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When the Spanish admiral, Don Juan de Langara, recognized his mistake, he attempted to escape; but the English ships were copper-bottomed, and Rodney making the signal for a general chase overtook the enemy, cut in between him and his port, regardless of a blowy night, lee shore, and dangerous shoals, and succeeded in capturing the commander-in-chief with six ships-of-the-line.
In the summer of 1793, Gravina commanded a division of the Spanish fleet in the Mediterranean, of which Admiral Langara was the commander-in-chief. At the capitulation of Toulon, after the combined English and Spanish forces had taken possession of it, when Rear-Admiral Goodall was declared governor, Gravina was made the commandant of the troops.
In Ross's squadron were one three-decker and two eighties. For three weeks, so severe was the epidemic, they could not move. Then came news that the Cadiz fleet under Langara had sailed the day Howe had reached Spithead, and he resolved to make a dash with every ship fit to put to sea to cut it off from Brest. He was too late.
No one could understand the reason of the unsatisfactory feeling, but Forster suggests that it was owing to the advice of a Spanish deserter, who had left his ship about March 1773. This vessel was commanded by Don Juan de Langara y Huarto, and was from Callao; her voyage has not been published, but the natives gave Forster to understand that four of her sailors had been hanged on her arrival.
Before he could get into position the junction between Langara and the Brest squadron was made, and in their full force the allies had occupied the mouth of the Channel. With the addition of the Brest ships the combined fleet numbered forty of the line, while all Howe could muster was twenty-two, but amongst them were seven three-deckers and three eighties, and he would soon be reinforced.
These writers aver that Hood, after entering Toulon as an equal with the Spanish admiral, Langara, laid claim to entire command of the land forces; that English commissioners were sent for the administration of the town; and that the English Government refused to allow the coming of the Comte de Provence, who, as the elder of the two surviving brothers of Louis XVI., was entitled to act on behalf of Louis XVII. The facts in the main are correct, but the interpretation put upon them may well be questioned.
They promised, while Gallinato was making these negotiations, to go overland to the kingdom of Lao, where Langara, king of Camboja, was living, in order to restore him to his kingdom.
Early in the morning of July 12th, "being fifteen leagues S.S.E. from Scilly," Langara with thirty-six of the line was seen to the westward. "As soon," wrote Howe, "as their force had been ascertained, I thought proper to avoid coming to battle with them as then circumstanced, and therefore steered to the north to pass between Scilly and the Land's End.
"I take for granted," he admitted to the Viceroy, "that the admiral will send me back in a cutter, but I shall give him a good ordered seventy-four, and take my chance of helping to thrash Don Langara, than which few things, I assure you, would give me more real pleasure."
In the summer of 1793, Gravina commanded a division of the Spanish fleet in the Mediterranean, of which Admiral Langara was the commander-in-chief. At the capitulation of Toulon, after the combined English and Spanish forces had taken possession of it, when Rear-Admiral Goodall was declared governor, Gravina was made the commandant of the troops.
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