Volume 2 — CHAP. XXVIII. THE VOTE OF THANKS.

MY MOTION FOR MINUTES OF COURT-MARTIAL.—MR. TIERNEY’S OPINION RESPECTING THEM.—MR. WHITBREAD’S VIEWS.—THE MINUTES INDISPENSABLE.—MR. WILBERFORCE ON THE SAME POINT.—LORD GREY’S OPINION OF THE MINISTRY.—THE VOTE OF THANKS LEAVES OUT MY NAME, YET THE CREDIT OF THE AFFAIR GIVEN TO ME.—INCONSISTENCY OF THIS.—I IMPUGN THE DECISION OF THE HOUSE.—SIR FRANCIS BURDETT’S OPINION.—MR. WINDHAM’S.—LORD MULGRAVE TURNS ROUND UPON ME.—HIS LORDSHIP’S MISREPRESENTATIONS.—YET ADMITS THE SERVICE TO BE “BRILLIANT.”—LORD MULGRAVE REBUKED BY LORD HOLLAND.—EARL GROSVENOR’S VIEWS.—LORD MELVILLE HITS UPON THE TRUTH, THAT I, BEING A JUNIOR OFFICER, WAS LEFT OUT.—VOTE OF THANKS IN OPPOSITION TO MINUTES.—THE VOTE, THOUGH CARRIED, DAMAGED THE MINISTRY.

From this time forward I never trod the deck of a British ship of war at sea, as her commander, till thirty-nine years afterwards I was appointed by her present most gracious Majesty to command the West India squadron; the greater portion of the interval being marked by persecution of which the court-martial on Lord Gambier was only the starting-point.

The commencement of the parliamentary session in 1810, was remarkable for its votes of thanks, and the refusal of all information which might justify them. This led Lord Milton to declare in the House of Commons, that “votes of thanks, from their frequency, had lost their value, and ceased to be an honour. They had got so much into the habit of voting thanks that it was almost an insult not to vote them.” (Feb. 1st.)

On the 25th of January 1810, Lord Grenville adverted 105in the House of Lords to notice of motion for a vote of thanks to Lord Gambier, for his services in destroying the enemy’s ships in Basque Roads; and observed that as the last intimation on the journals respecting Lord Gambier was his arrest, it would be necessary that the Minutes of the court-martial should be laid before the House, in order to enable it to judge of the necessity for a vote of thanks. To this Lord Mulgrave strongly objected, on the ground that it “would appear as if it was wished to retry the case.” Laying the sentence of acquittal only before the House, said his lordship, would be “sufficient to render their proceedings regular, and would answer all the purposes of the noble lord.” With this the House was obliged to be content, though how that sentence had been obtained the reader is now made aware.

On the 29th of January, in pursuance of notice previously given, I made a motion for the production of the minutes of the court-martial in the House of Commons; as being, from the extraordinary discrepancy between the nature of the evidence and the sentence, absolutely necessary, in order to enable members fairly and impartially to decide whether the thanks in contemplation of ministers were due to Lord Gambier for the part he took in what had been by them denominated a victory in Basque Roads.^[52]

In support of this production of the minutes, I adverted to a previously expressed opinion of the 106Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Perceval), that Lord Gambier had been honourably acquitted, but that an officer’s having done no wrong did not entitle him to the thanks of the House; which, if bestowed on trifling, or, indeed, on any but brilliant achievements, would dwindle into contempt, even with those on whom they should be conferred. Votes of thanks were already lightly esteemed in the Navy, and I pledged myself—if the House would insist on the production of the minutes—to prove that “Lord Gambier’s defence was contradicted by itself—by his lordship’s official letters—and by his own witnesses; many of whom, as to essential facts, were at variance with themselves and with each other.” Lastly, I undertook to prove to the House, that the chart of the 12th of April was “in a most material point false—and in every respect a fabrication.”

I will not inflict on the reader a recapitulation of the long discussion which followed, but the opinions of some whose names are to this day held in respect are too much to the point to be passed over. The opinion expressed by Mr. Tierney is so remarkable that I shall give it entire as reported.

“The question was not as to the noble lord’s (Gambier) innocence, but as to his claim to a most distinguishing reward. The honours of the House were high things, dear and valuable; but dear only because they implied merit, valuable only because that merit must be rare. Honours too frequently bestowed lost their value, and became signs of nothing but the weakness which lavished them, or the worthlessness on which they were to be thrown away.

“He would vote for the minutes, but in his vote he begged to be understood as merely calling for matter to enable him 107to shape his opinion. He could mean no slight to Lord Gambier. He respected his lordship’s character. He had some opportunities of hearing him spoken of, and it was always in a high strain of praise and estimation. But he had never understood that Lord Gambier took any share of the merit of the achievement to himself. He had not approached the French fleet nearer than seven miles. Ministers had praised Lord Gambier for discretion; he hoped they had not intended this as an instance in the enumeration of its proofs.

“It became the House to be cautious of being prodigal of honours entrusted to their distribution. Lord Cochrane ought to be heard; his judgment and character, his signal gallantry and signal honours^[53] deserved the serious attention of the House. Even his feelings, led as they were, perhaps, astray by an excess of strength and sensibility, deserved all the attention which could be paid to them.”

The opinions of Mr. Whitbread are no less remarkable. Sir C. Hamilton had said that the reason why no more ships were destroyed was solely attributable to me! and that he would engage to prove it to the House.^[54] Mr. Wynne also declared, on behalf of the Ministry, that the evidence was all on Lord Gambier’s side! and opposed to it only my solitary evidence. This called up Mr. Whitbread, whose remarks are reported as follows:—

“The noble lord (Cochrane) had done wrong in returning any answer to the application of the Admiralty.^[55] He ought to have told them, as a member of the House of Commons, he had no answer whatever to make; and if they thought the logs inconclusive why did they not manfully come down and try the question in that House?

108“The hon. gentleman (Mr. Wynne) talked of the injustice of trying an officer in that House! Must not the merits of every officer be inquired into when it is proposed to confer on him a vote of thanks? Was he not then on his trial? Was not that a species of trial to which any officer must necessarily be exposed before he could receive the high honour of the thanks of Parliament? After a court-martial, by which Lord Gambier had been acquitted, did it follow, as a matter of necessity that they must grant him the thanks of that House? He presumed this by no means followed.

“What then was the situation to which the House was reduced? The noble lord (Cochrane) had committed himself more than he had ever heard man do in that House to prove his statements respecting the conduct of Lord Gambier. And now a member (Sir C. Hamilton) came forward and said that the duty intrusted to Lord Cochrane had not been properly executed, and that if it had been he might have done far more injury to the enemy’s ships. The hon. baronet (Hamilton) said that at the time Lord Cochrane was in command, and made signals to the vessels employed under him, ‘some of them obeyed and others disobeyed the instructions they received, and that those who disobeyed were ultimately successful, whilst those who obeyed at the moment failed.’ The worthy baronet also added that ‘those who disobeyed the signals were promoted, whilst those who obeyed were not.’ What would become of the subordination of our Navy if our officers were to be informed, in any one instance, that those who obeyed the instructions of their superior officer were to be passed by, while those who disobeyed his signals might expect to be promoted!^[56]

“From the disagreeable situation in which the House was placed on both sides, he thought they must unavoidably have the Minutes.”

109Various other opinions were expressed. Mr. Wilberforce thought acquiescence in my motion for the production of the minutes “most important, as throwing a stigma on all the members of the court-martial;” which was true enough, one of my objects being to show that the influence of a corrupt government had been used to vitiate a tribunal upon which the very safety of the Navy depended. How far I should have succeeded in this may be left to the reader’s judgment.^[57]

Mr. Ponsonby would not agree to the motion because its adoption would be a violation of the fundamental principles of jurisprudence. Sir Francis Burdett said, that “Lord Gambier’s plan seemed to be a desire to preserve his fleet—my plan, to destroy the enemy’s fleet. He had never heard that the articles of war held out an instruction to preserve the fleet. What if Nelson, at the Nile or Trafalgar, had acted on this principle? He had never heard that Lord Gambier, in the affair of Basque Roads, pretended to have done any hard, or even important service. His only merit seemed to consist in what he omitted to do.”

Having thus been put on my defence by direct accusation on the part of a Ministerial supporter that I had not done my duty, I implored the House to give me an opportunity, not only of defending myself, but of laying bare matters of more importance to the country than either my judgment or character. I again pledged myself to prove all I had asserted, and to stake everything 110that was valuable to man on the issue, at the same time telling the House that, if the minutes were granted, I would expose such matters as might make the country tremble for its safety—and entreating it well to consider that there was another tribunal to which it was answerable, that of posterity, which would try all our actions and judge impartially.

Neither argument nor a sense of justice availed, and the word “sentence” was substituted for “Minutes,” in an amendment carried by a large majority of the faction, in that day dependent on and wielded by Ministers—of whose general conduct Lord Grey, in the opening debate of the session, thus thought it necessary to express himself:—“He was glad to find from the humble and chastened tone of Ministers that they appeared to feel some remorse for the numerous miseries which, by their imbecility and misconduct they had inflicted on their country. Had it been otherwise, he should have supposed the Almighty vengeance was hanging over this nation, and that therefore the hearts of its rulers had been hardened in proportion as their understandings were darkened.” This merited censure from one of the great lights of that day and of all time, passed unheeded in the conduct of the session, which outdid its predecessors in acts of subserviency to the faction in power by whose supremacy it was felt that the rotten-borough interest could alone maintain itself against the national execration which was now beginning to make itself heard.

At the conclusion of the preliminary debate, the Chancellor of the Exchequer rose to move a vote of thanks to Lord Gambier for his eminent services in 111destroying the French fleet in the Basque Roads! My name, as having effected anything, was purposely and very ingeniously left out! but warm thanks were accorded to those who directed the fireships,—not against the enemy, but against the banks of the Boyart and Palles shoals!

The passage in the vote of thanks is curious: “for their gallant and highly meritorious conduct on this glorious occasion, particularly marked by the brilliant and unexampled success of the difficult and perilous mode of attack by fireships, conducted under the immediate direction of Captain Lord Cochrane!” Yet Lord Gambier stated in his defence, “The success of the first part of the enterprise arose from the terror excited by the appearance of the fireships! as they failed in the principal effect they were intended to produce.” (Minutes, p. 131.) If the House had been in the possession of the minutes of the court-martial, would they have voted thanks to officers of whom the Commander-in-chief says that they “failed in their object”? Not a word of thanks to me for having conducted it, but to the Commander-in-chief, then twelve miles off, his only merit consisting in coming three miles nearer, anchoring out of gunshot—and to men whom a ministerial supporter had praised by saying they had been promoted for “disobeying my signals!” And this though the First Lord of the Admiralty had offered me his own regiment—a squadron of frigates, with carte blanche to do what I pleased with them—and a vote of thanks, conjointly with Lord Gambier, if I would not offer any opposition!

112The value of such a vote under such circumstances had been rightly estimated, even by those who acquiesced in it. The value of the service rendered was paltry, in comparison with what it ought to have been; and the vote, either to myself or my superiors, would have been worthy of it. I had from the first refused to have my name coupled with such pretence, as a fraud on national honours.

Yet, leaving me altogether out of the vote of thanks, so long as thanks were voted, and giving them to the Commander-in-chief and the officers under “my immediate direction,” was a specimen of party spite so transparent that it could deceive nobody. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, either ashamed of his subject, or forgetting the purpose in hand, most unaccountably gave me in his harangue the credit of the whole affair! He could only have done this from two motives. Either he was too much a gentleman to permit his personal honour to be trampled under foot by his colleagues, or he could not have read the vote of thanks till he came to it at the conclusion of his speech. There is, however, a third hypothesis. The subjoined eulogy might have been pronounced to blind the House.

“The attack having thus recommenced on the night of the 13th successively^[58] was followed up on the next day by the noble lord (Cochrane)^[59] with peculiar gallantry. The 113consequence was that no less than three sail of the line and a fifty-gun ship were completely destroyed. The House would not, therefore, he trusted, be disposed to refuse its thanks for eminent services when performed under such great peril and risk, whilst the enemy were possessed of the protection of their own batteries^[60], and other advantages which they could bring into play for the security of their own vessels. It was an enterprise of great and peculiar hazard and difficulty. The result had been highly injurious to the enemy, and had the effect of not only disabling but of removing the enemy’s whole squadron from the possibility of being for a considerable time available for the purposes of the naval campaign. Was not this an object of great magnitude?”

From this speech it is clear that the Chancellor of the Exchequer considered that the whole success was attributable to my exertions, and it is no less apparent that he contemplated my being included in the vote of thanks.

Then why leave me out of the vote of thanks, and give thanks to those who had nothing to do with this “work of great magnitude?”

Lord Mulgrave made no such blunder in the House of Lords, nor even mentioned my name except in terms of reprobation—possibly because I refused his lordship’s temptation of a squadron and a regiment to hold my peace! Yet it may be that the Chancellor of the Exchequer made no mistake. His eulogy might have been merely intended to appeal to the popular ear, whilst contemptuously excluding me 114from the vote. Be this as it may, the trick succeeded, and my voice was drowned amidst the clamour of faction, as were the voices of those who supported me in the House.

Still I was not disposed to allow the vote to pass without further protest. I again warned the House that “even their verdict was not conclusive upon character, but that there was another tribunal to which even that House was amenable, and that the public would one day exercise a judgment, even though the House might shrink from a just decision. I inquired what portion of Lord Gambier’s exploit merited thanks, or what had been the nature of his exploit? He lay at a distance—never brought his fleet to the place of action, or even within danger, and yet for such supineness he was to receive the highest honours of his country! The ground taken by ministers was frivolous—that where the subordinates admittedly deserved the praise, the superiors must receive it. The public would one day read the minutes, though the House would not. The public would judge from the facts, though the House would not. The public would not submit to have its eyes bound because the House chose to keep theirs shut. Let a single reason be adduced for this vote of thanks, and I was ready to vote for it—but the reasons which had been obtruded on the House were unworthy the name of arguments.”

Sir John Orde, of all the supporters of the ministry, gave the only honest reason for his vote in favour of Lord Gambier, though probably his argument might 115not pass current at the present day. It was this:—“As thanks to his Lordship have been proposed, I shall vote for them, because I entertained this opinion of Lord Gambier’s conduct before the prorogation of Parliament, and their Lordships of the Admiralty appeared to do the same!!” Poor Sir John! He must have had better reasons for his arguments than arguments for his reasons.

A few more reasonable opinions than that of worthy Sir John shall be transcribed verbatim, and first those of Sir Francis Burdett:—

“Sir Francis Burdett wished to know whether the service of Lord Gambier was worth the thanks of Parliament, even admitting it to have all the value attributed to it by anything but the unblushing and profuse spirit of ministerial favouritism.^[61] He would not ask whether, on the other hand, there was not the full and decided testimony of a man competent to give his judgment, and of whose admirable valour and good fortune the House and the nation had but one opinion? He felt that in making these observations he might be treading on perilous ground. He was probably bringing on himself some charitable retorts, particularly those of a gentleman whose charity was of a very peculiar nature. But he was careless about such remarks; for though he deprecated that person’s charity, he would not shun but would rather court his hostility.^[62]

“Had there been anything said to make out a reason of the vote demanded? Where was the evidence of the Commander-in-chief’s 116intrepidity or skill? Of that boldness which bursts its way through all obstacles? Of that genius before which obstacles vanish? In place of this, the House was insulted with a dry catalogue of negatives, and an account as to how the noble Admiral inspected the action at a distance of seven miles.^[63] The question had been treated lightly; but levity was unbecoming the grave matter for their deliberation.”

Mr. Windham said:—

“The thanks of that House did not deserve to be lavished on any man, unless his services were of that rank which forced itself into universal report and universal admiration. It was not to be evolved in some obscure process of official chemistry, not to be drawn out under bundles of obscure records, not to be elicited by any keen, cunning, recondite, subtilising process^[64] beyond the practice or perception of the general mass of mankind. To be praised, it must be known; to become matter of thanks, it must be matter of public fact.

In voting thanks it was time to pause. These old rewards had become worthless. It had been said that nothing was left but the peerage, and even of that high honour ministers had been most lavish. This was the natural process when there was no distinct scale of merit and reward. It was high time to stop. They had in their hands the great provision for national virtue. They had the honours of the country intrusted to them, and it became them as legislators not to suffer its streams to be idly diverted, nor to be prodigally and profusely poured forth to slake the thirst of undeserving ambition, still panting, still insatiable.”

Argument and fact were alike unavailing, and Sir John Orde’s extraordinary reasons and opinions prevailed. To 161 of the Admiralty opinion, only 39 117could be found alive to a true sense of legislative dignity or functions.

A few remarks on what passed in the House of Lords, where similar thanks were voted, are necessary.

Lord Mulgrave said that it was with great surprise that he first heard that a noble lord serving under the noble Admiral, and a member of another House, had intimated his intention to oppose the vote of the House of Commons, on the ground that his commander had not done his duty to the utmost. Lord Mulgrave, of course, alluded to my conversation with him nine months before, though I never said anything of the kind to his Lordship. What I said was, “that the Commander-in-chief had not done anything deserving the thanks of Parliament.” Had the Minutes been allowed to be produced in either House, this would have been proved beyond question, in spite of the sentence of acquittal, which was alone laid on the table.

Lord Mulgrave was no less unjust in attempting to convince the peers that I had done nothing but carry out Lord Gambier’s plan of fireships; referring them to Lord Gambier’s letter of March 19th, 1809, in which, instead of recommending an attack by fireships, Lord Gambier had denounced such an attempt as “hazardous, if not desperate,”^[65] as would have appeared had the minutes of the court-martial been laid before them.

Mine, as explained in the first volume, was not an attack by fireships alone, for such an attack could only have ended in the boarding of the fireships by the 118enemy’s row-boats, and the murdering of the crews. It was an attack by means of explosion-vessels, which should impress the enemy with the idea that every fireship was similarly charged, so as to have the effect of deterring them from boarding, and thus, the fireships, had they been properly directed, must have done their work in spite of the enemy’s row-boats.

Yet Lord Mulgrave followed Lord Gambier in this “suppressio veri.” On the very day Lord Gambier had not recommended the use of fireships—though Lord Mulgrave’s speech would lead the House, in the absence of the minutes of the court-martial, to infer that he had recommended their use—the Commander-in-chief had stated that an attack with fireships would be “hazardous, if not desperate.” A curious way, truly, of recommending the use of fireships; though, had he recommended them, they would have been of no use without the explosion-vessels, the terror created by which formed the very essence of my plan, and was the sole cause even of the trifling success gained. Again, said Lord Mulgrave:—

“Lord Cochrane arrived at Plymouth. He had on a former occasion been employed in blockading Rochefort, and was acquainted with the coasts. He was, therefore, consulted, and spoke with greater confidence of the success of the attempt than those who wrote from that quarter, It was not, however, merely the zeal and desire of execution he showed, but also the talent he displayed in meeting the objections started by naval men, which induced the Admiralty to employ his Lordship.”

This representation was thoroughly incorrect. So far from there being any “desire of execution” on 119my part, I tried every means in my power to avoid being intrusted with the execution of my own—not Lord Gambier’s,—plans as Lord Mulgrave insinuated. He, however, unconsciously admitted that other naval men “started” such objections, that they could not be got to undertake an attack with fireships, and therefore the duty was thrust on me, with the addition of the explosion-vessels I had suggested, thus convincing the Admiralty Board that an attack, on my plan, was both easy of execution and certain in its result. Lord Mulgrave’s expression of “those who wrote from that quarter,” viz Lord Gambier, showed that the Commander-in-chief had no confidence in fireships. Neither had I, unless accompanied by my plan of explosion-vessels.

Still persisting that this was an attack by fireships merely, Lord Mulgrave told the House that it was nothing new, which was the case, if the explosion-vessels were left out, but that—

“In the course of the last century there were two services performed by fireships; the first in 1702 at Vigo, and the second off Minorca in 1792. But what was the present service? Recollect, a fleet protected by shoals and currents, in sight of their own coast, and in presence of their countrymen. Nothing in the annals of our Navy was more brilliant!”

Who, then, performed that “brilliant” service, than which nothing could be more satisfactory? Lord Mulgrave told the House that Lord Gambier did, whilst lying with his fleet nine miles off, and reluctantly sending two line-of-battle ships and some frigates to my 120“assistance,” when almost too late to rescue me from the dilemma into which, in sheer despair of anything being done, I had voluntarily rushed, with the determination that if my frigate was sacrificed, while he was calmly looking on, he should take the consequences, and what they would have been I need not say. It was this act of mine, and this only, which caused the paltry service to be effected of destroying two line-of-battle ships and a store ship, instead of the whole enemy’s fleet!

Lord Mulgrave’s statements were severely rebuked by Lord Holland:—

“Lord Holland represented in strong terms the light in which ministers placed themselves before Parliament and the country by coming forward, so hastily in the first instance to procure thanks, and then suddenly sending Lord Gambier to a court-martial with the thanks on their lips. He thought that in a case of parliamentary thanks the case should be clear and strong to receive such a reward. What said Lord Cochrane in his reply to the Admiralty?^[66] ‘Look at and sift the log-books! and not ask me for accusations.’ He (Lord Holland) condemned the precipitancy of ministers, who by their measures had endeavoured to stultify the House as they had already stultified their own administration.

“After sending Lord Gambier through the ordeal of a court-martial, Lord Mulgrave now came down, pronounced his praises, and called upon the House to vote him their thanks! It was not in this manner that the French government conducted itself towards their admirals and generals. They instituted a very severe inquiry as to this affair at Basque Roads, and many of their commanders were most severely punished.^[67] They did not give thanks to General 121Monnet for his defence of Flushing, but, on the contrary, censured his conduct most severely.^[68]

“If the barren thanks of both Houses of Parliament were often to be voted in this way, they would soon cease to be of any value. The noble Lord (Mulgrave) had said a great deal about the battle of Talavera, and the resistance made to the vote of thanks in that instance. Now it did not appear to him (Lord Holland) that the battle of Talavera could have anything to do with the action of Basque Roads or with the conduct of Lord Gambier. But if resistance to the vote of thanks to Lord Wellington were adduced as a proof of party motives, it might well be considered a proof of party spirit on the other side to bring forward motions of thanks for services of such a description as were those of Lord Gambier.”

The remarks of other noble lords were more to the purpose:—

“Earl Grosvenor did not think the services of Lord Gambier of such a nature as to require the particular thanks of the House. He thought such should only be given on very signal and important victories. Nobody could doubt they were due to Lord Howe for his victory on the 1st of June, to Lord Duncan for his victory at Camperdown; to Lord St. Vincent for his glorious achievements near the cape which gave him his title, or to the immortal Nelson for the splendid exploits with which he had adorned our naval history. 122These were things which spoke for themselves, and nobody could doubt the propriety of voting thanks, as it were, by acclamation. He thought, however, the services of Lord Gambier were of a very inferior description, and called for no such reward.”

“Earl Darnley had no objection to the vote of thanks, but at the same time he thought the present vote one of the efforts now too often resorted to to throw a false lustre on the Government. To compare the services rendered by Lord Gambier at Basque Roads with the battles of the Nile or Trafalgar would be the height of presumption!”

Lord Darnley was right; the vote itself, no less than the assumption of victory, where, through the pusillanimity of the Commander-in-chief, none had been achieved, had no other object than to “throw a false lustre upon a Government” powerful in rotten-borough influence, but justly mistrusted by all besides, whether in Parliament or out of it. Because I acted practically and conscientiously on these sentiments, I have been marked through life an object of party malevolence.

However dexterous might be the ministerial legerdemain which could convert into victory the admitted intention of the Commander-in-chief not to fight,^[69] Lord Melville alone exposed the real secret of the matter:—

“Lord Melville conceived the Admiralty to have acted extremely wrong in giving to Lord Cochrane a command so contrary to the usual rules of the service, and which must have been so galling and disgusting to the feelings of other officers in Lord Gambier’s fleet. He respected as much as any man could the zeal, intrepidity, and enterprise of Lord Cochrane, but it was wrong to presume that these qualities 123were wanting in officers of that fleet of superior standing to his Lordship. Such a selection naturally put Lord Cochrane upon attempting enterprises whereby great glory might be obtained.”

Here lies the gist of the whole matter. Had I devised the plan of attack, and had the Board of Admiralty acceded to my earnest wish, and left it to my seniors to execute, or had I persisted in my determination to refuse a command which the Admiralty literally forced upon me, all would have been well. Even had Lord Mulgrave fulfilled his promise of satisfying the amour-propre of the fleet—which he neither did nor intended to do—all might have been well. As it was, I was exposed to the full amount of hostility which formed my reason for declining the command in the first instance.

It was felt—as Admiral Austen plainly says—by the officers of the fleet in Basque Roads, that a decisive victory would elevate me in national estimation over my seniors, as it unquestionably would have done. Lord Gambier was an easy man, and the “shoal and current” bugbear was successfully used to bring the fleet to an anchor in place of going on to the attack, he knowing no better, and having taken no trouble to ascertain the fact; in short, confining himself to mere blockade. This was the fault of the Commander-in-chief, but it did not justify him in bringing forward charts made up for the purpose of proving imaginary dangers from ruined fortifications and shoals where none existed.^[70] Nor did it justify the evidence of influenced 124witnesses to prove danger—in defiance of his Lordship’s own admission that no ship suffered injury!^[71] It did not justify his Lordship in assuming many things in his defence, which were not in evidence at all, and many more things that were totally at variance with the evidence contained in the minutes. To have declined pushing an advantage to victory, in deference to the jealousy of senior officers, was one thing; to trump up a story of an old storeship breaking up a boom of more than a mile in lineal extent, and moored with a hundred anchors, was another.

It will now be seen why the Government of that day refused the production of “minutes”minutes” of the court-martial, almost every page of which would have rendered the defence of the Commander-in-chief—or rather that of his solicitor, Mr. Lavie, for I will do Lord Gambier the justice of believing that he did not write the defence read to the Court by the Judge-Advocate—untenable for a moment. That the Ministry of that corrupt day should have resorted to such a subterfuge can, however, scarcely add to the contempt with which history already regards them.

I told the House of Commons that “posterity would judge their acts.” Here, then, is matter for that judgment. That it was not made public at the time arose from two causes. First, that in those days the bulk of the press was influenced by the Ministry; and a jackal howl, from one end of the kingdom to the other, would have been—and was, the reward of my pains. Secondly, that until his Grace the Duke of Somerset gave me, a 125few months since, the chart and other official materials requisite to lay the matter before posterity, it was not in my power to do so; except, as on my previous attempts at justification, by assertions, which would have had no more effect on the public mind than now would those of the factions which persecuted me. As I belonged to no party in the House, I found no friends but the few who, like myself, stood alone in their independence of party. Those were themselves disorganised, and deceived by the well-timed eulogy of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, into the belief that the vote of thanks included me also. The numbers of the independent party were, however, as nothing compared to the organised masses in power, or eager to place themselves in power. The debate was felt to have most seriously damaged the party to whom I was politically opposed, and that party ever afterwards made me a mark for their revenge. In this brief sentence may my whole subsequent history be comprised.

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