by John Keegan
On Trafalgar Day Nelson had the combined French–Spanish fleet clear in view. The encounter had come at the end of a long chase which had begun in May, taken him across the Atlantic to reach the West Indies in June, back again to the mouth of the Channel in August and finally south to the Straits of Gibraltar in September, where he blockaded Cadiz until the enemy put to sea in October. He had had a number of false starts and followed a number of false trails, but once Admiral Villeneuve had cleared the Straits of Gibraltar from the Mediterranean and set off into the deep Atlantic, Nelson had been able to make the assumption with some certainty that the French were heading for the West Indies. The campaign of Trafalgar was to prove a triumph of strategic manoeuvre. As an intelligence operation, it was not, at least in its later stages, one of complexity.
The contrast with Nelson’s earlier pursuit, discovery and destruction of a French fleet was extreme. In 1798 Nelson, recently promoted to independent command, was appointed to lead a British squadron back into the Mediterranean, from which it had been absent since late 1796, and to mount watch outside Toulon, the principal enemy naval base in the south of France. It was known that General Napoleon Bonaparte was in command of an army assembling there, that transports were gathering also, under the protection of a French battle fleet, and that an amphibious expedition was planned, directed against British interests. The question was which and where? Britain itself? Ireland? Southern Italy? Malta? Turkey? Egypt? All lay within Napoleon’s operational reach and some, Malta in particular, were stepping-stones to others. Beyond Egypt lay India, where Britain was rebuilding a substitute for the overseas empire lost in North America in 1783. If Napoleon could put to sea undetected, the Mediterranean would swallow his tracks and Nelson would discover where he had gone only when he had done his worst. The menace was guaranteed to perturb a watcher day and night. Nelson was perturbed. Before the French left port, he was anticipating their departure for “Sicily, Malta and Sardinia” and “to finish the King of Naples at a blow” but also perhaps for “Malaga and [a] march through Spain” to invade Portugal, Britain’s longest-standing ally. After they left, in late May, he was in hot pursuit, sometimes on the right track, sometimes the wrong, sometimes behind, sometimes ahead, sometimes on the wrong continent altogether. In the end he ran his quarry to earth. The scent had died in his nostrils several times, however, and his own false calculations had led him astray. Not until one o’clock in the afternoon of 1 August, when the lookout on HMS Zealous reported masts in Aboukir Bay, east of the Nile delta, had Nelson reassurance that the chase begun seventy-three days earlier had been brought to conclusion. How it had makes one of the most arresting operational intelligence stories of history.
THE STRATEGIC SITUATION IN 1798
Napoleon did not yet dominate the European world as he would as Emperor of the French after May 1804. He was not yet even First Consul, which he would be appointed in December 1799. He already promised to become, however, the leading political figure of the French Republic and was unquestionably its outstanding general, at a moment when French armies dominated Europe. The First Coalition of enemies of the French Revolution, formed in 1792 by Austria and Prussia, later joined by the north Italian kingdom of Sardinia, and enlarged by the French declaration of war on Spain, the Dutch Netherlands and Britain, had progressively fallen to pieces during the 1790s. The Netherlands had been occupied in early 1795 and reorganised as the Batavian Republic, under French control. Prussia and Spain had made peace later that year; in August 1796, under French pressure, Spain actually declared war on Britain, closing its ports in the Atlantic and the Mediterranean to the Royal Navy and adding the strength of its large fleet to that of the French.
In 1796 the young General Bonaparte confirmed his growing reputation with a series of spectacular victories in northern Italy. After defeat at the Battle of Lodi in May, the King of Sardinia made peace and ceded the port of Nice and the province of Savoy to France. During the rest of the year, Bonaparte harried the armies of the Austrian empire out of its north Italian possessions by inflicting defeats at Castiglione and Arcola. Finally, after weeks of manoeuvring around the fortress of Mantua, Bonaparte won a crushing victory at Rivoli on 14 January 1797 and drove the defeated Austrians back into southern Austria. The Austrian emperor sued for peace, concluded at Campo Formio in October. The terms included the creation of a puppet French Cisalpine Republic in northern Italy and the cession of the Austrian Netherlands (Belgium) to France. In February 1798 the French occupied Rome and made the Pope prisoner; in April, France occupied Switzerland.
The outcome of this succession of conquests was to leave Britain, which refused to make peace, without any ally except tiny Portugal, and without bases, except for the Portuguese Atlantic ports, anywhere in mainland Europe. Russia, the only powerful continental state still resistant to French influence, was keeping its counsel. Turkey, ruler of the Balkans, Greece and the Greek islands and Syria, and nominal overlord of Egypt and the pirate principalities of Tunis and Algiers, remained a French ally. The old maritime Republic of Venice had been given to Austria at the Treaty of Campo Formio but would soon pass to France. The foreign policy of the Scandinavian kingdoms, Denmark and Sweden, was subservient to that of France. As a result, not a mile of northern European or southern Mediterranean coastline—except for that of the weak kingdom of Naples, Portugal and the island of Malta—lay outside French control. The Baltic was effectively closed to the British, so were the Channel and Atlantic ports, so were the Mediterranean harbours. All Britain’s traditional overseas bases, except for Gibraltar, had been lost. In October 1796 the British government felt compelled to withdraw its fleet from the Mediterranean, where it had maintained an almost continuous presence since the middle of the seventeenth century, and to concentrate the navy in home waters. England was actually threatened by invasion; had it not been for Admiral Jervis’ defeat of the Spanish in the Atlantic off Cape St. Vincent in February 1797 and Admiral Duncan’s destruction of the Dutch fleet at the Battle of Camperdown in October, her enemies might have achieved a sufficient combination of force to fulfil the necessary conditions for a Channel crossing.
Despite the reduction in the enemy’s naval strength the two victories brought about, the Royal Navy could not rest confident of its ability to contain the threat; in October 1798 Bonaparte was appointed to command an “Army of England,” organised to sustain the pressure. Moreover, Britain correctly sought to pursue an offensive strategy, directed at checking invasion by forcing France to look to the protection of its own interests, rather than waiting passively to respond to French attacks. That required the maintenance of several separate concentrations of strength, a Channel fleet to defend the short sea crossing, an Atlantic fleet to blockade the great French bases at Brest and Rochefort and to keep an eye on the remains of the Spanish navy in Cadiz, detached squadrons to protect the British possessions in the West Indies, at the Cape of Good Hope and in India, and a host of smaller line-of-battleships and frigates to protect the convoys of merchantmen and Indiamen on which British trade, the lever of the war against France, depended.
Britain had the superiority. In 1797 it had 161 line-of-battle ships and 209 fourth-rates and frigates, against only 30 French line-of-battle ships and 50 Spanish.3 The French and Spanish did not, however, have to keep the seas, but could remain comfortably in port, awaiting their chance to sally forth at an unguarded moment, while the British ships were constantly on blockade, wearing out their masts and timbers in a battle with the elements, or else in dockyard, repairing the damage. Only two-thirds of the Royal Navy was on station at any one time, while the demands of blockade and convoy even further reduced the numbers available to form a fighting fleet for a particular mission: Duncan had only 16 ships to the Dutch 15 at Camperdown, Jervis was actually heavily outnumbered, 15 to 27, at Cape St. Vincent. Moreover, both the French and Spanish navies built new ships at a prodigious rate and found less difficulty in manning than the British did. With larger resources of manpower, the
y conscripted soldiers and landsmen to fill the naval ranks, and while the recruits included fewer experienced seamen than the British collared by the press, they were not necessarily more unwilling. The inequity of the press, the paucity of naval pay, the harshness of life aboard, caused large-scale naval strikes in the Royal Navy in the spring of 1797—the “mutinies” at Spithead and the Nore—which, for once, frightened the admirals out of thinking flogging the cure for all indiscipline. The prospect of joining action against the revolutionary French with an untrustworthy lower deck prompted immediate improvements to the lot of the common sailor.
Just in time. By the spring of 1798, a new naval threat had arisen. Unknown to the British government, the French leadership—the Directory—had relinquished for the time being the project of an invasion of England and decided to create an alternative threat to its island enemy’s strategic interests. The initiative had come from General Bonaparte. On 23 February he wrote, “To perform a descent on England without being master of the seas is a very daring operation and very difficult to put into effect . . . For such an operation we would need the long nights of winter. After the month of April, it would be increasingly impossible.”4 As an alternative, he proposed an attack on King George III’s personal homeland, the Electorate of Hanover. Its occupation would not, however, damage the commercial power of Britain. He saw another possibility: “We could well make an expedition to the Levant which would menace the commerce of the Indies.” The Levant, the region of the sunrise, lay across the shores of the eastern Mediterranean, in southern Turkey, Syria but also Egypt. Egypt was not only a fabled land but also the point at which the Mediterranean most nearly approached the Red Sea, the European means of access to the Indian Ocean and the Moghul dominions in India proper. France had not abandoned hopes of supplanting Britain as the dominant external influence in the Moghuls’ affairs, set back though its interests had been by British victories in the sub-continent in the last thirty years. A French descent on India, principal source of British overseas wealth since its loss of the American colonies, might deal a disabling blow to the Revolution’s chief enemy.
Bonaparte, moreover, had chosen the moment shrewdly. The Mediterranean was temporarily a French lake. Even given the diminished strength of its navy, enough warships could be found to escort a troop convoy from France’s southern ports to the Nile in safety, while its mercantile fleet, together with those of Spain and northern Italy, would provide transports aplenty. The withdrawal of the necessary force would not significantly deplete that required to sustain dominance over the defeated Austrians or to deter Russia from intervention in Western Europe. Moreover, an expedition would not be effectively opposed. Though Egypt was legally part of the Ottoman empire, under a Turkish governor, there was no proper Turkish garrison in the country. Power rested, as it had done since the thirteenth century, with the Mamelukes, a corporation of nominal slaves, purchased on the borders of Central Asia and trained as cavalrymen, who had usurped authority and used it to perpetuate their privileges. Though fiercely brave, they numbered only 10,000, and their ritualised horsemanship was tactically anomalous on a gunpowder battlefield. The local infantry they commanded was a half-hearted force.
Bonaparte found little difficulty, therefore, in persuading the French Foreign Minister, Charles de Talleyrand, that an Egyptian expedition was the next military step the Republic should take. Talleyrand enumerated the advantages, which included, surprisingly in view of the long-established Franco-Turkish entente, “just reprisal for the wrongs done us” by the Sultan’s government but also, more practically, “that it will be easy,” that it would be cheap and that “it presents innumerable advantages.”5 The five Directors argued against, more or less forcefully, but were worn down one by one. On 5 March 1798, they gave their formal assent to the operation.
Preparations then proceeded apace. Toulon was nominated the port of concentration; it was base to the thirteen warships—nine of 74 guns, three of 80, one (L’Orient) of 120—which would form the escort and battle fleet. An order stopping the movement of merchant shipping out of Toulon and neighbouring ports quickly permitted the requisitioning of enough transports, half French, the rest Spanish and Italian, to embark the army. Fewer would have been preferable, for such a large number made a conspicuous presence, but contemporary Mediterranean merchantmen were too small to carry more than 200 men each. Some were also needed to carry horses, guns and stores. As a convoy keeping strict station a cable’s length (200 yards) apart, transports would occupy a square mile of sea. In practice, the varied quality of the vessels and their masters’ seamanship guaranteed straggling over a much wider area.
The Army of the Orient eventually numbered 31,000 men: 25,000 infantry, 3,200 gunners and engineers, 2,800 cavalry. Only 1,230 horses were embarked, however, Bonaparte believing that he could commandeer sufficient extra mounts in Egypt to supply the deficiency in charger and draught teams. It was a prudent decision. Horses were difficult to load, difficult to stable aboard and, however carefully tended, all too ready to die at sea. Their fodder also occupied a disproportionate amount of the cargo space, in which room had to be found for two months’ food for the troops. Correctly, Bonaparte, or more probably Berthier, the future marshal who was already his trusted chief of staff, doubted the ready availability of rations in Egypt. The army was organised into five divisions, among whose officers was another future Marshal of the Empire, General Lannes. The officers of the fleet, commanded by Admiral Baraguey d’Hilliers, included Admiral Ganteaume, who would lead Nelson a dance in the months before Trafalgar, and Admiral Villeneuve, his tragic opponent in that battle. L’Orient, the flagship, was commanded by Captain Casabianca, father of the boy who would stand on the burning deck at the coming encounter of the Nile.
NELSON LOSES THE FRENCH FLEET
Brueys, the French admiral in Lommand, sailed from Toulon on 19 May, his 22 warships protecting a convoy of 130 merchantmen, filled with soldiers, horses, guns, stores and heavy equipment. Proceeding eastward at 37 miles a day, they headed first towards the northern point of the island of Corsica, steering to make a junction with a separate convoy of 72 ships from Genoa, which they did on 21 May. On 28 May they were joined by another convoy of 22 merchantmen from Ajaccio in Corsica, and on 30 May by the final complement of 56 ships, which had left Civita Vecchia, on the Italian mainland, on the 26th. The combined fleet, now numbering 280 transports, besides its escorting warships, set a course down the eastern side of the island of Sardinia, heading towards Sicily. It cleared the southernmost point of Sardinia on 5 June.
Nelson easily should have been up with it. He was not. The sea had sprung a surprise upon him. His flagship had been dismasted, his scouting frigates scattered, he and his crew had barely escaped from disaster. His ploy of interception had been scuppered, and he could not hope to begin reasserting control of the operational seaspace until he had completed essential repairs and found his consorts.
Nelson had left Gibraltar on 8 May, with his flag in Vanguard, 74 guns, commanded by Captain Edward Berry, and in company with Orion, 74 (Captain James Saumarez) and Alexander, 74 (Captain Alexander Ball). Admiral Lord St. Vincent, commander of the fleet off Spain and his superior, had given him three frigates, Emerald, 36, Terpsichore, 32, and Bonne Citoyenne, a sloop rather than frigate, of 20 guns. He had also assigned him another ten 74s, a 50-gun ship, Leander, and the brig Mutine, which were to join later.
Nelson’s departure did not go unnoticed, and Alexander was actually struck by a shot from a Spanish shore battery. He arrived nevertheless, apparently undetected, 70 miles south of Toulon on 20 May, “not discovered by the enemy, though close to their ports . . . and exactly in the position for intercepting the Enemy’s ships,”6 as Captain Berry wrote to his father. Moreover, Terpsichore had captured a prize, from which it was learnt that Bonaparte had arrived at Toulon and that fifteen warships were ready for sea, and, though it was not yet known when or whither they would sail, the intelligence gave Nelson and his captains assu
rance that they were in the right spot, ahead of time.
Then the wind began to freshen. Vanguard had sent up its topgallant masts, usually sent down when bad weather threatened. In the early morning of 21 May, Vanguard, still under topgallant masts, lost its main topmast, and with it two men, one swept overboard, one killed by falling to the deck. By daybreak, the mizzen topmast had gone as well, the foremast altogether, and the bowsprit was sprung in three places. The ship was almost unmanageable, could be sailed only on a broad reach—at right angles to the wind, which was approaching Force 12 on the Beaufort scale—and was driving towards the rocky west coast of Corsica, on which, unless brought about by some means, she would shortly dash to pieces.
The situation demanded any remedy, however unpromising. The rigging of a spritsail under the creaking bowsprit, an antique device not in naval use for many decades, succeeded in bringing up her head. Very slowly, she was worn round with the wind until she was pointing away from Corsica and so, during the course of the morning, as spars and standing rigging were hacked into the sea, clawed off the lee shore. On 22 May, as the hurricane abated, Alexander was able to pass a tow and began to drag Vanguard southward towards the west coast of Sardinia. By late afternoon, with the wind moderating, a safe haven between Sardinia and the island of San Piétro was in sight; but the danger of driving ashore still threatened. Nelson signalled an order to Alexander to cast off the tow. It was refused and, very gradually, Vanguard was brought to anchor on the morning of 23 May. The captain of Alexander, Alexander Ball, of whom Nelson had hitherto had a very guarded opinion, became henceforth one of his most valued advisers.
