Nelson: Britannia's God of War (53 page)

Such insecurity may appear remarkable, but Nelson’s ambition would be unfulfilled while there was still a war to win and fleets to annihilate. He approached the Grand Fleet rendezvous and home sunk in gloom, uncertain of the reception that would greet his return after a campaign without a battle. It was the very opposite of what one would expect from a man so long at sea, and absent from home, mistress and child. By now certain the enemy had put into a Biscay port, his health concerns began to reappear as he closed on the flag of another old friend, Sir William Cornwallis. He needed rest, and release from the incessant mental anxiety of planning a campaign, out-thinking the enemy and sustaining the logistics, human resources and morale of his squadron.

Hearing of Calder’s action and Villeneuve’s arrival at Coruna, Barham agreed with Nelson, and on 3 August ordered a concentration off Ushant. This was not a simple defensive measure: Barham properly left Cornwallis at liberty to detach forces to exploit any opportunity the enemy offered for a counter-stroke. To prove the point the fleet that fought the decisive battle of the campaign would be a detachment from the Grand Fleet.

Villeneuve left Coruna on 10 August, planning to head for Brest or Cadiz as circumstances dictated. It took another three days for his fleet, now raised to twenty-nine battleships, to get to sea. Half of them had not been at sea for years, if at all; the rest, while improved in skill and battle-hardened, were hardly in first-class order. The Rochefort division of five was at sea, but could not be found. On 14 August Calder joined Cornwallis, and Nelson arrived late the following day. Cornwallis had instructions to send Nelson home: he, his flagship and the shaky
Superb
needed refitting. This left Cornwallis with thirty-six battleships, ten of them three-decked ships ideal for close-quarters battle. No combination of French and Spanish ships could defeat Cornwallis, the acknowledged master of the tactical defensive.

*

Bonaparte’s many and complex plans were in ruins: his squadrons were no closer to Boulogne, barred by the solid mass of the Grand Fleet, while Keith’s reinforced North Sea fleet was ready to annihilate the invasion shipping gathered around Boulogne, if it dared to put to sea. Now the game was shifting. In a campaign that reflected the nature of the war, the British had blocked every offensive move the French had attempted; now they were concentrated and ready for a telling counterattack. By early August Foreign Minister Talleyrand knew the game was up, warning Bonaparte not to attempt the invasion.

On 13 and 14 August Bonaparte shifted his focus to the growing threat of an Austro-Russian attack, planning the campaign that culminated at Austerlitz. Yet rather than hold to the simple comfort of a massive concentration off Brest, Cornwallis immediately split his fleet. The day after Nelson arrived, he detached Calder south with eighteen battleships, including many from Nelson’s fleet, to look for Villeneuve at Ferrol and stop him putting to sea. He knew the enemy might have over thirty ships, but this was all he could spare. He retained eighteen ships off Brest, including no fewer than ten three-deckers. It was a powerful force.

Bonaparte raged at Cornwallis’s stroke of genius, something he had not anticipated, condemning it as a strategic blunder that risked everything. It was no such thing, as Barham acknowledged by ordering the same division, although he did not wish Calder to command. Cornwallis was in easy communication with the detached force, which was still under his orders, and Calder knew well enough what to do if he met the enemy, or heard of their whereabouts. The main threat that Villeneuve now posed was to the Anglo-Russian plans to attack in the Mediterranean, where Craig’s army and a larger Russian force were assembling. The main British counter-attack depended on cooperation with Russia, and this would be impossible if the enemy commanded the Mediterranean. Villeneuve was also ideally placed to attack the immense homebound convoys from the East and West Indies. The loss of a major convoy would have ruined the economy, brought down the Ministry and possibly bankrupted the state. After an invasion this was the gravest danger that Britain faced, and was never far from the minds of all her great strategists, especially Barham, Nelson and Cornwallis.

The knowledge that Nelson was at sea, hard on his heels, had broken Villeneuve’s spirit. Setting sail from Coruna on 13 August, he told Decrès: ‘I do not hesitate to say … I should be sorry to meet twenty of them. Our naval tactics are antiquated. We know nothing but how to place ourselves in line, and that is just what the enemy wants.’
¹²
By 19 August Cornwallis knew the enemy was heading south, and sent fresh instructions to Calder, confident they lacked the stores for a long cruise, the troops for a landing, or any object beyond reaching the Mediterranean. Two days later Ganteaume came out of Brest Roads, and anchored under the batteries. Cornwallis had a major decision to make. Should he pull back, let the enemy out to sea and annihilate them, or drive them back into Brest? While he was desperate for a great battle, his response was determined by the strategic context. The next morning he led his fleet in. Although driven off by storm of fire from the shore batteries, his attack forced Ganteaume to scramble for safety, and made him unlikely to venture out again.

Villeneuve, meanwhile, had initially headed west for a rendezvous with the Rochefort squadron, but the presence of British cruisers, false news of a fleet nearby and numerous neutral ships reporting the British in strength to the north quickly changed his mind. He set course for Cadiz; the invasion plans of Bonaparte were over, his fleet
was demoralised, her admiral already beaten and the allies bickering over who was to blame.

Arriving off Cadiz on 19 August, the Combined Fleet found Collingwood, forewarned from Lisbon, with three battleships and a frigate. Collingwood neatly stepped aside to allow them into Cadiz while covering the Straits. Once the enemy was in port he resumed his station, denying them access to food, naval stores and even sea-based intelligence. This was bold, but entirely in character. Bickerton sent his ships from off Cartagena: they arrived on 28 August, and Calder joined with eighteen more two days later. The enemy were now in a worse position than they had been in April. There were close on forty ships at Cadiz, but little food, and few stores. They were trapped by a force perfectly capable of knocking back any sortie, and demoralised from top to bottom.

Had Nelson, Barham, and the sound doctrine of the service defeated the most ambitious attempt ever made to invade England, or exposed the most outrageous bluff in the history of war? Bonaparte would assert both arguments on different occasions: the verdict on the real nature of the French schemes must remain open.

*

Never one to waste a scrap of information, Nelson continued to make notes on winds and currents as he headed north. When he reached the Grand Fleet, Cornwallis was expecting him, and sent word that he was not to stop, or to think of boarding the flagship so late in the day. ‘I am truly sorry that you have not had your accustomed good luck in falling in with the enemy. I believe that was all that anyone wished for, being perfectly satisfied what the consequence would be.’
¹³
Victory
and
Superb
were ordered to Spithead, while the rest of the squadron stayed with the Grand Fleet. Another old friend, Thomas Fremantle, commanding the ninety-eight-gun
Neptune
, understood what Nelson needed:

The combination of friendly words and the high praise appearing in the press must have speeded Nelson’s recovery. His ailments were produced by stress and anxiety, not physical illness. He was relieved of anxiety about his reception at home, and knew that the enemy had not
escaped. He trusted Cornwallis and Collingwood to finish the job, if he could not. It would be a far happier man who stepped off the
Victory
at Portsmouth.

On leaving for home Nelson thanked the officers and men of the squadron that had served him so well. He did not criticise Calder, but paraphrased the line St Vincent had sent him after Tenerife and Boulogne, that ‘men cannot command success’.
¹⁵
Once he had been through the papers, they went across to Keats, with an invitation to dine. The two ships reached Spithead on 18 August, and went into quarantine the following day. The crews were in excellent health, requiring only vegetables and other refreshments to remove the scurvy. Nelson arrived at Merton early on20 August, and was immediately summoned to London.
¹⁶
The day was occupied by meetings at the Admiralty, at Downing Street and at his prize agents, to see how his various outstanding cases were progressing.

News of Nelson’s return spread quickly. Clarence called on 22 August, while old Lord Hood praised his handling of the campaign, and predicted he would soon be back at sea. Keats passed on his assessment of the public mood: ‘all classes unite in one sentiment of admiration for your Lordship’s judicious and persevering conduct’.
¹⁷
Nelson in turn praised Keats’ judgement and courage, and reported that the ministers looked on him as some sort of conjuror. Despite the public acclaim, Nelson remained uncertain of his future: he was a Commander in Chief on leave, and the likelihood of his going back increased by the day.
¹⁸
Hood, still a confidant of Pitt, was convinced the enemy had gone to the Mediterranean, or to Cadiz. If so, Nelson would soon be back at sea.
¹⁹

Although Pitt and Secretary for War Lord Castlereagh were anxious to see Nelson, Lord Barham was more reserved. He had not seen much of the hero since the 1780s, and was only won over when he read the journal of his campaign. The Admiralty required flag officers to keep a journal of proceedings, in which both their actions and their reasons were laid out. Barham recognised the breadth and penetration of Nelson’s intellect, the wisdom of his decisions, the infinite pains he had taken to catch the enemy and his political insight. Discussions with Pitt and Castlereagh went so well that the Prime Minister, exhausted and burdened by the demands of the war as he was, considered riding over from Wimbledon to visit Merton. The West India merchant community was equally pleased, and requested an opportunity
to present their vote of thanks in person. While Nelson emphasised that he had only been doing his duty, and praised the high state of the local military and militia forces, it was still a fine compliment, fit to stand alongside those from the East India Company, the Levant merchants and the City of London.
²⁰
Nor was the Church unmoved. The Bishop of Exeter, a clerical friend of brother William, added: ‘I ought also to congratulate my country upon the safe return of (underHeaven) its ablest protector, who is now ready at hand to defend us from the threatened attack of our vaunting enemy.’
²¹

Yet despite the acclaim of great men, it was the effect he produced on the public that was simply astonishing. Minto was with him in a crowd:

To be in his presence, to touch the hem of his garment, just to see him was enough. It was all too reminiscent of the final days of the Christian redeemer, and few missed the growing presentiment of triumph and tragedy.

In the brief period when Nelson was ashore, Bonaparte finally recognised that the Anglo-Russian coalition contained the seeds of a disaster. Austria would join, and even half-hearted Prussia seemed ready to make common cause. The failure of his grand naval strategy was obvious, Villeneuve had gone south, Ganteaume had been driven back into Brest, and the Rochefort squadron was simply lost. The key to the situation lay in the south, where the small British army that had cost Nelson so much anxiety was ready to land at Naples. It would link up with the Russians and the Austrians for a campaign to recover Italy.

By 23 August Bonaparte was satisfied that he could wait no longer: next spring there would be too many enemies, too widely dispersed. He must strike now. Decrès made it clear that any chance of invading Britain had passed, if it had ever existed. The army at Boulogne would move east, front-line units being replaced by depot battalions, although the Emperor himself remained to lend colour to the deception of Austria. On 1 September Bonaparte learnt that Villeneuve was at Cadiz.

Captain Henry Blackwood arrived at Spithead the same day with
the same news, and posted up to the Admiralty. It was no mere courtesy that saw him stop off at Merton as he passed early the next morning. The fact that he found Nelson awake and fully dressed at 5 a.m. suggests the admiral had not thrown off the habits of shipboard life, and may have been expecting just such a call. Blackwood recognised that his news must bring Nelson back to the Mediterranean. Had Nelson lived anywhere else, the information would have taken days to reach him. Merton had proved its value as the home of a devoted public servant – on the right axis for naval intelligence, and an easy commute into town.