An Eye of the Fleet Read Online Free PDF

passing the frigate. Conditions now favoured the heavier ships. Resolution was overhauling the Spaniards rapidly and beyond her Edgar and Defence were bearing down on the enemy. Before the sun set behind a bank of cloud its final rays picked out the Resolution.
    The almost horizontal light accentuated every detail of the scene. The sea, piling up from the west, its shadowed surfaces a deep indigo, constantly moving and flashing golden where it caught the sun, seemed to render the warship on it a thing of stillness. The Resolution’s hull was dark with the menace of her larboard batteries as she passed scarcely two cables from Cyclops. Her sails drew out, pulling the great vessel along, transmitting their power down through the masts and rigging until the giant oak hull with its weight of artillery and 750 men made ten knots through the water.
    Drinkwater could see the heads of her upperdeck gunners and a line of red and silver marines on the poop. At her stern and peak battle ensigns stood out, pointing accusingly at the enemy ahead. Her bow chasers barked again. This time there was no white column. Devaux’s glass swung round. ‘She’s hit ‘em, by God!’ he shouted.
    Somebody on the fo’c’s’le cheered. He was joined by another as Cyclops’s crew roared their approval at the sight of Resolution sailing into battle. Drinkwater found himself cheering wildly with the other men in the top. Tears poured down Tregembo’s cheeks. ‘The bastards, the fucking bastardsЕ’ he sobbed. Drinkwater was not sure who the bastards were, nor, at the time, did it seem to matter. It is doubtful if Tregembo himself knew. What he was expressing was his helplessness. The feeling of magnificent anger that overcame these men: the impressed, the drunkards, the gaol birds and the petty thieves. All the dregs of eighteenth-century society forced into a tiny hull and kept in order by a ruthless discipline, sailed into a storm of lead and iron death cheering. Stirring to their souls by emotions they could not understand or control, the sight of puissant Resolution had torn from their breasts the cheers of desperation. It is with such spontaneous inspiration that the makers of war have always gulled their warriors and transformed them into heroes. Thus did the glamour of action infect these men with the fighting anger that served their political masters supremely well.
    Perhaps it was to the latter that the barely articulate Tregembo alluded.
    ‘Silence! Silence there!’ Hope was roaring from the quarterdeck and the cheering died as men grinned at one another, suddenly sheepish after the outburst of emotion.
    Faintly across the intervening sea a cheer echoed from Resolution and Drinkwater realised Cyclops must appear similarly magnificent from the seventy-four. A shudder of pride and cold rippled his back.
    Before darkness isolated the admiral from his ships Rodney threw out a final command to his captains: ‘Engage the enemy more closely.’ He thus encouraged them to press the enemy to the utmost degree. Both fleets were tearing down upon a lee shore with off-lying shoals. By five o’clock it was nearly dark. The wind had risen to a gale and gloomy clouds raced across the sky. But the moon was rising, a full yellow moon that shone forth from between the racing scud, shedding a fitful light upon the baleful scene.
    At sunset Resolution, Edgar and Defence had drawn level with the rearmost Spanish ships. Exchanging broadsides as they passed they kept on, heading the leeward enemy off from Cadiz.
    ‘Larboard battery make ready!’ The order rang out. Drinkwater transferred his attention to port as Cyclops was instantly transformed. The waiting was over, tension was released as gunners leapt to their pieces and the British frigate rode down the Spanish.
    The enemy was close on Cyclops’s larboard bow. Below Drinkwater a chaser rang out and a hole appeared in the Spaniard’s main topsail.
    Devaux ran aft along the larboard gangboard. He