For a fleet, the consciousness extended out to the line of ships that were in company, but each world was its own, self-contained and complete. With flags alone to communicate, there could be no casual gossip or civil exchange of pleasantries, no domestic scandals to discuss, no wistful hopes expressed.
And ahead was the enemy. At any moment a lookout’s cry could signal the first far glimpse of Villeneuve’s Combined Fleet and then somewhere in the midst of the ocean would come the climactic battle that would decide the fate of peoples thousands of miles distant.
Deep into the Atlantic the squadron heaved to, the onward march of the broad searching ships in line abreast coming to a stop. L’Aurore was ordered to pass within hail of the flagship in the centre. Knowing he was under eye, Kydd ensured his approach was impeccable. The unmistakable figure of the commander-in-chief himself raised a speaking trumpet from Victory’s quarterdeck.
‘Do you take these instructions to every vessel in my command, Mr Kydd – and know that even minutes lost waiting here in idleness takes the French further from my grasp.’
‘Aye, aye, my lord!’ Kydd bellowed back. Seeing the quick-witted Curzon sending men to the jolly-boat at the stern davits to prepare for launching, he added: ‘Then I’d be obliged should you order the fleet to be under way directly, sir.’
After a moment’s hesitation Nelson turned to Captain Hardy and said something. L’Aurore’s boat came alongside below the entry port and a small chest containing the orders was swayed aboard. It shoved off, and instantly a signal broke out at Victory’s mizzen – ‘Squadron to resume course’. If Kydd was wrong that he could distribute the orders while all the vessels were under full sail, it would be at the cost of fleet-wide amusement.
The boat returned to L’Aurore as the line of ships ponderously caught the wind and continued on their way. Kydd peered over the side. Nelson’s instructions were in individually labelled sailcloth packages and, from the way the men hefted them, properly weighted with musket balls.
‘Ah, Poulden,’ he said, as his coxswain hurried up to report. ‘To every ship, beginning with Tigre. And mark well how it’s to be done!’ His plan required a frigate of outstanding sailing qualities but he knew he had that. With satisfaction he saw Stirk tumble down into the boat: his manoeuvres also required the hand and eye of a true seaman.
Tigre was the windward ship-of-the-line. With her boat towing astern L’Aurore shook out a reef and caught up with, then passed her, for the fleet was progressing at the speed of the slowest, the barnacled Superb at some six knots only.
The tow-line was thrown off and with the last of the headway Poulden closed with the massive blunt bows of the 74 as it foamed along, heedless. At a dozen feet distant Stirk’s heave was unerring. The boat-rope shot up into the fore-chains and seamen aboard quickly took a turn, the boat now in an exaggerated bucketing as she was pulled along.
Then Stirk’s messenger line sailed over the bulwarks and the seamen hauled in the commander-in-chief’s instructions. Both lines were then cast off and thrown into the boat, which fended off and wallowed in the mid-ocean swell as Tigre’s massive bulk hissed past.
Miraculously L’Aurore was there for the boat: Kydd had brailed up his courses to fall back as Tigre passed and now quickly took up the tow and loosed sail for the next, Leviathan. One by one he did the same for the rest, and when it was done he resumed his position at the wing of the line.
‘From Flag, sir. “Manoeuvre well executed”.’ Kydd tried to affect disinterest at the signal midshipman’s report.
Day after day, mile after mile, the seas got brighter and warmer with sightings of tropical seabirds and flying fish. In any other time and place it would have been a sea idyll but soon there would be fighting and death. Daily gun-drill was regular and long; boarders were exercised, small-arms were practised. Somewhere ahead, in the open ocean or among the islands of the Caribbean, they would overhaul the French and force them to the battle that had been so long denied them.
Thirty, twenty, fifteen degrees latitude – the trade winds bore the squadron on at a pace. The chills of winter were a fading memory: hauling seamen had naked backs and bare feet, and windsails were rigged over the hatch gratings to send cool airs into the lower-deck.
Still no urgent cry came; L’Aurore, like the other frigates, was far out on the wings of the extended line, a width of near sixty miles being combed by the ongoing ships. Every new dawn saw each ship silently at quarters, doubled lookouts in their lofty eyrie straining to see as light began to steal over the grey sea, turning it by degrees to a deep blue – and always with the line of the horizon gradually firming and innocent of threat.
And after four thousand miles and three weeks at sea an undistinguished and tiny intrusion into the far blue rim: Barbados. What would they find there? That Nelson had been comprehensively fooled into a wild-goose chase across the whole Atlantic? Or that the French had come and gone, leaving a smoking ruin where once had been the richest of England’s possessions?
The squadron fleet came to anchor in Carlisle Bay – and, praise be, the cannon of Fort Charles thudded their salute. Smoke wreathed slowly about the Union Flag hanging limply above it in the tropical heat.
In minutes the bay was alive with watercraft heading out: bum-boats, with limes, bananas and illicit rum hidden inside coconuts, mixing with official vessels and store-ships.
Without warning guns began to open up around the whole fleet throwing the craft into confusion – but it was only another salute, the twenty-one for the King’s Birthday.
Shortly after, a boat brought an excitable army lieutenant to L’Aurore. He had alarming and thrilling news: the French had been sighted! They had caused destruction and consternation everywhere – at St Kitts, Nevis, Montserrat – and everyone was on edge at where they would strike next. The arrival of Nelson’s squadron was not a moment too soon.
Kydd realised that to have achieved such damage already, this could only have been Missiessy’s Rochefort squadron, which had sortied earlier. This was a double setback: not simply the devastation caused but that it was not Villeneuve – had they chased across the Atlantic after a phantom?
A peremptory gun banged out from Victory, drawing attention to the ‘all captains’ signal. Within two hours of anchoring, after a desperate chase across the ocean, Nelson was summoning a council-of-war.
Kydd wondered how he would take the latest news but the answer came as his barge neared the flagship. The Blue Peter broke at the masthead – the order for the fleet to make ready to sail.
Kydd entered the great cabin with several others at once. Nelson stood in much good humour, welcoming them in, exchanging gossip of the voyage, asking after ailments. When all had arrived he bade them be seated.
‘Gentlemen, you’ll be as elated as I to know that not only was I right in my surmise that Villeneuve was bound to the Indies but that he’s within a day or so’s reach of me. We’ve word here from General Brereton on St Lucia that he’s arrived in Martinique this past two weeks or so.’ He looked about the assembled group with beaming satisfaction.
‘Not only that . . . but he’s since sailed and cannot be far distant.’
Kydd’s pulse quickened. It sounded like an action was imminent. The clash of fleets would be in the Caribbean, much as Rodney’s great victory at the Saintes a generation before, just north beyond Martinique. Could it be . . . ?