He reached Barbados on June 4, only 21 days after Villeneuve's arrival at Martinique. The latter had found that the Rochefort squadron—as a result of faulty transmission of Napoleon's innumerable orders—was already back in Europe, and that the Brest squadron had not come. In fact, held tight in the grip of Cornwallis, it was destined never to leave port. But a reënforcement of 2 ships had reached Villeneuve with orders to wait 35 days longer and in the meantime to harry the British colonies. Disgruntled and despondent, he had scarcely got troops aboard and started north on this mission when he learned that Nelson was hot on his trail. The troops were hastily thrown into frigates to protect the French colonies. Without other provision for their safety, and in disregard of orders, Villeneuve at once turned back for Europe, hoping the Emperor's schemes would still be set forward by his joining the ships at Ferrol.
Nelson followed four days later, on June 13, steering for his old post in the Mediterranean, but at the same time despatching the fast brig Curieux to England with news of the French fleet's return. This vessel by great good fortune sighted Villeneuve in mid-ocean, inferred from his northerly position that he was bound for Ferrol, and reached Portsmouth on July 8. Barham at the Admiralty got the news the next morning, angry that he had not been routed out of bed on the arrival of the captain the night before. By 9 o'clock the same morning, orders were off to Calder on the Ferrol station in time so that on the 22d of July he encountered the enemy, still plowing slowly eastward, some 300 miles west of Cape Finisterre.
As a result of admirable communication work and swift administrative action the critic of Nelson at Cape St. Vincent now had a chance to rob the latter of his last victory and end the campaign then and there. His forces were adequate. Though he had only 14 ships to 20, his four three-deckers, according to the estimates of the time, were each worth two of the enemy 74's, and on the other hand, the 6 Spanish ships with Villeneuve could hardly be counted for more than three. In the ensuing action, fought in foggy weather, two of the Spanish were captured and one of Calder's three-deckers was so injured that it had to be detached. The two fleets remained in contact for three days following, but neither took the aggressive. In a subsequent court martial Calder was reprimanded for "not having done his utmost to renew the said engagement and destroy every ship of the enemy."
| NELSON'S PURSUIT OF VILLENEUVE, MARCH-SEPTEMBER, 1805 |
On July 27 the Allied fleet staggered into Vigo, and a week later, after dropping three ships and 1200 sick men, it moved around to Corunna and Ferrol. Instead of being shaken down and strengthened by the long cruise, it was, according to the commander's plaintive letters, in worse plight than when it left Toulon. Nevertheless, ten days later he was ready to leave port, with 29 units, 14 of them raw vessels from Ferrol, and 11 of them Spanish. If, as Napoleon said, France was not going to give up having a navy, something might still be done. His orders to Villeneuve were to proceed to Brest and thence to Boulogne. "I count," he ended, "on your zeal in my service, your love of your country, and your hatred of that nation which has oppressed us for 40 generations, and which a little preseverance on your part will now cause to rëenter forever the ranks of petty powers."[1]
[Footnote 1: Orders of 26 July, Desbrière, Projets, Vol. V, p. 672.]
Such were Villeneuve's instructions, the wisdom or sincerity of which it was scarcely his privilege to question (though it may be ours). In passing judgment on his failure to execute them it should be remembered that two months later, to avoid the personal disgrace of being superseded, he took his fleet out to more certain disaster than that which it now faced in striking northward from Corunna. "Un poltron du tête et non de la cœur"[2] the French Admiral was handicapped throughout by a paralyzing sense of the things he could not do.
[Footnote 2: Gravière II, 136.]
If he had sailer northward he would have found the British fleet divided. Nelson, it is true, after returning to Cadiz had fallen back from Gibraltar to the Channel, where he left his eleven ships with the Brest squadron in remarkable condition after more than two years at sea. Calder had also joined, bringing Cornwallis' total strength to 39. These stood between the 21 French at Brest and the 29 at Ferrol. But on August 16 Cornwallis divided his forces, keeping 18 (including 10 three-deckers) and sending Calder back to the Spanish coast with the rest. Napoleon called this a disgraceful blunder (insigne bêtise), and Mahan adds, "This censure was just." Sir Julian Corbeh says it was a "master stroke... in all the campaign there is no movement—not even Nelson's chase of Villeneuve—that breathes more deeply the true spirit of war." According to Napoleon, Villeneuve might have "played prisoners' base with Calder's squadron and fallen upon Cornwallis, or with his 30 of the line have beaten Calder's 20 and obtained a decisive superiority."
So perhaps a Napoleonic admiral. Villeneuve left Ferrol on August 13 and sailed northwest on a heavy northeast wind till the 15th. Then, his fixed purpose merely strengthened by false news from a Danish merchantman of 25 British in the vicinity, he turned before the wind for Cadiz. As soon as he was safely inside, the British blockaders again closed around the port.