"His brother! What! are there two of them? Helas!' "Fortune de la guerre,' said Captain Magendie."1

Conceiving that it more properly belonged to Captain Pellew to disarm officers of their rank, Captain Atcherly declined the honour of receiving their swords.

"He then went below to secure the magazines passing between decks amid an awful scene of carnage and destruction. The dead thrown back as they fell, lay along the middle of the decks in heaps, and the shot, passing through these had frightfully mangled the bodies. More than four hundred had been killed and wounded, of whom an extraordinary proportion had lost their heads. A raking shot, which entered in the lower deck, had glanced along the beams and through the thickest of the people, and a French officer declared that this shot alone had killed or disabled nearly forty men." "1

Having secured the magazine and put the key in his pocket and placed two sentries, one at each cabin door, Captain Atcherly, accompanied by the French Admiral and his two Captains, pulled off with his three remaining hands, and at length boarded, not the Conqueror, who had preceded in chase, but the Mars, her sister ship; where the French officers were ordered to remain."2

Those who know the Corps of Royal Marines and are familiar with its history will have no difficulty in picturing to themselves the two Marine sentries, the only representatives of the big Bucentaure's captors, pacing stolidly up and down outside the cabin doors with about as much concern as if they were doing sentry-go at their barrack gate. Lieutenant Owen of the Belleisle had a somewhat similar experience when sent to take possession of the surrendered Argonauta. He gives the following account of the incident:-3

"A beaten Spanish 80-gun ship-the Argonauta, having about this time hoisted English colours, the Captain was good enough to give me the pinnace to take possession of her: the Master accompanied me with eight or ten seamen or Marines who happened to be near us. On getting up the Argonauta's side I found no living person on her deck, but on my making my way, over numerous dead and a confusion of wreckage across the quarter-deck, was met by the second Captain at the cabin door, who gave me his sword, which I returned, desiring him to keep it for Captain Hargood, to whom I should soon introduce him. With him I accordingly returned to the Belleisle, leaving the Master in charge of the prize."

When the Redoubtable struck her flag to the Victory she was in such a battered condition that her Captain -Lucas-asked for assistance from the British. Eight Marines with a couple of midshipmen were sent to her from the Victory, and climbed on board through the stern ports. One of the Marines was at once attacked by a wounded French sailor with a musket and bayonet, who shouted, "I must kill one more of them!" The unfortunate Marine was run through

1 The Enemy at Trafalgar," by Edward Fraser.

2 In a note made by the late Captain Portlock Dadson, R.M., it is relat d that when Admiral Villeneuve was finally transforred to the Victory at 5-40 p.m., he was received by a Guard of Honour of the Royal Marines in full dress, under the command of Lieutenant Rotely, as if on parade on shore, which caused the Admiral to exclaim, "What cannot the English do!" I have been unable to verify this statement.

In the Life of Admiral Sir William Hargood, G.C.H., R.N.

the thigh and fell overboard. Naturally the rest of the party felt disinclined to render any further assistance, and were about to return to their ship, but were eventually induced by Lucas to remain.

There is little doubt that many other incidents of at least equal interest befell both officers and men of the Corps who took part in this battle, fraught with the greatest importance, not only to the British nation of that day, but also to millions of people then unborn. But while history has dealt fully with the performances of the opposing fleets, and even of their individual ships, it is silent as to the particular experiences of the Royal Marines. Here and there their red jackets peep out through the mists of smoke and time, and such glimpses have here been presented in a necessarily fragmentary manner. It only remains to add in conclusion that out of the ninety-two officers and 3,600 men of the Corps who went into action, four officers and 113 men were killed, and thirteen officers and 212 men wounded; and that "amidst all the honours and rewards abundantly conferred by a grateful country on Naval Officers, only one solitary mark of distinction was extended to the Corps of Marines serving in the Fleet. The brevet rank of Major conferred on Captain Thomas Timmins was considered adequate to the claims of a Corps whose gallant exertions had so materially contributed to the important results of this gloriously fought day."1

Against the story that Nelson was sending Marines aloft to attack the marksmen on the tops of the Redoubtable, one of whom in a few minutes time fired the fatal shot that ended his brilliant career, may be put the oft-quoted statement that the great Admiral would never allow the practice of picking off the enemy from the tops, which the French constantly did. Whether he ever permitted it or not, it is certain that during the 18th Century, musketry, grenades and small swivel guns were frequently used in our tops in action. But at the time of Nelson's death there was a feeling that it was not quite fair fighting. How long this continued, I am unable to say. I was told by the late Admiral Robert Hammick, R.N., when serving under his command in H.M.S. Warspite in 1893, that when he first went to sea there was a special gun mounted on the deck of his ship which was generally known as "Nelson's Revenge," as it was so mounted that it could be fired at the enemy's tops even when close alongside. It would be interesting to know whether this was the "gun and carriage for the purpose of dislodging marksmen from the enemy's tops in close action, and repelling boarders, etc.,” for the invention of which Captain Thomas Maxwell Bagnold, Royal Marines, received the silver medal of the Society of Arts in 1811. While on the subject of invention it may be noted that another officer of Marines, Captain John Bartleman, made a useful military invention in the same year, which is described as "a musket lock cover, which affords a complete preservation of the priming for many hours under the heaviest rain, and possesses other advantages superior to anything of the kind hitherto adopted. It has met with the approbation of Lord Wellesley and all the officers who have ever seen it tried, and forty thousand are now preparing to be sent out to Portugal for the use of the Light Troops of the Army."

1 From "Nicholas' Historical Records of the Marine Forces." Captain Timmins was the senior officer of the Royal Marines present in the action, and became a substantive Major, 1st June, 1810. He died as a Lieut. Col. on the Retired List, 23rd October, 1828,

THE ROYAL MARINE ARTILLERY AND OTHER CORPS MATTERS. "Never in my life have I met soldiers like the Marine Artillery. We suffered much fatigue and hardship, but never was seen anything not admirable in these glorious soldiers."-Gen. Sir Charles James Napier.

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E have seen that as far back as the time of Henry VIII., when the crude ordnance of the Middle Ages had been replaced by cannon of considerably greater efficiency, there was a considerable detachment of gonnars embarked in each of the Royal Ships and that, if we may judge from their uniform, they were "seamen gunners rather than soldiers or Marines. These men, or rather, it would appear, their instructors and the gunnery experts in the Royal Navy, were supplied by an organisation known as "The Fraternity of Artillery," or "Gunners of the Tower," which was incorporated in 1537. The head of the fraternity was the "Master Gunner of England," who saw to it that all his recruits were solemnly sworn not to divulge the secrets of the art of gunnery to any foreigner or alien.

In 1581, William Thomas, the then Master Gunner of England, stated that the Gunners of the Tower of London and of the Navy, which they supplied, were practically the only skilled gunners in the whole kingdom. The Naval Service, however, does not seem to have been very popular, and it was found impossible

1 In the 15th Century the King's ships were generally termed of the Tower," e.g., The Nicholas of the Tower, the Thomas of the Tower, etc., instead of "His Majesty's Ship The "Gunners of the Tower," therefore really bore the same title Royal Artillery."

as the

to supply the eight hundred gunners that were at this time required to complete it for service; barely a tenth of that number could be induced to come forward. As an instance, in the case of a ship of 400 tons, "thirty-six gunners were wanted, amongst whom six able men could not be found, as they were all pressed men, and altogether unskilful."

In this emergency the Master Gunner suggested that he and a committee of four of his most experienced gunners should be empowered to send deputies to Falmouth, Plymouth, Dartmouth, Lyme, Bristol, Chichester, Poole, Portsmouth, Berwick, Newcastle-on-Tyne, Hull, Boston and Yarmouth. These men were to examine and test any persons claiming to have a knowledge of gunnery, and to issue certificates of efficiency, without which no one would be allowed to serve on board ship as a Master-Gunner.1

Whether these proposals were carried out, and if so, with what amount of success, cannot be stated, but from all accounts the English gunnery in the Armada Fight of 1588 was pretty effective. The English ships stood off, and although the towering Spanish galleons were built of extraordinarily thick timbers, and supplied with a number of defensive devices, their guns lacked them through and through," says an old writer, and were fired three times to the enemy's one.

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Like everything else in the Army and Navy, gunnery without doubt went "to rack and ruin," under the rule of James I., but possibly from the practical instruction on shore during the Civil War it seems to have revived by the time of Cromwell and Charles II, and our ships gave as good as they got in the fierce fighting with the Dutch in the Channel and North Sea.

About this time the Board of Ordnance was responsible for the supply of guns and ammunition to both land and sea services, and probably had to do with the supply of gunners into the bargain. In 1686 a Chief Bombardier and twelve Bombardiers at two shillings a day were established for duties both by land and sea. The Gunners referred to by Luttrell in 1694 were probably an increase on the original establishment. It is evident from the word "Bombardier" that it was the growing use of mortars throwing shell that called for more scientific gunnery than had hitherto been required afloat. Effective as the gunnery of the Fleet had hitherto proved, there was little or no science about it. British Naval Officers liked to get to such close quarters with their opponents that it was next to impossible to miss. Most actions were fought muzzle to muzzle, and the British guns' crews had gained the reputation of handling their guns better and quicker than their enemies. Naturally the side that fired fastest and stood most stoutly to its guns came off the best.

But a bombardment at long range required a certain amount of science and calculation and the superintendence of skilled artillery officers, which, in those days, Naval Officers made no pretence of being. On the other hand the Artillery officer, points out an old drill-book of 1690, must be skilled in geometry and arithmetick, and must be careful to know what materials are requisite for his Art."3

1 Raikes' "History of the Honourable Artillery Company."

2 Vide page 27 Note.

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3 "The perfection of Military Discipline as practised in England and Ireland, 1690.”

So with the great increase in the use of "Bomb-Vessels," which took place at this period, when mortars fired projectiles of 240 pounds weight to a distance of something like 4,000 yards, the Navy fell back on the Army to assist it, since, oblivious of the fact that the French had established a Naval Artillery School nearly a hundred years before, it had failed to institute anything of the kind for itself. It had trusted entirely to seamanship and to the golden rule of always assuming the offensive, and it must be admitted that events had justified its confidence.

Usually a Fireworker" and two Bombardiers would be attached to each mortar. Bomb-Vessels generally worked in pairs, but when a larger number were attached to a Fleet or Expedition a "Firemaster" would be appointed as senior officer of Artillery on all the "Bombs." The famous Colonel Borgaard, a Dane by birth, and the first Colonel of the Royal Artillery on its creation in 1716, went as a Major in charge of the five Bomb-Vessels in the Spanish Expedition of 1702, which did valuable work in that campaign. Other "Bombs" and their amphibious gunners did yeoman service on the coasts of the Baltic, the Channel and Mediterranean, to say nothing of America and the West Indies.

But these Marine Artillerymen were only, so to speak, "lent" to the Navy, as were numbers of other Gunners as years went on. The Navy itself seemed content to leave mortars alone, and made no attempt to form a Corps of Marine Artillery, although a Colonel Campbell Dalrymple of the K.D.Gs., in a collection of "Military Essays," published in 1761, made the following suggestion for the formation of such a Corps :--

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"Of all the various branches of our profession," he wrote, none hath made a greater progress in it than the Regiment of Artillery; but as their numbers are now greater than what will be necessary in time of peace, there will probably be a large reduction of them when that takes place. Suppose, therefore, a Marine Battalion should be formed of the supernumeraries to serve aboard the Fleet, instead of what they call Quarter-Gunners, who, having no education or instruction till they are pressed and carried on board the Ships of War, are by no means equal to these men, regularly trained to the use of great guns, and from practice become excellent marksmen.'

The "Quarter-Gunners" referred to were assistants to the Gunner of a ship and were allowed in the proportion of one to each four guns. In 1780, too, a Marine Artillery Company was actually formed in New York. On 26th January of that year warrants were issued by Major-General Pattison, Commandant of that City from 1777 to 1780, for the formation of the "New York Marine Artillery Company. In this document-now in the Royal Artillery Library, Woolwich-are recorded the names of its officers and instructions for their guidance. On the 19th of February its numbers were returned at eighty men. Whether it ever served afloat cannot be said.

Our present Royal Marine Artillery-which dates from 1804-was not raised with any idea, in the first instance, of improving the gunnery of the Corps of Royal Marines or of the Navy or of manning the broadsides of our line-of-battle

1 Fide Note I.