Alfred Thayer Mahan - The Influence of Sea Power on the French Revolution

The result was depicted in a letter of Admiral Villaret Joyeuse, who was at once an officer of the old service, and yet had entered it from the auxiliary navy, having been captain of fireship; who, therefore, stood as nearly as possible between the two extremes of opinion. As a subordinate he had won the admiration of Suffren in the East Indies, and as admiral he commanded with honor the fleets of the Republic. He wrote: "The popular societies have been called on to point out the men having both seamanship and patriotism. The societies believed that it was enough for a man to have been long at sea to be a seaman, if he was besides a patriot. They did not reflect that patriotism alone cannot handle a ship. The grades consequently have been given to men without merit beyond that of having been much at sea, not remembering that such a man often is in a ship just as a bale is. It must be frankly said it is not always the man at once most skilful and patriotic that has had the suffrages of the societies, but often the most intriguing and the falsest—he, who by effrontery and talk has been able to impose upon the majority." [30] In another letter he says: "You doubtless know that the best seamen of the different commercial ports kept behind the curtain in the beginning of the Revolution; and that on the other hand there came forward a crowd who, not being able to find employment in commerce, because they had no other talent than the phraseology of patriotism, by means of which they misled the popular societies of which they were members, got the first appointments. Experienced captains, who might have served the republic efficiently by their talents and skill, have since then steadily refused to go to sea, and with inexcusable self-love still prefer service in the National Guard (ashore) to going to sea, where they say they would have to be under captains to whom they have often refused the charge of a watch. Hence the frequent accidents met with by the ships of the republic. Since justice and consequently talents are now (1795) the order of the day, and all France is now convinced that patriotism, doubtless one of the most necessary virtues in an officer of the government, is yet not the only one required to command armies and fleets, as was once claimed, you are quite right," etc. [31]

Enough has been said to show the different causes that destroyed the corps of French naval officers. Some of these were exceptional in their character and not likely to recur; but it is plain that even their operation was hastened by the false notions prevalent in the government as to the character and value of professional training, while the same false notions underlay the attempts both to fill the vacant places and to provide a new basis for the official staff of the future. The results of these mistaken ideas will be seen in the narrative; but it may be useful to give here the professional antecedents (taken from a French naval historian) of the admirals and captains in the first great battle of this war, June 1, 1794, by which time the full effect of the various changes had been reached. These three admirals and twenty-six captains of 1794 held in 1791 the following positions: the commander-in-chief, Villaret Joyeuse, was a lieutenant; the two other flag-officers, one a lieutenant, the other a sub-lieutenant; of the captains, three were lieutenants, eleven sub-lieutenants, nine captains or mates of merchant ships, one a seaman in the navy, one a boatswain, one not given. [32]

The action of the Assemblies with regard to the enlisted men of the fleet was as unreasonable and revolutionary as that touching the officers. For twenty years before the meeting of the States-General the navy had contained nine divisions of trained seamen-gunners, numbering some ten thousand men, and commanded, as in all services, by naval officers. It is scarcely possible to over-rate the value, in esprit-de-corps as well as in fighting effect, of such a body of trained men. In 1792 these were replaced by a force of marine artillerists, commanded by artillery officers. The precise relation of these to the sea-officers is not stated; but from the change must have sprung jealousies harmful to discipline, as well as injury to the military spirit of the naval officer. In 1794, these marine artillerists, and also the marine infantry, were suppressed on motion of Jean Bon Saint-André, so well known in connection with the French navy of the day. In his opinion, endorsed by the vote of the National Convention, it savored of aristocracy that any body of men should have an exclusive right to fight at sea. "The essential basis of our social institutions," said he, "is equality; to this touchstone you must bring all parts of the government, both military and civil. In the navy there exists an abuse, the destruction of which is demanded by the Committee of Public Safety by my mouth. There are in the navy troops which bear the name of 'marine regiments.' Is this because these troops have the exclusive privilege of defending the republic upon the sea? Are we not all called upon to fight for liberty? Why could not the victors of Landau, of Toulon, go upon our fleets to show their courage to Pitt, and lower the flag of George? This right cannot be denied them; they themselves would claim it, were not their arms serving the country elsewhere. Since they cannot now enjoy it, we must at least give them the prospect of using it." [33]

"Thus," says a French writer, "a marine artillerist, a soldier trained in the difficult art of pointing a gun at sea and especially devoted to that service, became a kind of aristocrat." [34] None the less did the Convention, in those days of the Terror, vote the change. "Take care," wrote Admiral Kerguelen, "you need trained gunners to serve guns at sea. Those on shore stand on a steady platform and aim at fixed objects; those at sea, on the contrary, are on a moving platform, and fire always, so to speak, on the wing. The experience of the late actions should teach you that our gunners are inferior to those of the enemy." [35] The words of common sense could get no hearing in those days of flighty ideas and excited imaginations. "How," asks La Gravière, "could these prudent words draw the attention of republicans, more touched by the recollections of Greece and Rome than by the glorious traditions of our ancestors? Those were the days in which presumptuous innovators seriously thought to restore to the oar its importance, and to throw flying bridges on the decks of English ships of the line, as the Romans did on board the galleys of Carthage; candid visionaries, who with simplicity summed up the titles of their mission in words such as these, preserved among the archives of the Navy: 'Legislators, here are the outpourings of an ingenuous patriot, who has for guide no other principle than that of nature and a heart truly French.'" [36]

The effects of this legislation were soon seen in the fighting at sea. The British seventy-four, Alexander, fought three French ships of her own size for two hours; the average loss of each of the latter equalled that of the one enemy. In June, 1795, twelve French ships-of-the-line found themselves in presence of five British. There was bad management in more ways than one, but five of the French had three of the enemy under their fire for several hours; only thirteen Englishmen were hurt, and no ship so crippled as to be taken. A few days later the same French fleet fell in with a British of somewhat superior force. Owing to light airs and other causes, only a partial engagement followed, in which eight British and twelve French took part. The whole British loss was one hundred and forty-four killed and wounded. Three French ships struck, with a loss of six hundred and seventy; and the nine others, which had been partially engaged, had a total of two hundred and twenty-two killed and wounded. In December, 1796, the British frigate Terpsichore met the French Vestale, of equal force. The latter surrendered after a sharp action of two hours, in which she lost sixty-eight killed and wounded against the enemy's twenty-two. This a French writer speaks of as a simple artillery duel, unmarked by any manœuvres. These are not instances chosen to prove a case, but illustrations of the general fact, well known to contemporaries, that the French gunnery was extremely bad. "In comparing this war with the American," says Sir Howard Douglas, "it is seen that, in the latter, the loss of English ships in action with French of equal force, was much more considerable. In the time of Napoleon, whole batteries of ships-of-the-line were fired without doing more harm than two pieces, well directed."