Hood requested Admiral Trogoff to identify the four least battleworthy 74s in his squadron for use as transports. The choice fell upon the Apollon, Entreprenant, Orion and Patriote. These have since often been written-off as barely seaworthy hulks but, in fact, were still perfectly sound warships, the newest being the 5-year-old Apollon and the oldest the 9-year-old Orion. Hood greatly regretted having to make a gift of these to the republican navy but, as he again confided to Stephens, it would have made no difference if they had been in a perfect state, for ‘our security demands it’. Except for a pair of 8-pounders for signalling purposes, all armament, including small arms, was transferred ashore, into the arsenal.
The ships readied, Admiral Goodall, in his capacity as governor, had posted and proclaimed about the town the following declaration, with immediate effect: ‘It is ordered that all Officers, Seamen and Others comprising the crews of the KING’s vessels Apollon, Entreprenant, Orion and Patriote to repair on board their respective ships before midday today, the 15th, on pain, in case of contravention, of being regarded as Prisoners and punished very severely.’ Goodall further observed royalist sensitivities in dating the notice ‘À Toulon ce 15 Septembre [sic] 1793 l’an premier du règne de Louis XVII’.
Threat was unnecessary, for every last man was almost certainly pleased to be given the chance to leave what was, by any standard, a potentially dangerous situation. All sailed on 17 September, ships and personnel issued with passports to guarantee free passage, unhindered by allied warships. To their number had been added a fifth ship, the little brig-corvette Pluvier, late of sixteen guns. Although returning loyally to the flag, the personnel on their eventual arrival were received very differently to how they might reasonably have expected.
Carrying a reported 1,420 deportees, the Apollon was accompanied to Rochefort by the Pluvier, with a further 300. Peremptorily, the ships were ordered to anchor in the Aix roads under the guns and fortifications of the Ile d’Oléron, and flanked by other warships. No communication was permitted with the shore, nor would the local représentants allow the crowded ships to be cleared until all aboard had been interrogated. All ratings were adjudged innocent but a Revolutionary Tribunal was set up to try thirty-four officers and sailing masters against the charge that they were involved in an agreement with the Toulon sections to similarly deliver Rochefort to the British.
The Pluvier was unfortunate in first calling at Bordeaux, where she was detained by contrary winds. Because this city had previously supported a high degree of federalist sympathies, the tribunal seized upon this as proof that her officers were involved in counter-revolutionary activities. Eventually, six naval and two infantry officers, together with a surgeon, were sentenced to death. There had been offered no proof of any complicity on the part of any of them other than their unavoidable contact with the British. For the représentants, it was sufficient to make an example, and to remind any waverers in the local population of the power of the state, exercised through them. The executions were public and carried out before a ‘frenzied’ gathering of townsfolk. Two others were sentenced to deportation, and eight of them to six months’ imprisonment.
As a matter of principle, both of the ships were quickly refurbished to prime condition by the yard at Rochefort. To exorcise any remaining taint of defection, both were renamed, the Apollon becoming the Gasparin, and the Pluvier the Commission.
The experience of the other repatriation ships was broadly similar. Each carrying 1,400 personnel, the Entreprenant and Patriote arrived at Brest on 14 October. Following isolation and interrogation, officers were incarcerated for months within the château, whose grim walls flanked the entrance to the Penfeld, where lay the arsenal. Generally, the mood here was less excitable, although six officers were sent to Paris where, following further investigation, they were executed for complicity with the dissident Toulon sections.
The National Assembly, obviously curious as to the general experience, summoned a representative party to the capital, accompanied by the Brest députés. Individuals were able to plead their case successfully and, following release on licence, were eventually fully reinstated in their ranks and grades.
The final ship of the squadron, Orion, anchored inside the Ile de Groix on 15 October. She had aboard 1,447 personnel and was actually welcomed by the commandant at Lorient who declared that, through their successful evasion of the enemy, they should be regarded ‘as brothers’. As, however, there were almost certainly ‘agents of the coalition powers’ among them, he summoned the regional représentant while detaining all on board for ‘reasons of public health’.
A search of the ship brought to light the journal of a junior officer which detailed how, on Hood’s squadron approaching Toulon on 28 August, the Orion had been moored so as to obstruct the fairway and how, throughout the ensuing night, her gunners had remained on duty, awaiting orders to resist. Later, the journal stated, the crew had refused to declaim ‘Vive le roi’ when so exhorted by Toulon’s civic representatives.
On such flimsy evidence did one’s fortunes depend during these tumultuous times. Now treated as heroes, all were released except a group of men who, for some reason unspecified, were packed off to the neighbouring Vendée to assist in the fight against insurgency. As for the Orion, she too was refitted and renamed Mucius Scévola, after another of the classical models so favoured by Montagnard idealism.
Overall, the treatment meted out to those repatriated appeared to be totally arbitrary, directed mainly at impressing upon the public conscience that any counter-revolutionary infection would be cured swiftly with unpleasant remedies. Contemporary French accounts fail to explain any logic or lines of consistency. Typically: ‘C’est ainsi qu’obéissant à l’instinct aveugle qui la poussoit à répandre le sang, la Convention frappoit indistinctment les ennemis de la révolution et ses partisans les plus zélés.’ (‘In following its blind instinct to spill blood, the Convention hits indiscriminately at the enemies of the revolution and its most zealous supporters.’)
AS THOSE REPATRIATED sailed to their various destinies, Napoleone Buonaparte, Captain of Artillery and future Emperor of France, busied himself with annoying the coalition fleet in the Petite Rade. As further guns arrived, he established a third battery (Rade) adjacent to the hamlet of Brégaillon.
There was nothing elaborate about these works. A contemporary sketch clearly depicts that of Sans-culottes. Three cannon on carriages, grouped almost as closely as on a third rate’s gun-deck, point through gaps in a low protective wall. This is apparently of broken masonry, roughly stabilized with stakes and, in places, backed by spare wooden barrels, probably packed with earth. To one side, behind the dubious cover of an earth bank, are casually stacked further large barrels, almost certainly containing the battery’s powder. A rude, existing stone building, the Chapelle de Brégaillon, provides a measure of shelter to the battery personnel while, outside, a Revolutionary banner flies provocatively from an improvised pole. In the distance, surprisingly close, is the high ground, crowned by a sémaphore, behind the key allied positions of L’Aiguillette and Balaguier. Somewhere on that high ground, allied troops are labouring, unseen, to elaborate Fort Mulgrave, a position which quite clearly enfilades those of Buonaparte and which should have been resolutely neutralized by Carteaux before it became firmly established. Ahead, and surprisingly close, the masts of allied ships spike the skyline.
Buonaparte’s prize gun, discovered in Marseille, was a 44-pounder culverin. Such weapons typically had barrels of length some twenty-five to thirty times their bore, compared with perhaps eighteen on standard cannon. This extra length conferred greater accuracy, range and consistency of aim, and the gun was quickly put to work.
As early as the night of 17/18 September, one of the navy’s improvised pontoons came under fire from the conventionnels’ batteries and was obliged to haul off. The allies were clearly concerned from the outset at this form of attack, and the fact that they did not put troops ashore to raid in force or to c
ontrol the western shoreline is evidence of the dearth of fighting men. It was already too late, for Carteaux held the area strongly and had mounted several sharp attacks against those engaged on constructing outworks. Buonaparte’s batteries near Brégaillon were just within range of Fort Malbousquet, and the Princess Royal records the despatch of a party to improve the latter’s defences, for it was not well supported by flanking works.
On the 25th the British deployed the 98-gun St George, Rear Admiral Gell’s flagship, in support of the ex-French Aurore (now British-manned) and two pontoons. Not for the first time, the navy learned that naval gunfire can rarely dominate land-based artillery. British naval gunners were trained to fire rapid broadsides at close range, so that precision aiming was rarely an issue. Thus, a broadside from the St George’s lower deck 32-pounders could throw up an impressive curtain of sand or soft earth, but this same soft ground would absorb all of its energy. The heavy balls had negligible effect, injuring the enemy only through a direct hit on an embrasure.
Accuracy of naval guns was affected also by a ship’s ranging at her anchor while, even in average conditions, there existed sufficient roll movement to affect the correct angle of elevation for a given range. Such problems did not affect the French artillery. Though far fewer, their guns were absolutely steady, and warships made targets that, with practice, became almost unmissable. To increase the navy’s discomfiture, the enemy also began to use red-hot shot, a favoured weapon known as boulets-rouges. In order to prevent the batteries annoying the anchorage at long range, it was necessary to engage them almost daily and for hours on end. A pontoon was lost and larger ships were often obliged to shift their berths.
For an interesting sidelight on this occupation, we can again thank Captain Nelson, writing to his wife.
Some of our Ships have been pegged pretty handsomely; yet such is the force of habit, that we seem to feel no danger … The other day we sat at a Court Martial on board Admiral Hotham, when Princess Royal, a French 74, our friend, three Frigates and four Mortar boats, were firing at a battery for four hours, the shot and shells going over us; which, extraordinary as it may seem, made no difference … The Ardent, Captain Robert Manners Sutton, brother to the Bishop [of Norwich], was much cut up, after behaving with the greatest gallantry and good conduct; near thirty of his men were either killed, or are since dead of the[ir] wounds …
The key defence work of Fort Malbousquet now also became the object of a steady pounding from the French batteries. Ollioules, too remote to be held permanently by allied forces, became the location of Carteaux’s headquarters, and new contingents of troops from the interior were joining him almost daily. They were billeted mainly in two large encampments at the foot of the heights behind the village. Those not required to garrison forward positions were set to work and, with the general high level of motivation typical of the republicans, showed rapid result.
From their ‘front line’ on the flats to the east of the little River Neuve, allied personnel looked across to a series of minor heights which each soon became capped by its own masked battery: the Rédoute de la Convention on the hill of Les Arènes, the Farinière on La Goubran, and the Poudrière on the Hauteur des Gaux.
To the east and north, General Lapoype was content to close and tighten his grip on the Toulon perimeter. His resident députés, Barras and Fréron, had enforced a ‘loan’ of 4 million livres from the hapless city of Marseille, which greatly facilitated victualling and general procurement for their army. The third force, from the Army of Italy, had to date made little impact and, during September, General Brunet was arrested for lack of zeal and replaced. Taken to Paris and accused by a tribunal of vaguely defined sympathies with the Toulonnais, he was executed in the November.
The village of Le Beausset, where Carteaux had earlier established his headquarters, was typical of those which declared themselves enthusiastically pro-Convention. It raised its own company of 500 Sans-culottes, which proved to be a nucleus which continuously attracted workers and seamen displaced by events in the city, now branded la ville infâme by Paris. By now, however, throughout the départemente of the Var, mobilization orders had gone out to every able-bodied male between the ages of 16 and 60.
ADMIRAL HOOD WAS considerably troubled by French activities along the western shore of the harbour. Buonaparte, despite being on somewhat distant terms with General Carteaux, who clearly regarded him as an overconfident upstart (and, possibly, a threat), had established here a virtual mastery. Allied garrisons on the western promontory and the Saint-Mandrier peninsula, although powerfully entrenched, were isolated, and now depended upon communication by water. The Corsican’s intention to capture or neutralize these positions was an ambition well understood by Hood, who equally well appreciated the implications. Buonaparte’s plan, powerfully backed by the députés, was favoured above those of the generals. Their task now was to keep allied forces stretched around the eastern and northern sides of the perimeter while, behind the relentless pounding of an increasing number of batteries, the main thrust would be readied from the west.
From the outset, Hood’s need was for more troops or, better, more British troops, over which he would have undisputed control. Unfortunately, these were simply unavailable in any number for reasons already stated. King George III, still exercising his right of input to what passed for a War Cabinet, was of the opinion that the main British strategic aim should be ‘to humble France, for nothing but her being disabled from disturbing other countries, whatever government [she may have], will keep her quiet’. In the process of achieving this aim, he informed Dundas, ‘steady attention [should be paid] to obtaining our own advantages’.
Having made a plaything of the defence budget in a desire to be all things to all people, the prime minister, Pitt, now found himself, with Grenville and Dundas, embroiled in squaring the circle of spreading inadequate military strength over a superfluity of hotspots. Into a mish-mash of uncoordinated and conflicting enterprises had suddenly appeared the great opportunity of the defection of Toulon. Hood was promised 5,000 troops but, due mainly to strong representations by the over-stretched Duke of York, these never materialized. British forces could simply be stretched no further, and any successful exploitation of Toulon would require not only a major contribution from coalition contingents but also from the French themselves, drawn from the ranks of regular troops and those National Guardsmen who, already within the perimeter, could be judged reliable.
Standards of discipline and fighting ability would be found to vary greatly, leading an exasperated Admiral Hood at one stage to describe the Spanish and Neapolitan troops as ‘dastardly trash’. The Spanish, in fact, generally cooperated well at a tactical level but their government remained deeply suspicious of British intentions, convinced that they, all too often their enemy, would turn the campaign to their own interest, particularly where the French Toulon fleet was concerned.
Some coalition governments were unhappy at the idea of allowing their troops to be commanded by leaders from other states with which relations were less than cordial. From Naples, for instance, Sir William Hamilton wrote to Hood as early as 1 September, assuring him of his Sicilian majesty’s every intention of fulfilling his agreed commitments. The letter stated, however:
Whatever Y. Lp. [Your Lordship] shall please to direct, HSM’s Officers have orders to obey. It wou’d not be so with the Spaniards (as Y.Lp. may perhaps know) that the harmony between the Courts of Madrid and Naples is not yet perfect. This Court looks upon our late Treaty as merely between Great Britain and the Two Sicilies.
All efforts by British diplomacy failed, however, to persuade Austria to honour her commitment to the Treaty of 30 August, and to send 5,000 troops. Having already despatched over 8,000 to Piedmont, the emperor was ill-disposed to incur further expense. Lord Mulgrave reinforced diplomatic pressure by travelling personally to Vienna in order to plead ‘the distress of [Austria’s] allies’, returning with an assurance from the foreign minister that he wo
uld pursue the matter. Nothing happened. During the whole period of the struggle for Toulon all further requests were met with what Mulgrave described as ‘delaying demands, excuses, pretty equivocal words and ambiguous promises’. But no troops.
On 14 September Grenville promised that 5,000 Hessians would be transferred from Flanders by the end of the month, but this never came about as Austria was still expected to stand by her word. The constant expectation of substantial reinforcement, coupled with the relative inactivity of Carteaux’s army, went far toward generating an attitude of complacency in Toulon, an assumption that the threat was slight.
Lord Mulgrave, the seasoned professional soldier, was least prepared to take chances, having been appointed commander-designate of British troops in the perimeter. At the outset, when Spanish forces greatly outnumbered the British, it was appropriate that Rear Admiral Gravina be placed in command of all troops, but large contingents were expected from the kingdoms of Sardinia and Naples. These were heavily subsidised by Britain and totally under British control. The appointment of a British commanding officer was thus appropriate. Spanish personnel would, however, remain under Gravina’s control and, although he proved to be personally cooperative and reliable, there would be sharp disagreements at lower levels, where the garrisons and combat units were mixed.
Mulgrave had his eye on the British military garrison at Gibraltar, which currently faced no threat. Following his initial inspection of the Toulon perimeter, he reported on 8 September to Hood that ‘the line of defence is now contracted as much as it can be, consistently [sic] with the security of the place’. He was, none the less, critical of the enemy’s occupation of Ollioules the day before ‘when the advanced Corps (which I had requested the Spanish Gen … to withdraw) were driven in. Y. Lp. will feel the absolute necessity of a reinforcement of British troops’. He went on:
The Fall of Toulon Page 24
