the Bogue, and at the distance of only a few miles from Canton, we can easily imagine how completely it must have paralysed for the moment all the little remaining spirit and energy of the Chinese. The city of Canton would probably have fallen an easy prey, had our successes been followed up by a bold dash at it. But the different approaches by which our forces could advance were then very imperfectly known, otherwise the smallness of our numbers would in any case have been amply compensated by the panic of the moment.
Throughout the operations of the day, Captain Elliot had distinguished himself by his personal courage, and landed with the party from the Nemesis to storm the fort. The loss of the Chinese is believed to have amounted to about three hundred killed and wounded. On our own side there were eight or nine men wounded and one killed. The magazine of the fort, and the guns, about sixty in number, were destroyed or rendered useless. Those of the Cambridge were blown up with the vessel.
The great raft across the river was not less than five hundred and fifty yards long, and is said to have cost the Chinese an immense sum of money, which was exacted from the Hong merchants. It was constructed with great strength and solidity, for upon it they had rested their most confident hopes of successful resistance. It was cleared away, not without a good deal of labour, on the following day, and thus the passage was now opened for the advanced squadron to proceed up to Whampoa.
The Madagascar was sent down to the Bogue, to inform Commodore Sir Gordon Bremer of what had taken place, while the boats of the squadron, together with the Sulphur and Nemesis, pushed on to explore the river higher up—a reconnoissance being necessary before the ships could advance, owing to the uncertainty as to what impediments the Chinese might have formed to obstruct the navigation.
During the day, the Nemesis and boats got far enough up the branch on the eastern side of Whampoa, called Junk River, to catch a view of a little fort at the upper end of Whampoa, called Howqua's Folly.[34] It was further ascertained that a large body of Chinese were collecting in that direction, principally on the shore opposite the island, and that a double line of stakes, interlaced with bamboos, were driven across the upper part of the Junk River passage, where also several large junks appeared to have been sunk.