Nelson: The Essential Hero (26 page)

As to my health, it never was better; and now I hope soon to return to you; and my Country, I trust, will not allow me any longer to linger in want of that pecuniary assistance which I have been fighting the whole war to preserve to her. But I shall not be surprised to be neglected and forgot, as probably I shall no longer be considered as useful. However, I shall feel rich if I continue to enjoy your affection. The cottage is now more necessary than ever ... I am fortunate in having a good surgeon on board; in short, I am much more recovered than I could have expected. I beg neither you nor my father will think much of this mishap: my mind has long been made up to such an event. God bless you, and believe me Your most affectionate husband HORATIO NELSON.

On Friday, 1 September, the
Seahorse
dropped anchor at Spithead. It was raining, the wind was squally, and the weather was unsuitable for Betsy Fremantle to go ashore in an open boat with her husband. But Nelson was all fever and impatience to leave the ship, strike his admiral’s flag, and get to Bath to see Fanny and his father. Tom Allen had his master’s cases and gear all ready, for he was to accompany Nelson on his visit while his surgeon was left behind to deal with his other duties. On a grey day, so typical of the Channel and of Portsmouth, Rear-Admiral Horatio Nelson, K.B., set foot on shore in England for the first time in over four years.

He was to receive a hero’s welcome. Just as England had needed a victory at the time of the Battle of Cape St Vincent, now the populace badly needed a figure around whom they could weave their webs of fantasy and of hope. The disaster of Tenerife was not made light of in the papers, the total loss of the cutter
Fox
figuring prominently in the columns, but - curiously enough perhaps - the author of the disaster was excluded from blame. Nelson, with his one eye and one arm, was taken into the public heart. The process of mythologising had begun. The same thing had happened to Drake after the defeat of the Armada, but that at least had been a victory. Nelson, it was true, had the astonishing success of Cape St Vincent behind him, and his ‘patent bridge’ had been widely celebrated, but he returned now as the author of a dismal failure. He was not seen as such, but as the gallant commander who had done all he could to make a success of what was intrinsically faulty planning on the part of the Earl of St Vincent, or even Dundas, the Secretary for War, or (for the politically minded) of William Pitt. No blame was allowed to attach to the man who had actually been responsible. His wounds absolved him from all criticism. As a Bath paper put it: ‘The Rear-Admiral, who was received at Portsmouth on the 1st with a universal greeting, reached Bath on Sunday evening in good health and spirits to the great joy of his Lady and Venerable Father. . . .’

He was
not
in good health, as Fanny was soon to find out when she had to learn from her doctor, Mr Nicholls, how to clean and dress the stump of an arm that was swollen and inflamed, and from which one ligature refused to part. Fanny who had consistently advised caution on his part, and whose letters had always been full of intense concern about his health and safety, was now faced with an unpleasant task resulting from his constant determination to be in at the heart of the action - wherever it was. Only opium could secure him a night’s sleep. But Fanny now had in this wounded and weakened man the child that they had never managed to have together, and her maternal instincts were satisfied in looking after him, cutting up his food, and helping him to dress and undress. Throughout the years that they had been parted, their letters had been full of tenderness and affection : it can never be doubted that this was no pretence on either side. They were to all intents and purposes a model married couple, whose friendship had perhaps deepened because they only had each other. Now Fanny was to add to her other duties and responsibilities that of writing many of Nelson’s letters for him. There can, however, have been little sexual exchange between them. Nelson was far too rundown and in much too great pain from his arm, while Fanny, whose nature we can only guess at but from what little we know was probably somewhat unresponsive, found the operation of dressing his wound so repulsive as to make her husband physically unattractive. At a time which Nelson was to describe in the words ‘I found my domestic happiness perfect’, the seeds of a future estrangement were inadvertently being laid.

On the recommendation of their Bath physician the Nelsons moved to London to find more expert opinion on the condition of the arm, which was still very painful and inflamed. Horatio’s brother Maurice found them rooms in Bond Street where a succession of doctors and surgeons examined the stump and the persistent ligature, the final conclusion being that it was best to leave all to time and nature to heal. In view of the limited surgical knowledge of the day Nelson was fortunate that a further operation was not attempted. It was while they were in London that news was received of Duncan’s victory over the Dutch at Camperdown, a victory which resulted in the annihilation of their fleet; something which caused Nelson to exclaim that he would have given his other arm to have been present. He had long ago seen that the inconclusive type of action which had characterised so much of the war to date, and indeed naval warfare in the past, was not what was required in this struggle of life and death between Britain and revolutionary France. Annihilation was to be his watchword.

On 13 October when the news reached the capital, all London, in the fashion of the time, was illuminated, flambeaux being lit outside the grand houses and state buildings, while people had their curtains drawn back and candelabra placed on tables in their windows to show their pride and pleasure in a victory which had done much to remove the threat of invasion from England’s shores. The Nelsons had retired early and the windows of 141 Bond Street were all darkened, in marked contrast to those of their neighbours. Nelson lay in a fitful feverish sleep induced by opium when a group of roisterers, who were breaking the windows of houses which were not celebrating the victory, hammered on the door to demand an explanation. On being informed that the hero of St Vincent, the badly-wounded leader of the Tenerife expedition, was staying there and must not be disturbed, they withdrew with the words, ‘You will hear no more from us tonight.’

During these weeks in London Nelson had pursued his usual active life, calling constantly at the Admiralty, visiting Lord Hood at Greenwich Hospital as well as his old ‘sea-daddy’ William Locker who also lived in the Hospital. It was Locker who prevailed on a never very reluctant Nelson (when it came to sitting for portrait painters) for another picture, to succeed the one which he had by Rigaud. This resulted in the commissioning of the little-known Lemuel Abbott who was inspired to produce one of the best, and certainly the best-known, of all representations of Nelson. Meanwhile engravers, working from the Rigaud portrait and changing Nelson’s rank from Captain to Admiral and taking away his right arm, were busy producing for the general public the popular image that was to stir the imagination during the years that were to follow. Some weeks before Camperdown Nelson had been presented at a levee to the monarch whom he served with such diligence and devotion all his life, during which George III had invested him with the Order of the Bath. Upon the King’s remarking, ‘You have lost your right arm!’ Nelson had replied with grace : ‘But not my right hand, as I have the honour of presenting Captain Berry.’

Quite apart from the pleasure he derived from having been invested by his monarch in person, Nelson had also received the Freedom of the City of London, and had been granted a pension of £1,000 a year. This necessitated his submitting a formal statement or ‘memorial’ to George III, outlining the services which he had rendered during the present war. It is of the greatest interest, for it details a war record which would have been impressive even if it had not been followed by his three great victories. He had been present at four fleet and three frigate actions, six engagements against batteries, ten boat actions cutting out harbours, and in the capture of three towns. He had served ashore with the Army for four months and had been in command of the batteries during the sieges of Bastia and Calvi. He had been engaged against the enemy over one hundred and twenty times, and had been present in engagements during which 7 sail-of-the-line had been captured, 6 frigates, 4 corvettes, and 11 privateers, and about 50 merchantmen had been taken or destroyed. During the course of this service he had lost his right eye, his right arm, and been ‘severely wounded and bruised in his body’. The pension which he was now awarded meant that at long last he and Fanny could think about getting themselves a home of their own for the first time. It was not quite the humble ‘cottage’ about which he had so often written, but ‘a gentleman’s house’, Round Wood Farm near Ipswich in Suffolk. Here at last, it would seem, was the haven in East Anglia where he and his wife would spend their declining years. He was never to live there. Round Wood would indeed provide a home for Fanny, his father and family, but by the time he next returned to England the whole pattern of his life would have changed.

On
the
morning of 4 December 1797, something long hoped for occurred. Nelson awoke after a night’s deep sleep that had been untroubled by any fevers or fancies to find that the pain in his arm had almost entirely disappeared. The surgeon was summoned and the bandages were undone, the cause of Nelson’s relief being immediately evident. During the night, the central ligature which had given all the trouble and led to the inflammation and poisoning, had come away, leaving a stump that would now heal easily. It was close on four and a half months since he had been hit in the arm at Santa Cruz. Only four days later he was to write to Captain Berry, who was at Norwich and engaged to marry a Norfolk girl: ‘If you mean to marry, I would recommend your doing it speedily, or the to be Mrs Berry will have very little of your company; for I am well, and you may be expected to be called for every hour.’

He had been promised the 80-gun
Foudroyant
which was due to be launched in January but, her completion being delayed, he had settled quickly for the 74-gun
Vanguard.
She was lying at Chatham and, as he reported to his former captain, Ralph Miller, was to be ‘well manned and soon’. Despite his anxiety to be back aboard ship again and once more involved in the war, he did not forget his other duties. The clergyman at St George’s, Hanover Square, London, received a request for a Thanksgiving: ‘An Officer desires to return thanks to Almighty God for his perfect recovery from a severe Wound, and also for the many mercies bestowed upon him.’

The
Vanguard
was ten years old and had been built at Deptford on the Thames in the dockyard that had originally been established by King Henry VIII. The first distinguished ship to bear her name had seen service against the Spanish Armada. In his
Vanguard
Nelson was soon to write another chapter in British naval history. Since she was delayed in her completion and in her working up for foreign service, he had time for a further visit to Bath. Round Wood was not yet ready for occupation so to Bath, which suited both Fanny and his ageing father, he went with all the confidence of a man recovered in health and sure of his future. As early as September 1797, when Nelson was very far from recovered of his amputation, St Vincent had written to Lord Spencer at the Admiralty: ‘I beg that Admiral Nelson may be sent to me.’ Lord Minto (formerly Sir Gilbert Elliot, the Scots Viceroy of Corsica, with whom Nelson had got on so well) was also to press upon Spencer that, if the Mediterranean was to be considered once again as a field for British activities, the man to be in command of them was undoubtedly Horatio Nelson. ‘He is as well acquainted with the Mediterranean’, he remarked, ‘as your lordship is with this room we are sitting in.’ Both men knew that something was brewing in France and, since England was the only enemy left, whatever it was must be a campaign against their country's interests. The fact that a great number of troops and ships were being accumulated in the French ports of the Mediterranean suggested they must be designed for that theatre. Further than that nothing for sure was known, and there remained a number of alternative destinations - the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily, Greece and its islands, with Constantinople as the main target, Egypt or the Levant, with a view to threatening India, or even Gibraltar, whose fall would close the Mediterranean finally and forever to the British and permit the French full access to that fortress-harbour which was the key to the inland sea.

In March 1798, having heard from his Captain, Berry, that the
Vanguard
was ready at Portsmouth, Nelson and Fanny went up to London. He attended a levee on 14 March, and took leave of his sovereign, while he was also invited to the Spencers’ before taking up his new command. Lord Spencer and his wife had had good opportunity for meeting, and assessing, their one-eyed, one-armed Admiral during his convalescent days in London and had formed their own conclusions - Lady Spencer’s at first being not at all favourable. ‘The first time I saw him’, she was to recall, ‘was in the drawing-room of the Admiralty, and a most uncouth creature I thought him. He was just returned from Tenerife, after having lost his arm. He looked so sickly, it was painful to see him, and his general appearance was that of an idiot; so much so, that when he spoke, and his wonderful mind broke forth, it was a sort of surprise that riveted my whole attention.’ Her husband had long known from his record that he was far from ‘an idiot’. Lady Spencer, however, having been so agreeably relieved to find that this frail, suffering (and painful to regard) small man possessed intellectual brilliance, even forgave him for upsetting her seating arrangements at dinner. He asked for his wife to be allowed to sit next to him, saying that he saw so little of her that he would not willingly lose a moment of her company. In reality, of course, this had been largely due to the fact that he had not yet acquired the dexterity to cut up his own food, which Fanny did for him. Lady Spencer, having observed his difficulties, had a table instrument made for him (now to be seen at Lloyd’s of London), which was a combined knife and fork in gold, with a steel cutting edge. Nelson constantly used it.