By the last day of May, all the troops destined for the hostile expedition were embarked on board of the ships of war and transports. In all there were thirteen thousand fighting men, with sixty pieces of cannon, and fifty mortars.
The embarkation of our horses was an object of peculiar care, and General Elliot, with Captain Lindsay, of ours, superintended this duty in person—for on the manner in which it is performed, depends all the chance of cavalry being employed with success in the field after landing.
They were conveyed on board the various ships, after a short march of exercise, and when perfectly cool. On the first night after embarkation, each received a mash mixed with some nitre, and bran was supplied to every trooper, as the chief portion of his horse's daily ration.
Every day each dragoon had to wash with care the hoofs and fetlocks of his horse, and to sponge its face, eyes and nostrils with cold water. We had ample wind sails rigged up for air, and spare slings and bands all ready in case of illness or accident, but, fortunately, neither occurred among the nags of our troop at least.
At daybreak, on the first of June, a gun from the commodore gave the signal for sea; and in less than ten minutes every vessel had her anchor apeak or atrip, and her head sails filled, and soon after, with nine hearty cheers, the whole armament, consisting of twenty-four ships of war, and one hundred and forty transports, cutters and tenders, stood out into the channel, and a glorious sight they presented.
The Essex, a sixty-four gun-ship, commanded by our commodore, the Honourable Richard (afterwards Earl) Howe, led the van, and closely in her wake followed the Brilliant of thirty-six guns, commanded by Captain Hyde Parker, who was afterwards knighted for his services off the coast of America.
As the Essex bore across Sandown Bay, I have been told that the French deserter, Theophile Damien, assisted with his own hands to steer the ship, as if in token of the good service he meant to perform for us in future.
There was a pretty stiff breeze on this morning, and I had a dread of sea sickness, as the vessel rolled heavily, her main-deck being encumbered by stores; but the novelty of the scene and of the situation, together with the activity of the seamen, as they swarmed up aloft and lay out upon the yards, occupied all my attention for a time; and to our tars of after years, the Jacks of Anson and of Howe, in their little low cocked hats, Dutch-cut pea-jackets, petticoat trousers, and brass-buckled shoes, would present a very unusual spectacle. Certainly their costume was scarcely fitted for sending down the topgallant yards, or lying out on the man-rope to close-reef topsails in a gale of wind; but they were true tars, nevertheless.
Ere long the breeze, which had favoured us so much that the shores of England had lessened astern, veered somewhat ahead; the weather became stormy and wet, and I was glad to keep below, and share the stall of my horse. While Kirkton, Charters, and others, who had been frequently at sea before, sat out upon the booms to leeward, and smoked to fill up the time.
In their mirth and cheerfulness, they formed a contrast to the unfortunate seasick troopers, who were all huddled away in groups, seeking shelter under the lee of anything that offered itself, and who remained there in discomfort and misery, till the drum beat for all but the watch to go below and turn in.
Next day I came on deck about dawn, and joined Charters, who was one of the morning watch, and here I may mention, that when on boardship, troops are divided into three watches, and must take their share of all deck duty with the seamen. A subaltern officer has charge of each watch, and there are also, when the numbers embarked will permit it, a captain and subaltern of the day.
"Gauntlet, my lad, you look pale," said Charters, as he trod to and fro to keep himself warm; for though the month was June, the air upon the morning sea was cold, and the chill spray came flying in showers over the weather cat-heads, as the Brilliant sped upon her course, like all the fleet which covered the open channel, close hauled; "the morning watch is a devilish cold one, and we have no chance here of getting a hair of the dog—eh?" added my friend, laughing.
"What land is that?" I asked, with chattering teeth, while clutching the rigging with one hand, and pointing southward with the other.
"The land of France—that is Cape La Hogue," replied Charters.
"Ay," growled an old quartermaster; "yonder is the fort, with the flag flying."
The old tar's eyes must have been better than mine, which could discern neither fort nor flag; but I muffled my trooper's cloak about me, and set myself to watch the hostile shore.
The outline of the land looked dim and low, and like a dark cloud, as it rose from the grey morning sea, which was all of a dusky tint and flecked with masses of foam. The whole aspect of the fleet was gloomy and cheerless now; the decks and canvas were wet and dripping with the rain of the past night, and with the spray of the waves, for there was a heavy sea running in the channel; but anon the sun began to rise through successive bars or streaks of purple and saffron cloud; then the long lines of waves rolled after each other glittering in light. The canvas aloft became whiter; the hulls of the vessels shone and became instinct with life, as the red port lids were triced up, the snowy hammocks placed in their nettings, and the scarlet coats crowded on the decks; drums and bugles were heard from time to time, warnings for parade, orders or messing, as the swift fleet flew on at the rate of eight knots per hour, and now and then, by a signal from the commodore, the best sailers were ordered to cast a tow-line to the more slow, especially our deeply laden storeships.
On the evening of the 3rd of June we came to anchor, between Sark and Jersey, for what reason I know not. In the night we had a hurricane; one transport lost a mast, another lost her bowsprit, and a third, crowded with foot soldiers, was totally lost by running foul of a sunken rock. The boats of the Brilliant were piped away with great celerity, and all the troops were saved before the wreck went to pieces; but I shall never forget that horrible night—the darkness of the atmosphere, the bellowing of the wind and the roaring of the sea, while the frigate leaped, plunged and strained on her cables, like a restive horse; and then, amid all this, the danger and excitement caused by the sinking of the transport amid the obscurity of that stormy midnight sea, and the loss of life that might have ensued but for the skill and bravery of our seamen.
Jersey is so surrounded by reefs of sunken rock, that it was a miracle no more of our armament perished on this occasion.
On the morning of the 5th, the commodore signalled to weigh anchor and pursue our course.
The whole fleet ran with a fair breeze along the coast of Normandy, and so close were we in shore, that the houses, farms, and even the inhabitants could be seen distinctly without the aid of glasses. At one place we saw a column of French Infantry on the march, with all their bayonets glittering in the sunshine; at another, where the land opened near Sainte Soule, a regiment of dragoons riding at full gallop in the direction we were pursuing.
"Tom, we shall be under fire to-morrow," said Charters, thoughtfully, as he knocked the ashes from his pipe into the palm of his left hand and scattered them to leeward.
"All the better," replied Kirkton, "the see-saw of home service has sickened me."
"And me too," added I, "and I long for some keen excitement."
"Excitement," replied Charters, "then you are likely to have it with a vengeance, my boy! Think of thirteen thousand men invading France!"
By two o'clock p.m. we came to anchor in Cancalle Bay, on the coast of Brittany, nine miles eastward of St. Malo. The Brilliant lay not far from the famous rock of Cancalle, so celebrated for its oysters, the fishing of which forms one of the chief sources of local wealth.
Commodore Howe, it would appear, had now questioned narrowly the two French deserters, Theophile Damien and Benoit Bossoit, whom I had been the humble means of introducing to his notice, and discovering that they were profoundly ignorant of the whole locality, he began to suspect both their veracity and intentions, and therefore ordered them to be made close prisoners, while, accompanied by the Duke of Marlborough, Colonel Watson our quarter-master-general, and Thierry the pilot, he went in the Grace, an armed cutter, to reconnoitre the Bay.
The information of two pretended deserters, as to the position and strength of batteries, and so forth, having proved perfectly erroneous, on his return the commodore ordered the Frenchmen to be searched; and then, on papers detailing the number and object of our armament being found upon them both, he forthwith ordered them to be put to death in the most summary manner.
Posted as sentinel on the poop of the Brilliant, I was in ignorance of all this, and was treading to and fro carbine in hand, with my eyes fixed on the rough and wooded shore of Brittany, when Captain Lindsay came on deck, harnessed in full regimentals with sword and gorget on.
"Well, Gauntlet," said he, "your two Frenchmen have, unfortunately, proved to be impostors and spies, after all."
"Spies!" I reiterated, with some dismay.
"Yes; of the most dangerous kind."
"And what is to be done with them, sir?"
"That which the laws of war direct—ah! look yonder!"
He pointed to the Essex, the ship of the commodore, and a thrill of horror ran through me, on beholding two human forms run up simultaneously by the neck, to the arms of the foreyard, where they dangled for a minute in mid-air; but they were not meant to be hanged, as each had a cold thirty-two pound shot at his heels.
This must have been a pleasant spectacle for Thierry the pilot, who was also a Frenchman, and consequently a traitor.
A gun was fired from the bow of the Essex; solemnly the echoes of the sea and shore replied, and ere the last had died away, both culprits had vanished under the waves, whose ripples closed over them and left no trace behind. Then, as the pale and fierce dark face of Damien came in memory before me, I turned to my leader and said—
"Captain Lindsay, the fate of Damien forms a terrible sequel to the story of his brother."
"That story was falsehood—all," replied the captain; "he was no relation whatever of the famous would-be regicide, who was a peasant of Artois. The name of the spy was Theophile Hautois, not Damiens, and he never was a privateersman, nor served under Thurot, but was a forester of Brittany, and, as some suppose, a robber among the Menez Mountains. His whole narrative, so far as he was concerned, proves an artful forgery, and, like his companion, he was a fully accredited spy of the French authorities, employed to obtain information which his lips can never render them now."
The boom of a second cannon now pealed across the Bay.
"The commodore has fired another gun and hoisted a signal," said an officer close by.
The signal midshipman raised his telescope to the bunting which we saw fluttering at the mainmast-head of the Essex.
"What is it now—what says the order?" asked several, with the impatience and curiosity natural enough at such a time.
"All ships having flat-bottomed boats and landing-stages, to hoist them out!" replied the middy, with a kindling eye.
"Bravo," added Captain Lindsay; "that seems like work! Ere long we shall have to look to our spurleathers and spatterdashes.”