Cochrane the Dauntless Page 3

  The year 1793 would prove to be a critical one in the life of his son Thomas. It was the year in which he was faced with the imminent loss of his inheritance and realised that he would have to make his own way in the world. It was the year in which France, having executed its king, declared war on Britain and thus initiated a conflict which would last for twenty-one years and provide the opportunity for several generations of naval officers to make their names and their fortunes. And it was the year in which his father at last consented to him joining the navy. His army commission was cancelled and in the summer of 1793, at the unusually late age of seventeen, he set off from Culross to join the crew of his uncle’s ship at Sheerness.

  Cochrane’s naval uncle, who played such an important role in his life, was a relatively junior frigate captain in 1793 but he would end his days with a knighthood and the rank of Admiral of the White.22 In many ways his naval career was more distinguished than that of his nephew who did not command a British ship of the line, let alone a squadron or a fleet, until he was an old man and then during a period of peace. The Hon. Alexander Forrester Inglis Cochrane was the sixth son of the eighth Earl of Dundonald and had joined the navy at the age of fifteen. As a midshipman and lieutenant he saw a great deal of action on the coast of North America and in the West Indies where he served under Sir Peter Parker and Sir George Rodney. Promoted to post-captain in 1782, he had a successful spell as a frigate captain before making his reputation in 1801 when he superintended the successful landing of General Abercromby’s army on the coast of Egypt. By 1804 he was a rear-admiral and commander-in-chief in the Leeward Islands. In 1806, as second in command to Sir John Duckworth in the West Indies, he played a key role in the Battle of San Domingo (‘Duckworth’s Action’), the last fleet action of the wars against Napoleonic France. For his part in this decisive victory he was made a Knight of the Bath and given the freedom of the City of London. Although he was an effective fighting captain, Alexander Cochrane lacked diplomatic skills and managed to annoy a number of influential superiors including Lord Keith and Lord St Vincent. Nevertheless, in a highly competitive profession in which family connections and influence, or what was known as ‘interest’, was often crucial to promotion and advancement, it did the young Thomas Cochrane no harm to have such an uncle looking out for him.

  In 1792 Captain Alexander Cochrane was in command of the 28-gun frigate Hind with orders to patrol the east coast of Scotland. He spent that year cruising back and forth from Berwick to Stornaway in the Western Isles. He used Leith Roads in the Firth of Forth opposite Edinburgh as a base and moored there on no fewer than eight occasions, often for several weeks at a time.23 Since Culross was only a few miles upstream we may reasonably assume that he visited his brother and family on several of these occasions. Knowing that his nephew was keen to join the navy, and seeing him at a loose end, he must have done his best to persuade Dundonald to put aside the army commission for his eldest son and allow him to join the crew of his ship. The threat of imminent bankruptcy no doubt contributed to Dundonald’s change of heart. With the nation at war, a naval career offered regular pay and the opportunity for swift promotion and prize money.

  Shipping off Leith Roads with the city of Edinburgh in the distance. Lithograph after the painting by J. C. Schetky.

  By the time Thomas had been equipped with a uniform and was ready to leave home the Hind had been ordered south. After several months cruising off Ushant and the Scilly Isles she returned to the Thames estuary for a refit. On 28 July 1793 she anchored at the Nore, the fleet anchorage off the mouth of the River Medway. At dawn the next day, with a pilot on board to guide her past the shoals and mud banks, she sailed up the entrance channel of the Medway and dropped anchor opposite Sheerness dockyard. It was there that Thomas Cochrane’s naval career began.

  2

  From Midshipman to Lieutenant

  1793–1800

  The dockyard at Sheerness, unlike those of Chatham, Portsmouth and Plymouth with their sheltered locations, fine Georgian storehouses and smart terraces of officers’ houses, was a bleak, inhospitable place. Built on reclaimed marsh land on the edge of the Isle of Sheppey it was isolated and windswept. There was a low-lying fortress guarding the entrance to the Medway but more prominent in that watery landscape were the warships and old hulks moored to wooden buoys in the main channel.

  Cochrane arrived at Sheerness on 29 July 1793 and was rowed out to the Hind.1 It was not a good moment to make his appearance. His uncle had gone ashore in the morning and the first lieutenant was busy preparing the ship for an overhaul by the dockyard carpenters and shipwrights. The guns and barrels of gunpowder were being hoisted out and lowered into barges alongside and preparations were in hand to take down the sails and topsail yards. The first lieutenant was John Larmour, one of those rare men whose seamanship and ability to handle the crew had led to his promotion from an ordinary seaman to commissioned officer. He had been a lieutenant since 1784 but had never lost the habit of getting his hands dirty. When Cochrane first met him he was dressed as a seaman with a marlinspike slung round his neck, and a lump of grease in his hand. ‘His reception of me was anything but gracious. Indeed, a tall fellow, over six feet high, the nephew of his captain, and a lord to boot, were not very promising recommendations for a midshipman.’2 On seeing Cochrane’s unusually large sea chest he ordered it to be cut down to size and Cochrane was mortified to find all his belongings turned out on the deck and the chest sawn in half. Larmour accompanied the operation with uncomplimentary observations on midshipmen in general and Cochrane in particular. The newcomer had the good sense to restrain his feelings and within a few days he had impressed Larmour by his obvious desire to learn his trade and to make up for lost time.

  For the next three months the Hind was in the hands of the dockyard and it was an ideal opportunity for Cochrane to get to know every inch of the ship before they put to sea. When the topmasts had been got down the ship was lashed alongside a hulk so that the sails, much of the rigging and the warrant officers’ stores could be unloaded. The ship was then hauled into one of the docks where she spent two weeks while the dockyard men repaired the copper sheathing on her bottom and recaulked the topsides. While the ship was being worked on by caulkers and carpenters the crew moved into a hulk which was hauled up on the foreshore nearby and was used as a temporary dormitory.

  A plan and elevation of His Majesty’s dockyard at Sheerness. Engraving after the pictures by Thomas Milton and John Cleveley, 1755.

  In the autumn of 1793 Captain Alexander Cochrane learnt that he had been appointed to command the Thetis, a larger frigate of 38 guns which had sailed into the Medway on 2 September and was now anchored off the dockyard. From the ships’ logs we learn that on 17 October the crew of the Hind were ‘turned over from his Majesties ship Hind to the Thetis’.3 After helping to dismantle one ship Cochrane had the chance to help prepare another ship for sea. As one of the young gentlemen and a future officer he could have spent much of this time ashore but he decided to follow Larmour’s example and work on board alongside the skilled hands and the dockworkers. He was allowed to do so on condition that he changed out of his midshipman’s uniform and wore the clothes of an ordinary seamen. ‘Nothing could be more to my taste; so, with knife in belt and marline spike in hand, the captain of the forecastle undertook my improvement in the arts of knotting and splicing; Larmour himself taking charge of gammoning and rigging the bowsprit, which, as the frigate lay in dock, overhung the common highway.’4

  This determination to master every aspect of the workings of a ship was characteristic of Cochrane. He had inherited from his father a passionate interest in how things worked and how they could be improved. Over the next few years he would make it his business to become accomplished in every specialist trade on board as well as learning the art of handling a ship in all conditions. His practical working knowledge of ships and seamanship would stand him in good stead when he commanded his own vessel and would earn him the respect of th
e men who served under him. However, he never forgot his debt to Larmour: ‘We soon became fast friends, and throughout life few more kindly recollections are impressed on my memory than those of my first naval instructor, honest Jack Larmour.’5

  Most boys who were destined to become officers joined the navy at a young age, usually between nine and fourteen. Until the system was changed in 1794 it was usual for the boys to be entered on the muster books as captain’s servants, sailors, or able seamen as required.6 When they had served three years at sea they could be rated as midshipmen. After a minimum of six years’ service a midshipman could apply to become a lieutenant. He was expected to produce journals and certificates to prove his service; and must then go before a panel of captains and pass an oral examination in which he must demonstrate a sound knowledge of navigation, seamanship and shiphandling.

  Cochrane’s early life at sea shows how the regulations could be bypassed, and how family connections could hasten a young man’s advancement. His father may have been on the verge of bankruptcy but he had a network of powerful friends and relations among the Scottish aristocracy who were prepared to put in a word on his eldest son’s behalf.7 The young Lord Cochrane’s rapid rise to lieutenant is a classic example of ‘interest’ at work. The muster book of the Hind shows that Cochrane made his appearance on board the ship on 29 July 1793. His age was noted as seventeen and he was rated ‘able seaman’.8 In fact his uncle had been entering Cochrane’s name on his ship’s books ever since 1780 when his nephew was only five years old. Cochrane’s name was entered as a captain’s servant first on the bomb vessel Vesuvius, then on the sloop Caroline and the frigates Sophie and Hind, thus securing him a theoretical thirteen years of sea time before he ever set foot on a warship.9 This practice, known as ‘false muster’, was not uncommon and could produce some strange results. The most notorious example was Rodney’s promotion of his fifteen-year-old son John who had been at sea for no more than a year when he was advanced from midshipman to post-captain in a matter of weeks. Edward Pellew promoted his son at a very early age and Cochrane’s uncle Alexander did much the same for his eldest son Thomas John who became a lieutenant at sixteen and a post-captain at eighteen.

  The practice of false muster and the effect of interest certainly helped Cochrane to make up for his late start in the navy but he was not given command of his own ship until he had been at sea for seven years and, thanks to his dedicated approach to his profession and his natural ability as a leader, he would prove to be more than capable of handling a ship and going into action when the moment came. His first step up occurred on 18 October 1793, less than three months after joining the navy. On the day following the transfer of the crew of the Hind to the Thetis his uncle advanced him from able seaman to midshipman. A few weeks later, on 27 November, the Thetis put to sea and Cochrane’s naval training began in earnest.

  A watercolour by George Tobin depicting the Thetis aground on the coast of North Carolina, December 1794. The sailors in the boats are taking soundings to find the depth of water before the ship is hauled off.

  On an overcast day, with a fresh gale blowing, they sailed out of the Medway into the Thames estuary and made their way up the east coast. They reached the Firth of Forth on 11 December and spent a month over Christmas at anchor in Leith Roads. The ship’s log records that the men were employed ‘scraping, cleaning, scrubbing hammocks, exercising the great guns’, but presumably Captain Cochrane and his nephew found the time to visit the family at Culross. On 13 January 1794 the Thetis weighed anchor and headed across the North Sea to Norway. Their orders were to intercept French privateers and to look out for an enemy convoy but neither were sighted. Cochrane was impressed by the rocky coastal scenery and by the hospitality of the inhabitants. The young midshipmen were allowed ashore on several occasions and they spent their time shooting and fishing and racing down the snowy slopes of the fjords on sledges. This pleasant winter holiday was brought to a close towards the end of February when they left the anchorage at Bergen and sailed to Spithead. There they joined a squadron under the command of Admiral George Murray. Their destination was North America and the objective was to protect British commerce and fisheries. Cochrane would spend the next four years cruising the eastern seaboard from Nova Scotia to Florida.

  They left Plymouth on 18 May and sighted New York on 24 July. They followed the coast down to Charleston and then sailed back to Sandy Hook Bay and Staten Island. On 18 January 1795 one of the lieutenants of the Thetis transferred to another ship and Cochrane’s uncle took the opportunity to appoint his nephew acting lieutenant in his place. Admiral Murray confirmed the provisional appointment, and Lord Spencer, the First Lord of the Admiralty, was prepared to let the provisional appointment stand. Writing to his friend Thomas Coutts, the banker, he said that he was aware of Captain Cochrane’s application on behalf of his nephew ‘and if it should turn out, which I think it very probably may, that the appointment by Admiral Murray was not strictly regular, he shall however be included in my list for promotion when there is a regular appointment’.10 Coutts was a descendant of the first Earl of Dundonald and had previously assured Captain Cochrane that he would always do what he could on his behalf: ‘Your father was kind to me when a boy and I hope I shall never forget a favour done to me.’11

  On 13 April 1795 Cochrane joined the 64-gun ship Africa at Hampton Roads and spent five weeks serving as acting lieutenant.12 They sailed as far as Bermuda before he was transferred from the Africa to the sloop Lynx, 16 guns, again as acting lieutenant. When the Lynx put into Halifax, Nova Scotia, the Thetis was lying at anchor there, and to Cochrane’s disappointment he found that he had missed the chance of action. Captain Cochrane, together with Captain Beresford in the Hussar, had intercepted five French warships in the seas off the Chesapeake River and captured a frigate and a sloop. Following the action John Larmour had been promoted which created a vacancy on the Thetis. Cochrane returned to his uncle’s ship as second lieutenant, though still in an acting capacity. Back in London Lord Spencer informed Coutts, ‘Captain Cochrane will no doubt be glad to hear that Lieutenant Larmour has been promoted… and that Lord Cochrane’s commission will be confirmed’.13 But it was evidently still considered a bit too soon for Cochrane to apply to be examined for lieutenant. Jane, the Dowager Countess of Dundonald, wrote to Captain Cochrane on 12 July 1795 informing him that ‘Earl Spencer has said that if he [Lord Cochrane] keeps steady to the sea he will do everything that he can to serve him. He is a man to be trusted when he says so much.’14

  That summer Cochrane saw some action for the first time. On 16 August the Thetis chased and captured a French privateer of 16 guns and four days later they took a sloop of 11 guns. The following August the Thetis was part of a squadron which engaged three French frigates off New York and forced one of them to surrender. Such actions were useful in improving the fighting ability of the crew but were insignificant compared with some of the naval actions taking place in Europe. On 28 May 1794 a British fleet of twenty-six ships of the line, seven frigates and five smaller vessels under the command of Lord Howe had engaged a French fleet of similar size in the Atlantic west of Ushant. After a hard-fought action spread over four days one of the French ships had sunk and six had been captured. The Battle of the Glorious First of June was hailed in Britain as a triumph. It would be the first of three major fleet actions which would take place on the European side of the Atlantic while Cochrane remained on the American station.

  Meanwhile, in February 1796, he passed his examination for lieutenant; Admiral Murray issued a temporary commission and the promotion was confirmed by the Admiralty on 27 May 1796.15 Two years and ten months after joining the navy the twenty-year-old Cochrane became a commissioned officer. Nelson had passed his lieutenant’s exam at the age of eighteen and a half but by that time he had accumulated more than six years of service at sea and had completed voyages to the West Indies, the Arctic and the Indian Ocean. Cochrane had been fortunate with his rapid promotion but the n
ext step from lieutenant to master and commander would not be so easy. There were nearly two thousand other lieutenants on the Navy List. Many of them were well connected and the majority of them had far more experience than he had. Nevertheless the family connections continued to operate on his behalf. When Admiral Murray was replaced by Admiral Vandeput as commander of the American station we find Thomas Coutts writing to Captain Cochrane, ‘A particular friend of mine is gone to command in your station. Admiral Vandeput, a very Gentleman like man in every respect and I hope you will become intimate with him if you are not so already – pray tell him I have written to you to mention him and that I am sure if it should be in his power to serve you or Lord Cochrane he will be pleased to do it were it only on my account.’16