Nelson: Britannia's God of War (56 page)

The fleet now lay thirty to forty miles west of Cadiz, with a line of frigates connecting it to Blackwood, supported by an inshore squadron of fast seventy-fours commanded by George Duff in the
Mars
. Nelson had carefully selected his location: it would let the enemy out, but prevent the fleet being driven through the Straits by adverse weather, while remaining well placed to intercept the Brest
fleet before it could contact Cadiz. Even so Nelson was desperate for more ships, to ensure he could turn any fleeting opportunity into a battle of annihilation. Once he learnt, as he did on 8 October, that Craig had orders to act in Italy or elsewhere in the event of a Continental war, he was certain the enemy was destined for the Mediterranean.
²⁵
By 10 October he was confident he had penetrated the enemy’s thinking, and could anticipate their moves, warning Collingwood where he thought they would be heading if they left harbour. He also issued his famous Tactical Memorandum to complete the process begun verbally in the Great Cabin of the
Victory
, explaining the ‘Nelson Touch’ to his captains.

The Trafalgar Memorandum of 9 October has been much debated: Corbett devoted a great deal of attention to the question of whether it was carried into effect, while the Admiralty subsequently undertook a minute investigation, published less than a year before the First World War broke out.
²⁶
Both missed the key point. The memorandum should not be seen as a free-standing document, but in the context of the verbal discussions of 29 and 30 September, in which Nelson had set out the spirit of his idea. The concept was, as ever, to reduce the complex, demanding problem of arranging a fleet for battle, forcing the enemy to fight, and securing a complete victory into a set of basic ideas that could be easily understood. The written version contained the intellectual fruits of a career dedicated to the pursuit and destruction of the enemy. It distilled the history, techniques and possibilities of sailing-fleet tactics, through the prism of personal experience, and applied them to the situation he anticipated. It was not prescriptive, and anyone who had understood Nelson’s career would not expect him to preclude the effects of chance, initiative, individual impulse, human error, weather or enemy action. What Nelson did give his captains was a priceless insight into his intellectual processes, a guide to the way he thought and the objects at which he aimed, together with the core concept of breaking the enemy formation in two places, to destroy two thirds of their fleet. Yet he did not elaborate on the other core concept: that the enemy’s command and control should be destroyed in the process. This would be his task. Finally, he reminded them that ‘something must be left to chance’ and added ‘in case Signals can neither be seen nor perfectly understood, no Captain can do very wrong if he places his Ship alongside that of an Enemy.’
²⁷

This last was the fallback position for the ‘blockheads’ without the
wit to think for themselves. It was the least he expected, not a mantra for success in battle. Experience had taught him that not all captains were equal, and he did not know enough of his new team to rely on them all. This was why he was so careful to choose the ships that would be close to him in battle; all were commanded by men he knew and trusted – Fremantle, Keats (if he arrived in time), Louis, Hallo well and Berry. This was no mere form, or personal preference. It was vital that the flagship be supported by the best and brightest officers. Similarly, Nelson gave Blackwood permission to use his name to issue orders to any ships in the rear of his line on the day of the battle. He had an absolute trust in Blackwood’s judgement.
²⁸

Unlike his predecessors, who commanded from the centre, Nelson would lead. He also massed his heavy ships, as far as their sailing qualities would allow, at the head of his two lines. He had long accustomed his fleets to follow his lead, placing the flagship at the head of the line when sailing. That he placed the flagship third in the line of battle was a concession to his subordinates, not a reflection of his ambition. He would lead, to control the pace and direction of the attack, select the point of impact and complete the vital task of destroying the enemy’s command and control. Furthermore, he would lead by example. With the flagship ahead of them, no officer would have occasion to wonder, as had often happened in the past, what the admiral meant them to do; they could see with their own eyes, and had no harder task than to follow. He was careful to stress that the memorandum was not intended to fetter Collingwood’s judgement, only to guide his thinking. The object was to annihilate the enemy, and get a ‘glorious Peace for our Country’.
²⁹
As he told Colonel Stewart, he expected Bonaparte would try an invasion, and only hoped to get at the enemy fleet soon.
³⁰

While Nelson kept his eye on the wind and weather, Collingwood found the inaction of the enemy hard to comprehend. With the war in Italy about to begin, surely this was the time to act? Early on the morning of 19 October, the enemy began to leave Cadiz. Nelson, almost fifty miles to the west, received the news a little over three hours later. Hearing that his relief, Admiral Rosily, was at Madrid, and unable to bear the thought of being superseded,  decided to go to sea. News that Louis’s squadron was at Gibraltar completed the picture: with an inferior enemy, he believed only twenty-two ships to his thirty-three, it was time to put to sea. The decision to sail was Villeneuve’s, and Villeneuve’s alone.

Blackwood’s response demonstrated why Nelson placed such faith in him. He signalled along his chain of ships, and immediately sent off his two sloops, one to Nelson, the other to recall Louis. Nelson was so certain of his judgement that the fleet was already heading to cut Villeneuve off from the Straits before his Combined Fleet had cleared Cadiz harbour. Throughout the day Blackwood was ‘talking to Lord Nelson’ using the Popham telegraph system and the line of frigates.
³¹
By 1 a.m. on 20 October the fleet was in position at the entrance to the Straits. Nelson hoped to see Louis returning on the easterly wind, but that hope was misplaced: Louis was two hundred miles to the east, and did not finish his convoy work until the following day. Nor was the enemy where he had expected: they took so long to leave harbour that they arrived north of Nelson’s position far later than he had anticipated. By mid-afternoon, however, they had been located, and with a strong wind blowing there was an opportunity for battle. Collingwood was summoned on board
Victory
. He urged immediate engagement, but Nelson was determined to wait. The enemy was too close to Cadiz, and it was too late in the day for a decisive action.

The enemy had spent much of their time trying to get into a specific formation, a regular line of twenty ships, equal to the force Villeneuve believed Nelson had – the remaining thirteen would be a reserve under Gravina. Gravina’s force could counter any attempt by Nelson to concentrate on part of the main line. It was perhaps the only tactical solution to the threat Villeneuve faced, and may explain why he was prepared to offer battle. The problem for both fleets on 20 October was the shifting and squally wind conditions, which left the skilful British ships in a huddle for two hours, and the less experienced allies in chaos for many more. The telegraph kept up contact with Blackwood. By nightfall the enemy could be seen to the north of the British fleet, close to Cadiz. Nelson then hauled away to the southwest, leaving Blackwood to keep contact during the night, changing back onto a north-easterly course at 4 a.m. on the 21st. At daybreak, shortly before 6, the British fleet was in apparent disorder, just a crowd of ships. The enemy could be seen eight or nine miles to the north-east, heading for the Straits in a rough line. There would be time to fight and win a battle, but not much more, as the weather was going to break within twenty-four hours. Among those watching the events unfold it would appear that only Nelson had been studying the barometer.

Collingwood had shifted his flag into the newly recoppered
Royal
Sovereign
, as ordered. Although Collingwood’s original flagship, the ninety-eight-gun
Dreadnought
,
was well-manned, and a formidable fighting unit, Nelson wanted his second-in-command in a ship with the speed to lead the line of battle. Nelson was a great believer in the superior fighting power of three-decked ships, but many of them sailed like haystacks.
Dreadnought
, Rear Admiral Lord Northesk’s
Britannia
and the
Prince
were all sluggish performers.
³²
Fortunately the new ninety-eights,
Temeraire
and
Neptune
, were in capable hands, and formed, with
Victory
, the spearhead of the British attack.

Nelson had begun a letter to Emma on 19 October, and left it open on the 20th: ‘As my last writing before the Battle will be to you, so I hope in God that I shall live to finish my letter after the Battle.’ He also wrote a note for Horatia.
³³
These notes, along with the codicil to his will compiled on the morning of the 21st, were sensible precautions, not morbid presentiment, but there can be no doubt that as the enemy line loomed ever closer his thoughts darkened.

*

At daybreak on 21 October, Villeneuve, horrified to find that Nelson had five more ships than he had expected, abandoned his tactical concept of a powerful reserve under Gravina to reinforce the point of attack. He would have to make do with a line of battle, though he knew this formation would allow the full flowering of Nelson’s genius. The light and shifting westerly wind and a heavy Atlantic swell made it difficult to form and hold a line. Nelson made no attempt to follow his memorandum, signalling the fleet to form in the order of sailing, and then to bear up and sail large for the enemy in the wake of the two flagships.

Over the next two hours, the British ships divided into two groups, gradually coming into line. Villeneuve responded by reversing course, heading north, back towards Cadiz, and ensuring his ships closed up for action. He must have feared an impetuous, unformed chase, the favoured tactic of old masters like Hawke. Nelson now signalled to steer for the centre of the enemy line, to break it in two places as he planned, and annihilate the rear and centre. Villeneuve had played right into his hands. Although Collingwood tried to rearrange his line, the speed of the attack, and Nelson’s insistence on using every stitch of sail, left him leading a second ill-formed column of ships, heading directly for the enemy, about one third in from the rear. The Combined
Fleet set no more sail than necessary to keep station: they were not running away, they were waiting to fight.

Nelson remarked on this fact to Blackwood at about 10 a.m., and Blackwood voiced the opinion of everyone on
Victory
’s quarter-deck that Nelson should not continue to lead the line, but should command from the
Euryalus
. When that option was predictably rejected, they argued that he should let the two ships astern pass and revert to the established order of battle. Blackwood took the message to the
Temeraire
, while Nelson signalled Duff to take the
Mars
ahead of Collingwood, but without ordering him to shorten sail there was no way Nelson could stop his old friend leading into battle. To make his point Collingwood set
Royal
Sovereign
’s studding sails: extra canvas to widen the sail area, increasing speed. Nelson was delighted – ‘See how that noble fellow Collingwood carries his ship into action!’ – and signalled for all possible sail to be set, hastening the moment of impact, and stretching out both lines, as the slower ships lost ever more ground to the swift.

In the light airs of that day the British ships closed at between two and three knots, no more than moderate walking pace. In the six hours between daybreak and the fighting, the officers and men of all three fleets had ample opportunity to think about what lay ahead. The ships were already cleared for action, the partitions, furniture and non-essential gear stowed away. The hammocks were up in nettings above the bulwarks, to reduce the danger from splinters. Many ships had musicians, and they played stirring and appropriate tunes as the ships closed: ‘Hearts of Oak’ was a particular favourite, along with ‘Britons Strike Home’, ‘Rule Britannia’ and ‘The Downfall of Paris’. The sun was shining and the different colour schemes of the enemy ships were easily picked out. The one clear difference between the fleets was that the iron bands around the lower masts were painted black in Villeneuve’s force; Nelson, with typical forethought, ordered his ships to paint the bands yellow, for identification in the smoke of battle.

21 October was a festival day for Nelson – the anniversary of his uncle’s famous battle, and the autumn fair at Burnham Thorpe. Curiously, he forgot to wear his uncle’s sword – the only time he went into battle unarmed. The enemy were little more than three miles away when he wrote out his last thoughts on the world beyond the looming fleet battle: