LEEWARD LINE.

Ships. Guns. Commanders.

Royal Sovereign 100 {Vice-Admiral Collingwood. {Captain Rotherham. Belleisle 74 " Hargood. Mars 74 " Duff. Tonnant 80 " Tyler. Bellerophon 74 " Cooke. Colossus 74 " Morris. Achille 74 " King. Dreadnought 98 " Conn. Polyphemus 64 " Redmill. Revenge 74 " Moorsom. Swiftsure 74 " Rutherford. Defiance 74 " Durham. Thunderer 74 Lieutenant Stockham. Defence 74 Captain Hope. Prince 98 " Grindall.

Besides one frigate of 38 guns, three of 36, and two brigs of 12 and 8 guns.

This was the fleet that lay off Cape Sta. Maria, some fifty miles from Cadiz, on Saturday, 19 October, 1805, and received from the frigates watching the port the message, passed on by connecting ships, that the enemy was at last coming out.

Villeneuve, like Nelson, had originally divided his fleet into three divisions. On the day of battle it fought in an order which was (as we shall see) partly the result of chance, arrayed in a long double line. He had deliberately mixed together in his array the French and Spanish units of his fleet, to avoid the dangers that might arise from mutual jealousies if they were drawn up in divisions apart. Instead of giving the list of his fleet according to the ordre de bataille drawn up in Cadiz harbour long before the event, it will be more convenient to arrange the list as they actually lay in line from van to rear on the day of battle.

The following, then, is the list of the allied Franco-Spanish fleet:

Ships. Guns. Commanders.

[*] Neptuno 80 Scipion 74 Captain Bellanger. Intrepide 74 Commodore Infernet. Formidable 80 {Rear-Admiral Dumanoir le Pelley. {Captain Letellier. [*] Rayo 100 Commodore Macdonel. Duguay-Trouin 74 Captain Touffet. Mont Blanc 74 Commodore La Villegris. [*] San Francisco de Asis 74 Captain de Flores. [*] San Agustino 74 " Cagigal. Heros 74 " Poulain. [*] Santisima Trinidad 130 {Rear-Admiral Cisneros. {Commodore de Uriarte. Bucentaure 80 {Vice-Admiral Villeneuve. {Captain Magendie. Neptune 80 Commodore Maistral. Redoutable 74 Captain Lucas. [*] San Leandro 64 " Quevedo. [*] San Justo 74 " Gaston. Indomptable 80 Commodore Hubert. [*] Santa Ana 112 Vice-Admiral de Alava. Fougueux 74 Captain Baudouin. [*] Monarca 74 " Argumosa. Pluton 74 Commodore Cosmao Kerjulien. []Algeciras 74 {Rear-Admiral Magon. {Captain Letourneur. [*][]Bahama 74 Commodore Galiano. []Aigle 74 Captain Gourrege. []Swiftsure[#] 74 " Villemadrin. []Argonaute 74 " Epron. [*][]Montanez 74 " Alcedo. [*][]Argonauta 80 " Pareja. []Berwick 74 Commodore Filhol-Camas. []San Juan Nepomuceno 74 " de Churucca. []Ildefonso 74 " de Vargas. []Achille 74 Captain Denieport. []Principe de Asturias 112 {Admiral Gravina. {Rear-Admiral Escano.

Besides five 40-gun frigates and two corvettes, one of 18, the other of 16 guns.

[*] Names of Spanish ships are distinguished by being marked with an asterisk.

[+] Ships of the "Squadron of Observation" originally intended to act independently under Gravina.

[#] Formerly British.

So far as mere figures can show it, the relative strength of the opposing fleets may be thus compared:—

Line of Battle. Lighter Ships.

Brigs and Ships. Guns. Frigates. Guns. corvettes. Guns.

British fleet 27 2148 4 146 2 20 Allied fleet 33 2626 5 200 2 30

But here once more—as so often happens in naval war—the mere reckoning up of ships and guns does not give the true measure of fighting power. The British fleet was immeasurably superior in real efficiency, and the French and Spanish leaders knew this perfectly well.

The morning of 19 October was fine and clear with the wind from the shore. So clear was the day that the lookout in the foretop of the "Euryalus" could see the ripples on the beach. As the sun rose the enemy's ships were seen to be setting their topsails, and one by one they unmoored and towed down towards the harbour mouth. It was a long process working the ships singly out of harbour. Blackwood, of the "Euryalus," stood close in, and from early morning till near 2 p.m. was sending his messages to the distant fleet.

Hoisted 7.20 a.m. transmitted to the "Victory" soon after 9 a.m.: "The enemy's ships are coming out."

11 a.m.: "Nineteen under sail. All the rest have top-yards hoisted except Spanish rear-admiral and one line-of-battle ship."

About 11.3: "Little wind in harbour. Two of the enemy are at anchor."

Noon: "Notwithstanding little wind, enemy persevere to get outward. The rest, except one line, ready, yards hoisted."

Just before 2 p.m.: "Enemy persevering to work outward. Seven of line already without and two frigates."

When the fleet began to show in force outside, Blackwood drew off to a distance of four miles from the shore and still watched them. He knew the "Euryalus" could outsail the fastest of the enemy if they tried to attack him. His business was to keep them under observation. He could see that for want of wind they were forced to work out ship after ship by towing them with rowing-boats. He knew they could not be all out till the Sunday morning, and he knew also that Nelson had acknowledged his messages and was beating up nearer and nearer to the port, though with the light winds he could only make slow progress. Unless the enemy scuttled back into the harbour a battle was inevitable.

On the Sunday morning (20 October) the wind freshened and enabled Villeneuve to bring out the last of his ships. They were hardly out when the wind changed and blew strong from the south-west, with squalls of rain. The French admiral signalled the order to tack to the southward under shortened sail. The fleet had been directed to sail in five parallel divisions, each in line ahead, but for want of training in the crews the ships lost station, and the formation was very irregular. At four in the afternoon the wind changed again to the north-west, but it was very light and the fleet moved slowly. To the westward all day the "Euryalus" and "Sirius" frigates were seen watching Villeneuve's progress, and just as darkness was closing in one of the French frigates signalled that there were twenty sail coming in from the Atlantic.

If there had been more wind, Villeneuve might have crowded all sail for the Straits, but he could only creep slowly along. Flashes and flares of light to seaward showed him the British were exchanging night signals in the darkness. He felt he was closely watched, and he was haunted by the memory of the disastrous night battle in Aboukir Bay. Though the wind had gone down the sea was rough, with a heavy swell rolling in from the westward, the well-known sign of an Atlantic storm that might break on the Spanish coast before many hours. The flickering signals of the British fleet seemed to come nearer as the darkness of the moonless autumn night deepened, and about nine a shadowy mass of sails was seen not far off. It was the "Euryalus" that had closed in with every light shaded to have a near look at the enemy.

There was an alarm that the British were about to attack, and Villeneuve signalled to clear for action and form the prescribed double line of battle. The sharp drumbeats from the French ships, the lighting up of open ports, the burning of blue lights, showed Blackwood what was in progress. It was nearly two hours before the lines were formed, and there was much confusion, ships slipping into stations not assigned to them; and Gravina, who had been directed to keep twelve of the best ships as an independent reserve, or "squadron of observation," placing them in the line instead of forming independently. Then the fleet went about, reversing its order. Villeneuve had given up the idea of reaching the Straits without a battle, and was anxious to have the port of Cadiz under his lee when the crisis came.

Nelson's fleet, in two columns in line ahead, was drawing nearer and nearer to his enemy. Between the two fleets the "Euryalus" flitted like a ghost, observing and reporting every move of the allies, and sometimes coming quite near them. When the enemy reversed their order of sailing, Blackwood's ship was for a short time ahead of their double line, and saw the allied fleet looking like "a lighted street some six miles long."

After midnight the alarm in the Franco-Spanish fleet had passed off, and all the men who could be spared had turned in. At dawn on the Monday the French frigate "Hermione" reported the enemy in sight to windward, and at seven Villeneuve again gave the order to clear for action.

The sight of the allied fleet had called forth a great outburst of exultation on board of Nelson's ships. "As the day dawned," wrote one of his officers, "the horizon appeared covered with ships. The whole force of the enemy was discovered standing to the southward, distant about nine miles, between us and the coast near Trafalgar. I was awakened by the cheers of the crew and by their rushing up the hatchways to get a glimpse of the hostile fleet. The delight they manifested exceeded anything I ever witnessed."

Opposing fleets separated by only nine miles of sea would in our day be exchanging long-range fire after a very few minutes of rapid approach. It was to be nearly six hours before Nelson and Villeneuve came within fighting distance. The wind had become so slight that the British fleet was often moving at a speed of barely more than a knot over the grey-green ocean swells.

Still anxious to fight, with Cadiz as a refuge for disabled ships, Villeneuve presently signalled to his fleet to go about. After they altered their order of sailing and began to sail to the northward, moving very slowly with the wind abeam (close-hauled on the port tack), the course of the "Victory" was a little north of east, directed at first to a point about two and a half miles ahead of the leading ship of the enemy. The "Royal Sovereign," leading the leeward line on a parallel course, was about a mile to the southward. As the allied fleet was moving so as presently to cross the course of the British, the result would be that at the moment of contact the line led by the "Victory" would come in a little ahead of the enemy's centre, and the "Royal Sovereign" to the rearward of it. But the courses of the two fleets did not intersect at right angles. Many of the current plans of the battle, and, strange to say, the great model at the Royal United Service Institution (though constructed while many Trafalgar captains were still living), are misleading in representing the British advance as a perpendicular attack in closely formed line ahead.

In the heavy swell and the light wind the allied fleet had succeeded in forming only an irregular line when it went about. There were wide gaps, some of them covered by ships lying in a second line; and the fleet was not in a straight line from van to rear, but the van formed an obtuse angle with the rearward ships, the flat apex towards Cadiz, so that some of Nelson's officers thought the enemy had adopted a crescent-formed array. At the moment of contact Collingwood's division was advancing on a course that formed an acute angle of between forty and fifty degrees with the line and course of the French rear. The result would be that the ships that followed the "Royal Sovereign" were brought opposite ship after ship of the French line and could fall upon them almost simultaneously by a slight alteration of the course. But the French van line lay at a greater angle to the windward attack, and here the British advance was much nearer the perpendicular.

Nelson had in his memorandum forbidden any time being wasted in forming a regular battle-line. The ships were to attack in the order and formation in which they sailed. If the enemy was to leeward (as was the case now), the leeward line, led by Collingwood, was to fall upon his rearward ships. Meanwhile, the windward line, led by the "Victory," would cut through the enemy just in advance of the centre, and take care that the attack on the rear was not interfered with. Collingwood was given a free hand as to how he did his work. Nelson reminded the captains that in the smoke and confusion of battle set plans were likely to go to pieces, and signals to be unseen, and he left a wide discretion to every one, noting that no captain could do wrong if he laid his ship alongside of the nearest of the enemy. The actual battle was very unlike the diagram in the memorandum, which showed the British fleet steering a course parallel to the enemy up to the actual attack, and some of the captains thought that in the confusion of the fight Nelson and Collingwood had abandoned the plan. But if its letter was not realized, its spirit was acted upon. Nelson had said he intended to produce a melee, a close fight in which the better training and the more rapid and steady fire of the British would tell. It was a novelty that the two admirals each led a line into the fight. The traditional position for a flagship was in the middle of the admiral's division, with a frigate near her to assist in showing and passing signals along the line. To the French officers it seemed a piece of daring rashness for the flagships to lead the lines, exposing themselves as they closed to the concentrated fire of several ships. "This method of engaging battle," wrote Gicquel des Touches, an officer of the "Intrepide," "was contrary to ordinary prudence, for the British ships, reaching us one by one, and at a very slow speed, seemed bound to be overpowered in detail by our superior forces; but Nelson knew his own fleet—and ours." This was, indeed, the secret of it all. He knew the distant fire of the enemy would be all but harmless, and once broadside to broadside, he could depend on crushing his opponents.

This was why he did not trouble about forming a closely arrayed battle-line, but let his ships each make her best speed, disregarding the mere keeping of station and distance, so that though we speak of two lines, Collingwood's ships trailed out over miles of sea, and Nelson's seemed to the French to come on in an irregular crowd, the "Victory" in the leading place, having her two nearest consorts not far astern, but one on each quarter, and at times nearly abreast. Every stitch of canvas was spread, the narrow yards being lengthened out with the booms for the studding-sails. Blackwood had been called on board the "Victory" for a while during the advance. Nelson asked him to witness his will, and then talked to him of the coming victory, saying he would not be satisfied with less than twenty prizes. He was cheerful and talked freely, but all the while he carefully watched the enemy's course and formation, and personally directed the course of his own ship. He meant, as he had said before, to keep the enemy uncertain to the last as to his attack, and as the distance shortened he headed for a while for the enemy's van before turning for the dash into his centre. Cheerful as he was, he did not expect to survive the fight. He disregarded the request of his friends to give the dangerous post at the head of the line to another ship, and though it was known that the enemy had soldiers on board, and there would be a heavy musketry fire at close quarters, he wore on his admiral's uniform a glittering array of stars and orders.

To the advancing fleet the five miles of the enemy's line presented a formidable spectacle. We have the impressions of one of the midshipmen of the "Neptune" in a letter written after the battle, and he tells how—

"It was a beautiful sight when their line was completed, their broadsides turned towards us, showing their iron teeth, and now and then trying the range of a shot to ascertain the distance, that they might, the moment we came within point-blank (about 600 yards), open their fire upon our van ships—no doubt with the hope of dismasting some of our leading vessels before they could close and break their line. Some of the enemy's ships were painted like ourselves with double yellow streaks, some with a broad single red or yellow streak, others all black, and the noble Santissima Trinidad with four distinct lines of red, with a white ribbon between them, made her seem to be a superb man-of-war, which, indeed, she was."

The Spanish flagship was the largest ship afloat at the time, and she towered high above her consorts. It was not the first time Nelson had seen her in battle, for she was in the fleet that he and Jervis defeated twelve years before off Cape St. Vincent.

As the fleets closed the famous signal, "England expects that every man will do his duty!" flew from the "Victory." At half-past eleven the "Royal Sovereign," leading the lee line, was within a thousand yards of the enemy, making for a point a little to rearward of his centre, when the "Fougueux," the ship for which she was heading, fired a first trial shot. Other ships opened fire in succession, and the centre began firing at the "Victory" and her consorts. Not a shot in reply was fired by the British till they were almost upon the allies. In the windward line the "Victory," already under fire from eight ships of the allied van, began the battle by firing her forward guns on the port side as she turned to attack the French admiral's flagship, the 100-gun "Bucentaure."

Just as the "Victory" opened fire, at ten minutes to twelve, Collingwood, in the "Royal Sovereign," had dashed into the allied line. He passed between the French "Fougueux" and the "Santa Ana," the flagship of the Spanish Rear-Admiral Alava, sending one broadside crashing into the stern of the flagship, and with the other raking the bows of the Frenchman. "What would not Nelson give to be here!" said Collingwood to his flag-captain. The hearty comradeship of the two admirals is shown by the fact that at that moment Nelson, pointing to the "Royal Sovereign's" masts towering out of the dense smoke-cloud, exclaimed, "See how that noble fellow, Collingwood, takes his ship into action!"



Swinging round on the inside of the "Santa Ana," Collingwood engaged her muzzle to muzzle. For a few minutes of fierce fighting he was alone in the midst of a ring of close fire, the "Fougueux" raking him astern, and two Spanish and one French ship firing into his starboard side. The pressure on him decreased as the other ships of his division, coming rapidly into action, closed with ship after ship of the allied rear. Further relief was afforded by Nelson's impetuous attack on the centre.

He was steering the "Victory" to pass astern of the "Bucentaure." Captain Lucas, of the "Redoutable," the next in the line, saw this, and resolved to protect his admiral. He closed up so that his bowsprit was almost over the flagship's stern, and the "Bucentaure's" people called out to him not to run into them. The "Victory" then passed astern of the "Redoutable," raking her with a terribly destructive broadside, and then ranged up alongside of her. Lucas had hoped to board the first ship he encountered. He grappled the English flagship, and while the soldiers in the French tops kept up a hot fire on the upper decks, the broadside guns were blazing muzzle to muzzle below, and a crowd of boarders made gallant but unsuccessful attempts to cross the gap between the two ships, the plucky Frenchmen being everywhere beaten back. The "Redoutable's" way had been checked, and through the gap between her and the "Bucentaure" came the "Neptune" to engage the French flagship, while the famous "fighting 'Temeraire,'" which had raced the "Victory" into action, passed astern of the "Redoutable" and closed with the Spanish "San Justo." Ship after ship of both the British divisions came up, though there were long gaps in the lines. The "Belleisle," second of Collingwood's line, was three-quarters of a mile astern of the "Royal Sovereign" when the first shots were fired. It was nearly two hours before the rearmost English ships were engaged.

Meanwhile, the leading eight ships of the French van, commanded by Admiral Dumanoir, in the "Formidable," after firing at the "Victory" and her immediate consorts, as they came into action, had held on their course, and were steadily drifting away from the battle. In vain Villeneuve signalled to them to engage the enemy. Dumanoir, in a lame explanation that he afterwards wrote, protested that he had no enemy within his reach, and that with the light wind he found it impossible to work back, though he used boats to tow his ships round. The effort appears to have been made only when he had gone so far that he was a mere helpless spectator of the fight, and his most severe condemnation lies in the fact that without his orders two of his captains eventually made their way back into the melee and, though it was too late to fight for victory, fought a desperate fight for the honour of the flag they flew.

Dumanoir's incompetent selfishness left the centre and rear to be crushed by equal numbers and far superior fighting power. But it was no easy victory. Outmatched as they were, Frenchmen and Spaniards fought with desperate courage and heroic determination. Trafalgar is remembered with pride by all the three nations whose flags flew over its cloud of battle-smoke.

There is no naval battle regarding which we possess so many detailed narratives of those who took part in it on both sides, and it would be easy to compile a long list of stirring incidents and heroic deeds. Though the battle lasted till about five o'clock, it had been practically decided in the first hour. In that space of time many of the enemy's ships had been disabled, two had been actually taken; and, on the other hand, England had suffered a loss that dimmed the brightness of the victory.

In the first stage of the fight Nelson's flagship was engaged with the "Redoutable" alone, the two ships locked together. Presently the "Temeraire" closed on the other side of the Frenchman, and the "Victory" found herself in action with a couple of the enemy that came drifting through the smoke on the other side of her, one of them being the giant "Santisima Trinidad." Before the "Temeraire" engaged her, the "Redoutable" had been fearfully damaged by the steady fire of the "Victory," and had also lost heavily in repeated attempts to board the English flagship. Only a midshipman and four men succeeded in scrambling on board, and they were at once killed or made prisoners. Captain Lucas, of the "Redoutable," in the report on the loss of his ship, told how out of a crew of 643 officers and men, sailors and soldiers, three hundred were killed, and more than two hundred badly wounded, including most of the officers; the ship was dismasted, stern-post damaged, and steering gear destroyed, and the stern on fire; she was leaking badly, and most of the pumps had been shot through; most of the lower-deck guns were dismounted, some by collision with the enemy's sides, some by his fire, and two guns had burst. Both sides of the ship were riddled, in several places two or more ports had been knocked into one, and the after-deck beams had come down, making a huge gap in the upper-deck. The "Redoutable," already in a desperate condition, became a sinking wreck when the "Temeraire" added her fire to that of the flagship.

But the "Victory" had not inflicted this loss herself unscathed. One of her masts had gone over the side, and there had been heavy loss on her upper decks and in her batteries. The wheel was shot away. Several men had been killed and wounded on the quarter-deck, where Nelson was walking up and down talking to Captain Hardy. One shot strewed the deck with the bodies of eight marines. Another smashed through a boat, and passed between Nelson and Hardy, bruising the latter's foot, and taking away a shoe-buckle. All the while there came a crackle of musketry from a party of sharpshooters in the mizen-top of the "Redoutable," only some sixty feet away, and Nelson's decorations must have made him a tempting target, even if the marksmen did not know who he was.

At twenty minutes past one he was hit in the left shoulder, the bullet plunging downwards and backwards into his body. He fell on his face, and Hardy, turning, saw some of the men picking him up. "They have done for me at last, Hardy," he said. "I hope not," said the captain. And Nelson replied: "Yes, my backbone is shot through." But he showed no agitation, and as the men carried him below he covered his decorations with a handkerchief, lest the crew should notice them and realize that they had lost their chief, and he gave Hardy an order to see that tiller-lines were rigged on the rudder-head, to replace the shattered wheel.

His flag was kept flying, and till the action ended the fleet was not aware of his loss, and looked to the "Victory" for signals as far as the smoke allowed. He had not been ten minutes among the wounded on the lowest deck when the cheers of the crew, following on a sudden lull in the firing, told him that the "Redoutable" had struck her colours.

Twenty minutes later the "Fougueux," the second prize of the day, was secured. She had come into action with the "Temeraire" while the latter was still engaged with the "Redoutable." On the surrender of the latter the "Temeraire" was able to concentrate her fire on the "Fougueux." Mast after mast came down, and the sea was pouring into two huge holes on the water-line when the shattered ship drifted foul of the "Temeraire," and was grappled by her. Lieutenant Kennedy dashed on board of the Frenchman, at the head of a rush of boarders, cleared her upper decks, hauled down her flag, and took possession of the dismasted ship.

Between two and three o'clock no less than nine ships were taken, five Spanish and four French. Villeneuve's flagship, the "Bucentaure," was one of these. She struck a few minutes after two o'clock. At the opening of the battle she had fired four broadsides at the approaching "Victory." Nelson gave her one shattering broadside in reply at close quarters, as he passed on to attack the "Redoutable." As this ship's way was stopped, and a space opened between her and the French flagship, Captain Fremantle brought his three-decker, the "Neptune," under the "Bucentaure's" stern, raking her as he passed through the line and ranged up beside her. Then Pellew brought the "Conqueror" into action beside her on the other side, and as chance allowed her guns to bear the "Victory" was at times able to join in the attack. French accounts of the battle tell of the terrible destruction caused on board the "Bucentaure" by this concentrated fire. More than two hundred were hors de combat, most of them killed. Almost every officer and man on the quarter-deck was hit, Villeneuve himself being slightly wounded. The men could hardly stand to the guns, and at last their fire was masked by mast after mast coming down with yards, rigging and sails hanging over the gun muzzles. Villeneuve declared his intention of transferring his flag to another ship, but was told that every boat had been knocked to splinters, and his attendant frigate, which might have helped him in this emergency, had been driven out of the melee. As the last of the masts went over the side at two o'clock, the "Conqueror" ceased firing, and hailed the "Bucentaure" with a summons to surrender. Five minutes later her flag, hoisted on an improvised staff, was taken down, and Captain Atcherley, of the "Conqueror's" marines, went on board the French flagship, and received the surrender of Admiral Villeneuve, his staff-officer Captain Prigny, Captain Magendie, commanding the ship, and General de Contamine, the officer in command of the 4000 French troops embarked on the fleet.

Next in the line ahead of the "Bucentaure" lay the giant "Santisima Trinidad," carrying the flag of Rear-Admiral Cisneros. As the fleets closed, she had exchanged fire with her four tiers of guns with several of the British ships. When the melee began she came drifting down into the thick of the fight. For a while she was engaged with the "Victory" in the dense fog of smoke, where so many ships were tearing each other to pieces in the centre. The high-placed guns of the "Trinidad's" upper tier cut up the "Victory's" rigging and sent down one of her masts. The English flagship was delivered from the attack of her powerful antagonist by the "Trinidad" drifting clear of her. By this time Fremantle was attacking her with the "Neptune," supported by the "Colossus." At half-past one a third ship joined in the close attack on the towering "Trinidad," which every captain who got anywhere near her was anxious to make his prize. This new ally was the battleship "Africa." During the night she had run out to the northward of the British fleet. Nelson had signalled to her early in the day to rejoin as soon as possible, but her captain, Digby, needed no pressing. He was crowding sail to join in the battle. He ran down past Dumanoir's ships of the van squadron, putting a good many shots into them, but receiving no damage from their ill-aimed fire. Then he steered into the thick of the fight, taking for his guide the tall masts of the "Trinidad." At 1.30 he opened fire on her. At 1.58 all the masts of the "Trinidad" came down together, the enormous mass of spars, rigging, and sails going over her side into the water as she rolled to the swell. She had already lost some four hundred men killed and wounded (Admiral Cisneros was among the latter). Many of her guns had been silenced, and the fall of the masts masked a whole broadside. She now ceased firing and surrendered. In the log of the "Africa" it is noted that Lieutenant Smith was sent with a party to take possession of her. He does not seem to have succeeded in getting on board, for the "Trinidad" drifted with silent guns for at least two hours after, with no prize crew on board. It was at the end of the battle that the "Prince" sent a party to board her and took her in tow.

Another flagship, the three-decker "Santa Ana," carrying the flag of Rear-Admiral Alava, became the prize of the "Royal Sovereign." Collingwood had opened the fight by breaking the line astern of her. His raking broadside as he swept past her had put scores of her crew out of action. When he laid his ship alongside of her to leeward, it was evident from the very first that she could not meet the English ship on anything like equal terms. In a quarter of an hour his flag-captain, Rotherham, grasped Collingwood's hand, saying: "I congratulate you, sir. Her fire is slackening, and she must soon strike." But the "Santa Ana" fought to the last, till only a single gun, now here, now there, answered the steady, pounding fire of the "Royal Sovereign's" broadside. At 2.30 her colours came down. Collingwood told his lieutenant to send the Spanish admiral on board his own ship, but word was sent back that Alava was too badly wounded to be moved. More than four hundred of the "Santa Ana's" crew had been killed and wounded.

The "Tonnant," third ship in Collingwood's line, and one of the prizes taken in the Battle of the Nile, captured another flagship, that of the gallant Rear-Admiral Magon, the "Algeciras." As the "Tonnant" went through the allied line, after exchanging fire with the "Fougueux" and the "Monarca," the "Algeciras" raked her astern, killing some forty men. The "Tonnant" then swung round and engaged the "Algeciras," and was crossing her bows when Magon, trying to run his ship alongside her, to board, entangled his bowsprit in the main rigging of the English ship. She was thus held fast with only a few forward guns bearing, while most of the broadside of the "Tonnant" was raking her. From the foretop of the "Algeciras" a party of marksmen fired down on the English decks and wounded Captain Tyler badly. Admiral Magon, in person, tried to lead a strong body of boarders over his bows into the English ship. Mortally wounded, he was carried aft, and of his men only one set foot on the "Tonnant." This man was at once stabbed with a pike, and would have been killed if an officer had not rescued him.

The ships lay so close that the flashes of the "Tonnant's" guns set fire to the bows of the "Algeciras," and the flames spread to both ships. A couple of British sailors dragged the fire-hose over the hammock-nettings, and while the guns were still in action they worked to keep down and extinguish the flames. One by one the masts of the "Algeciras" went into the sea, carrying the unfortunate soldiers in the tops with them. In a little more than half an hour she lost 436 men, including most of her officers. Her position was hopeless, and at last she struck her colours. The prize crew that boarded her found Magon lying dead on the deck, with his captain, badly wounded, beside him.

The "Bellerophon" (famous for her fight at the Nile, adding to her record of hard fighting to-day, and destined to be the ship that was to receive the conqueror of Europe as a prisoner) followed the "Tonnant" into action, and found herself engaged with the Spanish "Monarca" on one side, and the French "Aigle" on the other. She came in collision with the "Aigle," and their yards locked together. The "Bellerophon's" rigging was cut to pieces; two of her masts were carried away, and numbers of her crew were struck down, her captain being wounded early in the day. A little after half-past one the "Aigle" drifted clear, and was engaged by, and in half an hour forced to strike to, the "Defiance." Meanwhile the "Bellerophon" was hard at work with two Spanish ships, the "Monarca" and the "Bahama," and so effectually battered them that at three o'clock the former was a prize, and the other surrendered half an hour later.

The "Tonnant," after her capture of Magon's ship, shared in the victory over another brave opponent, Commodore Churucca, and his ship, the "San Juan Nepomuceno." Churucca was the youngest flag-officer in the Spanish navy. He had won a European reputation by explorations in the Pacific and on the South American coasts. Keen in his profession, recklessly courageous, deeply religious, he was an ideal hero of the Spanish navy, in which he is still remembered as "El Gran Churucca," the "great Churucca," who "died like the Cid." He had no illusions, but told his friends he was going to defeat and death, and he knew that when he left Cadiz he was bidding a last farewell to the young wife he had lately married.

"The French admiral does not know his business," he said to his first lieutenant, as he watched the van division holding its course, while the two English lines rushed to the attack. As the English closed with the Spanish rear, Churucca's ship came into close action with the "Defiance," and was then attacked in succession by the "Dreadnought" and the "Tonnant." The "San Juan" fought till half her men were hors de combat, several guns dismounted, and two of the masts down. As long as Churucca lived the unequal fight was maintained. For a while he seemed to have a charmed life, as he passed from point to point, encouraging his men. He was returning to his quarter-deck, when a ball shattered one of his legs. "It is nothing—keep on firing," he said, and at first he refused to leave the deck, lying on the planking, with the shattered limb roughly bandaged. He sent for his second in command, and was told he had just been killed. Another officer, though wounded, took over the active command when at last Churucca, nearly dead from loss of blood, was carried below. He gave a last message for his wife, sent a final order that the ship should be fought till she sank, and then said he must think only of God and the other world. As he expired the "San Juan" gave up the hopeless fight. The three ships all claimed her as their prize, but it was the "Dreadnought" that took possession.

The French "Swiftsure," once English, was won back by the "Colossus," after a fight in which the "Orion" helped for a while. With her capture one-third of the enemy's whole force, including several flagships, was in English hands. The victory was won; it was now only a question of making it more and more complete.

Shortly after three o'clock the Spanish 80-gun ship "Argonauta" struck to the "Belleisle," which had been aided in her attack by the English "Swiftsure." A few minutes later the "Leviathan" took another big Spaniard, the "San Agustino," carrying her with a rush of boarders. It was about four o'clock that, after an hour of hard fighting, the "San Ildefonso" hauled down her colours to the "Defence." About this time the French "Achille" was seen to be ablaze and ceased firing. In the earlier stages of the fight she had been engaged successively with the "Polyphemus," "Defiance," and "Swiftsure." Her captain and several of her officers and nearly 400 men had been killed and wounded when she was brought to close action by the "Prince." Her fore-rigging caught fire, and the mast coming down across the decks started a blaze in several places, and the men, driven from the upper deck by the English fire, had to abandon their attempts to save their ship. She was well alight when at last she struck her colours, and the "Prince," aided by the little brig "Pickle," set to work to save the survivors of her crew. She blew up after the battle. The "Berwick" was another ship taken before four o'clock, but I cannot trace the details of her capture.

While the battle still raged fiercely, Admiral Dumanoir, in the "Formidable," was steering away to the north-westward, followed by the "Mont Blanc," "Duguay-Trouin," and "Scipion." But two ships of his division, the "Neptuno" and the "Intrepide," had disregarded his orders, and turned back to join in the fight, working the ships' heads round by towing them with boats. The "Intrepide" led. Her captain, Infernet, was a rough Provencal sailor, who had fought his way from the forecastle to the quarter-deck. Indignant at Dumanoir's conduct, he had early in the battle given orders to steer for the thickest of it. "Lou capo sur lou 'Bucentaure'!" ("Head her for the 'Bucentaure'!") he shouted in his native patois. He arrived too late to fight for victory, but he fought for the honour of his flag. After engaging several British ships, Infernet struck to the "Orion." An officer of the "Conqueror" (which had taken part in the fight with the "Intrepide") wrote: "Her captain surrendered after one of the most gallant defences I ever witnessed. His name was Infernet, and it deserves to be recorded by all who admire true heroism. The 'Intrepide' was the last ship that struck her colours." The Spanish ship that had followed the "Intrepide" into action, the 80-gun "Neptuno," had shortly before been forced to strike to the "Minotaur" and the "Spartiate," another of the prizes of Aboukir Bay.

Before these last two surrenders completed the long list of captured ships, Nelson had passed away. The story of his death in the cockpit of the "Victory" is too well known to need repetition. Before he died the cheers of his crew and the messages brought to him had told him of capture after capture, and assured him that his triumph was complete. As the firing ceased, Collingwood took over the command of the fleet, and transferred his flag from his own shattered and dismasted ship, the "Royal Sovereign," to Blackwood's smart frigate, the "Euryalus."

When the "Intrepide" struck, seventeen ships of the allied fleet had been taken, one, the "Achille," was in a blaze, and soon to blow up; four were in flight far away to the north-west, eleven were making for Cadiz, all bearing the marks of hard hitting during the fight. Some desultory firing at the nearest fugitives ended the battle. Crowds on the breakwater of Cadiz and the nearest beaches had watched all the afternoon the great bank of smoke on the horizon, and listened to the rumbling thunder of the cannonade. After sunset ship after ship came in, bringing news of disaster, and all the night wounded men were being conveyed to the hospitals.

More than half the allied fleet had been taken or destroyed. The four ships that escaped with Dumanoir were captured a few days later by a squadron under Sir Richard Strachan. The French ships that escaped into Cadiz were taken possession of by the Spanish insurgents, when Spain rose against the French, and Cadiz joined the revolt.

As the battle ended, the British fleet was, to use the expression of the "Neptune's" log, "in all directions." The sun was going down; the sky was overcast, and the rising swell and increasing wind told of the coming storm. Most of the prizes had been dismasted; many of them were leaking badly; some of the ships that had taken them were in almost as damaged a condition, and many of them were short-handed, with heavy losses in battle and detachments sent on board the captured vessels. The crews were busy clearing the decks, getting up improvised jury masts, and repairing the badly cut-up rigging, where the masts still stood. Nelson's final order had been to anchor to ride out the expected gale. Collingwood doubted if this would be safer than trying to make Gibraltar, and he busied himself getting the scattered fleet and prizes together, and tacking to the south-westward.

The gale that swept all the coasts of Western Europe caught the disabled fleet with the hostile shore under its lee. Only four of the prizes, and those the poorest ships of the lot, ever saw Gibraltar. Ship after ship went down, others were abandoned and burnt, others drove ashore. In these last instances the British prize crews were rescued and kindly treated by the Spanish coast population. One ship, the "Algeciras," was retaken by the French prisoners, and carried into Cadiz. Another, the big "Santa Ana," was recaptured as she drifted helplessly off the port.

But though there were few trophies left after the great storm, Trafalgar had finally broken the naval power of Napoleon, freed England from all fear of invasion, and given her the undisputed empire of the sea. Yet there were only half-hearted rejoicings at home. The loss of Nelson seemed a dear price to pay even for such a victory.

Some 2500 men were killed and wounded in the victorious fleet. Of the losses of the Allies it is difficult to give an estimate. Every ship that was closely engaged suffered severely, and hundreds of wounded went down in several of those that sank in the storm. For weeks after search-parties, riding along the shores from Cadiz to Cape Trafalgar gathered every day a grim harvest of corpses drifted to land by the Atlantic tides. The allied loss was at least 7000 men, and may have been considerably greater.

The news came to England, just after something like a panic had been caused by the tidings of the surrender of a whole Austrian army at Ulm. It reached Napoleon in the midst of his triumphs, to warn him that his power was bounded by the seas that washed the shores of the Continent. Well did Meredith say that in his last great fight Nelson "drove the smoke of Trafalgar to darken the blaze of Austerlitz."



CHAPTER X

THE COMING OF STEAM AND ARMOURED NAVIES

THE FIGHT IN HAMPTON ROADS

MARCH, 1862

Trafalgar was the greatest fight of the sailing-ships. There were later engagements which were fought under sail, but no battle of such decisive import. It was a fitting close to a heroic era in the history of naval war, a period of not much more than four centuries, in thousands of years. Before it, came the long ages in which the fighting-ship depended more upon the oar than the sail, or on the oar exclusively. After it, came our present epoch of machine-propelled warships, bringing with it wide-sweeping changes in construction, armament, and naval tactics.

Inventive pioneers were busy with projects for the coming revolution in naval war while Nelson was still living. The Irish-American engineer, Fulton, had tried to persuade Napoleon to adopt steam propulsion, and had astonished the Parisians by showing them his little steamer making its way up the Seine with clumsy paddles churning up the waters and much sooty smoke pouring from its tall, thin funnel. The Emperor thought it was a scientific toy. Old admirals—most conservative of men—declared that a gunboat with a few long "sweeps" or oars would be a handier fighting-ship in a calm, and if there was any wind a spread of sail was better than all the American's tea-kettle devices. Fulton went back to America to run passenger steamers on the Hudson, and tell unbelieving commodores and captains that the future of the sea power lay with the "tea-kettle ships."

In the days of the long peace that followed Waterloo, and the great industrial development that came with it, the steam-engine and the paddle-steamer made their way into the commercial fleets of the world, slowly and timidly at first, for it was a long time before a steamship could be provided with enough efficient engine power to enable her to show the way to a smart clipper-built sailing-ship, and the early marine engines were fearfully uneconomical. Steam had obtained a recognized position in small ships for short voyages, ferry-boats, river steamers, and coasting craft, but on the open ocean the sailing-ship still held its own. An eminent scientist proved to demonstration that no steamship would ever be able to cross the Atlantic under steam alone. He showed that to do so it would be necessary for her to carry a quantity of coal exceeding her entire tonnage capacity, and he expressed his readiness to eat the first steamer that made the voyage from Liverpool to New York. But he lived to regret his offer.

In 1838 the "Great Western" and the "Sirius" inaugurated the steam passenger service across the Atlantic, and the days of the liner began. By this time paddle-wheel gunboats were finding their way into the British navy, and other powers were beginning to follow the example of England. Steamships were first in action in 1840, when Sir Charles Napier employed them side by side with sailing-ships that had shared the triumphs of Nelson. This was in the attack on Acre, when England intervened to check the revolt of the Pasha of Egypt, Ibrahim, against his suzerain, the Sultan.

But still the steamship was regarded as an auxiliary. The great three-decker battleships, the smart sailing frigates, were the main strength of navies. The paddle-steamer was a defective type of warship, because her paddle-boxes and paddle-wheels, and her high-placed engines, presented a huge target singularly vulnerable. A couple of shots might disable in a minute her means of propulsion. True she had masts and sails, but if she could not use her engines, the paddles would prove a drag upon all her movements.

It was the invention of the screw-propeller that made steam propulsion for warships really practical. Brunel was one of the great advocates of the change. He was a man who was in many ways before his time, and he had to encounter a more than usual amount of official conservatist obstruction. For years the veteran officers who advised the Admiralty opposed and ridiculed the invention. When at last it was fitted to a gunboat, the "Rattler," it was obvious that it provided the best means of applying steam propulsion to the purposes of naval war. The propeller was safe under water, and the engines could be placed low down in the ship.

By 1854, when the Crimean War began, both the British and French navies possessed a number of steam-propelled line-of-battle ships, frigates, and gunboats, fitted with the screw. They had also some old paddle-ships. But in the fleets dispatched to the Baltic and the Black Sea there were still a considerable number of sailing-ships, and a fleet still did most of its work under sail. Even the steamships had only what we should now describe as auxiliary engines. The most powerful line-of-battle ships in the British navy had engines of only 400 to 600 horsepower.[17] With such relatively small power they still had to depend chiefly on their sails. Tug-boats were attached to the fleets to tow the sailing-ships, when the steamships were using their engines.

[17] Compare this with 23,000 horse-power of the "Dreadnought's" turbine engines.

Another change was taking place in the armament of warships and coast defences. The rifled cannon was still in the experimental stage, but explosive shells, which in Nelson's days were only fired from mortars at very short range, had now been adapted to guns mounted on the broadside and the coast battery. Solid shot were still largely used, but the coming of the shell meant that there would be terrible loss in action in the crowded gun-decks, and inventors were already proposing that ships should be armoured to keep these destructive missiles from penetrating their sides.

The attack on the sea front of Sebastopol by the allied fleets on 17 October, 1854, was the event that brought home to the minds of even the most conservative the necessity of a great change in warship construction. It rang the knell of the old wooden walls, and led to the introduction of armour-clad navies.

The idea of protecting ships from the fire of artillery and musketry by iron plating was an old one, and the wonder is that it did not much earlier receive practical application. The Dutch claim to have been the pioneers of ironclad building more than three hundred years ago. During the famous siege of Antwerp by the Spaniards in 1585 the people of the city built a huge flat-bottomed warship, armoured with heavy iron plates, which they named the "Finis Belli," a boastful expression of the hope that she would end the war. An old print of the "Finis Belli" shows a four-masted ship with a high poop and forecastle, but with a low freeboard amidships. On this lower deck, taking up half the length of the ship, is an armoured citadel, with port-holes for four heavy guns on each side. The roof of the citadel has a high bulwark, loopholed for musketry. On three of the masts there are also crow's-nests or round tops for musketeers.

Heavily weighted with her armour, the ship had a deep draught of water, and probably steered badly. In descending the Scheldt to attack the Spaniards she ran aground in a hopeless position under their batteries, and fell into the hands of the Spanish commander, the Duke of Parma. He kept the "Finis Belli" "as a curiosity" till the end of the siege, and then had her dismantled. If she had scored a success, armoured navies would no doubt have made their appearance in the seventeenth century.

Between the days of the "Finis Belli" and the coming of the first ironclads there were numerous projects of inventors. In 1805 a Scotchman, named Gillespie, proposed the mounting of guns and "ponderous mortars" in revolving armoured turrets, both in fortifications on shore and on floating batteries. Two years later Abraham Bloodgood, of New York, designed a floating battery with an armoured turret. During the war between England and the United States in 1812 an American engineer, John Steevens, who was a man in advance of his time, proposed the construction of a steam-propelled warship, with a ram-bow, and with her guns protected by shields. He prepared a design, but failed to persuade the Navy Department that it was practicable. His son, Robert L. Steevens, improved the design, made experiments with guns, projectiles, and armour plates, and at last in 1842 obtained a vote of Congress for the building of the "Steevens battery," a low-freeboard ram, steam-propelled, and armed with eight heavy guns mounted on her centre-line, on turntables protected by armoured breastworks. The methods of the American navy were very dilatory, professional opinion was opposed to Steevens, whose project was regarded as that of a "crank," and the ship was left unfinished for years. She was still on the stocks when the Civil War began. Then other types came into fashion, and she was broken up on the ways.

The man who introduced the armour-clad ship into the world's navies was the Emperor Napoleon III, the same who introduced rifled field artillery into the armies of the world. Like other great revolutions, this epoch-making change in naval war began in a small way. What forced the question upon the Emperor's attention was the failure of the combined French and English fleets in the attack on the sea-forts of Sebastopol on 17 October, 1854. The most powerful ships in both navies had engaged the sea-forts, and suffered such loss and injury that it was obvious that if the attack had been continued the results would have been disastrous. Some means must be found of keeping explosive shells out of a ship's gun-decks, if they were ever to engage land batteries on anything like equal terms. Under the Emperor's directions the French naval architects designed four ships of a new type, which were rapidly constructed in the Imperial dockyards. They were "floating batteries," not intended to take part in fleet actions, but only to be used against fortifications. Their broad beam, heavy lines, rounded bows, and engines of only 225 horsepower, condemned them to slow speed, just sufficient to place them in firing position. They were armoured with 4-inch iron and armed with eighteen 50-pounder guns. The port-holes had heavy iron ports, which were closed while the guns were reloading.

Three of these floating batteries, the "Devastation," "Lave," and "Tonnant," came into action against the shore batteries at Kinburn on 17 October, 1855 (the anniversary of the attack on the Sebastopol sea-forts). There was some difficulty in getting into position, as they could just crawl along, and steered abominably. But when they opened fire at 800 yards at 9 a.m. they silenced and wrecked the Russian batteries in eighty-five minutes, themselves suffering only trifling damage, and not losing a dozen men.

It was the first and last fight of the floating batteries. But while in England men were still discussing the problem of the sea-going ironclad, the French constructors were solving it. They had to look not to parliamentary and departmental committees, but to the initiative and support of an intelligent autocrat. So events went quicker in France. In 1858 the keels of the first three French sea-going armour-clads were laid down at Toulon, and next year the armoured frigate "Gloire," the first of European ironclads, was launched, and every dockyard in France was busy constructing armour-clads or rebuilding and armouring existing ships.

France had gained a start in the building of the new type of warship. When the "Dreadnought" was launched, it was said somewhat boastfully that single-handed she could destroy the whole North Sea fleet of Germany. It might be more truly said of the "Gloire" that she could have met single-handed and destroyed the British Channel or Mediterranean Fleet of the day. It was the moment when tension with France over the Orsini conspiracy had caused a widespread anticipation of war between that country and England, and had called the Volunteer force into existence to repel invasion. But the true defence must be in the command of the sea, and the first English ironclad, the old "Warrior," was laid down at the Thames Ironworks. Work was begun in June, 1859, and the ship was launched in December, 1860. She was modelled on the old steam frigates, for the special types of modern battleships and armoured cruisers were still in the future. She was built of iron, with unarmoured ends and 4 1/4-inch iron plating on a backing of 18 inches of teak over 200 feet amidships of her total length of 380 feet. There was a race of ironclad building between France and England, in which the latter won easily, and it was only for a very short time that our sea supremacy was endangered by the French Emperor's naval enterprise. But when the English and French fleets entered the Gulf of Mexico in 1861, our ships were all wooden walls, while the French admiral's flag flew on the ironclad "Normandie," the first armoured ship that ever crossed the Atlantic.

Notwithstanding this fact, American writers are fond of saying, and many Englishmen believe, that the introduction of armoured navies was the outcome of the American Civil War of the early 'sixties. All that is true is that the War of Secession gave the world the spectacle of the first fight between armour-clad ships, and the experiences of that war greatly influenced the direction taken in the general policy of designers of ironclad warships.



Towards the close of the Crimean War a Swedish engineer settled in the United States, John Ericsson, had sent to the Emperor Napoleon a design for a small armoured turret-ship of what was afterwards known as the Monitor type. He wrote to the Emperor that he asked for no reward or profit, for he was only anxious to help France in her warfare with Russia, the hereditary foe of Sweden. The war was drawing to a close, and for his future projects the Emperor wanted large sea-going ships, not light-draught vessels for work in the shallows of the Baltic. So Ericsson received a complimentary letter of thanks and a medal, and kept his design for later use. His opportunity came in the first months of the Civil War.

In the fifty years between the war of 1812 and the outbreak of the struggle between North and South, the American navy had been greatly neglected. It was a favourite theory in the United States that a navy could be improvised, and that the great thing would be, in case of war, to send out swarms of privateers to prey upon the enemy's commerce. Very little money was spent on the navy or the dockyards. On the navy list there were a number of old ships, some of which had fought against England in 1812. There were a number of small craft for revenue purposes, a lot of sailing-ships, and a few fairly modern steam frigates and smaller steam vessels depending largely on sail-power, and known as "sloops-of-war"—really small frigates.

While the dockyards of Europe had long been busy with the construction of the new armoured navies, the United States had not a single ironclad. Both parties to the quarrel had to improvise up-to-date ships.

Sea power was destined to play a great part in the conflict. As soon as the Washington Government realized that it was going to be a serious and prolonged war, not an affair of a few weeks, a general plan of operations was devised, of which the essential feature was the isolation of the Southern Confederacy. When the crisis came in 1861 the United States had done little to open up and occupy the vast territories between the Rocky Mountains and the Mississippi Valley. The population of the States was chiefly to be found between the Mississippi and the Atlantic, and in that region lay the states of the Confederacy. They were mainly agricultural communities, with hardly any factories. For arms, munitions of war, and supplies of many kinds they would have to depend on importation from beyond their frontiers. It was therefore decided that while the United States armies operated on the northern or land frontier of the Confederacy, its sea frontiers on the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico should be closely blockaded, and its river frontier, the line of the Mississippi, should be seized and held by a mixed naval and military force. For these last operations troops on the banks and gunboats on the river had to combine. It was said at the time, that on the Mississippi army and navy were like the two blades of a pair of shears, useless apart, but very effective when working together.

Strange to say, it was not the industrial North, but the agricultural South, that put the first ironclad into commission as a weapon against the coast blockade. When the Secessionist forces seized the Navy Yard at Norfolk, in Virginia, a fine steam frigate, the "Merrimac" (built in 1855), was under repair there. The guard of the dockyard set her on fire before surrendering, but the flames were extinguished, and the "Merrimac," with her upper works badly damaged, was in possession of the Southerners. A Northern squadron of frigates and gunboats, steam and sailing ships, anchored in Hampton Roads, the landlocked sheet of water into which runs not only the Elizabeth River, which gives access to Norfolk, but also the James River, the waterway to Richmond, then the Confederate capital. The northern shores of Hampton Roads were held by Federal troops, the southern by the Confederates. Presently spies brought to Washington the news that the "Rebels" were preparing a terrible new kind of warship at Norfolk to destroy the squadron in Hampton Roads and raise the blockade.

The news was true. The Confederates had cut down the "Merrimac" nearly to the water's edge and built a solid deck over her at this level. Then on the deck they erected a huge deck-house, with sloping sides pierced with port-holes for ten heavy smooth-bore guns. The funnel passed up through the roof of the deck-house. There were no masts, only a flagstaff. The flat deck space, fore and aft, and the sloping sides of the deck-house were to be armoured with four inches of iron, but there were no armour plates available. Railway iron was collected and rolled into long narrow strips, and these were bolted on the structure in two layers, laid crosswise in different directions. An armoured conning-tower, low and three-sided, was built on the front of the deck-house roof. The bow was armed with a mass of iron, in order to revive the ancient method of attack by ramming. Thus equipped the "Merrimac" was commissioned, under the command of Commodore Buchanan, and renamed the "Confederate States' ironclad steam-ram 'Virginia,'" but the ship was always generally known by her former name.

At noon on Saturday, 8 March, 1862, the "Merrimac" started on her voyage down the Elizabeth River. It was to be at once her trial trip and her first fighting expedition. She was to attack and destroy the Federal blockading fleet in Hampton Roads. Up to the last moment the ship was crowded with working men. They were cleared out of her as she cast off from the quay. As the "Merrimac" went down the river the officers were telling off the men to their stations. Not one of her guns had ever been fired. There had been a few hurried drills. Everything was improvised.

The first disappointment was to find that with the engines doing their best she could only make five knots. She steered badly, answering her helm slowly and turning on a wide circle. As one of her officers put it, "she was as unmanageable as a water-logged vessel." She drew 22 feet of water, so that she had to keep to the narrow channel in the middle of the river, and the risk of getting hopelessly aground was serious.

The Confederate troops crowded the batteries on either bank, and cheered the "Merrimac" as she went slowly down. It was a fine day, with bright sunshine and absolutely no wind, and the broad stretch of water in Hampton Roads was like a pond. At the same time a small squadron of Confederate gunboats came down the James River to co-operate in the attack. These ships were the "Yorktown" (12 guns), the "Jamestown" (2 guns), and the "Teaser" (1 gun). Two other gunboats, the "Beaufort" and the "Raleigh," followed the "Merrimac." But the chief hope of the attack was placed upon the ironclad.

The nine vessels of the blockading fleet lay along the north side of Hampton Roads, from the point at Newport News to Old Point Comfort, where the Roads open on Chesapeake Bay. They were strung out over a distance of about eight miles. The shore on that side was held by the Federals, and the point at Newport News bristled with batteries. Near the point were anchored the sailing frigate "Congress," of 50 guns, and the sloop "Cumberland," a full-rigged three-master, armed with 30 guns. On board the Federal ships there was not the remotest expectation of attack. Clothes were drying in the rigging. A crowd of boats lay alongside. It was known that the Confederates had been busy converting the old "Merrimac" into an armoured ram at Norfolk Navy Yard, but it was not believed that she was yet ready for action. The men had just eaten their dinners, and were having a pipe, when the first alarm was raised. By the wharf at Newport News lay a tug-boat, the "Zouave," which had been armed with a 30-pounder gun, and was rated as a gunboat and tender to the fleet. Her captain noticed the smoke of steamers coming down the Elizabeth River, and cast off from the wharf and went alongside the "Cumberland." The officer of the watch told him to run across to the river mouth and find out what was coming down from Norfolk.





"It did not take us long to find out," he says, "for we had not gone over two miles when we saw what to all appearances looked like the roof of a very big barn belching forth smoke as from a chimney. We were all divided in opinion as to what was coming. The boatswain's mate was the first to make out the Confederate flag, and then we all guessed it was the 'Merrimac' come at last."

The little "Zouave" fired half a dozen shots, which fell short. The "Merrimac" took no notice of this demonstration, but steadily held her way. Then the "Cumberland" signalled to the "Zouave" to come back, and she ran past the anchored warships and under shelter of the batteries. These were now opening fire on the Confederate gunboats issuing from the James River. The "Congress" and "Cumberland" had cleared for action and weighed anchor. Other ships of the fleet had taken the alarm, and were coming up into the Roads to help their consorts. The Confederate batteries at Sewell's Point opened fire at long range against these ships as they stood into the Roads.

The "Merrimac" was steering straight for the "Cumberland," in grim silence, her unarmoured consorts keeping well astern. When the range was about three-quarters of a mile the two Federal ships opened fire with the heavy guns mounted on pivots on their upper decks, and the shore batteries also brought some guns to bear. A heavy cannonade from sea and shore was now echoing over the landlocked waters, but the "Merrimac" fired not a gun in reply. A few cannon-shot struck her sloping armoured sides, and rebounded with a ringing clang. The rest ricochetted harmlessly over the water, throwing up sparkling geysers of foam in the bright sunlight.

At last, when the range was only some 500 yards, the bow-gun of the "Merrimac" was fired at the "Cumberland," with an aim so true that it killed or wounded most of the men at one of her big pivot-guns. A moment after the ram was abeam of the "Congress," and fired her starboard battery of four guns into her at deadly close range. With the projectiles from 25 guns of the "Congress" and 15 of the "Cumberland" rattling on her armour, riddling her funnel, and destroying davits, rails, and deck-fittings, the "Merrimac" steamed straight for the "Cumberland," which made an ineffectual attempt to avoid the coming collision. At the last moment some men were killed and wounded in the gun-deck of the ram by shots entering a port-hole. Then came a grinding crash as the iron ram of the "Merrimac" struck the "Cumberland" almost at right angles on the starboard side under her fore-rigging. On board the Confederate ship the shock was hardly felt. But the "Cumberland" heeled over with the blow, and righted herself again as the "Merrimac" reversed her engines and cleared her, leaving a huge breach in the side of her enemy. The ram had crushed in several of her frames and made a hole in her side "big enough to drive a coach and horses through." The water was pouring into her like a mill-race.

From the "Merrimac," lying close alongside with silent guns, came a hail and a summons to surrender. From the deck of the "Cumberland" her commander, Morris, replied with a curt refusal. The firing began again; the "Cumberland's" men, driven from the gun-deck by the inrush of rising water, took refuge on the upper deck. Some jumped overboard and began swimming ashore. Others kept her two pivot-guns in action for a few minutes. Then with a lurch she went down. Boats from the shore saved a few of her people. Those who watched from the batteries could hardly believe their eyes as they saw the masts of the warship sticking out of the water where a few minutes ago the "Cumberland" had waited in confidence for the attack of the improvised "rebel" ironclad.

As her adversary went down, the "Merrimac" turned slowly to menace the "Congress" with the same swift destruction. She took no notice of the harmless cannonade from the shore. Lieutenant Smith, who commanded the "Congress," had realized that collision with the enemy meant destruction, rapid and inevitable, and decided that his best chance was to get into shoal water under the batteries. He had slipped his cable, shaken out some of his sails, and signalled to the tug-boat "Zouave" to come to his help. The "Zouave" made fast to the "Congress" on the land side, but she had not moved far when the ship grounded within easy range of the "Merrimac's" guns. These were already in action against her.

The leading ship of the seaward Federal squadron, the frigate "Minnesota," had come in within long range, and opened on the "Merrimac" and the gunboats. But she had only fired a few shots when she also ran aground on the edge of the main channel, but in such a position that some of her guns could still be brought to bear. Taking no notice of this more distant foe, the "Merrimac" devoted all her attention to the "Congress." She sent a broadside into the stranded frigate, and then passing under her stern, raked her fore and aft and set her on fire. Lieutenant Smith, of the "Congress," was badly wounded. Lieutenant Prendergast, who succeeded to the command, decided that with his ship aground and the enemy able quietly to cannonade her without coming under fire of most of her guns, to prolong the fight would be to waste life uselessly. After consulting his wounded chief he dipped his colours and displayed a white flag. The little "Zouave" cast off from the frigate, and as she cleared her, fired a single shot from her one gun at the "Merrimac," and then ran down to the "Minnesota." This shot led afterwards to a false report that the "Congress" had reopened fire treacherously after surrendering.

Civil war has often been described as fratricidal. In this action between the "Congress" and the "Merrimac" two brothers were opposed to each other. Commodore Buchanan, who commanded the "Merrimac," knew, when he attacked the "Congress," that a younger brother of his was a junior officer of the frigate. The younger man escaped unscathed, but the commodore was slightly wounded during the fight. When the "Congress" struck her colours, Buchanan ordered two of the gunboats to take off her crew. Her flag was secured to be sent to Richmond as a trophy. While the gunboats "Raleigh" and "Beaufort" were taking off the Federal wounded, there came from the batteries on shore a heavy fire of guns and rifles. Several of the wounded and two officers of the "Raleigh" were killed, and the gunboats drew off, leaving most of the crew of the "Congress" still on board. They escaped to the shore in boats and by swimming. Meanwhile the "Merrimac" fired a number of red-hot shot into her, and she was soon ablaze fore and aft. Then the ironclad turned and fired at the "Minnesota."

The sun was going down and the tide was running out rapidly. The deep draught of the "Merrimac" made the risk of grounding, if she closely engaged the "Minnesota," a serious matter. So Buchanan signalled to the gunboats to cease fire, and, accompanied by them, steamed over to the south side of the Roads, where he anchored for the night under the Confederate batteries, intending to complete the destruction of the Federal fleet next morning.

The first day's fight was over. It had been a battle between the old and the new—between a steam-propelled armoured ram and wooden sailing-ships. The "Cumberland" had been sunk, the "Congress" forced to surrender and set on fire, and the "Minnesota" was hopelessly aground and marked down as the first victim for next day. The Federals had lost some two hundred men. The Confederates only twenty-one. Buchanan was wounded, not severely, but seriously enough for the command of the "Merrimac" to be transferred to Lieutenant Jones. As night came on the moon rose, but the wide expanse of water was lighted up, not by her beams only, but also by the red glare from the burning "Congress." The flames ran up her tarred rigging like rocket trails, masts and spars were defined in flickers of flame. At last, with a deafening roar that was heard for many a mile, she blew up, strewing the Roads with scattered wreckage.

At ten o'clock that evening, while the "Congress" was still burning, a strange craft had steamed into the Roads from the sea, all unnoticed by the Confederates. She anchored in the shallow water between the "Minnesota" and the shore. Her light draught enabled her to go into waters where less powerful fighting-ships would have grounded. To use the words of one who first saw her as the sun rose next day, she looked like a plank afloat with a can on top of it. She was Ericsson's ironclad turret-ship, the "Monitor."

In the first weeks of the war inventors had besieged the United States Navy Department with proposals for the construction of ironclad warships. The Department was still leisurely debating as to what policy should be adopted, when news came that the "Merrimac," half-burnt at Norfolk Yard, was being reconstructed as an armoured ram, and it became urgent to provide an adversary to meet her on something like equal terms. It was at this moment that John Ericsson came forward with his offer to construct an armoured light-draught turret-ship, which could be very rapidly built and put in commission. This last point was of cardinal importance, for report said that work on the "Merrimac" was far advanced, and no ship could be built on ordinary lines, of sufficient power to meet her, in the time now available. The vessel must be of light draught to work in the shallow coast waters, creeks, and river mouths of the Southern States. She might have to fight in narrow channels, where there would not be room for manoeuvring to bring broadside guns to bear. Ericsson, therefore, proposed that her armament should be a pair of heavy guns mounted in a turret, which could be revolved so as to point them in any direction, independently of the position of the ship herself.

The hull was to be formed of two portions, a kind of barge-like structure or lower hull, built of iron, and mostly under water when the ship was afloat, and fixed over this the upper hull, a raft-like structure, wider and longer, and with overhanging armoured sides and lighter deck-armour. The dimensions were—

Upper part of hull, length 172 feet, beam 41 feet. Lower hull, length 122 feet, beam 34 feet. Depth, underside of deck to keel-plate, 11 feet 2 inches. Draught of water, 10 feet.

Engines and boilers were aft, and the long overhang of the armoured deck astern protected the under-water rudder and screw propeller. In the overhang at the bow there was a well, in which the anchor hung under water. Forward, near the bow, there was a small armoured pilot-house, or, as we now call it, "conning-tower." Amidships, in an armoured turret, were mounted two heavy smooth-bore guns, of large calibre, and throwing a round, solid shot.

The conning-tower was built of solid iron blocks, nine inches thick. The sight-holes were narrow, elongated slits. This was the helmsman's station.

The committee to which Ericsson's plans were referred was at first hostile; some of the members declared that the ship would not float, that her deck would be under water, and she would be swamped at once. Further objections were that no crew could live in the under-water part of the hull. But at length all objections were met, and the Swedish engineer was told that his plans were accepted, and that a regular contract would be drawn up for his signature. Ericsson knew the value of time, and before the contract was ready the keel plates of his turret-ship had been rolled and a dozen firms had started work on her various parts. While the ship was being built, he proposed she should be named the "Monitor," and the name became a general term for low-freeboard turret-ships.



The keel of the ship was laid at Greenpoint Yard, Brooklyn, in October, 1861. She was launched on 30 January, 1862. The work of completing and fitting was carried on day and night, and she was commissioned for service on 25 February, 1862. But even when her crew were on board there were a number of details to be completed. Workmen were busy on her almost up to the moment of her departure from New York harbour nine days later, so there was no chance of drilling the men and testing the guns and turret.

Lieutenant Worden, United States Navy, was promoted to the rank of captain and given command. He formed a crew of volunteers for what was considered a novel and exceptionally dangerous service. Officers and men numbered fifty-eight in all.

On the morning of Thursday, 6 March (two days before the "Merrimac's" attack on the "Cumberland"), the "Monitor" left New York in tow of the tug "Seth Low," bound for Hampton Roads. The two days' voyage southwards along the coast was an anxious and trying time, and though the weather was not really bad, the "Monitor" narrowly escaped foundering at sea.

At 4 p.m. on the Saturday she was off Cape Henry, and the sound of a far-off cannonade was heard in the direction of Hampton Roads. The officers rightly guessed that the "Merrimac" was in action. It was after dark that the turret-ship steamed up the still water of the landlocked bay, amid the red glare from the burning "Congress." She anchored beside the United States warship "Roanoke." On board the fleet which eagerly watched her arrival there were general disappointment and depression at seeing how small she was.

Worden shifted his anchorage in the night, and taking advantage of the "Monitor's" light draught steamed up the Roads, and anchored his ship in the shallow water to landward of the stranded "Minnesota."

There was not much sleep on board the "Monitor" that night, tired as the men were. At 2 a.m. the "Congress" blew up in a series of explosions. After that the men tried to settle down to rest, but before dawn all hands were roused to prepare for the coming fight. A little after 7 a.m. the "Merrimac" was seen steaming slowly across the bay, escorted by her flotilla of gunboats. She was coming to complete the destruction of the United States squadron, and had marked down the "Minnesota" as her first victim, in blissful ignorance of the arrival of the "Monitor." Worden realized that if he allowed the fight to take place near the stranded ship, the "Merrimac" might engage him with one of her broadsides, and use the other to destroy the "Minnesota." He therefore steamed boldly out into the open water, challenging the Confederate ram to a duel. As he approached the wooden gunboats prudently turned back and ran under the shelter of the Confederate batteries on the south shore, leaving the "Merrimac" to meet the "Monitor" in single combat.

So that Sunday morning, 9 March, 1862, saw the first battle between ironclad ships, with North and South, soldiers, sailors, and civilians anxiously watching the combat from the ships in the Roads and the batteries on either shore.

Worden was in the pilot-house with a quartermaster at the wheel, and a local pilot to assist him. His first lieutenant, Dana Greene, commanded the two 11-inch guns in the turret. The "Merrimac" was the first to open fire. Worden waited to reply till she was at close quarters, then stopped his engines, let his ship drift, and sent the order by speaking-tube to the turret, "Commence firing!" The "Monitor's" turret swung round, and her two guns roared out, enveloping both ships in a fog of powder smoke as the huge cannon-balls crashed on the sloping armour of the "Merrimac." They did not penetrate it, but the theory of the Northern artillerists was that the hammering of heavy round shot on an enemy's armour would start the plates, shear bolt and rivet heads, and crush in the wooden backing, and so gradually succeed in making a breach in the armour somewhere. But throughout this fight at close quarters the "Merrimac's" cuirass remained intact.



The Southern ship was replying with a much more rapid fire from her broadside guns. Hit after hit thundered on the "Monitor's" turret, but its plating held good, though the sensation of being thus pummelled was anything but pleasant to the men inside. At an early stage of the fight a quartermaster was disabled in a startling way. He was leaning against the inside of the turret, when a shot struck it just outside. The momentary yielding of the plating to the blow passed on the shock to the man's body, and he fell stunned and collapsed, and had to be carried below.

Although the speaking-tube from conning-tower to turret was inside the armoured deck, a similar action of a shot, that did not penetrate, smashed it up, and after this orders had to be passed with difficulty by a chain of men. And this was not the only trouble the crew of the "Monitor" had to contend with. But the "Monitor," with all her defects, had the great advantage over the "Merrimac" of a slightly greater speed and of a much greater handiness. Her turning circle was much smaller than that of the larger ship, and she could choose her position, and evade with comparative ease any attempt of her clumsy adversary to ram and run her down. The "Merrimac," with her damaged funnel and diminished draught on her furnaces, found it even more difficult than on the previous day to get up speed. At times she was barely moving. Her depth was also a drawback in the narrow channel. While the light-draught "Monitor" could go anywhere, the "Merrimac," drawing 22 feet of water, was more than once aground, and was got afloat again after many anxious efforts.

The "Monitor" had a good supply of solid shot; the "Merrimac" very few, for she had been sent out, not to fight an armour-clad, but to destroy a wooden fleet. Finding that his shell-fire was making no impression on the "Monitor's" turret, and recognizing the difficulty of ramming his enemy, Commander Jones made up his mind to disregard the "Monitor" for a while, and attempt to complete the destruction of the "Minnesota." He therefore ordered his pilot to steer across the Roads, and take up a position near the stranded frigate. The pilot afterwards confessed that he was more anxious about facing the rapid fire of the "Minnesota's" numerous guns than standing the more deliberate attack of the "Monitor's" slow fire. He could have brought the "Merrimac" within half a mile of the "Minnesota," but he made a wide detour, and ran aground two miles from the Federal ship. When after great efforts the ironclad was floated again, the pilot declared he could not take her any nearer the "Minnesota" without grounding again, and Commander Jones reluctantly turned to renew the duel with the "Monitor," which had been steaming slowly after him. The "Monitor's" officers thought the "Merrimac" was running away from them, and were surprised when she closed with their ship again.

Once more there was a fight at close quarters. Those who watched the battle could make out very little of what was happening, for the two ships were wrapped in clouds of powder smoke and blacker smoke from their furnaces. The "Merrimac's" funnel was down, and the smoke from her furnace-room was pouring low over her casemate. In the midst of the semi-darkness Jones tried to ram the turret-ship, and nearly succeeded. Worden, using the superior handiness of his little vessel, converted the direct attack into a glancing blow, but the Confederates thought that if they had not lost the iron wedge of their ram the day before in sinking the "Cumberland" they would have sunk the "Monitor."

The turret-ship now kept a more respectful distance. For more than a quarter of an hour she did not fire a shot. The Confederates hoped they had permanently disabled her, but what had happened was that the "Monitor" had ceased fire in order to pass a supply of ammunition up into the turret, which could not be revolved while this was being done. Presently the "Monitor" began firing again. Jones of the "Merrimac" now changed his target. Despairing of seriously damaging the "Monitor's" turret, he concentrated his fire on her conning-tower, and before long this plan had an important result. Dana Greene gives a vivid description of the incident:—

"A shell struck the forward side of the pilot-house directly in the sight-hole or slit, and exploded, cracking the second iron log and partly lifting the top, leaving an opening. Worden was standing immediately behind this spot, and received in his face the force of the blow, which partly stunned him, and filling his eyes with powder, utterly blinded him. The injury was known only to those in the pilot-house and its immediate vicinity. The flood of light rushing through the top of the pilot-house, now partly open, caused Worden, blind as he was, to believe that the pilot-house was seriously injured if not destroyed; he, therefore, gave orders to put the helm to starboard, and 'sheer off.' Thus the 'Monitor' retired temporarily from the action, in order to ascertain the extent of the injuries she had received. At the same time Worden sent for me, and I went forward at once, and found him standing at the foot of the ladder leading to the pilot-house.

"He was a ghastly sight, with his eyes closed and the blood apparently rushing from every pore in the upper part of his face. He told me that he was seriously wounded, and directed me to take command. I assisted in leading him to a sofa in his cabin, where he was tenderly cared for by Dr. Logue, and then I assumed command. Blind and suffering as he was, Worden's fortitude never forsook him; he frequently asked from his bed of pain of the progress of affairs, and when told that the 'Minnesota' was saved, he said, 'Then I can die happy!'"[18]

[18] "Battles and Leaders of the Civil War," vol. i, pp. 726, 727. Worden recovered, and there was no permanent injury to his sight. He lived to be a distinguished admiral of the United States Navy.

In the confusion that followed the disablement of her commander, the "Monitor" had drifted away from the "Merrimac," but still in a position between her and the "Minnesota." The Confederate ship fired at the temporarily disabled turret-ship a few shots, to which there was no reply. Commander Jones and his officers believed they had put their opponent out of action. But the "Merrimac" was not in a position to profit by her advantage. It was near 2 p.m. The tide was running out rapidly, and the risk of grounding was serious. Ammunition was beginning to be scarce. The crew was exhausted, and the ship's pumps had to be kept going, for under the strain of the heavy firing, and the repeated groundings during the two days, the hull was leaking badly. Jones judged the time had come to break off the action, and the "Merrimac" turned slowly, and began to steam into the Elizabeth River, on her way back to Norfolk.

The "Monitor," seeing her retiring, fired a few long-range shots after her. They splashed harmlessly into the water. So the famous fight ended.

On board both ships no life had been lost, and only a few men were wounded, Captain Worden's case being the most serious. In fact, there were fewer casualties than on the first day, when the loss of life in the wooden ships had been serious, and the "Merrimac," despite her armour, had had twenty-one men killed and wounded by the lighter projectiles of the "Cumberland" and "Congress" finding their way into her casemate through the port-holes. Neither ship had suffered severe injury, though if the battle had continued, the damage done to the conning-tower of the "Monitor" might have had serious results. When the "Merrimac" was docked at Gosport Yard, Norfolk, to be overhauled and repaired, it was found that she had ninety-seven indentations on her armour. Twenty of these were judged to be the marks of the "Monitor's" 11-inch balls. In these places the outer layer of armour-plating was cracked and badly damaged. The under layer and the wood backing were uninjured. The other seventy-seven marks were mere surface dents made by the lighter artillery of the wooden ships. The "Monitor" had used reduced charges of 15 pounds of gunpowder, and it was believed that if the full charge of 30 pounds had been used, the results might have been more serious, but the Navy Department had ordered the reduced charge, as it was feared that with full charges the strain on the gun-mountings and turret-gear would be too severe. The "Merrimac's" funnel was riddled, and all outside fittings shot away. Two of her guns had been made unserviceable on the first day by shots striking their muzzles.

Both sides claimed the victory in the Sunday's battle. The Confederates claimed to have driven off the "Monitor," and stated that Jones had waited for some time for her to renew the fight, before he turned back to Norfolk. The Federals argued that the object of the "Merrimac" was to destroy the "Minnesota," and the "Monitor" had prevented this, and was therefore the victor. The frigate was successfully floated next tide. Sometimes the fight is described as a drawn battle, but most writers on the subject accept the Federal contention, and give the honours of the day to the little turret-ship.

The battle of Hampton Roads was notable, however, not so much for its immediate results, as for its effect on naval opinion and policy. It finally closed the era of unarmoured ships; it led to a perhaps exaggerated importance being attached to the ram as a weapon of attack; and it led to a very general adoption of the armoured turret, and for a while to the building of low-freeboard turret-ships in various navies. It was not till long after that the story of the "Monitor's" perilous voyage from New York was told, and thus even in America it was not realized that the "Monitor" type was fit only for smooth waters, and was ill adapted for sea-going ships. On the Federal side there was a kind of enthusiasm for the "Monitor." Numbers of low-freeboard turret-ships of somewhat larger size, and with improved details, were built for the United States, and even the failure of Admiral Dupont's "Monitor" fleet in the attack on the Charleston batteries did not convince the Navy Department that the type was defective. Ericsson's building of the "Monitor" to meet the emergency of 1862 was a stroke of genius, but its success had for a long time a misleading effect on the development of naval construction in the United States.

The "Merrimac" was abandoned and burned by the Confederates a few weeks later when they evacuated Norfolk and the neighbourhood. At the end of the year the "Monitor" was ordered to Charleston. She started in tow of a powerful tug, but the fate she had so narrowly escaped on her first voyage overtook her. She was caught in a gale off Cape Hatteras on the evening of 31 December, 1862. The tow-ropes had to be cut, and shortly after midnight the "Monitor" sank ten miles off the Cape. Several of her officers and men went down with her. The rest were rescued by the tug, with great difficulty.

Had the wind blown a little harder during the "Monitor's" first voyage from New York, or had the tow-rope to which she hung parted, there is no doubt she would have gone down in the same way. In that case the course of history would have been different, for the "Merrimac" would have been undisputed master of the Atlantic coast, and have driven off or destroyed every ship of the blockading squadrons. The fates of nations sometimes depend on trifles. That of the American Union depended for some hours on the soundness of the hawser by which the "Monitor" hung on to the tug-boat "Seth Low" of New York.



CHAPTER XI

LISSA

1866

In the American Civil War there had been no battle between ironclad fleets. "Monitors" had engaged batteries. The "Merrimac" had had her duel with the first of the little turret-ships. But experts were still wondering what would happen when fleets of armoured ships, built in first-class dockyards, met in battle on the sea.

The war between Austria and Italy in 1866 gave the first answer. The experiment was not a completely satisfactory one, and some of its lessons were misread. Others were soon made obsolete by new developments in naval armaments.

Still, Lissa will always count among the famous sea-fights of the world, for it was the first conflict in which the armoured sea-going ship took a leading part. But there is another reason: it proved in the most startling way—though neither for the first time nor the last—that men count for more than machines, that courage and enterprise can reverse in the actual fight the conditions that beforehand would seem to make defeat inevitable. "Give me plenty of iron in the men, and I don't mind so much about iron in the ships," was a pithy saying of the American Admiral Farragut. There was iron enough in the Austrian sailors, Tegethoff and Petz, to outweigh all the iron in the guns and armour of the Italian admirals, Persano and Albini, and the "iron in the men" gave victory to the fleet that on paper was doomed to destruction.