Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 Part 14

3rdly. If any flagship shall be so disabled as not to be fit for service, the flag officer or commander of such ship shall remove himself into any other ship of his division at his discretion, and shall there command and wear the flag as he did in his own.

RUPERT.

For Sir Edward Spragge, Knt., vice-admiral of the blue squadron.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Meaning, of course, Article 1 of the 'Additional Instructions' of April 18, 1665, which would be No. 17 when the orders were collected and reissued as a complete set. No copy of the complete set to which Rupert refers is known to be extant.

[2] It should be noted that this instruction antic.i.p.ates by a century the favourite English signals of the Nelson period for bringing an unwilling enemy to action, _i.e._ for general chase, and for ships to take suitable station for neutral support and engage as they get up.

PART VI

THE THIRD DUTCH WAR TO THE REVOLUTION

I. THE DUKE OF YORK, 1672-3

II. SIR JOHN NARBROUGH, 1678

III. THE EARL OF DARTMOUTH, 1688

PROGRESS OF TACTICS DURING THE THIRD DUTCH WAR

INTRODUCTORY

For the articles issued by the Duke of York at the outbreak of the Third Dutch War in March 1672 we are again indebted to Lord Dartmouth's naval ma.n.u.scripts. They exist there, copied into the beginning of an 'Order Book' which by internal evidence is shown to have belonged to Sir Edward Spragge. It is similar to the so-called 'Royal Charles Sea Book,' and is nearly all blank, but contains two orders addressed by Rupert to Spragge, April 29 and May 22, 1673, and a resolution of the council of war held on board the Royal Charles on May 27, deciding to attack the Dutch fleet in the Schoonveldt and to take their anchorage if they retired into Flushing.

The orders are not dated, but, as they are signed 'James' and countersigned 'M. Wren,' their date can be fixed to a time not later than the spring of 1672, for Dr. Matthew Wren, F.R.S., died on June 14 in that year, having served as the lord admiral's secretary since 1667, when Coventry resigned his commissionership of the navy. They consist of twenty-six articles, which follow those of the late war so closely that it has not been thought worth while to print them except in the few cases where they vary from the older ones.

They are accompanied however in the 'Sea Book' by three 'Further Instructions,' which do not appear in any previous set. They are of the highest importance and mark a great stride in naval tactics, a stride which owing to Granville Penn's error is usually supposed to have been taken in the previous war. For the first time they introduced rules for engaging when the two fleets get contact on opposite tacks, and establish the much-abused system of stretching the length of the enemy's line and then bearing down together. But it must be noted that this rule only applies to the case where the fleets are approaching on opposite tacks and the enemy is to leeward. There is also a peremptory re-enunciation of the duty of keeping the line and the order enforced by the penalty of death for firing 'over any of our own ships.' Here then we have apparently a return to the Duke of York's belief in formal tactics, and it is highly significant that, although the twenty-six original articles incorporate and codify all the other scattered additional orders of the last war, they entirely ignore those issued by Monck and Rupert during the Four Days' Battle.

We have pretty clear evidence of the existence at this period of two schools of tactical opinion, which after all is no more than experience would lead us to suspect, and which Pepys's remarks have already indicated. As usual there was the school, represented by the Duke of York and Penn, which inclined to formality, and by pedantic insistence on well-meant principles tended inevitably to confuse the means with the end. On the other hand we have the school of Monck and Rupert, which was inclined anarchically to submit all rules to the solvent of hard fighting, and to take tactical risks and unfetter individual initiative to almost any extent rather than miss a chance of overpowering the enemy by a sudden well-timed blow. Knowing as we do the extent to which the principles of the Duke of York's school hampered the development of fleet tactics till men like Hawke and Nelson broke them down, we cannot but sympathise with their opponents. Nor can we help noting as curiously significant that whereas it was the soldier-admirals who first introduced formal tactics, it was a seaman's school that forced them to pedantry in the face of the last of the soldier-school, who tried to preserve their flexibility, and keep the end clear in view above the means they had invented.

Still it would be wrong to claim that either school was right. In almost every department of life two such schools must always exist, and nowhere is such conflict less inevitable than in the art of war, whether by sea or land. Yet just as our comparatively high degree of success in politics is the outcome of the perpetual conflict of the two great parties in the state, so it is probably only by the conflict of the two normal schools of naval thought that we can hope to work out the best adjusted compromise between free initiative and concentrated order.

It was the school of Penn and the Duke of York that triumphed at the close of these great naval wars. The attempt of Monck and Rupert to preserve individual initiative and freedom to seize opportunities was discarded, and for nearly a century formality had the upper hand. Yet the Duke of York must not be regarded as wholly hostile to initiative or unwilling to learn from his rivals. The second and most remarkable of the new instructions acquits him. This is the famous article in which was first laid down the principle of cutting off a part of the enemy's fleet and 'containing' the rest.

Though always attributed to the Duke of York it seems almost certainly to have been suggested by the tactics of Monck and Rupert on the last day of the Four Days' Battle, June 4, 1666. According to the official account, they sighted the Dutch early in the morning about five leagues on their weather-bow, with the wind at SSW. 'At eight o'clock,' it continues, 'we came up with them, and they having the weather-gage put themselves in a line to windward of us. Our ships then which were ahead of Sir Christopher Myngs [who was to lead the fleet] made an easy sail, and when they came within a convenient distance lay by; and the Dutch fleet having put themselves in order we did the like. Sir Christopher Myngs, vice-admiral of the prince's fleet, with his division led the van. Next his highness with his own division followed, and then Sir Edward Spragge, his rear-admiral; and so stayed for the rest of the fleet, which came up in very good order. By such time as our whole fleet was come up we held close upon a wind, our starboard tacks aboard, the wind SW and the enemy bearing up to fall into the middle of our line with part of their fleet. At which, as soon as Sir Christopher Myngs had their wake, he tacked and stood in, and then the whole line tacked in the wake of him and stood in. But Sir C. Myngs in fighting being put to the leeward, the prince thought fit to keep the wind, and so led the whole line through the middle of the enemy, the general [Monck] with the rest of the fleet following in good order.'

The account then relates how brilliantly Rupert fought his way through, and proceeds, 'After this pa.s.s, the prince being come to the other side and standing out, so that he could weather the end of their fleet, part of the enemy bearing up and the rest tacking, he tacked also, and his grace [Monck] tacking at the same time bore up to the ships to the leeward, the prince following him; and so we stood along backward and forward, the enemy being some to windward and some to leeward of us; which course we four times repeated, the enemy always keeping the greatest part of their fleet to windward, but still at so much distance as to be able to reach our sails and rigging with their shot and to keep themselves out of reach of our guns, the only advantage they thought fit to take upon us at this time. But the fourth time we plying them very sharply with our leeward guns in pa.s.sing, their windward ships bore up to relieve their leeward party; upon which his highness tacked a fifth time and with eight or ten frigates got to the windward of the enemy's whole fleet, and thinking to bear in upon them, his mainstay and main topmast being terribly shaken, came all by the board.' Monck not being able to tack for wounded masts 'made up to the prince,' and then the Dutch, after a threat to get between the two admirals, suddenly bore away before the wind for Flushing.[1]

The manoeuvre by which Myngs attempted from to windward to divide the enemy's fleet and so gain the wind of part of it seems to be exactly what the new instruction contemplated, while its remarkable provision for a containing movement seems designed to prevent the disastrous confusion that ensued after the Dutch line had been broken. This undoubtedly is the great merit of the new instruction, and it is the first time, so far as is known, that the principle of containing was ever enunciated. In this it compares favourably with everything we know of until Nelson's famous memorandum. Its relations to Rodney's and Howe's manoeuvres for breaking the line must be considered later. For the present it will suffice to note that it seems designed rather as a method of gaining the wind than as a method of concentration, and that the initiation of the manoeuvre is left to the discretion of the leading flag officer, and cannot be signalled by the commander-in-chief.

As to the date at which these three 'Further Instructions' were first drawn up there is some difficulty. It is possible that they were not entirely new in 1672, but that their origin, at least in design, went back to the close of the Second War. In Spragge's first 'Sea Book'

there is another copy of them identical except for a few verbal differences with those in the second 'Sea Book.' In the first 'Sea Book' they appear on the back of a leaf containing some 'Sailing Instructions by the Duke of York,' which are dated November 16, 1666, and this is the latest date in the book. Moreover in this copy they are headed 'Additional Instructions to be observed in the next engagement,' as though they were the outcome of a previous action. Now, as Wren died on June 10 (o.s.), and the battle of Solebay, the first action of the Third War, was fought on May 28 (o.s.), it is pretty clear that it must have been the Second War and not the Third that was in Spragge's mind at the time. Still if we have to put them as early as November 1666 it leaves the question much where it was. Besides the idea of containing the main body of the enemy after cutting off part of his fleet, the death penalty for firing over the line is obviously designed to meet certain regrettable incidents known to have occurred in the Four Days' Battle. Nor is there any evidence that they were used in the St. James's fight of July 25, and as this was the last action in the war fought, the 'next engagement' did not take place till the Third War. It is fairly clear therefore that we must regard these remarkable orders as resulting from the experience of the Second War, and as having been first put in force during the Third one.

After the battle of Solebay these supplementary articles were incorporated into the regular instructions as Articles 27 to 29. This appears from a MS. book belonging to Lord Dartmouth ent.i.tled 'Copies of instructions and other papers relating to the fleets. Anno 1672' It contains a complete copy of both Sailing and Fighting Instructions, with a detailed 'order of sailing' for the combined Anglo-French fleet, dated July 2, 1672, and a corresponding 'order of battle' dated August 1672. It also contains the flag officers' reports made to the Duke of York after the battle.

Instructions for the 'Encouragement for the captains and companies of fireships, small frigates, and ketches,' now appear for the first time, and were repeated in some form or other in all subsequent orders.

Finally, it has been thought well to reprint from Granville Penn's _Memorials of Penn_ the complete set of articles which he gives in Appendix L. No date is attached to them; Granville Penn merely says they were subsequent to 1665, and has thereby left an unfortunate impression, adopted by himself and almost every naval historian, both British and foreign, that followed him, that they were used in the campaign of 1666, that is, in the Second Dutch War. From the fact however that they incorporate the 'Further Instructions for Fighting'

countersigned by Wren, we know that they cannot have been earlier than 1667, while the newly discovered MS. of Lord Dartmouth makes it practically certain they must have been later than August 1672. We may even go further.

For curiously enough there is no evidence that these orders, on which so much doubtful reasoning has been based, were ever in force at all as they stand. No signed copy of them is known to exist. The copy amongst the Penn papers in the British Museum which Granville Penn followed is a draft with no signature whatever. It is possible therefore that they were never signed. In all probability they were completed by James early in 1673 for the coming campaign, but had not actually been issued when, in March of that year, the Test Act deprived him of his office of lord high admiral, and brought his career as a seaman to an end. What orders were used by his successor and rival Rupert is unknown.

Of even higher interest than this last known set of the Duke of York's orders are certain additions and observations which were subsequently appended to them by an unknown hand. As it has been found impossible to fix with certainty either their date or author, I have given them by way of notes to the text. They are to be found in a beautifully written and richly bound ma.n.u.script in the Admiralty Library. At the end of the volume, following the Instructions, are diagrammatic representations of certain actions in the Third Dutch War, finely executed in water-colour to ill.u.s.trate the formation for attack, and to every plan are appended tactical notes relating to the actions represented, and to others which were fought in the same way. The first one dealt with is the 'St. James's Fight,' fought on July 25, 1666, and the dates in the tactical notes, as well as in the 'Observations' appended to the articles, range as far as the last action fought in 1673. The whole ma.n.u.script is clearly intended as a commentary on the latest form of the duke's orders, and it may safely be taken as an expression of some tactician's view of the lessons that were to be drawn from his experience of the Dutch Wars.

As to the authorship, the princely form in which the ma.n.u.script has been preserved might suggest they were James's own meditations after the war; but the tone of the 'Observations,' and the curious revival of the word 'general' for 'commander-in-chief,' are enough to negative such an attribution. Other indications that exist would point to George Legge, Lord Dartmouth. His first experience of naval warfare was as a volunteer and lieutenant under his cousin, Sir Edward Spragge, in 1665. Spragge was in fact his 'sea-daddy,' and with one exception all the examples in the 'Observations' are taken from incidents and movements in which Spragge was the chief actor. One long observation is directed to precautions to be taken by flag officers in shifting their flags in action, so as to prevent a recurrence of the catastrophe which cost Spragge his life. Indeed, with the exception of Jordan, Spragge is the only English admiral mentioned. Dartmouth was present at all the actions quoted, and succeeded in const.i.tuting himself a sufficient authority on naval affairs to be appointed in 1683 to command the first important fleet that was sent out after the termination of the war. These indications however are far too slight to fix him with the authorship, and his own orders issued in 1688 go far to rebut the presumption.[2]

Another possible author is Arthur Herbert, afterwards Lord Torrington. He too had served a good deal under Spragge, and had been present at all the battles named. This conjecture would explain the curious expression used in the observation to the seventh instruction, 'The battle fought in 1666.' There was of course more than one battle fought in 1666, but Herbert was only present in that of July 25th, the 'St. James's Fight,' represented in the ma.n.u.script--and it was his first action. But here again all is too vague for more than a mere guess.

But whoever was the author, the ma.n.u.script is certainly inspired by someone of position who had served in the last two Dutch Wars, and its undeniable importance is that it gives us clearly the development of tactical thought which led to the final form of Fighting Instructions adopted under William III, and continued till the end of the eighteenth century. The developments which it foreshadows will therefore be best dealt with when we come to consider those instructions. For the present it will be sufficient to note the changes suggested. In the first place we have a desire to simplify signals and to establish repeating ships. Secondly, for the sake of clearness the numbering of the articles is changed, every paragraph to which a separate signal is attached being made a separate instruction, so that with new instructions we have thirty-three articles instead of James's twenty-four. Thirdly, we have three new instructions proposed: viz., No. 5, removing from flag officers the right to divide the enemy's fleet at their discretion without signal from the admiral; No. 8, giving a signal for any squadron that has weathered part of the enemy by dividing or otherwise to bear down and come to close action; and No. 17, for such a squadron to bear down through the enemy's line and rejoin the admiral. All of these rules are obviously the outcome of known incidents in the late war. There are also suggested additions or alterations to the old articles to the following effect: (1) When commanders are in doubt or out of sight of the admiral, they are to press the headmost ships of the enemy all they can; (2) When the enemy 'stays to fight' they are to concentrate on his weathermost ships, instead of his headmost, as under the old rule; (3) Finally, while preserving the line, they are to remember that their first duty is 'to press the weathermost ships and relieve such as are in distress.'

It is this last addition to the Duke of York's sixteenth article that contains the pith of the author's ideas. All his examples are chosen to show that the system of bearing down together from windward in a line parallel to that of the enemy is radically defective, even if all the advantages of position and superior force are with you, and for this reason--that if you succeed in defeating part of the enemy's line you cannot follow up your success with the victorious part of your own without sacrificing your advantage of position, and giving the enemy a chance of turning the tables on you. Thus, if your rear defeats the enemy's rear and follows it up, your own line will be broken, and as your rear in pressing its beaten opponents falls to leeward of the enemy's centre and van it will expose itself to a fatal concentration. His own view of the proper form of attack from windward is to bear down upon the van or weathermost ships of the enemy in line ahead on a course oblique to the enemy's line. In this way, he points out, you can concentrate on the ships attacked, and as they are beaten you can deal with the next in order. For so long as you keep your own line intact and in good order, regardless of your rear being at first too distant to engage, you will always have fresh ships coming into action at the vital point, and will thus be able gradually to roll up the enemy's line without ever disturbing your own order. Fortifying himself with the reflection that 'there can be no greater justification than matter of fact,' he proceeds to instance various battles in the late wars to show that this oblique form of attack always led to a real victory, whereas whenever the parallel form was adopted, though in some cases we had everything in our favour and had fairly beaten the Dutch, yet no decisive result was obtained.

From several points of view these observations are of high interest. Not only do they contain the earliest known attempt to get away from the unsatisfactory method of engaging in parallel lines ship to ship, but in seeking a subst.i.tute for it they seem to foreshadow the transition from the Elizabethan idea of throwing the enemy into confusion to the eighteenth century idea of concentration on his most vulnerable part. In so far as the author recommends a concentration on the weathermost ships his idea is sound, as they were the most difficult for the enemy to support; but since the close-hauled line had come in, they were also the van, and a concentration on the van is theoretically unsound, owing to the fact that the centre and rear came up naturally to its relief. To this objection he appears to attach no weight, partly because no doubt he was still influenced by the old intention of throwing the enemy into confusion.[3] For since the line ahead had taken the place of the old close formations it seemed that to disable the leading ships came to the same thing as disabling the weathermost. The solution eventually arrived at was of course a concentration on the rear, but to this at the time there were insuperable objections. The rear was normally the most leewardly end of the line, and an oblique attack on it could be parried by wearing together. The rear then became the van, and the attack if persisted in would fall on the leading squadron with the rest of the fleet to windward--the worst of all forms of attack. The only possible way therefore of concentrating on the rear was to isolate it and contain the van by cutting the line. But in the eyes of our author and his school cutting the line stood condemned by the experience of war.[4]

In his 'Observations' he clearly indicates the reasons. He would indeed forbid the manoeuvre altogether except when your own line outstretches that of the enemy, or when you are forced to pa.s.s through the enemy's fleet to save yourself from being pressed on a lee sh.o.r.e. The reasons given are the disorder it generally causes, the ease with which it is parried, and the danger of your own ships firing on each other when as the natural consequence of the manoeuvre they proceed to double on the enemy. The fact is that fleet evolutions were still in too immature a condition for so difficult a manoeuvre to be admissible. Presumably therefore our author chose the attack on the weathermost ships, although they were also the van, as the lesser evil in spite of its serious drawbacks.

The whole question of the principles involved in his suggestion is worthy of the closest consideration. For the difficulty it reveals of effecting a sound form of concentration without breaking the line as well as of adopting any form that involved breaking the line gives us the key of that alleged reaction of tactics in the eighteenth century which has been so widely ridiculed.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The original draft corrected by Lord Addington, princ.i.p.al secretary of state, is in _S.P. Domestic_, Car. II, 158.

[2] See _post_, p. 170.

[3] _Cf_. Hoste's second Remark, _post_, p. 180.

[4] In the Instructions which Sir Chas. H. Knowles drew up about 1780, for submission to the Admiralty he has at p. 16 a remark upon rear concentration which helps us to see what was in the author's mind. It is as follows: 'N.B.--In open sea the enemy (if of equal force) will never suffer you to attack their rear, but will pa.s.s you on opposite tacks to prevent your doing it: therefor the attempt is useless and only losing time.'

_THE DUKE OF YORK_, 1672.[1]

[+Spragge's Second Sea Book. Dartmouth MSS.+]

_Instructions for the better ordering of his majesty's fleet in fighting_.

1. Discovery of a fleet, striking the admiral's flag and making a weft.[2]

2. To come into the order of battle.[2]