Dawlish Chronicles

In this blog, and later on my website, I have dealt several times with single-ship actions during the Age of Fighting Sail (see links at the end of this article), the protagonists being mainly British and French, though the Americans do figure in 1812-15. In most cases British victory over the French seems to have been all but pre-ordained, for the Royal Navy had reached a peak of professionalism in this period and the French officer corps had suffered badly in the revolution, a setback from which it never fully recovered. It is therefore somewhat of a surprise to learn not only of a French vessel capturing a British one in a single-ship action, but also that she was significantly smaller and less powerful.

The climax of the action. Bayonnaise (R) rams Ambuscade and the latter's mizzen falls
Painting by Jean Francois Hue, 1751-1823

The Bayonnaise was a French 24-gun corvette, launched in 1793. Ship-rigged (i.e. with three masts), of 580 tons and 125-ft. length, she was armed with 24 eight-pounders and four light “obusier”. The latter were short-barrelled, close-range weapons, the French answer to the British carronade, and of use only when ships were lying close together, ideally hull-to-hull. Her normal crew was about 220. Designed originally as a privateer, she was taken on the French Navy while still on the stocks. Her light armament fitted her well for a privateering, commerce-raiding role, but was likely to put her at a severe disadvantage if she encountered any larger vessel.

HMS Ambuscade was, by contrast, much more powerful, a 32-gun fifth-rate frigate which had seen successful service against the French in the American Revolutionary War. Though her dimensions were generally similar to the Bayonnaise , and though she carried a similarly sized crew, her armament was considerably heavier – 26 twelve-pounders, a total of eight six-pounder bow and stern chasers, four eighteen-pounder carronades on the quarterdeck and two on the forecastle. In any ship-to-ship action between the two vessels the Bayonnaise might have been expected to have no chance of survival.

From August 1798, at a time when the Royal Navy’s blockade of the French coast was becoming ever more effective, Ambuscade, commanded by Captain Henry Jenkins, was ordered to patrol off the French Atlantic coast. At dawn on 14^th December, when she was cruising off the Gironde estuary, and expecting to meet HMS Stag, she sighted a sail. Assuming this to be the Stag, she steered closer. The newcomer was in fact the Bayonnaise which, significantly as it later proved, was carrying a 40-man army detachment in addition to her own crew. The French ship, recognising that she was outsized and out-gunned, went about and fled. A stern-chase ensured and it was not until noon that the range closed sufficiently for the first shots to be fired.

Bayonnaise was to take ferocious punishment in the next hour, with serious damage to hull, masts and rigging. The action might have ended when Ambuscade crossed Bayonnaise’s stern. This was the most vulnerable part of any sailing man-of-war, as shot crashing through the stern could run longitudinally along the entire inner decks, destroying all in their path. The manoeuvre, if successfully executed, was the deciding factor in many naval battles. It was at this moment of greatest risk that Bayonnaise’s luck kicked in. One of the Ambuscade’s‍ 12-pounders burst, killing thirteen around it and destroying the vessel’s boats. In the ensuing confusion Bayonnaise headed south and a new stern chase developed. Ambuscade, recovered from her set-back, drew level in mid-afternoon –when on this winter’s day only a few hours of daylight still remained.

The moment of ramming - note damage to sails
As represented by naval artist Antoine Roux (1765-1835)

Ambuscade was now sailing parallel to Bayonnaise and well placed to batter her to fragments. Desperate measures were called for if the latter was to survive. Richter, her captain, ordered sail to be backed and swung the helm hard over to port, smashing into Ambuscade’sstarboard flank close to the stern. Bayonnaise’s bowsprit crashed into the British frigate’s mizzen mast. It fell, and the tangle of cordage and wrecked spars locked both vessels together.

The extra men Bayonnaise carried – soldiers, accustomed to handling muskets – now proved decisive. A withering fire was directed on Ambuscade’s deck, so many of her officers being wounded that only a single lieutenant was left in command. Bayonnaise too was taking casualties – Captain Richter had an arm shot off –but the advantage now lay with her. French seamen and soldiers clambered across the bowsprit on to Ambuscade and a savage melee developed. Bayonnaise’s new-found luck continued, for a powder charge exploded on Ambuscade’s quarterdeck, inflicting yet more casualties. The fighting continued for another half-hour, but numbers told. When Ambuscade’s colours were struck it was by her purser, the last Royal Navy officer still in action.

The most dramatic - and magnificent - representation of all
The French boarders can be seen storming across the bowsprit to the Ambuscade
This painting by Louis-Philippe Crepin (1772-1851) is in the Musee National de la Marine in Paris

The butcher’s bill for this action was 15 killed and 39 wounded on Ambuscade while Bayonnaise had 25 killed and 30 wounded. The captains of both vessels were among the wounded, and many other officers beside. It should be borne in mind that “wounded” often implied the necessity of amputation of limbs and that death by gangrene was a serious possibility thereafter. As was normal when a captain lost his ship, Captain Jenkins was later court-martialled, though he was exonerated, despite what many considered poor leadership and tactical manoeuvring.

Both vessels were to have active careers thereafter. Ambuscadewas taken into French service as Embuscade – wooden ships were almost infinitely repairable if they had not exploded or been sunk. She was however recaptured in 1803 by no less a prestigious ship than HMS Victory, and she resumed her old name. She had an active and successful career thereafter until she was broken up in 1810. Bayonnaise’sluck ran out in 1803, the same year in which Ambuscade/Embuscade’s turned for the better. Run down by HMS Ardent off Cape Finnisterre, her crew burned her rather than surrender.

French pride in the Bayonnaise/Ambuscade action was unbounded – probably because such victories were rare – and eminent artists of the time produced dramatic paintings of it. They convey much of the excitement and drama and some have been used to illustrate this article.

Links to some other single ship actions:

The HMS Bellona and Courageux action, 1761 (Click here)

The mostferocious frigate action ever? HMS Quebec vs Surveillante, 1779 (Click here)

HMS Indefatigable vs. Droits de l’Homme 1797 (Click here)

The aftermath of the wreck of the French frigate Medusa in 1816 is widely regarded as one of the most horrible events in maritime history. Abandoned on an overloaded raft by officers and crew who took to the boats when the vessel grounded off the coast of modern Mauritania, only fifteen persons survived out of a total of 147. In the thirteen days the raft drifted, 132 died through thirst and starvation, fighting and suicide. Cannibalism also occurred. Though the ship’s boats had reached safety no systematic search was made for the raft and it was only discovered, accidentally, by the British ship Argus. A major scandal at the time, the raft became the subject of an unforgettable painting by Théodore Géricault (1791-1824).

"The Raft of the Medusa" - today in the Louvre, Paris

The breakdown in responsibility and discipline that led to this appalling disaster can be contrasted with the happy outcome of what could have been a similar tragedy when a Royal Navy frigate, HMS Alceste, was wrecked the following year. The value of professionalism and discipline has seldom been so dramatically illustrated.

HMS Alceste was built in 1804, as the Minerve, for the French Navy – generally similar in fact to the Medusa. Two years later she was captured by the Royal Navy and taken into service as HMS Alceste, under command of Captain (afterwards Sir) Murray Maxwell, (1775 –1831). He was to be her captain for much of her Royal Navy career until her final loss. In 1811, in company with HMS Active, Maxwell and the Alceste captured the French frigate Pomome. Maxwell was to be congratulated on this in strange and unforeseeable circumstances six years later. The Alceste provided sterling service through the remainder of the Napoleonic Wars and in the War of 1812.

The capture of the French frigate Pomone by HMS Alceste and HMS Active
Painting by Pierre Julien Gilbert (1783-1860)

In 1816 Alceste was assigned to carrying William Pitt Amherst, the first Lord Amherst, on a diplomatic mission to China, the objective being to establish formal relations between Britain and the Chinese Empire. Amherst was landed at Canton (Guangzhou) and travelled overland to Pekin (Beijing). In his absence Captain Maxwell and the Alceste undertook extensive survey work in uncharted waters off the coasts of China, Korea, and Okinawa. This work is so well thought of, even today, that Maxwell has been honoured by a South Korean postage stamp.

Sir Murray Maxwell - the only Royal Navy officer honoured by a Korean stamp?

On her return to China Alceste required repairs to ready her for the long voyage home. This necessitated mooring in calm water in the Pearl River, close to Canton. A request to do so was refused by the Chinese authorities, who threatened to have the gun-batteries guarding the river open on the Alceste should she proceed. Captain Maxwell responded in the robust manner to be expected of the Royal Navy of his day – he bombarded and subdued the shore defences and some seventeen war-junks supporting them. He then moored, commenced his repairs and awaited Amherst’s return.

HMS Alceste attacking the Chinese batteries and junks. Note Chinese rockets
As depicted by Alceste's surgeon, John MacLeod, in his account of her final voyage

In the event Amherst’s mission proved to be a total failure, doomed as it was by mutual incomprehension. Self-sufficient for millennia, China officials had little or no understanding of the outside world and regarded all other nations as inferior. Amherst was informed that he could only be admitted to the Emperor's presence if he were to kowtow – which meant kneeling and bowing so low as to touch the forehead on the ground. As representative of a proud nation that had opposed the might of France and her allies for over twenty years, and which had the previous year seen off the Emperor Napoleon, Amherst had no intention of abasing himself or his country. Faced with an impasse, he had no option to head home. He rejoined the Alceste and she set out for England, he and his entourage, plus the frigates crew, adding up to 257 on board.

Disaster struck in the Java Sea – an area largely uncharted at the time. Despite continuous soundings the Alceste ran on to a hidden reef on 18 February 1817, the damage so severe that the flooding was too much for the pumps to handle. Abandonment was now essential, the nearest island, Pulau Liat, being close enough for crew and passengers to be transferred safely to shore. In an uncanny resemblance to the Medusa wreck, a raft was used in the evacuation in addition to the ship’s boats. On this occasion however order and discipline prevailed. Provisions and fresh water were at a premium however and it was decided that the boats would head for Batavia (now Djakarta), the Dutch administrative centre in Java, 200 miles to the south, to organise a rescue. Amheurst joined them.

Boats setting out from the island to salvage what remains on the burning hulk
Engraving from one of Surgeon Macleod's illustrations

Captain Maxwell had remained on the island and now organised a return to the wreck to recover whatever supplies remained as there were still some 200 mouths to feed. The attempt was interrupted by the arrival of Malay pirates and the salvage party, which had been unarmed, had to beat a hasty retreat. The pirates looted the wreck and burned it thereafter. Fearing further pirate attack, Maxwell supervised construction of a stockade – called appropriately “Camp Maxwell” – and readied it for defence. Another salvage party managed to recover some flour and wine from the Alceste’s burned-out hulk but the supplies-situation remained critical.

The anticipated pirate attack came on 26 February. A sortie led by Alceste’s second lieutenant led to an initial repulse – with several pirates killed – but further pirate reinforcements arrived thereafter. They made no attempt to land, contenting themselves with firing swivel guns towards the stockade. Yet more pirates arrived and on 1 March an assault, which promised to be overwhelming, seemed imminent. It was at this critical juncture that a ship was seen approaching. Her appearance, and a brief attack by Alceste's marines, broke the pirates’ resolve and they fled. The vessel turned out to be an East-Indiaman, the Ternate, which Amherst had encountered in Batavia. It was to here she returned the castaways – not a single life had been lost – and Amheurst chartered another ship, the Caesar, to take them back to Britain.

Camp Maxwell - the passengers and crew of HMS Alceste cheer their rescuers
An engraving from one of Surgeon MacLeod's illustrations

The Caesar put in to St. Helena on her voyage home and both Amherst and Maxwell had an audience with the ex-Emperor Napoleon, now in his second year of exile there. Napoleon complimented Maxwell on his achievement and hoped that he would be exonerated (as he was to be) in the inevitable court martial for her loss. He also referred admiringly – and sportingly – to Maxwell’s capture of the French Pomone in 1811. It was to Amherst, when discussing his failed mission, that Napoleon made his celebrated remark “China is a sleeping giant. Let her sleep. For when she wakes, she will shake the world"– a prophesy which was to come to pass in our own day.

Maxwell was rightly hailed as a hero, was knighted in 1818. He was however seriously injured by a paving stone thrown from a mob opposing him when he stood for Parliament that same year. He returned to naval service and held a number of responsible positions but he never recovered from the paving-stone injury. He died at 56 – too young. Amherst was to serve as Governor-General of India from 1823 to 1828.

And now, when we admire Géricault’s “Raft of the Medusa” we should remember the Alceste also. She and her gallant crew deserve it.

To read more about operations against Malay pirates later inthe 19th century click here

A hundred years this month the sinking by German U-boats of three large ships, one civilian, two naval, alerted the world to the fact that the submarine was now a serious menace. A mere decade before the first puny craft to enter service in half-a-dozen navies were regarded as little more than an expensive and puny novelty. Now they represented a serious threat both to trade and to conventional naval forces. Their impact went far beyond the tactical however. On May 7^th the liner Lusitaniahad been sunk off the south coast of Ireland with massive loss of life, some of it American, triggering outrage in the United States and almost bringing it into the war. On May 25^th and 27^th respectively the British pre-dreadnought battleships Triumphand Majestic were sunk of Gallipoli by a German submarine, forcing withdrawal of all heavy naval units from providing fire-support to British and Empire forces. It was the first step in the road to recognition that the campaign to force the Dardanelles could never succeed, and to final evacuation early in 1916.

HMS Audacious, 23,400-tons, ten 13.5" guns, sunk by a single mine, 27 October 1914

The focus on these three spectacular U-boat actions has however drawn attention for a much lower profile, but equally serious, U-boat offensive against a humbler target, Britain’s fishing fleet. Hundreds of trawlers and drifters had been active in the North Sea before the war and fish represented an important component of the British national diet. One surprise of the early months of World War 1 was just how serious a hazard mines represented – indeed the brand new super-dreadnought HMS Audacioushad been sunk by one within two months of the start of the war. It is indeed surprising that the mine should have been so underestimated by the Royal Navy, since they had proved their worth ten years before in the Russo-Japanese War. Fixated as it was on powerful battleships, fast battlecruisers and swarms of light cruisers and destroyers for supporting heavier units in fleet actions, the Royal Navy had made no provision for mine-sweeping craft. The response – a creditably fast one – was to commandeer large numbers of small civilian vessels for hasty conversion for this role. Trawlers, already equipped with net-handling winches, were especially suited to such work and indeed a flotilla of them, still manned by civilian crews, had attempted, unsuccessfully, to sweep the Dardanelles of Turkish mines at the start of the Gallipoli campaign. The trawlers’ sea-keeping ability also made them suitable for anti-submarine patrolling, and a number were hastily equipped with light naval guns.

Typical armed trawler, HMT John Edmund. Note White Ensign and 12-pounder at bow
(with acknowledgement to www.naval-history.net)

The sudden conscription of large numbers of fishing craft placed an extra burden on those which remained in fishing service. Britain, a major food importer, and with her supply lines threatened by U-boats, was now more dependent than ever before on fish catches and the North Sea, now a battleground, was the usual source. This then was the background to the German U-boat offensive against Britain’s fishing fleet. The losses were very heavy. In May 1915 – the month of the Lusitania, Triumph and Majestic sinkings – four U-boats, U-9, U-30, U-39 and U-41 – sunk a total of 23 trawlers in the North Sea. Six of these became victims on May 2^nd and no less than eleven on May 3^rd.

Typical requisitioned trawler, HMT Quail, armed with 2 3-pounders only
(with acknowledgement to www.wrecksite.eu)

Serious though the losses were in material terms the crews remained relatively unscathed. At this stage of the war, before maritime aircraft and semi-rigid airships were available for systematic reconnaissance, the U-boats could surface with little risk of detection by any but their targets. Only the largest civilian vessels carried radios, and none of the trawlers. These latter were judged by the Germans as too small to merit expenditure of a torpedo. The most common U-boat tactic was to surface, order their targets’ crews to abandon ship in their boats, and then sink them by gunfire. In the case of larger craft, German boarders placed explosive charges to blow out the bottoms. Mines represented a more deadly hazard for the fishermen. Six trawlers were victims in May 1915, a typical case being the Uxbridge, which on the 3^rd. of the month caught a mine in her nets, which then exploded and sank her.

Given the scale of the losses to the fishing fleet it is gratifying to learn of a U-boat receiving its come-uppance at the hands of a trawler, albeit one taken into Royal Navy service as a patrol vessel. The German submarine U-14 had come on station east of the Scottish coast at the beginning of June. On the 2^nd and 3^rd of the month she sank two neutral ships, the 1670-ton Danish Cyrus and the 2240-ton Swedish Lappland respectively. The campaign against the fishing boats was still in full swing, with seven sunk by other U-boats on June 3^rd and five on June 5^th. The U-14’s newly commanding captain, Oberleutenant Max Hammerl, would have had every expectation of joining in the massacre. His luck was however to run out two days later, on June 5^th, off Peterhead, when he encountered what appeared to be a fishing trawler. The Oceanic II was indeed a trawler, but one that had now been armed.

U-14

Hammerl, unsuspecting, ordered the gun crew of his surfaced U-14 to fire two warning shots across the Oceanic II’s bows. Joined now by a second trawler, the Hawk, the Oceanic II returned fire at a range of one mile. Hammerl responded by ordering diving – a manoeuvre that would almost certainly saved his craft had there not been a problem with the vents of the forward diving tanks. The U-14’sstern sank but the bows remained above water, a target into which the the Oceanic II’s gunners poured fire while the Hawk steamed in to ram. This ended the contest. Hammerl ordered “abandon ship” and all six officers and twenty-one enlisted men managed to escape and be taken prisoner. Hammerl himself went down with his submarine.

Both trawlers had done well in the action. Humble they might have been but they had scored a significant success, one that was to be repeated by many other equally humble craft in the coming years of the war.

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The island of Zanzibar, off the coast of modern Tanzania, was to be the scene in 1896 of what has been described as “The Shortest War in History”. It lasted a mere 38 minutes but in this short period it proved to be very bloody indeed.

African slaves at Zanzibar - photograph - by A.G. Gomes and Co. - undated but probably 1880s

Primarily an Arab settlement, with strong links to Oman, Zanzibar’s wealth had been based on the slave-trade, with expeditions reaching far into East and Central Africa to capture prisoners who would be shipped to the slave markets of Arabia. In 1858 the Zanzibar’s ruler, the Sultan, threw off allegiance to Oman and declared independence. This was accepted by Britain – though formal recognition had to wait to 1886 – and in the coming decades the island, and the similarly named capital, provided a base for the Royal Navy’s anti-slave trade operations along the East African coast. There was a definite paradox here – many Zanzibar Arabs were heavily involved in the slave-trade and the institution remained legal on the island.

Arab slave merchants inspecting African slaves at Zanzibar

By the 1890s the newly-forged German Empire, hungry for colonies, was establishing itself in Tanganyika, the mainland directly west of Zanzibar, while British interests were similarly engaged in setting up a colony in Kenya, further north. German efforts to suppress slaving were resented by Arabs traders, resulting in armed clashes, and leading also to significant Anti-German resentment on Zanzibar itself. Britain and Germany were now vying for supremacy in East Africa and Zanzibar, in view of its position, assumed strategic significance.

Helgoland in the 1890s, after Germany took it over - contemporary postcard
All the potential for a Gibraltar or Malta in the Noth Sea - and thrown away by Britain!

Germany was to do well out of its opposition to British control of Zanzibar for in a treaty signed in 1890 it pledged to give up its interest in there in exchange for Britain handing back to Germany the island of Helgoland in the North Sea. Occupied by Britain since 1814, this small island was ideally placed to protect the approaches to both the new German naval base of Wilhelmshaven and the western entrance of the Kiel Canal. Had Britain retained Helgoland and fortified it heavily, as the Germans were thereafter to do, the course of both world wars might have been significantly different.

Lloyd Mathews (1850-1901)
The power behind the throne

Britain had recognised the sovereignty of Zanzibar and its Sultan in 1886, and the Zanzibar-Helgoland Treaty strengthened its position. A new Sultan, Ali bin Said, came to power in the same year as the treaty. Zanzibar was declared a British protectorate, the slave trade was banned, though ownership of slaves remained legal, and a British nominee, Lloyd Mathews, was appointed to lead the Sultan’s cabinet. A further measure of Britain’s power was that it was accepted as having a veto over the appointment of future sultans. Lloyd Mathews had been seconded by Britain as long before as 1877 to create a small, modern, Zanzibari army which was to number in due course over 6000 men. He carried the rank of Brigadier-General and in due course was to become the real power behind the throne.

Sultan Ali died in 1893 and was succeeded by Hamad bin Thuwaini, who was acceptable to Britain. Zanzibari opinion was now however growing hostile to British presence – the slave-trade ban was starting to bite – and the Sultan was authorised to recruit a 1000-man “bodyguard” to maintain order. This proved to be a double-edged sword and British residents were soon complaining about the bodyguard’s behaviour.

Khalid bin Bargash

Sultan Hamad lasted three years, dying suddenly on August 25^th1896. His nephew, Khalid bin Bargash, who was suspected by some as having been involved in his uncle’s death, immediately ensconced himself in the palace complex at Zanzibar Town, with the obvious intention of taking over as sultan. Britain preferred another candidate however, Hamid bin Mohammed, and intended to use its veto. Khalid was warned accordingly but he proceeded anyway, massing forces loyal to himself at the palace complex. This was a residential wooden structure, modern in construction, provided even with electricity. By evening Khalid had almost 3000 supporters under arms, about a quarter of them defectors from the army, the bulk of which remained loyal to their British commander. Khalid’s force also had several machine guns, two modern 12-pounders and a 17th-century bronze cannon. Also declaring for Khalid was the crew of the royal yacht, the HHS Glasgow.

The Sultan's armed yacht, HHS Glasgow

Mathews was having none of it. The force immediately available to him to oppose Khalid was small numerically – some 900 Zanzibari soldiers, many of them ex-slaves, and commanded by a Lieutenant Raikes who was seconded from Britain’s Wiltshire Regiment. They were supplemented by up to 180 marines and seamen landed from a small Royal Navy cruiser, HMS Philomel and two gunboats, HMS Thrush and HMS Sparrow, which were conveniently in the harbour. These vessels’ firepower was considerable – Philomelmounted eight 4.7-inch guns and eight 3-pounders, while the sisters Thrush and Sparrow each carried six 4-inch and two 3-pounders. The three ships also carried numerous machine guns. Fully exposed at the palace complex, which extended along the water-front, Khalid’s supporters would have been well advised to disperse – which they did not.

HMS Thrush - a classic Mitchell print

The late sultan was buried before nightfall, in line with Muslim custom, and Khalid, despite further warnings from Mathews, proclaimed himself as his successor. Zanzibar was linked to the outside world by telegraph and authorisation was asked from the British Government in London for the naval vessels to open fire should circumstances demand – there was still hope for a peaceful settlement.

HMS St. George - classic Victorian livery and massive firepower

The stand-off continued, with Khalid showing no intention to back down. Yet more Royal Navy might arrived, another small cruiser, HMS Racoon– six 6-inch and eight 3-pounders – and the flagship of the Cape and East Africa Station, HMS St. George. Any one of the other ships, even the gunboats, would have been sufficient for the job in hand, but the St. George was an absolute sledgehammer. An Edgar Class protected cruiser of 7350 tons, she carried no less than ten 6-in guns and twelve 6-pounders. Her greatest power lay however in the two massive 9.2-inch ship-killers carried as bow and stern-chasers. Also arriving was authorisation from the British Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury to “adopt whatever measures you may consider necessary.”

The palace before the bombardment

The last round of negotiations failed. It is difficult at this remove to understand how Khalid could have believed he had any hope of withstanding the forces against him. The British naval commander, Rear-Admiral Harry Rawson, made it plain that if Khalid had not submitted by 9000 hrs the following day, fire would be opened. Through the afternoon all commercial shipping left the harbour and British residents were taken on board the St. George and a British merchant ship. Fear and foreboding must now have reigned in the city – a British official wrote later that "The silence which hung over Zanzibar was appalling. Usually drums were beating or babies cried but that night there was absolutely not a sound."

Contemporary illustration:
HMS St. George in action

On the following morning, August 7^th, while the British ships were readying for action, final warnings were issued to Khalid. He refused yet again to stand down. At 0900, at the exact moment the ultimatum ran out, Racoon, Thrush and Sparrow opened fire simultaneously on the palace. The wooden structure, never designed for defence, and now barricaded with crates and bales, offered no protection to Khalid’s 3000 supporters from the hail of high-explosive shells delivered at point-blank range. Some later reports indicated that Khalid fled for safety at the first shot, though others credited him with staying longer.

As the bombardment commenced the Zanzibari yacht Glasgow opened fired upon the St. Georgewith her seven 9-pounder guns, an unwise step in view of both ships’ relative gunpower. Fire was returned by the St. George and the Glasgow was sunk, her crew then being rescued by Royal Navy launches.

The shelling of the palace continued for 38 minutes. The palace was now on fire and Khalid’s flag had been cut down. Around 500 Zanzibaris, women as well as men, had been killed or wounded and it remains unclear how many were combatants. Opportunistic looting during the chaos also led to some 20 deaths in the Indian quarter. Though Raikes' Zanzibari troops had come under fire as they approached the palace, none were wounded, and the sole British casualty was a Petty Officer wounded, though not fatally, on the Thrush.

The palace in ruins after the bombardment and fire

By the afternoon the town was under British control and seamen had been landed to combat, successfully, the fires spreading from the palace to threaten customs sheds containing explosives. The acceptable candidate, Hamid bin Mohammed, had been installed as sultan. He was to be no more than a puppet and he was required shortly afterwards to abolish slavery. The process was to prove a slow and bureaucratic one, just over 17000 slaves being emancipated in the next decade, out of a slave population that had been estimated at 60000 in 1891.

German cruiser SMS Seeadler - Khalid's means of escape
(Seen at New York in 1893)

And what of ex-Sultan Kahlid following his two-day reign? He found asylum, with some followers in the German consulate, where he was guarded by German sailors and marines. British forces remained outside to arrest him should he come out. The consulate bordered on the harbour and on October 2^nd a boat from the German cruiser SMS Seeadler pulled alongside. Khalid stepped on board and was taken to the cruiser, and then on to Tanganyika, without setting foot on Zanzibari soil. He remained there until captured by British forces during World War 1. He was exiled in the Seychelles and St. Helena before being finally return to East Africa. He died in Mombasa in 1927.

The British players were highly regarded for their actions during the crisis. Somewhat ridiculous Zanzibari decorations (including the “Order of the Brilliant Star of Zanzibar”) were distributed freely and Rear Admiral Rawson was knighted. Rawson’s career had still a long way to run and his most famous exploit was to come in the following year.

We’ll be looking at that in a future blog.

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Love historical and naval/military fiction? Looking for an exciting read ? Interested in conflict in the Victorian period? Click on the image below to learn more. You can read the opening section and plunge yourself into a world of danger, betrayal and merciless conflict in which neither side has clean hands and one man battles to maintain his integrity.

When reading about the Royal Navy in the 19^thCentury one never ceases to be amazed by the degree of autonomy accorded to ships’ commanders, even of relatively junior rank, and the willingness of both Admiralty and Government to back their actions. I’ve come across one such case recently, one which is so extreme and so dramatic that a novelist would hesitate to invent it. I found a mention in a book from the early 1900s entitled “Our Sailors - Gallant Deeds of the British Navy during Victoria's Reign” by W.H.G. Kingston. I’ve been unable to do much cross-referencing with other sources – perhaps some reader might know more – but the story is worth recounting.

In the aftermath of the Wars of Liberation from Spanish rule in the early 19^th Century, the successor republics were locked in an almost endless series of, revolts, revolutions and civil wars. Many of the borders were significantly different than those of today, perhaps the most notable being those of “New Granada”, which lasted from 1831 to 1858. This republic had modern Colombia as its core, but also areas which are today parts of Venezuela, Ecuador and Panama. (The latter broke away from Colombia, with US support, as late as 1903). From 1839 to 1841 New Granada was engulfed in a conflict known as “The War of the Supremes” (In Spanish: “Guerra de los Supremos”), in which various regional leaders, essentially warlords, vied to gain power.

On February 6^th1841 two British merchant vessels, the brig Jane and Sara, and a sloop, Little William, were lying at, a small harbour on the Gulf of Morrosquillo, near El Zapote, some 65 miles south of Cartagena. A small flotilla of ships arrived which were in the service of one of the contending warlords, a General Carmona. The British ships were looted and the passengers – including a Colonel Gregg – and the crews were taken ashore and imprisoned. The seizure appears to have been an open act of piracy rather than to have any political dimension. The prisoners did however manage to get a message to the British consul at Cartagena, who immediately demanded their release, though without result.

No illustration appears to exist of HMS Charybdis but this
painting by Thomas Butterwoth (1768-1842) entitled "A brig chasing a privateer"
gives some impression of how she might have looked in action.
(With acknowledgement to the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich)

This was however a period when British citizens could expect robust support from their government in the event of high-handed treatment by foreign nations and a Royal Navy brig, HMS Charybdis, was in the area for this very purpose. The consul contacted the brig’s commander, a Lieutenant Michael de Courcy, who set off with all despatch in Charybdis to resolve the matter.

On arrival at El Zapote de Courcy found that General Carmona’s flotilla consisted of a corvette, a brig, and three “schooners of war”, all presumably hastily armed impressed and armed civilian vessels. Charybdis was thus outnumbered and though officially rated as a “6-gun brig” mounted only a single long gun amidships and two carronades. Her crew consisted of 55 officers and men. de Courcy now demanded release of the British ships and prisoners but the local commander rejected the demand “with great insolence”. It also appears that Colonel Gregg was shot soon afterwards – the circumstances are unclear.

Outnumbered or not, de Courcy now sailed Charybdis into the anchorage, and Carmona’s corvette promptly opened fire on her, shooting away the forestay and thereby threatening collapse of the foremast. Charybdis returned fire so effectively that the corvette’s colours were promptly run down. Once suspects that the two carronades – murderous at close quarters – played a major role in this as when the corvette was boarded it was found that her commander and twenty-five of his men had been killed. Charybdisnow directed her fire on the brig, sinking her, after which the schooners wisely decided to surrender.

The entire action had lasted less than an hour, and the crisis was resolved. de Courcy not only received the full backing of the Admiralty and Government but was promoted to commander in recognition of his swift and decisive measures. It is hard to imagine any commander being allowed similar discretion or freedom today – radio communication has a lot to answer for!

The above are the facts as I know them and I would be grateful if anybody can fill in further details. Who was Colonel Gregg, for example, and what led to him being shot? What was de Courcy’s subsequent career?

The only cross-reference I can find on the web is, bizarrely from a contemporary magazine entitled “The Gardners’ Chronicle” and it reports the incident on the basis of reports from Jamaican newspapers. Directly after it is a brief paragraph which horrifies eve at this remove in, a letter from Puerto Rico, then a Spanish possession, which states chillingly that “three negroes had been shot, and eight others sentenced to the bastinado, and to be employed in hard work for ten years on the public works of the island, for having taken part in an insurrection.” Slavery had another half-century to run in the Spanish Empire and once wonders how many more nameless victims in that time were still to endure such ghastly punishments.

It is my pleasure this week to introduce a guest blog by my friend and fellow-novelist Alison Morton. She is known for her innovative - and highly credible - alternate-universe thrillers, in which a remnant of Roman power has survived onto the 20th Century and beyond. She has just published her fourth, Aurelia,and you'll find out more about her and her books, at the end of this article.

I asked Alison to suggest a topic for her guest blog that would be nautically - or water-borne - related, and she came up with the following, fascinating, article. Over to Alison!

Romans and Rivers

Nowhere more than with flowing water do Roman preoccupations with religion, ceremony, power, cultural identity and commerce come together.

Roman ideas about rivers cannot go beyond simple military technicalities of attack and defence; living and working by rivers, the religious symbolism of springs and water and the role of rivers as boundaries were integral to the Roman psyche. Rivers often marked not only private property, but settlements, regions, provinces and even the extent of Roman rule – the edge of empire. The Danube (Danubius fluvius) is a perfect example of the latter. And of course, rivers served as communication for commercial as well as military use; the Rhone (Rhodanus fluvius) was the trade conduit into Gaul, Britannia and all points north.

Reconstruction of Trajan's Bridge across the lower Danube by the engineer E. Duperrex in 1907

Springs (hot and cold), streams, flowing water and mighty rivers were thought to possess a divine or semi-divine status, often with strong local traditions. Crossing a river meant negotiating with or placating the local deity. Trajan ordered religious ceremonies on the banks of the Danube before building the bridge east of the Iron Gates, (near the present-day cities of Drobeta-Turnu Severin in Romania and Kladovo in Serbia) before he took his army across. For a hard-headed and practical people, the Romans were very superstitious and it was a rash commander who ignored the required observances. The larger the river was, the more important the mental and spiritual boundary. Connected with this anxiety about water, many Romans looked down on the naval branch of their armed forces; despite its competence, it was considered a second-rate posting for a career soldier.

The Romans didn’t develop a purposeful, Empire-wide strategy in respect of rivers as a form of control, but exploited the river environment as they did any other natural part of the landscape. Often it was the fastest and safest way of moving goods and people and supplying troops, especially in a hostile environment on land, and the most efficient way of monitoring and controlling the local population by means of bridges and fording points. One use of naming rivers helped identify and imprint on the popular consciousness the extent and local of imperial conquests and the superiority of Roman forces and generals, e.g. crossing the Tigris, conquering the tribes across the Rhine (or not!).

And the Tiber, the great artery of Rome… According to legend, the city of Rome was founded in 753 BC on the banks of the Tiber about 25 kilometres from the sea at Ostia. The island in the middle of the river, Isola Tiberina, was the site of an important ancient ford, later bridged. The river marked the boundary between the Etruscans to the west, the Sabines to the east and the Latins to the south.

Pons Fabricius Built AD 62 on the east side of the Isola Tiberina

The Tiber was critically important to Roman trade and commerce, navigable as far as 100 kilometres upriver; some scholars think the river was used to ship grain from the Val Teverina as early as the 5th century BC.

During the Punic Wars of the 3rd century BC, the harbour at Ostia at the mouth of the Tiber became a key naval base and later, Rome's most important port, where wheat, olive oil, and wine amongst other essential commodities were imported from Rome's colonies around the Mediterranean. (See earlier blog about this). Wharves were also built along the riverside in Rome itself, lining the riverbanks around the Campus Martius area.

Sometimes the river was uncompliant and flooded the port, farmland, channels, drainage ditches and the roads leading to Rome, and causing mudslides and the destruction of houses and commercial buildings as Pliny the Younger wrote to Macrinus in the first century AD.

The heavy sedimentation of the river made it difficult to maintain Ostia, prompting the emperors Claudius and Trajan to establish a new port on the Fiumicino in the 1st century AD. They built a new road, the via Portuensis, to connect Rome with Fiumicino, leaving the city by Porta Portese ('the port gate'). Both ports were eventually abandoned due to silting.

The Roman Navy on the frontier rivers

During the early Imperial period, the Mediterranean became largely a peaceful ‘Roman lake’ (mare nostrum) and the navy was reduced mostly to patrol, anti-piracy and transport duties, especially escorting the grain shipments to Rome. It also manned and maintained craft on major frontier rivers such as the Rhine and the Danube. But it wasn’t all plain sailing(!). In AD 15 and 16, Germanicus carried out fleet operations along the rivers Rhine and Ems, without permanent results due to grim Germanic resistance and a disastrous storm.

The Danube Basin

Under the ‘Five Good Emperors’ (AD 96 – AD 180) the navy played an important role during Trajan's conquest of Dacia, and operated, albeit temporarily, a fleet for the Euphrates and Tigris rivers. During Marcus Aurelius’s wars against the Marcomanni confederation, naval actions took place on the Danube and the Tisza.

Lighter ships, small-oared vessels, such as the navis actuaria, with 30 oars (15 on each bank) were ideal for transport in coastal and fluvial operations, for which its shallow draught and flat keel were ideal. In Late Antiquity, it was succeeded by the navis lusoria, used extensively used for patrols and raids by the legionary flotillas in the Rhine and Danube frontiers.

Reconstruction of a late period navis lusoriain Mainz museum. Photo by Martin Bahmann

The Classis Germanica was established in 12 BC by Drusus at Castra Vetera. It controlled the Rhine river, and was mainly a fluvial fleet, although it also operated in the North Sea. On one unfortunate occasion, the Romans' initial lack of experience with the tides of the ocean left Drusus' fleet stranded on the Zuyder Zee. After AD 30, the fleet moved its main base to the castrum of Alteburg, some 4 km south of Colonia Agrippinensis (modern Cologne).

The Classis Pannonica, was a fluvial fleet controlling the Upper Danube from Castra Regina in Raetia (modern Regensburg) to Singidunum in Moesia (modern Belgrade). Some writers trace its establishment to Augustus's campaigns in Pannonia in ca. 35 BC, but it was certainly in existence by AD 45. Its main base was probably Taurunum (modern Zemum) at the confluence of the river Sava with the Danube.

As an afterword, it’s worth noting that the (imaginary) 21^st century state of Roma Nova – the setting for my books – was founded on cliff above a river in the last days of Empire. (Click here for more background). Today, there are flourishing commercial docks in Roma Nova (mentioned in INCEPTIO and PERFIDITAS) and the base for a small fleet of well-armed patrol boats of the Imperial Fleet ready to deter any modern waterborne barbarians. Readers of the Roma Nova thrillers could see some resemblance to large towns built on the rivers Drava and Sava which flow into the Danube…

More about Roma Nova and Alison

Even before she pulled on her first set of combats, Alison Morton was fascinated by the idea of women soldiers. Brought up by a feminist mother and an ex-military father, it never occurred to her that women couldn’t serve their country in the armed forces. Everybody in her family had done time in uniform and in theatre – regular and reserve Army, RAF, WRNS, WRAF – all over the globe.

So busy in her day job, Alison joined the Territorial Army in a special communications regiment and left as a captain, having done all sorts of interesting and exciting things no civilian would ever know or see. Or that she can talk about, even now…

But something else fuels her writing… Fascinated by the mosaics at Ampurias (Spain), at their creation by the complex, power and value-driven Roman civilisation started her wondering what a modern Roman society would be like if run by strong women…

Now, she lives in France and writes Roman-themed alternate history thrillers with tough heroines:

INCEPTIO, the first in the Roma Nova series

– shortlisted for the 2013 International Rubery Book Award

– B.R.A.G. Medallion

– finalist in 2014 Writing Magazine Self-Published Book of the Year

PERFIDITAS, second in series

– B.R.A.G. Medallion

– finalist in 2014 Writing Magazine Self-Published Book of the Year

SUCCESSIO, third in series

– Historical Novel Society’s indie Editor’s Choice for Autumn 2014

– B.R.A.G. Medallion

– Editor’s choice, The Bookseller’s inaugural Indie Preview, December 2014

Alison’s latest thriller, AURELIA, goes back to the late 1960s and starts the adventures of a new heroine, Aurelia Mitela. Here’s a little more about it:

Late 1960s Roma Nova, the last Roman colony that has survived into the 20th century. Aurelia Mitela is alone – her partner gone, her child sickly and her mother dead – and forced to give up her beloved career as a Praetorian officer.

But her country needs her unique skills. Somebody is smuggling silver – Roma Nova’s lifeblood – on an industrial scale. Sent to Berlin to investigate, she encounters the mysterious and attractive Miklós, a known smuggler who knows too much and Caius Tellus, a Roma Novan she has despised and feared since childhood.

Barely escaping a trap set by a gang boss intent on terminating her, she discovers that her old enemy is at the heart of all her troubles and pursues him back home to Roma Nova...

AURELIA book trailer: https://youtu.be/K5_hXzg0JWA

(Warning: there is exciting music!)

Aurelia is available in paperback and as ebook from a variety of retailers:

http://alison-morton.com/books-2/aurelia/where-to-buy-aurelia/

Connect with Alison on her Roma Nova blog: http://alison-morton.com/blog/

Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/AlisonMortonAuthor

Twitter: https://twitter.com/alison_morton@alison-morton

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5783095.Alison_Morton

In both World Wars the greatest danger many troops faced, especially if they were in support or non-frontline roles, may well have been that of sinking of their transports. It is a tribute to the efficacy of convoy and escort provisions that in practice only few of the millions of men who were transported by ocean did experience such nightmares. When the worst did happen however the chances of escape from below decks on an overcrowded troopship could well be low and the casualty numbers correspondingly high. The hundredth anniversary of one such disaster, largely forgotten today, is due in August of this year.

1915 can be fairly regarded as the year in which the submarine first demonstrated its full potential far from home bases. The sinking by German U-boats of the Lusitania, the attacks of naval vessels off the beaches of Gallipoli and the campaign against Britain’s fishing fleet have all been mentioned in earlier blogs. In the second half of the year U-boats operating out of Austro-Hungarian bases on the Adriatic found new hunting grounds the Eastern Mediterranean and the Aegean. The Dardanelles expedition was stalled, but manpower-intensive, the Turkish threat to the Suez Canal remained and Mesopotamia – modern Iraq – sucked in more and more troops as British advances there met increased opposition. Together, these demands necessitated major Allied shipping movements, including troop transportation.

Contemporary postcard: Royal Edward in civilian service, rre-WW1

The Royal Edwardwas a large, modern and virtually new liner when, like her identical sister Royal George, she was requisitioned for service as a British troopship in 1914. Of 11,117 tons and 523 feet long, and originally named Cairo and Heliopolis, these vessels had been built for fast mail-service between Marseilles and Alexandria. Steam turbines and three shafts gave them a top speed of 19 knots and they had accommodation for 1114 passengers, 344 of them in first class. In 1909 both ships were sold on to the “Royal Line”, a subsidiary company of the Canadian Northern Railway, to establish a service between Britain and Canada. They were renamed Royal Edward and Royal George.Under these names they were to become troopships, a role for which their size and speed made them ideal.

Royal Edward as a troopship, 1914

In July-August 1915 the Royal George transported troops from Britain who were intended to reinforce the British 29^th Division at Gallipoli. A brief stop was made at Alexandria before heading north-west up into the Aegean towards the main British staging base at Mudros. Sources vary as to the exact total of men carried but it appears to have been around 1600, of whom some 200 represented crew. By this stage German – and to a lesser extent Austro-Hungarian – submarine presence had been making itself felt in the area. Among these craft was the tiny coastal submarine UB-21.

UB-14 and her crew - tiny but very, very dangerous

Constructed at Bremen in North Germany and a mere 92 feet long and of only 125 tons surface displacement, the UB-21 was a new vessel. She had been transported overland, in sections, by rail from Germany before being reassembled at the Austro-Hungarian base at Pola. Her armament was limited – two 17-inch torpedo tubes and a single machine gun. She had a crew of fourteen and diesel and electric power on a single shaft only. Despite her small size and puny armament she was destined to inflict higher losses on the enemy than many larger and more potent vessels.

UB-14's sister, UB-13, being transported by rail - in sections - from Germany

UB-14's debut was spectacular. Under her first commander, Oberleutnant Heino von Heimburg (1889-1945), she sank the 9800-ton Italian armoured cruiser Amalfi off Venice in July 7^th1915. This was von Heimburg’s second victory, for while previously commanding UB-15 he had sunk the Italian submarine Medusa on June 10^th. Following the Amalfi sinking UB-21 received orders to proceed to Turkey – a passage achieved only with difficulty, and partially under tow by a Austro-Hungarian destroyer, due to her limited range.

UB-14's first victim - the 9800-ton Italian armoured cruiser Amalfi

On August 13^thUB-14 sighted two ships, unescorted, some 60 miles north of Crete. The first proved to be a hospital ship, the Soudan, and, marked as such, von Heimburg allowed her to pass safely. The second was the Royal Edward. It seems that an evacuation drill had taken place on board her only shortly before and a major part of the troops carried were now below and re-stowing their kit, a fact that was to have tragic consequences. At one-mile range UB-14 launched a single torpedo. It struck the troopship close to the stern and she began to settle quickly. Though the radio-operator had time to transmit a distress signal the huge ship went down in six minutes. Many of the troops, trapped below, went down with her but many also found themselves in the water.

Alerted by the radio message, the Soudan came about and spent the next six hours recovering some 440 men. Two French destroyers and some trawlers also arrived and rescued another 221. Despite this the final death toll was still high – some 935 according to some accounts. UB-14 had already departed from the scene and the lack of an escort had almost certainly contributed to her success.

von Heimburg with Blue Max -1917

UB-14’s career was only beginning. Three weeks later, on September 2^nd 1915, still in the Aegean, she torpedoed the 11,900 ton transport Southland, then carrying Australian troops. Though 40 of the 1400 men on board died the remainder got away in lifeboats. The Southland herself was saved from sinking by being beached on a nearby island. Though repaired, her luck was not to last and she was to be torpedoed and sunk in 1917 off the north-west coast of Ireland.

In late 1915 the UB-14made the dangerous passage up the Dardanelles but was forced to put in to port for repairs. Her next victim was not to be by torpedo, but due to a personal exploit by Oberleutnant von Heimburg. On September 4^th a Royal Navy submarine, the E7 had also made the passage but had become entangled in nets below the surface. Turkish craft had dropped several mines around her, but without result. von Heimburg took matters into his own hands. He rowed out to the site with the UB-14’s cook and used a plumb weight to locate the E7. On finding metal and knowing he was directly over the trapped submarine he dropped a further charge. Deciding that the game was up, the E7 surfaced and came under fire from Turkish shore batteries. Her commander ordered “abandon ship” and set scuttling charges, thereby sinking his vessel. von Heimburg somehow survived this maelstrom and was subsequently – and deservedly – awarded the Pour le Mérite, the coveted Blue Max.

HMS E7, similar to E20, also sunk by von Heimburg

UB-14 was to operate thereafter in the Black Sea, where she was to sink two Allied vessels in October 1915, and in the Sea of Marmara, where she sank the British submarine E20 in November. von Heimburg was replaced as commander early in 1916 buttheUB-14’s Black Sea career was to continue to the end of the war. She ended by being scuttled off Sevastopol in early 1919 following Germany’s surrender.

And von Heimburg’s later career? He was to retire from the German Navy as an admiral in 1943, following which – one regrets to record – he became a judge on a Nazi “People’s Court”. He was captured by the Soviets in 1945, taken to Russia, and died in captivity there. It was an ignominious end, in both moral and personal terms, for an undoubtedly brave man.

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If you want to read about the Turkish Navy in an earlier war, click on image below

for more details and "Look Inside" to read the opening:

The Crimean War (1854-56) in which Britain, France, Turkey and Piedmont took on Russia is generally thought of in terms of the operations in the Crimea itself. Most notable of these were the Siege of Sevastopol and battles in its immediate support such as Balaclava, Inkermann and the stormings of the Malakoff Redoubt and the Redan. Operations did however take place in other theatres, most notably the Baltic, Eastern Anatolia and the Russian Pacific Coast (See Blog of March 27th 2015). Prior to the landing of the large Allied invasion force in the Crimea in September 1854 there was however an earlier – and significant – naval action. This was the bombardment of the Russian Black Sea port of Odessa in April 1854. It was carried out by a combined British-French force and though it initially had a superficial quality of “an affair of honour” it was to have powerful strategic implications.

HMS Furious

Though hostilities between Russia and Ottoman Turkey had commenced in 1853 it was not until March 28^th 1854 that Britain and France declared war on Russia and that planning for offensive operations, including landings in Russian territory, commenced. Normal protocol called for safe repatriation of diplomatic and consular staff from all combatant nations. As part of this process the Royal Navy paddle-frigate HMS Furiousarrived at Odessa to bring off the British consul. She anchored outside the harbour with a flag of truce at her mast-head and sent in a boat, also with a flag of truce flying. As the boat left with the consul, both it and Furious were fired upon by a Russian shore-battery, happily without inflicting damage.

HMS Furious - and her boat - under Russian fire despite white flag of truce

Outrage was predictable, felt not least by Admiral Sir James Dundas (1785 –1862), Royal Navy Commander-in-Chief in the Mediterranean since 1852 and a veteran of the Napoleonic Wars. He ensured that a combined Anglo-French squadron was hastily assembled and he addressed a note to Odessa’s Russian governor, General Osten-Sacken, demanding “that all the British, French, and Russian vessels now at anchor near the citadel or the batteries of Odessa be forthwith delivered up to the combined squadron; and that if at sunset no answer or a negative be received, they will be compelled by force to avenge the insult offered, though, for humanity’s sake, they adopt the alternative with regret, and cast the responsibility of the act upon those to whom it belongs.” No satisfactory reply was received and action was now inevitable.

French illustration of bombardment - note main squadron not engaged and in line-ahead offshore
Bombarding force shown directly north of town. "Imperial Mole" jutting out to north.

The British-French squadron arrived off Odessa on April 22^ndand its composition was a clear indication that the Age of Fighting Sail was well past. The numerically largest component was a total of eighteen wooden line-of battle ships, of which twelve were British (including the embarrassingly-named HMS Trafalgar). These were however kept offshore out of shore-battery range – the Russian destruction of the Ottoman Turkish felt at Sinope the previous year had shown just how vulnerable wooden ships were to modern shell-fire. The responsibility for bombardment of Odessa was therefore allocated to smaller, and more maneuverable, vessels, all of which, other than a single British sailing frigate, HMS Arethusa, had steam power as either their primary means of propulsion. The French contributed four steam paddle-frigates, the Descartes, Caton, Mogador and Vauban, and the British five generally similar vessels, Furious, Retribution, Sampson, Terrible and Tiger. The later may be regarded as representative of these vessels – of 1300 tons and 206 feet long she carried fourteen 32-pounder guns along her flanks, plus two 10-inch on deck-mounted pivots. 400-hp engine power drove her twin paddlewheels and these, by their size and location, represented her greatest vulnerability. It is notable that the bombardment force also included six ship's boats armed with 24-pounder rockets, a 19^th-century version of modern missile-craft. Also present was the 21-gun screw-frigate Highflyer, and the 70-gun steam ship Sans Pareil.

The Sans Pareil represented a “last gasp” of the wooden ship-of-the line. She had been laid down in 1845 as an 80-gun “second rate”, a sailing vessel generally similar to the first HMS Sans Pareil, which had been captured from the French a half-century previously. While still on the stocks she was recognised as an anachronism and work on her in this form was suspended in 1848. She was modified thereafter to employ steam propulsion – a 622-hp engine driving a single screw and giving a speed of 7 knots. The steam plant resulted in a reduction of the number of guns to 70, all 32-pounders and her sailing rig was maintained. Of 3,800 tons and 200 feet long, only the presence of her smoke-stack made her look any different to a vessel of the Nelsonic era.

Contemporary depiction of the bombardment - note close range involved.
Note also boat in foreground with launching tube for 24" rocket in the bows

The bombardment commenced at dawn on April 22^ndwith Descartes, Sampson, Tiger and Vauban opening fire on the Russian positions at a range of 2,000 yards. In an echo of an earlier age Vauban was hit by heated shot which started a fire aboard and caused her to drop out of line. Furious, Retribution, Terrible and Mogador then joined the attack, while Arethusa, Highflyer and Sans Pareil stood in reserve further out. Terrible scored the most notable triumph of the bombardment, a hit on a magazine on the Imperial Mole which caused a spectacular explosion. The action continued for ten hours, during which some 24 Russian ships in the port were set on fire and several interned British and French merchantmen took advantage of the confusion to escape. The rocket boats were meanwhile dedicated to initiating conflagrations in the dockyard storehouses. During the afternoon the Arethusa also came inshore to engage shore batteries. By the time the action was broken off at 1730 hrs much of the town and port facilities were on fire. Odessa had been essentially eliminated as an operational Russian base and was to remain so for the rest of the war.

The explosion of the magazine on the Imperial Mole

Some bitter satisfaction – albeit a minor one – was however to be accorded to the Russians. An Allied naval presence was maintained off the port and on May 12^th, during a thick fog, HMS Tiger ran on to rocks five miles south-west of Odessa. Her guns were dropped overboard to lighten her and her boats dropped anchors to allow her to warp herself off, though to no avail. She then came under fire from Russian field artillery that had arrived on the cliffs above. Burning, and with her captain and others severely wounded, there was no option but to strike her colours. Her engines were later recovered by the Russians and installed in the imperial yacht, appropriately names “Tigr.” HMS Tiger’s Captain Giffard, who had lost a leg, died of gangrene three weeks later and was buried at Odessa with full military honours. Four others also died of wounds.

Admiral Dundas

The attack on Odessa is one of the few occasions when a naval bombardment of shore defences proved successful in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries – indeed Nelson himself had warned that “A ship’s a fool to fight a fort”. Boldness alone did not account for the success, and due account must be taken of maneuverability of steam-propelled craft and the protection this gave when they came under fire from shore. Credit is also due to Dundas for his decision to keep his larger – and more vulnerable – ships out of the fray. Otherwise undistinguished as a senior commander, his neutralisation of Odessa was to be critical in allowing the subsequent invasion of the Crimea and the uninterrupted supply of the forces landed there.

If you’re interested in naval adventure in the late 19^thCentury you may enjoy Britannia’s Shark.Click on the image below to learn more, and to read the opening by the “Look Inside” feature.

Wilhelm - looking ludicrous

As eldest grandson of Queen Victoria – at whose death he was present – and as nephew of Britain’s King Edward VIII, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany displayed had a half-respectful, half-resentful, attitude to Britain. He gloried in being an honorary admiral of the Royal Navy (and in wearing the appropriate uniform), he raced his yacht Meteorregularly in the Cowes Regatta and enjoyed private visits during which he dressed as an English country-gentleman. His suspicion and dislike of Britain, which later amounted to a near-mania, only intensified after the Anglo-French Entente Cordiale in April 1904, prior to which there had been some possibility of an Anglo-German Alliance.

Beresford as politician

The Entente was still a month in the future, when Wilhelm visited Gibraltar in March 1904. It was to be seen in retrospect as the climax of the Kaiser’s somewhat one-sided love-affair with Britain. I was reminded of this recently when I read an account of it by Admiral Lord Charles Beresford, then in command of the Royal Navy’s Channel fleet. The name of this fleet was somewhat of a misnomer as its area of operations was essentially the North Atlantic. Beresford had transferred his flag from HMS Majesticto her sister pre-dreadnought HMS Caesar, on February 2nd 1904 and the Kaiser was to arrive in Gibraltar the following month.

Beresford, whose very public feud with Admiral John Fisher was to cause controversy in subsequent years, was the ideal man to manage an occasion of this sort. He had at one stage been a crony of the then Prince of Wales – later Edward VII – before a falling out with him over a shared mistress and he had conducted an active political career as a member of parliament in parallel with his career as a naval officer.

SS Koenig Albert - destined to end her days as Italian war-booty

SMS Friedrich Karl

The Kaiser arrived in Gibraltar in March 1904 on board the 10483-ton German liner, Koenig Albert, escorted by the armoured cruiser SMS Friedrich Karl. As a mark of respect for his honorary rank of a British Admiral his flag was hoisted on HMS Caesar.

HMS Caesar - destined to fly the Kaisers flag as an honorary Royal Navy Admiral

The account of what happened thereafter is best told in Beresford’s own words:

“On the 20th, his Majesty honouring me with his presence at dinner in the Caesar, the boats of the Fleet were lined on either side of-the passage between the Koenig Albert and the Caesar; and when the Emperor proceeded between the lines, every boat burned a blue light, all oars were tossed, blades fore and aft, in perfect silence, the midshipmen conveying their orders by signs.”

An earlier "arch of fire" -
during Edward VII's visit in 1903

After dinner Beresford proposed the Kaiser’s health and when “I stood up, glass in hand, as I said the words “Emperor of Germany," a rocket went up from the deck above, and at the signal every ship in the Fleet fired a Royal Salute. As the Emperor was leaving that night, the German flag and the Union Jack were hoisted on the Rock, half the searchlights of the Fleet being turned on the one flag, and half on the other. Precisely as the Koenig Albert passed between the ends of the breakwaters, two stands of a thousand rockets, each stand placed upon the end of a breakwater, were ignited, and rushing upwards, met in a triumphal arch of fire high over the mastheads of the Emperor's ship.”

Wilhelm did not realise it, but this marked the end of the affair. The following month Britain linked its destiny – fatefully – with France in the Entente Cordiale and the slide commenced towards war a decade later. He was to visit Gibraltar one time, only a year later, but on this occasion there was to be no rockets, no searchlights, no triumphal arch of fire.

It followed from Wilhelm’s visit to Tangier, Morocco, in March 1905 when declared he had come to support the sovereignty of the Sultan —a statement which amounted to a provocative challenge to French influence in Morocco. The result was a serious international crisis that nearly led to war between Germany on the one side, Britain and France on the other. It was finally resolved peacefully, but it set the scene for further confrontations.

En route home from Morocco Wilhelm stopped at Gibraltar. He met a very frosty reception which he summed up in his memoirs: “The first I learned about the consequences of my Tangier visit was when I got to Gibraltar and was formally and frigidly received by the English, in marked contrast to my cordial reception the year before.”

1914 was nine years away, and the clock had started clicking.

Thursday June 18^th2015 was the 200^th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo and to mark it I asked my friend and fellow-novelist Tom Williams to write a guest blog about it. In it he puts the Waterloo Campaign into a perspective not often emphasised – that it was not a seamless continuation of the Peninsular War but the climax of a surprise-crisis that caught Britain unawares and demanded rapid ad-hoc measures to cope with it. These Tom explains well and he also draws some very disturbing lessons for us today as we see Britain – and Europe – sliding towards virtual demilitarisation, despite external threats.

Tom Williams

Tom Williams’s military fiction had a rather remarkable origin – enthusiasm for Tango dancing has taken him on several trips to Buenos Aires, which has left him with a love of Argentina. His book about the British invasion of 1806 and the role of the real-life spy, James Burke, was based on his own experiences exploring Buenos Aires, riding with gauchos on the pampas and trying (and failing) to cross the snow-covered Andes on a horse. “Burke in the Land of Silver” was followed by books about Burke's fictional adventures in Egypt (“Burke and the Bedouin”) and in Belgium (“Burke at Waterloo”). Tom also writes rather more serious stories about Victorian colonialism – a visit to Borneo spawned a book about James Brooke (“The White Rajah”). There's a book set in India too (“Cawnpore”), although that's the only one of his settings that Tom hasn't visited. “Never mind”, he says,” there's always next year”

So over to Tom himself:

Waterloo 200 years on – and its lessons for today

This month marks the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. Do the events of 1815 have any lessons for us today? Quite possibly, they do.

Although, with the benefit of hindsight, we all know that Napoleon was finally defeated at Waterloo, the generals and politicians of the time had celebrated his fall with the capture of Paris in 1814. The Corsican Corporal's exile to Elba marked the end of the Napoleonic Wars as clearly as the fall of the Berlin Wall marked the end of the Cold War.

Off to Elba, 1814 - classic contemporary cartoon by Gillray

As with the end of the Cold War, the British were quick to cash in the peace dividend. The country had been at war more or less continuously for 21 years since France declared what would become known as the War of the First Coalition on 1 February 1793. At the height of the Napoleonic wars the British had over 200,000 British men under arms (supplemented with a further 50,000 foreign and colonial troops). The cost of the war had been horrific. The direct economic cost to Great Britain is usually put at £831 million (a figure quoted by no less a body than the Royal Statistical Society in 1915). In 21st-century value terms the sum would, of course, be massively greater. The cost led to an increase in the national debt to £679 million, more than double the country's GDP. Such an enormous amount of money meant significant disruption to the economy of the whole country. The number of young men taken away from the land in order to fight impacted on agricultural production and the significantly increased taxation also hit the economy. In 1814, the British Treasury issued perpetual bonds (now known as consols) to consolidate some of the outstanding debt. Some of these bonds have still not been paid off and form part of 2015's National Debt.

Little wonder that, as soon as Napoleon was apparently safely ensconced on Elba, the government took immediate steps to reduce military expenditure. Most obviously, troops were demobilised. Other economies included such things as abandoning the line of semaphore towers that connected London to the Channel ports.

The folly of these economies was obvious as soon as Napoleon returned to France and the semaphore towers were rushed back into service. More critically, Wellington desperately needed troops, but there were few troops to be had. Many of those that were available were new recruits with no experience of battle. More experienced men had either been discharged or sent to America to reinforce troops fighting a completely separate war over there (the war in which the British famously burned down the White House).

Closing the gates at Hougoumont by Robert Gibb
(with acknowledgement to the National Gallery of Scotland)

Just as nowadays we are assured that in times of war the Regular Army can be efficiently and effectively supplemented with troops from the Territorial Army, so, in 1815, there was a militia that could be called up to serve "in time of war or insurrection". But though Bonaparte was back in Paris, was Britain at war? Legally, it was not, and so the government dithered, refusing to call up the militia until the last moment. When militia troops did arrive, it was so late that many of them went into battle wearing their militia uniforms rather than those of the regiments with which they were now serving. Although paintings made after the event all show Hougoumont defended by Guardsmen in their scarlet, many of the defenders had not yet been issued with Guards tunics.

Wellington asked that he should have 40,000 British infantry and 15,000 cavalry to be sent to Belgium. All he got was around 30,000 British soldiers of all arms, only 7,000 of them veterans.

Wellington was particularly angry that his Staff officers had been dispersed and he was unable to rely on the coterie of veterans who had surrounded him during the Peninsular War. Wellington was a great believer in what would nowadays be called cronyism. He ran the army with a group of men he had grown up with and felt comfortable alongside. Now they were scattered – dead, serving in North America, or otherwise unavailable for active service. Instead, Wellington found himself surrounded with increasing numbers of well-connected young men who sought service on his Staff as a good career move. He wrote, "I am overloaded with people I have never seen before; and it appears to be purposely intended to keep those out of my way whom I wish to have." He ordered back to his side any of the men that he thought that he could trust, even those he had some personal antipathy to. Men who thought they had seen the last of military life found themselves once again under the Colours. The irascible Picton was recalled so unexpectedly that he famously arrived with no uniform at all and rode into battle (and to his death) in civilian clothes.

Unsurprisingly, Wellington was unimpressed with the force available to him: "I have got an infamous army, very weak and ill-equipped, and a very inexperienced staff."

The meeting of Wellington and the Prussian Commander, Bluecher by Daniel Maclise
(National Army Museum and Parliamentary copyright with all rights reserved)

In the end, of course, Wellington won. But it was hardly the great British victory it is painted as. Forty per cent of the troops in the army Wellington commanded were German-speaking and, of course, it was the arrival of Blucher's Prussians that finally saved the day. Earlier in the afternoon there had been panic in Brussels, as the civilian population was convinced that the Allies had lost. It was, indeed, as Wellington is regularly misquoted as saying, "A damn close run thing". A British army, ill-prepared and outgunned, pulled through because, in the end, but fighting men stood their ground, dying by the thousand, sacrificed to what we would now call defence cuts and Whitehall bungling.

The lesson of Waterloo is that you never know where and when you might have to fight. The militia was mobilised too late and, though they appear to have fought bravely, Wellington was always concerned that their lack of experience could all too easily have resulted in them breaking under fire. Two hundred years later we do not have the stomach to see British soldiers die in those numbers but we do not appear to be taking the steps that are needed to ensure that we do not put an “infamous army” into the field again.

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And here’s some information on Tom’s novel “Burke at Waterloo". Click here for more:

Napoleon is in exile on Elba, but Bonapartists in Paris are plotting for his return. James Burke, British spy, is sent to infiltrate their ranks. He foils attempts to assassinate the Duke of Wellington and the French king, but the Bonapartist mastermind escapes. Burke pursues him from the cafes of Paris to the ballrooms of Brussels, a chase that ends in a final showdown on the field of Waterloo. Burke at Waterloo is a spy thriller set against a carefully researched historical background with Wellington's famous victory seen from an unusual perspective.

Two spectacular cases of submarines penetrating enemy anchorages are well known to naval-history enthusiasts. The first was when the Royal Navy’s E14, commanded by Lieutenant Commander Edward Boyle VC, surfaced in the Golden Horn, in the heart of Istanbul, in May 1915. This followed penetration of the heavily-mined Dardanelles, and was part of a successful campaign against Turkish shipping. The second instance was when Germany’s U-47, commanded by Kapitänleutnant Gunter Prien, found her way through the defences of the Royal Navy’s protected anchorage at Scapa Flow in 1939 and sank the battleship Royal Oak at anchor there.

Boyle's E14

A third equally daring action is this type deserves to be better known and though it ended in tragedy it involved courage and skill of a very high order. It was also to be the prelude to an amazing – and unlikely – second career for the submarine involved. The story also links two decent and heroic men who, in other circumstances, might well have valued each other as friends.

The submarine was a combat-unproven weapon at the outbreak of war in 1914, but several major navies, including that of France as well of those of Britain, Germany and the United States, had invested heavily in such vessels in the previous decade. Extensive testing and evaluation of operational procedures had been undertaken and a number of second-rank navies were rapidly following suit. Alternative design approaches were still being investigated and French development followed a somewhat different track than other navies. This was epitomised by the large number – 34 in total – of generally similar Brumaire-class and Pluviôse-class boats designed by Maxime Laubeuf. Though all had electrical underwater-propulsion, several of the earlier-constructed units were powered on the surface by steam – which slowed diving and proved impractical operationally. (The French experience was not taken to heart by the Royal Navy, which later committed heavily to its own disastrous K-class). Later Brumaire/ Pluviôse boats had diesel power for surface running.

The steam-driven Vendemiaire of the Pluivose class

These craft were 167 to 171 feet long and had a surface displacement of 398 tons and in their time were innovative as being of double hull construction. This involved a generally cylindrical inner hull, strong enough to resist external pressure, but with an outer, boat-shaped hull to improve surface seakeeping. Innovative when new, these features became standard thereafter in most other navies . To modern eyes however the Brumaire and Pluviôse classes had a strange appearance, unlike those of other navies of the time, whose vessels looked generally similar to those we see today. The Laubeuf boats had no coning tower (or in modern parlance “sail”) as such, only a small, low open bridge for steering on the surface. Extending fore and aft of this platform was a walkway supported on stanchions. In the open space below this were four “Drzewiecki” drop-collars which each carried an 18-inch torpedo at the start of a cruise, with two reloads carried in cradles beneath the walkway. These six torpedoes were therefore carried externally and these, plus the walkway, can only have added significantly to parasitic drag. There was in addition a single 18” torpedo tube in the bow, into which a reload could be inserted from within without the need to surface – as was impossible with the drop-collars. Carrying eight torpedoes, these boats has a very powerful offensive capability

Montgolfier, Brumaire-Class submarine, sister of Curie, seen at anchor on the Seine in Paris (!!)

The Curie, launched in 1912, belonged to the Brumaire-class, with diesel power for surface running. In August 1914, when France and Britain went to war with the Central Powers – Germany and Austro-Hungary – Curie was assigned to supporting the French Navy’s attempt to close off the Otranto Straits between Southern Italy and Greece. By so doing they would bottle-up the efficient and locally powerful Austro-Hungarian navy within the Adriatic. (Click here for a separate article about this). Blockade was however a slow process and more daring spirits considered the possibility of infiltrating a submarine into the main Austro-Hungarian naval base at Pola, close to the head of the Adriatic, so as to sink major units moored there.

Some of Curie's crew - note the tiny steering plafform

Gabriel O'Byrne

Curie was chosen for the mission, probably not least because of the competence and obvious flair of her commander, who had apparently conceived the idea of such an attack. Born in 1882, Lieutenant 1^stClass Gabriel O’Byrne was, despite his name, French, a descendent of one of the Irish “Wild Geese” who entered French service during the 18^th Century when Penal Laws in Ireland barred Catholics from any significant Civil or Military service. Entering the Navy in 1896, O’Byrne was to see service in China during the Boxer Rising in 1900 and was later to specialise in submarines, taking command of the Curie shortly after her commissioning.

On December 17^th 1914 the Curie was towed half-way up the Adriatic by the armoured cruiser Jules-Michelet. It should be noted that at this time Italy was still neutral and operation from an Italian base nearer to Pola was not an option. The Curie, with a complement of 29 and her mascot dog (possibly called, most appropriately, “Radium”), was cast off 150 miles from Pola. She spent the following day approaching the Austro-Hungarian base, making most of the passage on the surface. She submerged closer to shore, passing unwittingly but safely through a defensive minefield. December 19^th was sent probing the harbour’s approaches and defences – which were complex, as can be seen from the contemporary illustration below. Still undetected, O’Byrne resolved to make his entrance, submerged, on December 20^th.

Curie's penetration of the Pola base

Maintaining a depth of some 60 feet, Curie reached the harbour’s outer boom around midday. Scraping of short duration was heard as she passed what appeared to the mooring cables of the outer boom. O’Byrne now took her up to periscope depth and saw, too late, the buoys of a second boom directly ahead. The Curie was almost instantly caught in steel netting. Ballast tanks were vented in desperate attempted to sink free and the crew were set to race back and forth to alter trim while the motors raced to drag the craft clear. It was to no avail. The propellers themselves became entangled and soon the over-heated electric motors were threatened to burn out. These efforts continued for four hours and the air became increasingly so foul that the dog died of asphyxiation and the crew were in little better shape. The last attempt to break free pitched the craft 30 degrees bow-down. This caused sea-water to reach the battery terminals, thereby releasing poisonous chlorine gas.

Curie under fire - French contemporary postcard. The flag is probably an artist's invention!

The situation was now hopeless. O’Byrne destroyed his secret documents and ordered surfacing, knowing from the sounds of nearby propellers that there were enemy vessel almost directly overhead. As the Curie broke surface these vessels opened fire on her, as did a nearby shore battery. One shell penetrated the steering position, another the pressure hull. O’Byrne now ordered “Abandon ship!” and opened all vents to scuttle the craft. He himself was wounded – in the lungs – and his second-in-command, Lieutenant Pierre Chailley, had been killed outright. The coxswain had been wounded badly enough to die in hospital shortly after. O’Byrne had to be dissuaded from going down with his command. He found himself in the icy water with his men for the next hour until they were rescued by boats from one of the Curie’s intended targets, the dreadnought Viribus Unitis. All the prisoners were treated with dignity – indeed admiration – and in view of the gravity of his injuries O’Byrne was sent to a hospital in Graz in Austria. Here, in June 1915, the Austro-Hungarian authorities allowed his wife to come from France to care for him. Here we’ll leave O’Byrne for now, but we’ll return to him later.

Under new management: Curie reborn as U-14. Note the heightened surface steering platform.

George von Trapp

Austro-Hungarians efforts to raise the Curie began immediately and she broke surface in early February 1915. It was ascertained that she could be made serviceable. She was given what amounted to a raised coning tower – essential for long-term surface seakeeping – as well as more powerful electric motors, a new battery and an 88mm gun for surface attacks. She was given extra fuel-tanks, which increased her radius of operation on the surface significantly and in June 1915 she was commissioned as U-14 of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. She was to see no success under her first commander, who fell ill, but in October her new captain was to be Linienschiffsleutnant Georg Ritter von Trapp. This officer had already scored signal successes with his previous boat, U-5, and he was to prove himself the most successful Austro-Hungarian submarine ace of the war. His later career saw him as the patriarch of the von Trapp family singers – as per “The Sound of Music” and he was to be played in the movie version by Christopher Plummer. By the end of the war von Trapp had completed nineteen war patrols, sinking over 45,000 tons of merchant shipping, plus the French armoured cruiser Leon Gambettaand the French submarine Nereide. Among his victims was the Italian bulk-carrier SS Milazzo of 11500 tons and at the time the largest merchant ship afloat. This officer’s very varied career will be the subject of a later blog. At the end of the war the U-14 was recovered by France and served in the French Navy until scrapped in 1929.

And what of O’Byrne? Though well treated in Austria, his health did not improve and he was repatriated to France, via Switzerland and the Red Cross, in 1917, dying shortly afterwards. He left his wife and two children. Rightly recognised as a hero, he was decorated as a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur and received the Croix de Guerre. A recognition that he might have valued even more was that the lead-vessel of a three-boat class of submarine was to be named after him. Launched in 1919, the O’Byrne was to serve in the French Navy until 1935. A similar honour was deservedly accorded to the Curie’ssecond in command, Pierre Chailley, killed during the Pola attack, the second boat of the class being named after him and serving until 1936.

Henry Foournier, third boat of the O'Byrne class, 1921

Chivalrous by nature, and lacking employment when the breakup of the Empire cost both Austria and Hungary their coastlines, and with them their need for a navy, von Trapp fell on hard times in the aftermath of the Great War. His private life and a new career thereafter was to prove not-unwelcome surprises however. A decent man, and unwilling to compromise his principles, he was forced to flee his native country after the Nazi take-over and was to die in the United States in 1947.

As I pieced together this story I was struck by the pronounced similarity of both O’Byrne and von Trapp. Brave, resourceful and dedicated, and from very similar social and religious backgrounds, they both remained men of integrity. It’s easy to imagine them as friends in different circumstances. I found myself reminded of Thomas Hardy’s lines in his poem “The Man He Killed”:

Had he and I but met,

By some old ancient inn,

We should have sat us down to wet

Right many a nipperkin!

And later:

Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow down
You'd treat if met where any bar is,
Or help to half-a-crown

Readers of my novel Britannia’s Shark may remember Commander Nicholas Dawlish RN having a brief encounter with von Trapp’s father August, also a naval officer, in April 1881. “The tight-lipped Fregattenkapitän” had led an enquiry on behalf of the Austro-Hungarian Navy into an incident in which Dawlish had little pride. If you’d like to know more then click on the image to the left - you can "look inside" to read the opening!

From 1833 to 1940 the Kingdom of the Netherlands experienced one of the longest periods in which any Western European nation did not go to war. A separate army was maintained in the Dutch East Indies (today Indonesia) but the home army saw no service against a foreign enemy for over a century. There was however one incident in this period in which serious bloodshed occurred in the streets of Amsterdam, leaving many dead, as the army was called in to subdue rioting. The trigger for these tragic events was a ludicrous one.

The Netherlands in the late nineteenth century was generally prosperous, but as with so many other countries in Europe serious pockets of poverty and deprivation remained in large cities and towns. Though a democracy by the standards of the time, the Netherlands’ political structures did not yet reflect the concerns – and resentments – of a major part of the population. One outlet – a safety valve in fact – for such tensions consisted of customs and celebrations during which the impoverished felt liberated, even if only for a day. Crude, and often descending into drunkenness and violence as they often did, any attempt by the authorities to restrict such celebrations aroused bitter anger.

"Kermis on the Haarlemer Plein, Amsterdam " by George Hendrik Breitner (1857-1923)
With acknowledgement to the Amsterdam Museum

One such occasion was in 1876 when the Burgermeester – Mayor – of Amsterdam announced that the annual September Carnival “Kermis”) would be forbidden. Reasoning that more wealthy citizens could afford a carnival all year round, and they only for one day a year, large numbers of poor took to the streets. The violent rioting that followed lasted four days and was only put down when army units were brought in to support the police. In what was seen to be an over-reaction by the authorities, which stoked rather than supressed the violence, it is surprising that only one person was killed, though dozens were injured.

Palingtrekken, as illustrated in a French magazine

The need for a measured response, rather than over-reaction, seems to have been lost on the authorities however and far more serious civil unrest occurred a decade later in 1886. Large public gathering were always viewed with suspicion but on this occasion – quite ironically – a humane impulse also played a role in banning a popular event. Comparable to bear-baiting or dog-fighting elsewhere “palingtrekken” – “eel pulling” – was a cruel but much-enjoyed sport among the poor. A rope was stretched across a canal and a live ell was suspended from the centre. Contestants passed underneath in an open boat and attempted to drag the wretched creature free. Slippery, and thrashing blindly, the eel was difficult to pull down and the contestant often fell in the water, much to the merriment of the onlookers. By 1886 many regarded this sport as cruel and inhumane and in July 1886 an annual contest of this sort, due to take place at Amsterdam’s Lindengracht (a “gracht” is a canal in town), was banned by the authorities.

Street fighting in the Jordaan 26th July 1886
(note stones and shutters thrown from above)

The organisers were determined to go on regardless and on 25^thJuly 1886, a Sunday, a large crowd gathered to watch. The police moved in to disperse it and were immediately resisted. By evening, after a full-scale riot, order appeared to have been restored. Violence erupted again the following day however, and now the residents of the poverty-stricken Jordaan quarter joined in, ripping up paving stones and building barricades. The police moved in and were met with heavy objects thrown down from the roofs above. The violence now escalated to a level at which it was regarded essential to bring in the army. Permission was given to use live ammunition and the barricades were cleared one by one.

The fighting lasted only a single day, but during it 26 people were killed and many more wounded. In the aftermath some saw the events as part of a Socialist plot but the public prosecutor, after investigation, rejected this. The events had been spontaneous and reflected a deep social malaise. The Eel Riot left bitter memories, particularly in the Jordaan. A half-century later, in 1934, rioting by unemployed was to trigger further chaos there, on this occasion with five dead and 56 seriously wounded.

Largely forgotten today, the Eel Riot had been triggered by a noble impulse. Only a sense of proportion was lacking.

The Lindengracht, seen here before being filled-in in 1896

Though major fleet actions such as Camperdown, The Nile and Trafalgar seem to most as emblematic of the Great Age of Fighting Sail. Such engagements were, by their very nature, few in number. Far more common – and in many cases even more savage – were the “single ship actions” in which one warship met another on the open sea, when each captain and his crew were determined to hazard all, and when retreat was seldom, if ever, an option. The most dramatic of all such actions were those which matched one frigate against another – these vessels not only being heavily armed for their size and highly manoeuvrable, but commanded by energetic young captains hungry for promotion and prize money.

End of the Blanche vs. Pique action - both ships in states not unusual after such combats
Painting by John Thomas Baines with Acknowledgement to National Maritime Museum, Greeenwich

Weight of armament alone was not necessarily a deciding factor. Far more important were a captain’s ability to manoeuvre his ship into a position from which he could inflict the most serious damage on his adversary. This meant “raking” – shooting down the axis of the enemy vessel, either from ahead or, even more lethally, from astern. Sailing vessels had no substantial transverse bulkheads and cannon-fire of this type could rip along an entire gun-deck, scything down all in its path. Allied to this factor was speed and accuracy in gunnery, not just as regards opening broadsides but in ability to maintain steady fire, if necessary for hours on end.

Should each of the contestants be unable to inflict a knock-out blow by gunnery alone – which was often the case when damage to masts, spars and sails impaired ability to manoeuvre – one last tactic remained. This was to board, to draw close enough to the enemy to launch much of the ship’s company across and to attempt to subdue the other crew with close-range small-arms fire and in furious hand-to-hand fighting. In such a desperate case the advantage lay with the crew that had trained and trained and trained again and which had been welded into a single proud unit with high morale. And the single most important factor of all - a bloody-minded determination to prevail.

All these features were present in one of the most furious single-ship actions of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. This occurred on the night of 4^th-5^thJanuary 1795 when the Royal Navy frigate HMS Blanche engaged a French counterpart, the Pique, off Guadeloupe in the West Indies. The Blanche, a 32-gun, 12-pounder frigate commanded by Captain Robert Faulknor had been cruising on the West Indian station for several months – exports from French “sugar islands” such as Guadeloupe were critical for the French war-economy and the Royal Navy was committed to doing everything possible to disrupt such trade. Faulknor was aggressive and on the penultimate day of 1794 his crew managed to “cut out” a French schooner from under the guns of a small fort on the island of small island of Desirade , just east of Guadeloupe. Such “cutting out” was essentially a commando operation, a surprise attack with ship’s boats aimed at hijacking the enemy vessel. Such attacks demanded high levels of skill, confidence and morale and Blanche’ssuccess on December 30^th proved that there was no shortcoming in these qualities.

French frigate Incorruptible (1795) - Pique would have looked generally similar

Faulknor now took Blanche to stand off the harbour of Pointe-a-Pitre, Guadeloupe, where she was joined by another frigate HMS Quebec (a successor to the vessel of the same name that was involved in a ferocious action in 1779 – see reference at end of this article). Within Pointe-a-Pitre lay a French frigate, the Pique, commanded by a Captain Conseil. He resisted the urge to come out while two British frigates waited for him offshore and he remained under the protection of the harbour’s shore batteries. Only after the Quebec departed on 2^ndJanuary did he emerge, but for the next two days he cruised back and forth under the shelter of the shore guns until he could be sure that the Quebec was not lurking close by.

The Blanche was still on station however, and not inactive. At midday on the 4^th she captured an American schooner bringing a cargo of wine and brandy from Bordeaux – a valuable prize that Faulknor sent away with a prize crew. Still concerned that the Quebecmight be nearby, Conseil made no move to recapture the prize. By midnight however, when the Quebec had not reappeared, Conseil finally decided to take his ship out to engage the Blanche. The night was a bright one but it is unclear why he decided to trigger what must be an engagement in semi-darkness.

As she advanced the Pique lay to windward of the Blanche –the most advantageous situation as regards freedom of manoeuvre. They passed on opposite tacks and each fired an ineffective broadside. The Blanche then went about and was now sailing parallel to the Pique and gradually overhauling her. Conseil let her come up till she was within musket-shot of his starboard quarter, then threw his helm his helm over, with the intention of crossing Blanche’s bows and raking her as he did - a measure which, if successful, might have decided the action. Faulknor recognised the danger and the Blanche bore away also. This brought both vessels before the wind, at close range, broadside to broadside.

Victorian era illustration: Blanche (L) bears away from Pique's attempt to cross her bows

The artillery duel now began in earnest and for the next hour and a quarter they thundered broadsides at each other, to no obvious detriment of either. The Blanchewas however the faster sailer of the two and she slowly drew ahead. By 0230 she had passed the Pique and it was now Faulknor’s opportunity to rake. The helm was thrown across to lay the Blanchebroadside across the Pique’sadvancing bows. The damage that Blanche had sustained in the gunnery duel had perhaps been underestimated and as the helm answered the strain on masts and rigging proved too much. The main and mizzen both fell, the only stroke of luck being that they collapsed over the starboard side so that the guns to port still bore on the Pique’sbows. With range now point-blank, Blanchenow poured fire into an enemy which could bring no fire to bear in return.

Death of Captain Faulknor

The next – and most remarkable phase of the action now commenced. The injured Blanche might have drifted free had the Pique’s bowsprit not run over her port quarter. It tangled in the wreckage there and both ships were now locked together. The French attempted to board, but made the cardinal mistake in such circumstances, that of not devoting sufficient numbers to the assault. As they were driven back by the Blanche’s crew Faulknor realised that boarding now might represent his own best option. Making a virtue of necessity, and intent on holding the vessels locked together, Faulknor ordered that the Pique’s bowsprit to be lashed to the quarter-deck capstan. While this was happening he fell dead with a shot through the heart, command now devolving to his deputy, a Lieutenant Watkins.

A few of the Blanche's 12- pounders on the main deck could still be trained upon the Pique'sbows but most of the firing was now confined to the small-arms men aloft and on deck, and to carronades, and swivels on the two ships' forecastles. Pique was now taking serious punishment and at 0300 her fore and mizzen-mast went overboard. The force involved broke the lashings holding the ships together so that Piqueimmediately dropped astern, with Blanchedead ahead. The breeze was light but a sudden stronger puff on Pique’s main top ail drove her into the Blanche again, her bowsprit running over the British ship’s starboard quarter. Despite a hail of small-arms fire from the Pique's forecastle, the Blanche’s crew managed to secure the Frenchman's bowsprit to the stump of the fallen mainmast. The Pique's crew made several attempts to sever the link but were driven back by the Blanche’smarines. was too much for them. Locked fast together, Blanche leading, Pique dragging astern, both ships now drifted uncontrollably ahead of the wind. It should be borne in mind that by now the close-quarters action had been in progress for some three hours.

Lieutenant Watkins now ordered the measure that would break the deadlock. He ordered one of the 12-pounder main deck guns to be run aft to where the carpenter and his crew were trying to cut two ports in the stern through which it could fire. (The coolness of these men going about their business in the heat of the action borders on the unbelievable). The beams across the transom were however rock-hard and all efforts to cut them were defeated. The necessary ports were therefore provided by the simple method of firing the 12-pounder into the stern frames. The wood took fire, as had been expected, but men had been standing by with buckets of water to quench it. Another 12-pounder was manhandled aft and these two weapons now brought a devastating fire to bear through the improvised ports on to the Pique. The result was that her remaining mast was brought down, falling aft so as to put out of action the quarter-deck guns. These had been run inboard and pointed forward so as to be the only heavy weapons that could be brought to bear on the Blanche.

Victory at last: HMS Blanche towing the vanquished Pique
Painting by James Jenkins, engraved by Thomas Sutherland

The French was now defenceless, except for their small arms but they still resisted. Only at 0515 – after five hours of ferocious action, and by which time Captain Conseil and many of his officers were dead, did she strike her colours. Both ships were floating wrecks – their boats were so badly damaged that the young Lieutenant David Milne who crossed to the Piqueto take possession had to do so along the cable still linking the vessels.

As so often with such actions one is surprised by the disparity of casualties. Of Blanche’s198 men only 8 were killed, including Captain Faulknor, and 21 wounded. The Pique had had the worse of the canoneering and from a crew variously reported as between 60 and 360, she lost 76 killed, including Captain Conseil, and about 110 wounded.

Looking at this action from over two centuries later, one is struck by the sheer horror of the duration of the close-quarters fighting. When portrayed in a movie such an action is depicted in five or ten minutes of screen time, if in a book then at outside in a dozen pages. The fact that men – on both sides – endured and remained defiant for over five hours is a commentary on the sheer bloody-mindedness accepted as routine in the navies of the era.

A sad end - the wreck of HMS Blanche

And as for both ships’ subsequent careers? Like all wooden ships of the time they were suited to fast and comprehensive repair. Blanchecontinued to serve in the Royal Navy until she was wrecked off the Dutch coast in 1799. Pique was taken into British service under the command of David Milne (1763-1845), who had boarded her to take the surrender. Her luck ran out in 1798 when she was wrecked in an action off the French coast. The loss did Milne’s career no harm – he was to be second in command to Lord Exmouth (Edward Pellew) at the bombardment of Algiers in 1816 and he was to end as a Vice-Admiral. His naval career spanned 60 years, from the great Age of Fighting Sail to the early years of the new Age of Steam.

And here are two more notable frigate actions:

Click here: The Most Ferocious Frigate Action Ever? HMS Quebec vs Surveillante, 1779.

Click here: HMS Indefatigable vs. Droits de l’Homme, 1797.

If anyone is challenged today to draw a simple picture of a ship, there is probably a more than a 99% likelihood that they’ll draw a long hull, a smaller superstructure above it, one or more funnels and the assumption that it is driven through the water by a screw propeller. This is our modern paradigm of “a ship”. Were the same request made in the 1830s however the answer would be very different, with a large paddle-wheel half-way along the side, and the implication that it would be matched by another on the far side. The earliest steam ships were driven by all driven by paddles and the screw propeller, which we take for granted today, had not yet arrived.

The P&O paddle-steamer William Facwett - a typical vessel of the 1830s

So how did the propeller – insignificant in size by comparison with the more dramatic paddle-wheel – achieve its prominence and drive its competitor from the worlds’ oceans? The surprising answer goes back to the Third Century BC and the great scientist and mathematician Archimedes (287 BC – 212 BC). Any of us who have studied physics, even at the high-school level, will be familiar with the principle named after him, the recognition that a body immersed in a fluid experiences a buoyant force equal to the weight of the fluid it displaces. There was much more to Archimedes than that – including mathematics that prefigured Newton’s and Leibnitz’s invention of Calculus almost eighteen centuries later – and he gave his name to one of the most complex technical creations of ancient times, the Archimedes screw.

This device was a long helical spiral set either in a tube, or in an open trough, and when rotated could lift water from a lower level to a high. Sophisticated versions, some very large, are in use today. (It’s worth looking at “Archimedes Screw” on Google images). In the past, when the power to them was limited to windmills or by animal or human labour, their capacity was limited though they did find their uses in irrigation, or land reclamation or mine drainage. The advent of steam power from the 18^th Century onwards allowed them to shift significantly larger quantities which, when discharged, could generate powerful axial forces. The potential existed therefore for their use for propulsive as well as drainage purposes.

"The Death of Archimedes" by Thomas Degeorge (1786-1854)

Before jumping on in more detail to the Age of Steam it is sad to record what became of Archimedes. His native city of Syracuse, in Sicily, was besieged by the Romans and he was instrumental in developing machines for its defence. When the city fell orders were given to capture him alive as his expertise was so highly valued – prefiguring the American efforts to capture of Nazi rocket-engineers in 1945 – but a Roman soldier who had either not heard or not heeded the order burst in on Archimedes. He found him engrossed in geometric studies and was greeted with the request "Do not disturb my circles!" Archimedes was butchered anyway.

Steam power was first applied successfully and profitable, by Robert Fulton, in 1807. Propulsion was by paddle-wheels, a logical development from the water-wheels that powered so much industry of the time. Used on calm water, as Fulton’s craft demonstrated on the Hudson River, paddles were very efficient and for the next two and a half-decades they became the standard method of steam-ship propulsion.

1909 replica of Fulton's successful "Clermont"

Effective as they might be on rivers and lakes, paddles were however less effective on the open sea, especially when the vessel was rolling so that one wheel was exposed while the other dug deep, thus placing a heavy and rapidly varying load on the engine. The potential for paddle-steamers as warships was also limited since in any ship-to-ship or shore-to-ship action involving heavy guns the large-diameter paddles would represent large and vulnerable targets. For all these reasons the search was on for a propulsive system that could be accommodated below the waterline, and therefore less subject to sea-conditions and less vulnerable to enemy fire.

Thoughts now turned to screw propulsion and the 1830s many patents for such were taken out, few reaching the testing stage and fewer still offering promise. Efforts focussed on modifying the Archimedes screw for marine use were however promising. One such attempt is sketched in a patent granted to Francis Pettit Smith (1808 –1874) in 1836, as shown below.

Testing was to prove that two or more complete turns of the spiral were not required and the modified version had a single turn, as shown on the right. These tests, conducted on a small craft, were successful enough for Smith to convince investors, and the prestigious Rennie engineering firm, to establish a new company named the Ship Propeller Company. This new venture committed to construction of a 237-ton, 125-feet long vessel of 22.5 -feet beam. Her lines – essentially those of a schooner – were selected for minimum water-resistance and her slender, raking funnel and masts (she carried sail as well as steam power) gave her an elegant appearance. Installed power was nominally 80-horsepower though in practice this proved to be closer to 60.

The name chosen was, most appropriately, Archimedes.

Look, No Paddle Wheels! The Archimedes under steam power

Initial trials in 1839 were impressive – a speed of 10 knots was achieved on her first open-sea passage from London to Portsmouth. There she was tested, again satisfactorily, against comparable Royal Navy ships, all paddlers. Disaster struck on the return voyage – a boiler exploded, causing casualties, – but the accident had nothing to do with the screw propulsion and Archimedeswas soon available for further trails. These included evaluation against the Royal Navy's fast Dover-Calais mail-packets, the fastest of which, and closest to Archimedesin size and power was HMS Widgeon. The latter proved slightly faster in smooth seas – which obviously favoured the paddles’ deep bite, but it was concluded that, as regards power-to-weight ratio, the screw propeller had proven "equal, if not superior, to that of the ordinary paddle-wheel." The scene was set for the Royal Navy’s own first venture into screw propulsion – but we’ll leave that for a later article.

Archimedes carried sails as well as steam power- an essential
back up when engine reliability could not be counted on

Even more exhaustive tests followed – including a circumnavigation of Britain and a passage from Plymouth to Oporto in Portugal in less than three days. Excited by these results, Britain’s premier engineer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, was involved in having the Archimedes loaned for further tests to the Great Western Steamship Company, for which he was then constructing the world's largest steamship, the SS Great Britain. Brunel had the vision – and indeed the audacity – to settle on this new means of propulsion. Following a series of tests of different propeller types it was decided to fit the Great Britain with a four-bladed type designed by Smith.

The Great Britain on her maiden voyage - 14 days to cross the Atlantic

The Great Britain brought new standards of speed and comfort to North Atlantic travel (even if Charles Dickens was less than complimentary about the accommodation when he crossed in 1842). Though ocean-going paddle steamers were still constructed – including by Brunel himself – the Great Britain’s success, made possible by that of the Archimedes, had confirmed that the future lay in screw propulsion. (The Great Britain survives, in a restored state , in the British pot of Bristol).

And the Archimedes? For all her technical success Smith and his investors lost heavily – some £50,000 in money of the day, worth tens of millions in the 21^stCentury. The Royal Navy did not purchase her, as Smith had hoped, and she was sold on by the Ship Propeller Company. She was to suffer the indignity of having her engines removed and converted to a sailing vessel. She was wrecked, as such off the Dutch coast in 1864, and ignominious end for a ship that had made history. It is however pleasing to record that Smith’s later career was a satisfactory one, including appointment as Curator of the Patent Office Museum in South Kensington and a well-deserved knighthood in 1871.

And the implications of the Archimedes for the Royal Navy? We’ll read about that soon in a later blog.

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Interested in adventure in the age of transition for sail to steam?

Click on the image below to learn more and to read the opening.

The Scott Memorial

I’ve been in London today and am just back home, so no time this Friday evening for a long blog. The weather was beautiful – warm and sunny – and it’s on such summer days that London is always at its best. My business took me through Victoria Place, which intersects Pall Mall, just up for Trafalgar Square and I always love walking through it because of the commemorative statues there. On this occasion I did what I’d been threatening to do for ages – to whip out my mobile ‘phone and photograph some of them.

One of my favourites is the memorial to Captain Scott and the companions who died with him on his return journey from the South Pole in 1912. It’s got significance for me in that Scott was one of the heroes of my youth and that the story of his companion, Laurence Oates, was told me by my father when I was little as an example of courage and devotion to duty.

It was Oates who, when he was sick and frostbitten, realised that he was an encumbrance to the rest of the party, who were themselves little better. Oates left the group’s tent in a blizzard, his last words being "I am just going outside and may be some time" and was never seen again. Scott wrote in his own diary “We knew that Oates was walking to his death... it was the act of a brave man and an English gentleman.” The sacrifice was in vain and Scott and his companies died themselves shortly after, Scott last of all, leaving a very moving diary. I told my own daughters the same story in due course and we went to the British Museum to see Scott’s diary, written in pencil and open at the last page. I suspect that parents and grandparents will be inspiring younger generations by Scott’s last journey for centuries to come.

Franklin Memorial

Franklin

Just across from the Scott memorial is that to the Arctic Explorer, Sir John Franklin, who disappeared with his two ships HMS Erebus and HMS Terror in 1845 in his search for the North West Passage. Numerous expeditions were sent to find him without success – and his indomitable wife never gave up hope and urged that the search be continued. It is only since the 1980s that a series of discoveries and exhumations – and latterly identification of the wreck of HMS Erebus– has cast light on the dreadful fate of the crews. The plinth of Franklin’s statue is flanked by plaques listing all crew-members of both ships.

Next to Franklin is a more recent statue and it was of particular significance today, July 10th, the 75^th Anniversary of the start of the Battle of Britain. It commemorates Air Chief Marshal Sir Keith Park of the RAF, who commanded No.2 Group of Fighter Command, tasked with the defence of London.

An assessment by Lord Tedder, Chief of the Air Staff, said of Park in this period: “If any one man won the Battle of Britain, he did. I do not believe it is realised how much that one man, with his leadership, his calm judgement and his skill, did to save, not only this country, but the world.” Park went on to play a similar role in the air-defence of Malta. As I saw his statue today, ignored by passers-by, I could not but recall and article in today’s Daily Telegraph which Indicated that “Four out of ten young adults have no idea what the Battle of Britain was, according to research commissioned for the 75th anniversary ….only half of all adults (sample of 1000) knew who “The Few” were, and one in ten 18 to 24-year-olds thought the Battle took place last year, with the same number thinking it was a Viking attack when presented with multiple choice answers.”

Inscription - Park Memorial

The Crimea Memorial

Further on in Waterloos place one encounters the Crimea War memorial, the main group commemorating the army units with separate statues of Florence Nightingale - as "The lady with the lamp"- and Sidney Herbert, the Secretary At War who sent her, and her team of nurses to Istanbul and the Crimea.

Later, on my way back to my railway station I cut across Horse Guards Parade to look at the statues of two late Victorian generals, Sir Garnet Wolseley and Lord Roberts. I love equestrian statues - I believe the best ever is that of Ulysses S. Grant, portrayed as after the Battle of the Wilderness in 1864, on his memorial on the Mall in Washington D.C. In London it’s appropriate that Wolseley looks especially smart since in his lifetime the phrase “All Sir Garnet”was used to convey satisfaction and excellence – as in “That piece of work is all Sir Garnet!”

A little further on, off Whitehall, one comes across the Gurkha Memorial, notable not just for the listing sheer number of Gurkha units that have fought for Britain since 1817. The memorial lists in addition no fewer than 31 Wars and campaigns, the most recent being Afghanistan.

And nearby, what I always find one of the most moving memorials of all, that for the British tank crews of WW2. It shows a full crew, as would have manned a Sherman Firefly or a Cromwell tank, Driver, Hull Gunner, Gunner, Loader and Commander. These men not only fought hard but they died very hard also, often by fire in blazing tanks they could not escape from. It’s good they’re not forgotten.

WW2 Tank Crew

Band of Brothers

London’s numerous memorials make walking a joy – as today has once again proved for me as well as reminding me once again of the sacrifices made to win us the freedom we take for granted. .

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One seldom comes across any mention of chaplains in Nautical Fiction, despite the fact that by the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars period both all line-of-battle ships and frigates were allowed them. The decision to have such men – usually referred to as “parsons” – may well have rested with individual station commanders. Some admirals and captains were famed for their piety – most notably Admiral of the Fleet James Gambier, 1st Baron Gambier (1756 –1833) – but others were likely to be more casual in their observances in the manner of the 18^th Century.

The cautious Gambier and the fire-eating Lord Cochrane

during the Battle of Basque Roads in 1809

Gambier, backed by his chaplain, is shown reading the Bible

and ignoring Cochrane's request to pursue the French fleet

Patrick O’Brian’s “The Ionian Mission” does however feature what Jack Aubrey described as “a whole God damned – a whole blessed convocation of clergy”, six of whom he was to transport to the Mediterranean ”for Admiral Thornton likes to have chaplains aboard.” Such men were expected not only to conduct divine service on Sundays and funerals in the case of fatalities, and take their place in the cockpit during battle to assist the surgeon in matters likely to be temporal no less than spiritual, but also to act as schoolmasters for the midshipmen.

The future King William IV
under instruction as a midshipman
on HMS Prince George, 1779

It is likely that these clergymen varied enormously in motivation, attitude and piety. Some were almost certainly likely to have been able to obtain “Livings” ashore – which were often in the gift of wealthy landowners – and some might have had good reason to be absent from the country on the grounds of financial or moral embarrassment of one sort or another. Some would have been genuinely pious and for many with a scientific bent the opportunity for research in foreign parts would have been irresistible.

I came to thinking about such men when I stumbled upon a brief discussion of them in an 1894 book, “The British Fleet” by Commander N. Robinson. It suggests that when chaplains were first assigned, towards the end of the 17^th Century they were not always welcome on board, and for a surprising reason. Having time on their hands chaplains tended to write journals, but that the to prevent having any such "true relations of their voyages” – many “gentlemen-captains” preferred not to have them on board.

One chaplain who did however write was the Rev. Thomas Pocock, M.A., chaplain of HMS Orford, in 1698, the Ranelagh in 1704, and the Union in 1711. His journal principally relates to the operations of the Ranelagh off the Spanish coast, the capture of Gibraltar, and the battle of Malaga. (Click here for article on these events). Pocock summarised a typical Sunday’s duties as “I preached this morning on the quarter-deck, read prayers about 4. I catechized first the volunteers and then the officers' boys, and I distributed about l00 books among the ship's crew. I gave six young gentlemen 6d. a piece for learning the 6 first Psalms."The mention of the 100 books is interesting in that it may hint at a higher standard of literacy on the lower deck than we perhaps think typical of the period.

Ned Ward (1667-1731)

The most entertaining assessment – satirical but probably with more than a grain of truth – appears in “The Wooden World Dissected " (1706), written by Ned Ward (1667 – 1731), about whom we’ll say more further on. Ward had spent time at sea and he stated that "a sea-chaplain is one that in his junior days was brought up in fear of the Lord; but the University reasoned him out of it at last, and he has ofttimes thanked his good stars for it. . . . There's as great a difference betwixt him and a reverend divine as betwixt a quack doctor and a learned physician ; and he will never show it more than when you offer to tell him so, for he'll be readier to confute ye with his fists than any other proofs whatever. . . . He drinks and prays with much the like fervour, and to show his abundant humility he will sometimes drink flip with the midshipmen; and, to prevent the fall of a weak brother, he will oft be so charitable as to drink for him. He wears his prunella gown as chearily (sic) as he does his honesty ; there's something in the wind to be sure when he puts on either. The captain, when he has got a super-ordinary dinner, sends for him to give the Benediction, but he gives no long-winded Grace, for he loves to keep his breath to cool his pottage. He's the captain's trusty camarade (sic)at a game or so, on a Sunday evening, but they play not so deep as they drink a hearty Bout prevents the spiritual food of the day from lying heavy on the stomach, there being no better digester of good doctrine than good liquor."

Daniel Defoe (of Robinson Crusoe fame) in the pillory -
so popular that the crowd threw only flower at him

Ward combined the occupations of journalist and tavern-keeper after travels to Jamaica and New Englad, in neither of which he made his fortune. His first success came with “The London Spy”, a satirical work published in 18 monthly instalments which purported to be a "complete survey" of the London scene. He built on its success with over one hundred further satires in prose and verse which targeted just about every power and interest group of his time. He also got so heavily involved in politics and in 1706 he was twice arrested for “seditious libel” of the Whig government and condemned to stand in the pillory on both occasions. Like his contemporary journalist Daniel Defoe, he seems to have come uninjured through this ordeal.

Ward's writings became popular even in the Americas, and it must be to his credit that he evoked the ire of the Puritan supporter of the Salem Witch Trials, Cotton Mather. This luminary warned in 1726 against pestilences “all those worse than Egyptian Toads (the Spawns of a Butler, and a Brown, and a Ward…)". One suspects that Ward would have been rather proud of this. A short list of the names of some of his pamphlets, as listed below, is a delight in itself, and I’ll be looking to learn more myself about this colourful character.

Female Policy Detected, or, The Arts of a Designing Woman Laid Open (1695)

Sot's Paradise(1698)

The Weekly Comedy, as it is Dayly Acted at most Coffee-Houses in London (1699)

A Journey to Hell(1700–1705)

The Dissenting Hypocrite (1704)

Honesty in Distress but Relieved by No Party (1705)

Hubibras Redivivus(twelve monthly parts, 1705–1707) – the bitter attack on the Whig government that led to Ward being put in the pillory

The Wooden World Dissected (1706) – a controversial account of the Royal Navy, see extract above!

Mars Stript of his Armour (1708)

The Secret History of Clubs (1709) – which contains one of the first descriptions of gay clubs in London.

A Vade Mecum for Malt-Worms (1715)

The Delights of the Bottle (1720)

A man who thought up titles like these must have been a delight to know – though not if one was to become the target of his satire!

A recent blog told the story of the invention and initial testing of screw-propellers for ships, building on principles established two millennia previously. In the late 1830s the practicality of this concept was proven in a series of exhaustive tests by the experimental steamship SS Archimedes, as detailed in that earlier article (Click here to read). These tests included evaluation against the Royal Navy's fast paddle-driven mail-packets and indicated that “as regards power-to-weight ratio, the screw propeller had proven equal, if not superior, to that of the ordinary paddle-wheel."

SS Archimedes - proving the concept and showing the way ahead

The Royal Navy had taken its first steps into the steam age in the previous decade, but the associated method of propulsion had major drawbacks for a man-of-war, not least in that they provided a large and vulnerable target. Use of steam propulsion was therefore limited to vessels – such as mail-packets, or gunboats for colonial service – which would be unlikely to engage in combat with other ships. The screw-propeller however, located as it was below the waterline, would remove this vulnerability. The success of the Archimedes– a civilian vessel – therefore encouraged the Royal Navy to build a vessel of its own, directly comparable in power and armament to typical paddle-gunboats already in service, so as to allow directly comparative testing.

The tug-of-war: HMS Rattler (l) towing Alecto (r) March 1845

The resulting design was to be HMS Rattler, an 894-ton, 185-ft long wooden sloop powered by a 440-hp steam engine, with an auxiliary sailing rig. The latter was to remain a standard feature of practically all warship types for the next half-century since it allowed a degree of independence from coaling locations as well as economy of operation. The Rattler was designed to carry a powerful armament – a single 8-inch pivot gun which could bear over a wide arc, and eight 32-pounders as broadside weapons. This armament was typical of gunboats of the period, which were more likely to be involved in shore-bombardments in remote locations than in ship-to-ship combat.

The launch of HMS Trafalgar in 1841
100 survivors of the battle were present

The Rattler was completed in 1843 and spent the next two years in trials, a variety of propeller shapes being tried out and relative efficiencies established. Later tests involved races with the generally similar, but paddle-driven, HMS Alecto. Theseculminated in the “tug-of-war”of March 1845 for which the Rattler is best remembered, when she was linked by a tow-cable stern to stern with Alecto. Both vessels applied full power – a sight that must have been magnificent to see, waters swirling in Rattler’swake as her propeller churned, and foam thrashing from Alecto’s twin paddle-wheels. In the event it proved no contest – Rattler dragged Alecto behind her at a speed of two knots. The screw-propeller had proved itself.

Testing over, Rattlerwas now ready to embark on her active naval career. One of her first tasks was to help tow Sir John Franklin’s ships Erebusand Terror to the Orkney Islands, the first stage of their voyage to disaster in the Canadian Arctic. She thereafter joined the“Squadron of Evolution”, one of the “Experimental Squadrons” employed in the 1830s and 1840s to test the new technologies – including improved hull shapes – then being introduced. The most notable – and impressive – aspect of this was that the trials assessed operations of vessels of differing size in a group, and not individually. If Rattler represented the future, then one of the largest ships in the squadron very definitely represented the last-gasp of the Age of Sail. HMS Trafalgar was a 120-gun first rate ship-of –the-line, launched in 1841, in Queen Victoria’s presence. She was named by Nelson’s niece and of 500 people on board during the ceremony, 100 had been at the Battle of Trafalgar. She was powered by sail alone – she would not have been out of place at Trafalgar – and it was not until 1859 that she was to receive an auxiliary steam engine. The eight-ship Experimental Squadron sailed as far as South America and during part of the voyage Rattler towed the 78-gun Superb, launched in 1842, and herself almost identical to Nelson’s ships four decades earlier.

Rattler’s next service was to be at the sharp-end of Royal Naval operations in the 1840s as part of the Atlantic Anti-Slave Trade patrol. The greatest hazard of this service was not associated with combat, but by being stationed off the West Coast of Africa at a time when the origin of malaria was not understood and crews were vulnerable to it when ashore. Rattler’s most notable achievement in this period was the capture of a Brazilian slave brigantine, the Alepide – the action must have provided a welcome burst of excitement in two years of otherwise monotonous patrolling.

Chinese war-junk of the period

Rattler thereafter went east and served in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852. Her next deployment was to take herto Chinese waters. In the aftermath of the First Opium War (1839-42) European and and American traders were becoming active in commercial operations along the long Chinese coast. Hong Kong was one of the British soils of that war and the focus of much of the trade. Weak Imperial Chinese power meant however that much of the coast was subject to the depredations of pirates operating from hundreds of locations along it. For many decades Western navies were to be involved in small-scale, but often very vicious, fighting to eradicate this curse. A particularly serious incident occurred in September 1855 when the pirates seized four merchant vessels at Lantau island, just east of Hong Kong. The offence was all the more serious in that the vessels were under escort by the Eaglet, a small civil vessel chartered for British naval service.

HMS Rattlerwas to come to the rescue, operating in concert with the 2400-ton American steam-frigate USS Powhatan (a paddle-steamer!). In service since 1852, the Powhatanhad accompanied Commodore Matthew C. Perry's expedition to Japan in 1854, arguably one of the most significant events in modern history. She was very heavily armed – a single 11-inch and ten 9-inch Dahlgren smoothbores and five 12-pounders.

USS Powhatan - she was later to serve with distinction in the American Civil War

The Battle of Ty-ho Bay, in which Rattler and Powhatan engaged a fleet of pirate junks, was to be one of the first occasions when British and American naval forces cooperated (The War of 1812 was still fresh in the memory of many on both sides). The opposing force consisted of fourteen large junks and twenty-two smaller ones, crewed by a total of some 1,500 pirates and they were armed with small cannon. The appearance of the British and American ships – followed by the Eaglet, towing six boats loaded with British and American seamen – induced sixteen of the junks to turn tail and escape, but the remainder stood their ground. The pirates opened fire – ineffectually, given their armament – and were now subjected to heavy fire in return. Six junks were sunk and the boats brought by Eaglet slipped their tows and headed for the remainder. Classic boarding followed – in the fine old Age of Fighting Sail tradition of “cutting out” – and fourteen junks were captured after stiff resistance. At the end of the action fourteen large junks and six small ones were destroyed.

Royal Navy warship engaging a pirate junk off the Chinese coast, 1840s-50s

Pirate casualties were estimated at around 500 and another 1000 were captured. It is not clear what became of them (Do any readers have information?), but it not unlikely that some would have been executed subsequently. British casualties amounted to four killed and several wounded, while the Americans lost five dead.

This was to be the Rattler’sfinal adventure before returning to Britain, where she was scrapped in 1856. A footnote on the hazards of disease and illness while operating in Eastern waters is provided by a memorial in St. Ann’s Church, Portsmouth erected by Rattler’s officers and ship’s company “In remembrance of thirty- six of their gallant shipmates who between the years 1851 and 1856 died in the service of their country”. It notes that of these “twenty five fell under the baneful effects of the climates of Burmah and China, five were drowned and six were killed in action with pirates on the coast of China.”

HMS Rattler’s life had been a short one – a decade and a half – and it was not just eventful but epoch- making too.

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Ever since the Crimean War (1854-56) the Victoria Cross has been the highest award for British service personnel for gallantry in the face of the enemy. It takes precedence in order of wear over all other British orders, decorations, and medals, including the Order of the Garter. Instituted by Queen Victoria in 1856 it was revolutionary at the time of introduction in that award made no distinction between officers and enlisted men. Of some 1358 awarded since then, only fifteen have been won since the end of WW2. The medal is of bronze taken from Russian cannon captured at Sevastopol and these cannon themselves may have been of Chinese origin.

Departure of the Baltic Expedition from Spithead 1854

Though the first Victoria Cross was won in the Crimean War the heroism that won it took place not in the Crimea but in the Baltic. Britain and France entered the war against Russia in March 1854. In parallel with efforts to invade the Crimea measures were also put in hand to send a vast British fleet to the Baltic to neutralise fortifications protecting the approaches to St. Petersburg and seal it off. The execution left much to be desired however. “A finer fleet never sailed or steam from Spithead than that destined for the Baltic in 1854” according to the future Hobart Pasha (Click here for moredetails). Referring however to the overall commander, Sir Charles Napier, known as ’Fighting Old Charley, Hobart went on to write that“it was not long before we discovered that there was not much fight left in him.”

Approaching Bomarsund - steam vessel towing sailing warship through narrow channel

The initial British objective was the incomplete Russian fortress of Bomarsund in the Åland Islands. This was vulnerable to land-attack since the designers had assumed that the narrow channels near the fortress would not be passable for the large ships needed to land troops. This assumption was valid for sailing vessels but it took no account of the fact that steam ships could manoeuvre with greater ease and thus bring weakly defended sections of the fortress. One gets the impression that the focus on Bomarsund was due to its accessibility rather to any significant strategic importance and Hobart, in his memoirs, hints that dissatisfaction with the decision was widespread. He wrote: “if ever open mutiny was displayed – not by the crews of the ships, but by many of the captains, men who had attained the highest rank in their profession – it was during the cruise in the Baltic in 1854.”

Bombarding Bomarsund

On 21^stJune 1854, three British ships, Hecla, Odin and Valorous, came close enough to begin bombardment. Russian fortress-artillery replied and the action lasted most of the following night. At its height a live shell, its fuse hissing, crashed on to one the deck of the Hecla, a wooden paddle-sloop. Given that this vessel was wholly unarmoured, it seems an act of the grossest folly to have exposed ever her in this way. Only seconds remained before the shell would explode and orders were shouted for everybody to thrown themselves flat. On deck however was the twenty-year old Midshipman Charles Davis Lucas (1834 - 1914), who had already served seven years, a period that included the Second Burmese War . Rather than throw himself down Lucas grabbed the shell, dashed to the side and threw it overboard. It exploded on hitting the water. No further damage was done, nor were any of the crew wounded. The indecisive action was broken off shortly afterwards to wait until British and French reinforcements would arrive.

Contemporary illustration - Lucas throwing the shell overboard

Lucas in 1857

Lucas’s action had saved the Hecla, but given the reward structure in place at the time the only recognition possible was for her captain, W.H. Hall, to promote him to the rank of Acting Lieutenant. The Crimean War was the first to be covered extensively by the newspapers and Lucas’s behaviour, together with other individual acts of bravery, was widely reported. The outcome was a motion in Parliament "that an Order of Merit to persons serving in the army or navy for distinguished and prominent personal gallantry to which every grade should be admissible"should be created.

Though Lucas was the first winner, he was not however the first to receive his medal in the inaugural award ceremony in June 1857. This was held in London’s Hyde Park and it was estimated that over 100,000 people came to watch. Queen Victoria pinned the crosses on the recipients in strict order of Service precedence and seniority. Lucas was therefore fourth in line, following three more senior recipients, the first being Commander Henry Raby. Lucas may however have been lucky to miss the first slot – the Queen conducted the tricky operation of pinning on the medal from horseback. In the process , and by accident, she plunged the double-pronged pin for holding the medal into Raby’s chest. This was presumably a minor inconvenience compared with the dangers he had been exposed to while winning the medal!

Queen Victoria awarding the first Victoria Crosses, 26th June 1857
by George H. Thomas (1824-1868)

Lucas VC as Rear-Admiral

Lucas went on to have a distinguished naval career, promoting to captain in 1862 and retiring in 1873, making rear-admiral on the retired list in 1885. It is pleasing to note that he married the daughter of Captain Hall of the Hecla. He was to live on until 1914, another of those naval officers who joined a service still commanded by veterans of the age of Nelson, but who themselves lived to see technological innovations of the early 20^th Century such as turbines, radio, aircraft and submarines which were to change the nature of sea warfare.

Technology changes but human nature doesn’t. The Victoria Cross remains today, as it did in 1854, the recognition of human courage at its most sublime.

High-quality radio communications today, and the associated ability of ships in difficulty to transmit distress messages, make it difficult to envisage just how desperate were the plights of shipwrecked crews in earlier years. An earlier article (see links at the end ) touched on the sufferings of the survivors of the French frigate Medusa in 1817, as were immortalised in the painting by Theodore Gericault. Of these we know, only because the remaining handful were rescued, but in hundreds of similar cases nobody lived to tell of their experiences. One case, not unlike the Medusa’s, was however to occur in 1845 and also off West Africa. This involved the Royal Navy.

One of the most potent images in history -
the symbol of Britain's Anti-Slavery Society

Britain had abolished the Slave trade in 1807 and in the following years many other nations were to follow her example. It was not however until the Napoleonic Wars ended in 1815 that resources could be assigned to active suppression. For some five decades thereafter in the Atlantic, and even longer in the Indian Ocean, British warships were devoted to catching ships running slaves from Africa to Brazil, the Caribbean or Arabia. The “preventative squadron” of the West Coast of Africa Station was to constitute the main British effort up to about 1860. Though punctuated by periods of intense action, monotonous patrolling occupied most of the time and was made all the more hazardous for being based at locations, like Lagos, where malaria was rampant. The annual mortality rate was 55 per 1,000 men, compared with 10 for fleets in British waters or in the Mediterranean. The ships employed by the Royal Navy were often not fast enough to catch slavers, which were built, often expressly, for speed, and other governments, which gave lip-service to the abolition of the trade (but not abolition of slavery itself), were less than cooperative. France would not allow boarding parties to search French-registered ships and the American, Spanish, Portuguese, and Brazilian economies were so dependent on slave labour that these governments had no incentive to act effectively.

A typical success of the Anti-Slavery patrol
The capture of the slaver Gabriel by HMS Acorn, July 1841
by Nicholas M. Condy (Credit © National Maritime Museum London UK)

By the 1840s some 25 vessels and 2,000 officers and men were on the West Africa Station and supported by approximately 1,000 “Kroomen”, recruited mainly from Sierra Leone. The Kroomaen came to be highly respected and were later to provide valuable service in similar duties in the Indian Ocean. Monotonous as the patrolling may have been, engagements could be very dramatic and very bloody when slavers were run down. Just how bloody would be proved by the experiences of some of HMS Star’s crew.

Another success: Capture of the Slaver Formidable by HMS Buzzard, 17 December 1834
by William J. Huggins (Credit © National Maritime Museum London UK)

On the 27th February 27th 1845 HMS Wasp, a Cruizer-class brig-sloop launched in 1812, was cruising in the Bight of Benin off the Niger Delta, when a strange sail was seen and pursued. She was boarded in the early evening and found to be a Brazilian schooner, the Felicidade. Though apparently not carrying slaves – not yet – she was fitted for transporting them and she carried a crew of 28. With the exception of her captain and one other they were transferred to the Wasp. Command of the captured Felicidadewas assigned to the Wasp’s Lieutenant Stupart, supported by a Midshipman Palmer and a crew of fifteen British seamen.

Prisoners found on a Slaver

The Felicidade now operated independently of the Waspand on March 1^st captured a second prize, the Echo. This was a major success – no less than 430 slaves on board, and a crew of 28. The Felicidade was now, by comparison, a smaller prize and command of her was assigned to Midshipman Palmer, while Lieutenant Stupart took command of the Echo. Palmer was left with seven British seamen and two Kroomen. This in itself was not dangerous – young midshipmen had been taking command of prizes for a century or more – but it was made so by transferring the Echo’s captain and several of the crew to the Felicidade as prisoners. Once on board these desperate men overpowered and murdered Palmer and his small crew, took possession of the Felicidadeand sailed her away.

Slaves being loaded - one suspects that those who murdered
the Felicidade's prize crew were not unlike the thugs shown here.

On March 6^th the hijacked Felicidade was spotted HMS Star, another ship of the Anti-Slavery patrol. She was boarded and the crew was questioned. They claimed that the vessel was called Virginie and that the wounded men on board had had been injured by a falling spar. There was however sufficient evidence of a fight – blood stains on the deck – and there were indications that British seamen had been on the schooner. The captain and crew, now suspected of murder, were taken on board the Starfor questioning in Sierra Leone. The Felicidadewas to proceed independently to St. Helena, where a prize court was established. Command of her was assumed by a Lieutenant Wilson from the Star, supported by nine naval seamen.

Now sailing independently, the Felicidade encountered a heavy squall. She went over, filled, and sank, so as only to leave part of her bow above water. When the squall passed the whole crew was left clinging to the bow rail. Unsuccessful attempts were made to dive down to extract provisions from the hull and it was clear that she was sinking gradually. Lieutenant Wilson kept his nerve however. He found that there were three knives among the crew and he decided to make a raft of the main-boom and gaff, and such other items floating in the water. Ropes for binding them together were cut from the rigging, a small mast was erected and a topgallant studding-sail was secured to it. On this ramshackle raft ten men hoped to reach the African coast, 200 miles away, without rudder, oar, compass, provisions, or water.

Their suffering was great in the twenty days that followed. Almost naked, washed by every wave, unprotected against daytime sun or night-time chill, they had no supplies of either fresh water or food and sharks hovered near by. Five of their number were to die, two Kroomen among them the first to go. Wilson did however manage to maintain control as well as hope. Rain fell occasionally and it was caught in the sail and stored in a keg that had floated out of the schooner. Ingenuity – and desperation – was to turn the circling sharks into the only available source of food. A bowline was made at the end of a rope and used – one can only wonder how many tries were made – to lasso an eight-foot long shark and drag it on to the raft. They killed it, drank its blood, and ate it. Three more sharks were taken in the same way and it was these that kept the Wilson and four others alive until they were picked up in sight of land by HMS Cygnet.

The aftermath was amazing. The prisoners taken by HMS Star were taken to Britain to be tried for piracy. The assize judge duly convicted them of murder – a capital offence. Fine legal minds now found grounds for appeal. Did a British court-of-law have jurisdiction over a vessel owned by a Brazilian who murdered a prize crew? The appeal succeeded. The murderous thugs were released and transported back to Brazil at the cost of the British taxpayer. One can well imagine the indignation in naval circles and the sense of grievance felt by the families of the murdered men. They had looked for natural justice and were rewarded by flagrant injustice based on legal hair-splitting. “Remember the Felicidade!” was a cry heard often thereafter on the Anti-Slavery Patrol. One suspects – indeed hopes – that it might have led to some more summary justice on later occasions.

Parallels with modern sensitives to legal niceties in relation to pirates and others of their ilk are too obvious to need emphasis.

“Remember the Felicidade!”

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For an account of an equally desperate encounter with slavers in this period, you may be interested in this account of the life of the spectacular – but now largely forgotten – Victorian naval hero, Hobart Pasha. His unlikely career included chasing slavers, service in the Crimean War in the Royal Navy, an encounter with the Pope, blockade-running for the Confederacy in the American Civil War, dealing in ladies' foundation garments and leadership of the Turkish Ottoman Navy. Click here to read about him.

For the article that mentioned the wreck of the Medusa, click here.

“He’s a thief,” Topcliffe said. “A most accomplished and successful one. That’s why he’s useful to us.”

“But he seemed…”

“Exactly what he is. A clever, cultured, agreeable American gentleman, whose profession just happens to be larceny.”

Adam Worth in 1892

And this is how Adam Worth, alias Henry Judson Raymond, is described as he makes his appearance in Britannia’s Shark, in which he plays a key role. Important though this involvement in the affairs of Empire proved to be however, it was only one episode – unknown to the general public until now – in the career of a real-life professional criminal who was to be described by a senior Scotland Yard official as “The Napoleon of the Criminal World.” This historical figure was as remarkable for the global span of his activities as for the ease with which he found acceptance at the highest levels of British society, despite very humble beginnings.

Worth was born in Germany in 1844 and was taken by his parents to the United States when he was five years old. They settled in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where his father worked as a tailor. Worthy left home early and by 1860 was in New York City, employed there as a clerk in a department store – what he apparently described later as “my first and only honest job". This could have been the start of a life of respectable drudgery but for Worth – as for many others – the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 was to provide an opportunity if only he could survive it.

Second Bull Run - where Worth died officially

Worth, now seventeen, enlisted, attracted probably as much by the generous bounty paid to volunteers as by the prospect of adventure. Showing obvious leadership talents, he was quickly promoted to sergeant in the 34^th New York Light Artillery Regiment. When serving at the Second Battle of Bull Run in August 1862 – yet another in a long string of Union defeats – Worth was seriously wounded and shipped back to hospital in Washington D.C. On recovering he found that he had in error been listed as killed in action.

This was Worth’s big opportunity. Officially dead, he was now free to enlist once more and to claim another bounty. Like many others he got a taste for it, taking the money, deserting, re-enlisting again in another unit under another name. (It might be commented in passing that such “bounty- jumpers”, though reprehensible, were no worse than the rich young men who took advantage of their right to pay poor men to serve as substitutes on their behalf once the draft was introduced. The bounty-jumpers at least risked death by firing squad if apprehended).

Worth evaded retribution for his bounty-jumping and at the end of the Civil War saw opportunities in the New York criminal underworld, that merciless society so memorably depicted in the Martin Scorcese movie “Gangs of New York”. Working in his favour was the fact that he was abstemious by nature and that he had a marked talent for planning and financing criminal enterprises. His luck did however run out, landing him in Sing Sing prison. He escaped within weeks.

Marm Maddelbaum
- not to be underestimated!

With his appearance now altered by magnificent mutton-chop whiskers, he established a profitable relationship with a fence and criminal financier called Frederika Mandelbaum, known to her friends as "Marm" - obviously a lady to be approached with caution. By 1869 Worth had masterminded a serious of big robberies and was sufficiently respected to be contracted to spring a robber called Charley Bullard from prison. This successful operation involved bribing of guards and digging of a tunnel. Worth and Bullard now formed a partnership – one of their most notable coups was robbery of a bank in Boston by the same method featured in the Sherlock Holmes story “The Red Headed League”. For this a shop was set up near the bank and from it a tunnel was excavated to gain entrance. Worth and Bullard were now so successful that the Pinkerton Detective Agency was set on their trail. Judging the United States to be too hot for them they set sail for Europe.

A typical dinner party hosted by “Marm” Mandelbaum (R) and her "inner circle".

From "Recollections of a New York Chief of Police" (1887) by George W. Walling,

Paris in the aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 and the Commune that followed in 1871 was the corrupt and hedonistic sink immortalised in the work of Zola, de Maupassant and Toulouse-Lautrec. Worth had now re-invented himself as “"Henry Judson Raymond", an American financier, and had acquired the grace and polish to carry it off. With Bullard he operated a major gambling operation in Paris as well as initiating a series of high-value robberies. In the mid-1870s they moved to Britain and here “Raymond” established himself as a popular member of smart society, an acquaintance of the Prince of Wales and a free spender. He bought a magnificent villa in the London suburb of Clapham and maintained in parallel an apartment in a fashionable area off Piccadilly.

Worth's Clapham villa today
(with acknowledgements to Wikipedia)

Worth formed a criminal network and organised major robberies and burglaries through intermediaries such that his name was unknown to those who were involved directly. The focus was on high-value proceeds and Worth established the principle that those working for him did not use violence. William Pinkerton, who was later to have direct dealings with him, wrote that:

In all his criminal career, and all the various crimes he committed, ... he was always proud of the fact that he never committed a robbery where the use of firearms had to be resorted to, nor had he ever escaped, or attempted to escape from custody by force or jeopardizing the life of an official, claiming that a man with brains had no right to carry firearms, that there was always a way, and a better way, by the quick exercise of the brain.

Gainsborough's Duchess of Devonshire

Scotland Yard was aware of Worth’s network but was unable to prove anything. From his London base the Worth operation now functioned on an international scale, including an ambitious swindle involving forged letters of credit in Turkey and a theft of $500,000 worth (in 1870s money!) of uncut diamonds. To oversee the latter operation Worth travelled to South Africa. It was in this period also the Worth pulled off his most spectacular coup. The Thomas Ganisborough painting of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, had recently been rediscovered and was on display in 1876 at an art dealer’s gallery in London. Worth became fascinated by it – obsessed might be the better word. He organised its successful theft with two associates, thereby triggering an international hue-and-cry in the coming years about its whereabouts. The expectation was that the unknown thieves would attempt to sell it or ransom it but it was in fact to remain in Worth/Raymond’s London apartment within a mile of the gallery. He appears to have immense pleasure in possessing it.

Worth’s criminal enterprises – and his double life – continued through the 1880s. By the early 1890s however he was losing his touch and was arrested in the course of a botched robbery of a money-transport in Belgium in 1892. Worth refused to talk but the net drew in on him when his photograph and details were circulated to Scotland Yard and the United States’ Pinkertons and NYPD. He was now betrayed by several of his associates and following trial was sentenced to seven years in a Belgian gaol. It appears to have broken him, possibly more for the fall from social respectability and prestige than from the physical conditions – he must have endured worse in the Civil War.

He was released early, for good behaviour, in 1897. He determined to return to the United States, where his two children were living (Worth’s affairs with women would need an article to themselves!) but to do so he needed funds. He got them by robbing £4000 (1897 money!) worth of diamonds from a London dealer.

Karl Marx - Worth's neighbour
in Highgate Cemetery

Worth was at risk of prosecution in the United States for his earlier offences there. He had one card still up his sleeve – the Duchess of Devonshire, whom he had managed to keep hidden for some twenty years. He approached the Pinkertons and agreed to return the painting to the dealers he has stolen it from in return for $25,000 and a guarantee of non-prosecution. The exchange of portrait and payment took place in Chicago. In funds again, Worth returned to London – again as Henry Judson Raymond – with his children. His son appears at a later stage to have become a career Pinkerton detective. The Duchess of Devonshire’s ransom seems to have slipped as easily through Worth’s fingers as all the other money he had come by over four decades. He died in London in 1902 and was buried, under the name of Raymond, in a pauper’s grave in Highgate Cemetery, close to Karl Marx.

The appellation of “The Napoleon of the Criminal World” was awarded Worth by Sir Robert Anderson, Assistant Commissioner (Crime) of the London Metropolitan Police, from 1888 to 1901. The phrase seems to have inspired Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, with the idea of a criminal mastermind, Professor James Moriarity. Holmes described him as follows:

Moriarty - he looks
less fun than Worth!

'He sits motionless, like a spider in the centre of its web, but that web has a thousand radiations, and he knows well every quiver of each of them. He does little himself. He only plans. But his agents are numerous and splendidly organised… the agent may be caught. In that case money is found for his bail or his defence. But the central power which uses the agent is never caught - never so much as suspected”

And Holmes summed him up as:

“…the Napoleon of crime. He is the organizer of half that is evil and nearly all that is undetected in this great city. He is a genius, a philosopher, an abstract thinker. He has a brain of the first order.'

Adam Worth would have been flattered!

If you would like to know more about Adam Worth’s involvement in the affair of Britannia’s Shark,

and with another real-life notable of the 19^thCentury, John Phillip Holland, CLICK HERE. It will allow you to read the opening of the book via the "Look Inside" feature.

The Bayonnaise and HMS Ambuscade action, 1798

Links to some other single ship actions:

Discipline, heroism and survival: HMS Alceste, 1817

Trawlers at War in the North Sea, May-June 1915

The Shortest War in History: Zanzibar 1896

HMS Charybdis to the rescue, 1841

Romans: River Trade and Warfare

Massacre at Sea: Royal Edward and UB-14, 1915

The Bombardment of Odessa 1854

Kaiser Wilhelm II at Gibraltar 1904

Guest Blog by Tom Williams: Waterloo + 200

One Submarine, Two Flags and Two Heroes

Blood in the Streets, Amsterdam 1886

Duel in the Dark: Frigates Blanche and Pique 1795

And here are two more notable frigate actions:

SS Archimedes – setting the shipping paradigm

Polar Explorers and other Heroes – London’s Statues

Chaplains at sea in the Age of Fighting Sail

The Eventful Career of HMS Rattler

The First Victoria Cross Winner 1854

Shipwreck, Survival, Slave Trade Suppression - and Injustice, 1845

Adam Worth: the real-life “Napoleon of Crime”