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Updated: May 1, 2025
The naval armament, consisting of eighteen ships of the line, besides frigates, fireships, bomb-ketches, and transports, was put under the command of sir Edward Hawke, an officer whose faithful services recommended him, above all others, to this command; and rear-admiral Knowles was appointed his subaltern.
Many of the transports broke loose and a good deal of damage was done to small vessels and boats. Next night a greater danger threatened, when the ebb-tide, running five miles an hour, brought down seven French fireships, which suddenly burst into flame as they rounded the Point of Levy. There was a display of devil's fireworks such as few men have ever seen or could imagine.
By this arrangement, each of the British was covered in its advance, until it reached its prescribed antagonist as nearly fresh as possible, and the order of the British column was reversed from end to end. A division of frigates and fireships, under Captain Riou, was held ready for any special service.
"On the 11th of June," said Lord Cochrane, "information was received that the enemy was seriously thinking of evacuating the port before the fireships were completed.
Nelson in the Elephant commanded the fighting squadron, which consisted of seven 74's, three 64's and two of 50 guns, with 18 bomb vessels, sloops, and fireships. The rest of the ships, under Parker, were anchored at the other end of the shoal and 5 miles north of the city; it seems they were to have coöperated, but the south wind which Nelson needed made attack impossible for them.
The fireships with which he had been ordered to ruin the enemy's fleet had partly failed through the error of others.
He was forced to stand to the North, so that he rushed right into the jaws of destruction. He encountered in those remote and almost unknown waters tempests that were even more merciless than the fighting ships and fireships of the island heretics. Philip II. bore his loss with the same calmness that he bore the victory of Lepanto.
By dawn of the 21st more than 70,000 French had crossed, but at this critical interval the bridge again gave way, broken by the fireships and the stone-laden boats sent by the Austrians down the swift current. The struggle went on all day, the bridge being again built and again broken, and at night the French, cut off from their supply of ammunition, were forced to retreat.
The image of the Antwerp devil-ships imprinted itself indelibly upon the Spanish mind, as of something preternatural, with which human valour could only contend at a disadvantage; and a day was not very far distant one of the memorable days of the world's history, big with the fate of England, Spain, Holland, and all Christendom when the sight of a half-dozen blazing vessels, and the cry of "the Antwerp fireships," was to decide the issue of a most momentous enterprise.
The famous Captain Cook, who was sailing master of a frigate on this expedition, made the necessary soundings in three days; and the fleet of forty warships and a hundred transports went through without a scratch. Vaudreuil's second chance was with seven fireships, which, having been fitted out by the Bigot gang at ten times the proper cost, were commanded by a favoured braggart called Delouche.
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