From these considerations, a powerful fleet was ordered to be got in readiness to put to sea on the shortest notice, and ten regiments of foot were marched to the Isle of Wight. The naval armament, consisting of eighteen ships of the line, besides frigates, fireships, bomb-ketches, and transports, was put under the command of sir Edward Hawke, an officer whose faithful services recommended him, above all others, to this command; and rear-admiral Knowles was appointed his subaltern. Sir John Mordaunt was preferred to take the command of the land-forces: and both strictly enjoined to act with the utmost unanimity and harmony. Europe beheld with astonishment these mighty preparations. The destination of the armament was wrapped in the most profound secrecy: it exercised the penetration of politicians, and filled France with very serious alarms. Various were the impediments which obstructed the embarkation of the troops for several weeks, while Mr. Pitt expressed the greatest uneasiness at the delay, and repeatedly urged the commander-in-chief to expedite his departure; but a sufficient number of transports, owing to some blunder in the contractors, had not yet arrived. The troops expressed an eager impatience to signalize themselves against the enemies of the liberties of Europe; but the superstitious drew unfavourable presages from the dilatoriness of the embarkation. At last the transports arrived, the troops were put on board with all expedition, and the fleet got under sail on the eighth day of September, attended with the prayers of every man warmed with the love of his country, and solicitous for her honour. The public, big with expectation, dubious where the stroke would fall, but confident of its success, were impatient for tidings from the fleet; but it was not till the fourteenth, that even the troops on board began to conjecture that a descent was meditated on the coast of France, near Rochefort or Rochelle.
ADMIRAL KNOWLES SENT TO TAKE AIX.
On the twentieth, the fleet made the isle of Oleron, and then sir Edward Hawke sent an order to vice-admiral Knowles, requiring him, if the wind permitted the fleet, to proceed to Basque road, to stand in as near to the isle of Aix as the pilot would carry him, with such ships of his division as he thought necessary for the service, and to batter the fort till the garrison should either abandon or surrender it. But the immediate execution of this order was frustrated by a French ship of war standing in to the very middle of the fleet, and continuing in that station for some time before she discovered her mistake, or any of the captains had a signal thrown out to give chase. Admiral Knowles, when too late, ordered the Magnanime, captain Howe, and Torbay, captain Keppel, on that service, and thereby retarded the attack upon which he was immediately sent. A stroke of policy greatly to be admired, as from hence he gained time to assure himself of the strength of the fortifications of Aix, before he ran his majesty’s ships into danger.
ATTACK AND SURRENDER OF AIX.
While the above ships, with the addition of the Royal William, were attending the French ship of war safe into the river Garonne, the remainder of the fleet was beating to windward off the isle of Oleron; and the commander-in-chief publishing orders and regulations which did credit to his judgment, and would have been highly useful, had there ever been occasion to put them in execution. On the twenty-third the van of the fleet, led by captain Howe in the Magnanime, stood towards Aix, a small island situated in the mouth of the river Charente, leading up to Rochefort, the fortifications half finished, and mounted with about thirty cannon and mortars, the garrison composed of six hundred men, and the whole island about five miles in circumference. As the Magnanime approached, the enemy fired briskly upon her; but captain Howe, regardless of their faint endeavours, kept on his course without flinching, dropping his anchors close to the walls, and poured in so incessant a fire as soon silenced their artillery. It was, however, near an hour before the fort struck, when some forces were landed to take possession of so important a conquest, with orders to demolish the fortifications, the care of which was intrusted to vice-admiral Knowles.
Inconsiderable as this success might appear, it greatly elated the troops, and was deemed a happy omen of further advantages; but, instead of embarking the troops that night, as was universally expected, several successive days were spent in councils of war, soundings of the coast, and deliberations whether the king’s express orders were practicable, or to be complied with. Eight days were elapsed since the first appearance of the fleet on the coast, and the alarm was given to the enemy. Sir Edward Hawke, indeed, proposed laying a sixty gun ship against Fouras, and battering that fort, which it was thought would help to secure the landing of the troops, and facilitate the enterprise on Rochefort. This a French pilot on board, Thierry, undertook; but after a ship had been lighted for the purpose, vice-admiral Knowles reported, that a bomb-ketch had run a-ground at above the distance of two miles from the fort; upon which the project of battering or bombarding the fort was abandoned. The admiral likewise proposed to bombard Koch elle; but this overture was over-ruled, for reasons which we need not mention. It was at length determined, in a council of war held on the eighth, to make a descent, and attack the forts leading to and upon the mouth of the river Charente. An order, in consequence of this resolution, was immediately issued for the troops to be ready to embark from the transports in the boats precisely at twelve o’clock at night. Accordingly the boats were prepared and filled with the men at the time appointed, and now they remained beating against each other, and the sides of the ships, for the space of four hours, while the council were determining whether, after all the trouble given, they should land; when at length an order was published for the troops to return to their respective transports, and all thoughts of a descent, to appearance, were wholly abandoned. The succeeding days were employed in blowing up and demolishing the fortifications of Aix; after which, the land officers, in a council of war, took the final resolution of returning to England without any further attempts, fully satisfied they had done all in their power to execute the designs of the ministry, and choosing rather to oppose the frowns of an angry sovereign, the murmurs of an incensed nation, and the contempt of mankind, than fight a handful of dastardly militia. Such was the issue of an expedition that raised the expectations of all Europe, threw the coasts of France into the utmost confusion, and cost the people of England little less than a million of money.