The Duc de Biron belonged to the Gontaut-Lauzun family, one-time partisans of the usurper Henri Quatre of Navarre. An ancestor, Charles de Biron, was named Admiral and Marshal of France before he suffered the common fate of prominence too close to a King. On being accused of conspiracy and tried for treason, he was beheaded by order of the erratic monarch he served. The family nevertheless prospered in royal service and by Rodney’s time had acquired an excess of riches, judging by the startling expenditures of Biron’s nephew Armand Louis de Gontaut, born 1747, who took the title Duc de Lauzun. He is recorded as having bought a colonelcy for 1.5 million livres (then worth about $400,000). His mansion was the present Ritz Hotel. He spent 1,337 livres and 10 sous for half a box at the opera, 1,500 for half a box at the Théâtre des Italiens and the same for a box at the Comédie Française. In between theatrical distractions and keeping count of amours that seemed likely to match Leporello’s proud record for Don Giovanni in Spain of “a thousand and three,” he applied himself to the subject of the day by writing a treatise on The Defenses of England and All Her Possessions in the Four Quarters of the World. Whether or not impressed by his subject, he became one of the young nobles who volunteered to fight in the American Revolution and was to take an active part in the Yorktown campaign. Elected in 1789 a deputy to the Estates General as a partisan of the Revolution, he commanded the Revolutionary Army of the Rhine but, in the course of factional struggles, suffered the fate of his ancestor and met death on the guillotine in 1793.
Because Rodney had been heard to boast that he could deal with the French fleet if free to go back to England, and because English newspapers were implying that the French were keeping Rodney from the front because of his military talent, it has been suggested that Biron’s generosity may have been moved as much by national pique as by chivalry. Whatever his motive, the sense of warmth and esteem it offered Rodney after the neglect by his own compatriots, and the prospect of release from Paris, came at a critical moment, for, as he writes, his passport had expired and the creditors had grown so “clamorous” that he risked being sued or worse, for they were only held back by the police and by the visits of “those great families whose attentions kept my creditors from being so troublesome as they otherwise would have been.” “For more than a month past,” he wrote to his wife on May 6, he had not had a letter from anyone “but Mr. Hotham and yourself.” Such astonishing neglect by his friends at home seems to suggest that Rodney was not very popular in his own circle in England, which makes all the more striking the puzzling contrast with the remarkable kindness and generosity of the Duc de Biron’s offer and the hospitable attentions of the “great families” of Paris—unless the explanation may be that the French derived a perverse pleasure in finding themselves aiding an enemy in distress, especially an English enemy.
On the same May 6 on which he acknowledged the absence of any message from England, Rodney, understandably depressed, dropped his scruples and accepted Biron’s offer to advance him 1,000 louis, satisfying all creditors. On his return to England in May, 1778, money to repay the loan was raised by Drummond’s Bank, whose director Henry Drummond was a relative of Rodney’s first wife. When this gentleman learned the circumstances, he arranged to cancel the debt. Rodney’s more pressing need of active employment was left hanging for yet another year, on the ground that the major commands in America and the West Indies and of the Grand Fleet had been filled. In fact, this was not true. At a time when Spain’s belligerency was anticipated and the combined Bourbon enemies were preparing for assault, Rodney was passed over as successor to Keppel for command of the Grand Fleet in favor of Sir Charles Hardy, one of the superannuated admirals whom Sandwich was scraping from the bottom of the barrel like last season’s dried apples when more active flag officers would not accept appointments, fearing to be made scapegoat if anything went wrong. Taken out of comfortable retirement at Greenwich Hospital, Hardy had not been at sea for twenty years. “Does the people at home think the nation in no danger?” wrote a senior captain of the Grand Fleet to a colleague while under Sir Charles Hardy’s limp command. “I must inform you the confused conduct here is such that I tremble for the event. There is no forethought … we are every day from morning to night plagued and puzzled in minutiae while essentials are totally neglected.… My God, what have you great people done by such an appointment?” Political division in the navy, besides setting comrades against each other, had injured the service by narrowing the choice of flag officers, and even of the Navy Board, to old and tired veterans, weak in health and spirit, the relics of better days.
Nature took care of the problem, when in May, 1780, after a year of the too heavy responsibility, Sir Charles Hardy died. The sigh of relief was short, for Hardy’s successor, when Admiral Barrington refused the command, was the seventy-year-old Admiral Francis Geary, another withered apple, whom an officer described as “wholly debilitated in his faculties, his memory and judgment lost, wavering and indeterminate in everything.” In three months Geary was not dead but exhausted, reporting that he could not get out of bed in the morning and sending his doctor’s opinion confirming his request for leave. When Barrington, who was second in command, again refused to move up, the Admiralty searched its own premises for an officer not likely to collapse, and found a member of the Admiralty’s Board in his fifties, Vice-Admiral Darby, willing to take the command.
While Rodney had been held idle, a scramble in the West Indies had taken place when the French, after the stalemate at Ushant, redirected their offensive against British commerce from the Caribbean. By aggressive troop landings, they captured Dominica, lying between Martinique and Guadeloupe, giving them a strong position in the middle of the Leeward and Windward islands. At the same time, the British took back Ste. Lucie, which Rodney always considered the key base from which to observe Fort Royal in Martinique. In the following summer of 1779, more islands fell with the French capture of St. Vincent near the middle of the Windward chain and of Grenada at the bottom.
When Spain joined France against Britain in June, 1779, both powers had reached the conclusion that defeat of their common enemy could best be realized by attack on the heart rather than on the limbs; by direct invasion of the home islands rather than assault on her sea-lanes and wide-flung colonies, reaching across the world from Ceylon to Jamaica. The invasion was planned for the summer of 1779 with a combined fleet of 66, far greater strength than the 45 ships that Britain could muster in the Channel for defense. What saved her was a worse case of French ministerial indecision and sloppy management than her own. Correspondence between Versailles and Madrid had been under way since December, but coordination of the fleets and commanders was on paper, not in practice, which proved a serious flaw. D’Orvilliers, the French commander, sailed for the rendezvous under hurried orders the first week in June and was not joined by the main Spanish fleet until July 23, by which time he had been cruising for six weeks doing nothing, with ships already short of provisions and water. They were poorly manned, he complained, with “mediocre captains,” of whom there is “a still greater number on this cruise than in the last one.” Sickness, which had already taken a terrible toll among the Spaniards, was spreading among his crews. Further time was lost in the translation of signal books and orders which had not been prepared in peace time. Conscious of too little joint experience to expect good maneuvering, D’Orvilliers wrote that he would have to place his hopes on “bravery and firmness.”
Alarm gripped England as people caught sight of the white-winged herd of enemy sails coming up the Channel. A Royal Proclamation ordered horses and cattle to be withdrawn from the coasts, booms to be placed across harbors, troops to be encamped on the south coast. Weather again came to the aid of the English, not like the storm that had scattered the Armada of Philip II but its opposite—a calm that held the enemy motionless within sight of Plymouth. The situation of the French fleet, D’Orvilliers reported, “becomes worse every day” because of the epidemic of sickness and the dwindling
water supply. On top of this, a frigate arrived bringing a total change of orders for a landing at Falmouth, on the coast of Cornwall, instead of on the Isle of Wight as was the original plan. Furthermore, D’Orvilliers was told that the King wished the fleet to remain at sea “for several months” and that a supply convoy was “about to leave” Brest to meet him. To change a vast plan of operations at the last moment when army and navy were already at sea was hardly a sensible procedure. To postpone action when supplies were running out and “this terrible epidemic” was weakening his ships was, D’Orvilliers was forced to say, “very unfortunate,” and to expose fleets at sea during the autumn and winter was likewise. It was clear, wrote a personage of the court, the Duc de Chatelet, to the commandant at Havre, that the ministry had decided to “risk at all hazards … some sort of expedition against England in order to fulfill the engagement to Spain.” The court had been unable to come to a decision, reflecting the same “ignorance and vacillation” of our ministers who have “behaved like weak-minded people who never know what they want to do until the moment comes to do it.…” Under these circumstances, with the death rate on the Spanish ships leaving them virtually helpless, the invasion was called off in the fall of 1779 and the combined fleet dispersed. England was spared by act of God, if not by the navy, from what might have been the first invasion since the Normans of 1066.
At this late stage, in October, 1779, at a time of many threats, when Spain together with France was besieging Gibraltar and the Armed Neutrality League was showing hostility and the Dutch were considering adhering to it, Rodney, because of his reputation as an aggressive sailor, was taken back into active service. Since he did not belong to the political Opposition but supported the government in believing that “coercion of the colonies was perfectly just,” he had obtained his long-awaited audience with the King, who promised him an early appointment. Now, having been left to molder a year in London when no other officer of repute would serve under Sandwich, he was offered command of the Leeward Islands station and Barbados. Relief of Gibraltar, near exhaustion of its last supplies, was to be his immediate mission.
Anxiety for the great gate of the Mediterranean, England’s most important foothold on the Continent, was acute. With time pressing at his back, Rodney hastened at once to Portsmouth to prepare the fleet to make sure of seaworthy ships and full crews. He found working conditions and discipline there revealing, according to his biographer, an “extraordinary want of diligence in the different public departments,” and an “absence of proper zeal and activity in the officers of his fleet who were almost all strangers to him; and many of whom behaved to him with a marked disrespect and want of cordiality.”
Their attitude was political, for Rodney was known as a supporter of the government and of the war against the Americans. Feelings on this subject had become heated and divisive to the point of a civil war in opinion, strongly felt in the navy. In a recent diatribe, Opposition speakers in Parliament denounced the “pernicious system of government” as having brought the navy in home waters to a condition “superlatively wretched” and Britain, as they claimed, to “confusion, discord and ruin.” More than wretched, the navy was very far from the level prescribed by the unwritten rule that the British Navy must be kept at least as strong as the combined forces of France and Spain. As First Lord, Sandwich bore the blame.
Feeling the cold wind of public disfavor and threat of losing office, Parliament responded to the King’s plea in his speech from the throne in November, 1779, for more vigorous prosecution of the war by voting added subsidy for mercenaries and a draft of 25,000 seamen and 18,000 marines for the navy. Through a shower of complaints about delays and indiscipline, Rodney was able at least to put together a fleet fit for sea. He suffered a final frustration from westerly winds followed by a “stark calm” that held him in port for about two weeks, while Sandwich nagged when he felt a breeze in London: “For God’s sake go to sea without delay. You cannot conceive of what importance it is to yourself, to me and to the public that you should not lose this fair wind.” At last a wind blew through Portsmouth and on December 24, 1779, Rodney was able to sail to the encounter that would make him the hero of the hour.
He led a great fleet of 22 ships of the line, 8 frigates and 66 storeships and transports loaded together with a convoy of no fewer than 300 merchantmen bringing the trade to the West Indies. With his long train of followers that stretched over miles of ocean, he sailed south into the Atlantic, heading for the coast of Spain. En route he came upon a Spanish convoy on its way to supply the besieging force at Gibraltar. When the Spaniards in greatly inferior force surrendered without a fight, he took over the 54-gun escort, 6 frigates and 16 supply ships, which, with their cargo, were added to his train. Sailing on, he sighted on January 16 a Spanish squadron off Cape St. Vincent, on the coast of Portugal just north of Cádiz. It was lying in wait to intercept the Gibraltar relief force, of which the Spaniards had been warned. With only 11 ships of the line and 2 frigates, half the size of Rodney’s fleet, the Spaniards should have run for safety to Cádiz. Now, facing Rodney’s numbers, they chose to seek shelter in some harbor of the Cape.
Rodney, commanding from his cabin where he was lying ill with gout, chased them through the night under a rising moon until 2 a.m. Not to be deprived of a triumph while bedridden, he took a decision of instant boldness that few but he would have dared. With a hard gale blowing, giving promise of a storm, he raised the signal to engage to leeward—that is, to come between the enemy and the land, with the object of preventing the Spaniards from running to safety into a harbor. Leeward was a helpless position that every captain would normally avoid, with the added danger, in this case, of darkness and being dashed on the rocks by the rising storm. No council of war in advance had prepared his captains for any such unorthodox action, apart from his giving them all notice “upon my approaching the said Cape to prepare for battle.” Unlike Nelson, Rodney did not believe in holding conference and making friends with his officers. The risk he took in the moonlight depended on his own seamanship and his officers’ belief in him. Considering their attitude at Portsmouth, this appeared less than solid. Perhaps his boldness now inspired belief. They followed him, hoisting all their canvas for maximum speed and jettisoning barrels and lumber overboard to lighten weight.
The “brilliant rush” of the English fleet swept toward the shore while the light of the now full moon showed the fleeing Spaniards “flying for Cadiz like a shoal of frightened porpoises” pursued by sharks. Rodney told his sailing master to pay no attention to the smaller merchantmen but to lay him alongside the largest, “the admiral if there be one.” The Admiral’s ship proved to be the 80-gun Fenix, flagship of Don Juan de Langara, the Spanish commander who struck his flag along with five others. Another Spanish ship blew up with a tremendous explosion and four were taken, entangled with the English in the shoals. With the twilight falling in the short light of January, and the wind at gale force, Rodney had to put crews aboard the prize while keeping his fleet off the rocks. In the morning he could count possession of six enemy warships of the line, including the Admiral’s flagship and the Admiral himself as prisoner. Three more of the enemy line were wrecked on the rocks. Only two of Langara’s squadron escaped. Not forgetting his relief mission, in the midst of his triumph Rodney sent frigates to inform the consul at Tangier that Britain now held the Straits and provisions must be sent across to Gibraltar at once. Through storm wind and a heavy sea he reached the Straits, drove off the blockading squadron and anchored off the Rock, where he found the garrison and inhabitants on short rations close to starvation, with sentries posted at every store to prevent assault on the last produce on the shelves. After supplying Gibraltar and, beyond it, Minorca, with two years’ supply of stores and provisions, Rodney sailed for the Caribbean while cutters hastened back to London with the glorious news of Gibraltar’s relief and the tale of the moonlight battle.
Rodney’s numerical superiority at Cape St. Vincent reduced th
e victory from the heroic scale, but it was intrepidity and perfect command that brought him glory. Horace Mann, Walpole’s faithful correspondent, wrote from Florence that Rodney’s victory “caught like wild fire about the town” and Mann received congratulations from everyone he met. Rodney was greeted at home as the rescuer not only of Gibraltar but of the honor of the navy and, more than that, the honor of the flag. Guns were fired from the Tower of London and fireworks blazed for two nights running. “Everybody almost adores you,” wrote his eldest daughter, “and every mouth is full of your praise.” It was impossible to describe, wrote his wife, “the general applause that is bestowed upon you; or to mention the number of friends who have called to congratulate me on this happy event.” Many of them without doubt were the same friends who had left him without a word when he was down and out in Paris. How quick is the leap to catch on to the coattails of success! Rodney’s reward was the rather ephemeral gift of the thanks of Parliament, voted by both Houses, and the freedom of the City of London presented in a gold casket. More gratifying was his election unopposed on the floodtide of his victory as M.P. for the borough of Westminster.