Alfred Thayer Mahan - The Life of Nelson, Volume 2

" "Our joint exertions have been used to get the King to go to Naples," he wrote to Troubridge, "but of no avail; the Austrians will be there before him." Although the French had been expelled from all the Neapolitan dominions, the presence of fifteen hundred in Rome and Civita Vecchia served then as an excuse. Nelson implored the commander of the British troops at Minorca to spare twelve hundred of his men, to aid Troubridge on the Roman coast. "Sir Charles Stuart," he tells him flatteringly, "by his timely exertion saved this Kingdom [Sicily] from anarchy and confusion, and perhaps from rebellion. So it is now, my dear Sir, I trust, in your power (and I have assured the good King and Queen of your readiness to serve them and the good cause as much as Sir Charles) to send for the taking possession of Civita Vecchia and Rome; this done, and with my life, I will answer for the success of the expedition. All would be quiet and happy; and their Sicilian Majesties might return to their throne without any alarm from mobs.... I am sure I need not venture to say more on the subject. Your Excellency's judgment and heart will point out the necessity of the measure if it can be accomplished." "Our King would be much gratified that Britain not Austria should reinstate the Pope."

Sir James Erskine, thus importuned, did not see his way to sending the troops. Naturally, as a soldier, he did not rely as much upon the navy preventing a landing in his island, as upon his own powers of resistance after it was effected, and was therefore unwilling to spare from the latter. The point of view of a seaman was, and is, different. He complained, too, that Duckworth had taken a great many ships to Gibraltar. Nelson admits the mistake, and expresses his regret, but no word of dissatisfaction with Erskine transpires through his evident disappointment. He only says, "Pardon what I am going to repeat, that either in Malta or on the Continent, a field of glory is open." "Minorca," he wrote to Spencer, "I have never yet considered in the smallest danger, but it has been a misfortune that others have thought differently from me on that point." Towards the end of September, Troubridge, without the aid of British troops, but supported by the arrival of a division sent by Suwarrow, reported the evacuation of Rome and Civita Vecchia. "How happy you have made us!" wrote Nelson to him. "My pen will not say what I feel." The King, however, would not return to Naples, now that this obstacle was withdrawn. "The Queen has a noble generous disposition," said Nelson two months later. "Unfortunately the King and her Majesty do not at this moment draw exactly the same way; therefore, his Majesty will not go at this moment to Naples, where his presence is much wanted." "We do but waste our breath," he avowed afterwards.

In the beginning of October, a visit which he had intended making to Minorca was hastened by a report that thirteen hostile ships-of-the-line had been seen off Cape Finisterre, and it was thought they might be destined for the Mediterranean. Nelson hoped to assemble ten to meet them; but the news proved to be false. He left Palermo for this trip on the 5th of October, and returned again on the 22d, having remained five days in Port Mahon. The arrangements for the naval force, depending entirely upon himself, were soon settled; but he was disappointed in obtaining, as he had hoped to do from a personal interview with Erskine, a detachment of two thousand troops for Malta. About that island he was, to use his own words, almost in despair. For over a year La Valetta had been blockaded by land and sea. For the latter he could with difficulty find ships; for the former he could obtain no men to aid the islanders, who, half starving, dependent for food chiefly upon Sicily, were sustained in their resistance mainly by hatred of the invaders, and by the tactful appeals and encouragement of Captain Ball, who lived ashore among them. The Barbary pirates, by virtue of their war with Naples, captured many of the vessels laden with supplies, despite Nelson's passports; while the Sicilian Court, though well disposed, lacked the energy and the propelling force necessary to compel the collection and despatch of the needed grain. On one occasion Troubridge or Ball, desperate at the sight of the famine around them, sent a ship of war into Girgenti, a Sicilian port, seized, and brought away two corn-laden vessels. "The measure was strong," said Nelson, but he refrained from censuring; and, while apologizing to the Government, added he hoped it "would not again force officers to so unpleasant an alternative." He feared that in their misery the Maltese would abandon the struggle, particularly if they got wind of the purpose of Great Britain to restore the hated Order of Knights, in deference to the wishes of the Czar. "The moment the French flag is struck," he had been obliged to write to Ball, "the colours of the Order must be hoisted and no other; when it was settled otherwise, the orders from England were not so strong."

About this time came information that several ships were fitting out at Toulon, with supplies for the besieged. This increased Nelson's anxieties, and at the same time emphasized the necessity which he had always urged of using speedier and surer means to reduce the place, while the undisputed mastery of the sea gave the opportunity. "What might not Bruix have done, had he done his duty?" was his own comment upon that recent incursion; and who could tell how soon as great a force might appear again under an abler man? He turned in every direction, and was instant in his appeals for aid. He wrote to Acton that he had positive information that seven ships were loaded in Toulon. "I therefore beg leave to propose to your Excellency, whether under our present circumstances, it would not be right for his Sicilian Majesty to desire that the English garrison at Messina should instantly go to Malta, for I am clear, that if Malta is relieved, that our forces got together could not take it, and the commencement of a new blockade would be useless. All the Barbary cruisers would there have their rendezvous, and not a vessel of his Sicilian Majesty's could put to sea." He exhorts the minister also to apply to the Russians for immediate help at Malta.

At the same time, to augment his embarrassments, orders came from Lisbon recalling the Portuguese squadron, which formed the larger part of the sea blockade. Nelson forgot how often he had abused them as useless, and grappled with that part of the difficulty with characteristic boldness. He peremptorily forbade the admiral to obey his orders. "As the reduction of the Island of Malta is of the greatest consequence to the interests of the allied Powers at war with France, and the withdrawing of the squadron under your command, at this time, from the blockade of that island, will be of the most ruinous consequences to their interests … you are hereby required and directed, in consideration of the above circumstances, and notwithstanding the orders you may have received from your Court to return to Lisbon, not on any consideration whatsoever to withdraw one man from that island, which may have been landed from the squadron under your Excellency's command, or detach one ship down the Mediterranean, until further orders from me for that purpose." Your orders, he tells Niza in a private letter, were founded upon the belief that your presence was no longer necessary; "but the contrary is the fact—for your services were never more wanted than at this moment, when every exertion is wanting to get more troops of English and Russians to Malta." He is evidently thinking of his difference with Keith; but now he is within the limits of his commission as Commander-in-chief. Doubting, however, whether his official authority will prevail with Niza to disobey his recall, he plies him skilfully with appeals to those sentiments of honor which had received such illustration in his own noble career. "If you quit your most important station till I can get" reliefs for you, "depend upon it, your illustrious Prince will disapprove of (in this instance) your punctilious execution of orders." "We shall soon get more troops from Messina and Minorca; and I am not a little anxious for the honour of Portugal and your Excellency, that you should be present at the surrender. I hold myself responsible." "You was the first at the blockade. Your Excellency's conduct has gained you the love and esteem of Governor Ball, all the British officers and men, and the whole Maltese people; and give me leave to add the name of Nelson as one of your warmest admirers, as an officer and a friend."

Читать дальше