The Battle of the Nile

By Oliver Warner

First published in 1960, this is a gripping account of the decisive sea battle between the forces of Napoleon and the British under Nelson in 1798.

The Battle of the Nile (also known as the Battle of Aboukir Bay‎‎) was a major naval battle fought between the British Royal Navy and the Navy of the French Republic at Aboukir Bay on the Mediterranean coast off the Nile Delta of Egypt from 1-3 August 1798. The battle was the climax of a naval campaign that had ranged across the Mediterranean during the previous three months, as a large French convoy sailed from Toulon to Alexandria carrying an expeditionary force under General Napoleon Bonaparte. The British fleet was led in the battle by Rear-Admiral Sir Horatio Nelson.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Friedland Books
• Release date: Jul 11, 2017
• ISBN: 9781787206656

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Text originally published in 1960 under the same title.

© Friedland Books 2017, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.

Publisher’s Note

Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

THE BATTLE OF THE NILE

OLIVER WARNER

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers:

HENRY V, IV, iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 4

DEDICATION 6

PREFACE 7

ACKNOWLEDGMENT 8

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 9

1 — Eyewitness Ashore 11

2 — French Imagination 14

II 20

III 22

3 — Counter-moves 27

II 28

III 34

IV 41

4 — The Battle 44

II 49

IV 57

V 63

VI 64

5 — In the Ships 67

II 72

III 76

IV 77

V 79

VI 80

VII 81

VIII 81

IX 82

6 — Afterwards 86

II 89

III 91

7 — Repercussions 96

II 99

8 — The Wider Scene 101

II 103

III 105

IV 107

V 109

9 — The Last of the French Ships 112

II 115

III 116

Epilogue — NAPOLEON ON THE BELLEROPHON 118

APPENDIX 120

THE NILE SQUADRON, WITH CAPTAINS IN ORDER OF SENIORITY 120

THE FRENCH LINE OF BATTLE 123

FRIGATES 123

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 124

DEDICATION

To

My Father

PREFACE

Captain Berry, returning on parole to England in the winter of 1798 after being captured in the Leander when carrying Nelson’s despatches, gave the Duke of Clarence a copy of a Narrative of Proceedings which covered events leading to the Battle of the Nile, and incidents of the action. This pleased the Duke and other members of the Royal Family so much that Berry, who was soon knighted, was urged to print his Record. It appeared as by An Officer of Rank in the Squadron, and it is not only the first authoritative account of Nelson’s methods as an admiral, but from that day to this it has been the only publication relating solely to the Nile.

Berry remains essential, and his work, together with much supporting material, is included in the third volume of Sir Harris Nicolas’s Dispatches and Letters of Lord Nelson (1845). Appropriate extracts from ships’ logs and journals are printed in the second volume of the Navy Records Society’s Logs of the Great Sea Fights, edited by Rear Admiral Sturgis Jackson (1900). I have also consulted logs and manuscripts in the National Maritime Museum and in the Nelson Papers in the British Museum, and have made use of the Memoirs of John Nicol (1822), Sir John Theophilus Lee (1836), Sir George Elliott (1863) and others, and of the Voyage up the Mediterranean (1802) by the Rev. Cooper Willyams who served in the Swiftsure and who, like Lee, was an accomplished amateur artist.

For a description of the events in Egypt itself, well summarised in Col. P. G. Elgood’s Bonaparte’s Adventure in Egypt (1936), I am indebted to my colleague Reginald Highwood, who suggested what I should read, and stimulated my researches by the breadth of his own knowledge. My friend Richard Pennington, Librarian of MacGill University, out of his enthusiasm for Bonaparte, also guided me with encouraging skill. I have to thank my publishers for many courtesies, not the least for their eagerness to include so many unusual illustrations, some of them published for the first time. I owe more than I can say to my wife, for easing the path of a writer in many varying ways.

O.W.

Spring, 1960

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The Author and Publishers wish to thank the following for permission to reproduce the illustrations in this book:

Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, for fig. 2

The Trustees of the British Museum, for figs. 8, 41, and 42

Musée de la Marine, Paris, for figs. 3, 5, and 44

Musée de Versailles et des Trianons, for fig. 4

The National Maritime Museum, for figs. 1, 9–14, 16–19, 23, 24, 35, and 43

The Parker Gallery, for figs. 29, 30, 32, 34, and 36–40

Mrs. Clare Robinson, for fig. 26

Radio Times Hulton Picture Library, for fig. 27

Royal Hospital School, Horsham, for fig. 15

Victory Museum, Portsmouth, for fig. 25, and for figs.

20–22 from the Maurice Suckling Ward Collection

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Figure

1 Nelson coming on deck at The Nile to watch the blazing L’Orient—Frontispiece Detail from a painting by Daniel Orme

2. Napoleon—From a portrait by Dutertre

3. Ganteaume—From a contemporary lithograph

4. M. Poussielgue, financial adviser to the French Expedition—From a drawing by Dutertre

5. Capt. Dupetit-Thouars—From a contemporary lithograph

6. Map of the coast of Egypt, and the Bay of Aboukir in relation to the Eastern Mediterranean

7. The Pharos at Alexandria under the French Flag—Engraved by J. C. Stadler, after the Rev. Cooper Willyams (Chaplain in H.M.S. Swiftsure)

8. A Mameluke (1801)—After an engraving by J. F. L. Grobert

9–14 The Ship’s Company in 1799: Lieutenant; Carpenter; Purser; Captain; Sailor; Admiral—From coloured aquatints by Thomas Rowlandson

15. Nelson in 1797—From a watercolour by Henry Edridge, A.R.A.

16. Captain Edward Berry—From the portrait by J. S. Copley, R.A.

17. Captain Thomas Troubridge—From the portrait by Sir William Beechey, R.A.

18. Nelson’s Ships in the Bay of Naples (17 June, 1798)—From a watercolour by Giacomo Guardi

19. Capture of the Guillaume Tell by the Foudroyant, Lion and Penelope (1800)—From an aquatint by J. Wells after N. Pocock

20. Sir William Hamilton—From a miniature (1794)

21 Ferdinand IV of Naples—From a contemporary miniature

22 Emma, Lady Hamilton—From a contemporary miniature

23 Sir James Saumarez—From the portrait by Sir William Beechey, R.A.

24 Captain Alexander Ball—From the portrait by H. W. Pickersgill, R.A.

25 Captain William Peyton, of H.M.S. Defence—From a contemporary silhouette

26 Mr. Midshipman Downes, who was killed in the Leander in her fight with Le Généreux—From a contemporary portrait

27 Admiral Brueys—From an early nineteenth-century engraving

28 Plan of the Battle—From Clarke and M’Arthur, "Life of Admiral Lord Nelson, K.B.", 1809

29 The Attack at Sunset—Painted and engraved by Robert Dodd (1799)

30 On the Ensuing Morning—Painted and engraved by Robert Dodd (1799)

31 The Start of the Action, as seen by Bedouins ashore—From an engraving by J. Fittler (1808) after the painting by N. Pocock

32 The approach of the British Squadron to the attack of the French—Engraved by Robert Pollard, from a painting by Nicholas Pocock (1799)

33 L’Orient blows up—Woodcut from a Banbury Chap Book, c. 1800

34 The English Squadron leading into the Bay of Shoals

Engraved, from drawings taken on the spot by Capt. Jas. Mar, by Thos. Hellyer

35 Nelson wounded at The Nile—From a portrait by an unknown artist

36 Battle of The Nile...representing the situation of the English and French Squadrons on the morning of the second of August 1798—Engraved, "from drawings taken on the spot", by Thos. Hellyer (1800)

37 On board Le Tonnant: the death of Capt. Dupetit-Thouars—From a lithograph by A. Mayer and Bayot

38 Victors of the Nile—Engraved from designs by R. Smirke, 1803

39 At 10 o’clock at Night—Painted and engraved by Robert Dodd (1799)

40 Near Midnight—Painted and engraved by Robert Dodd (1799)

41 Sketch Map of the Battle of Aboukir—Drawn by Lord Nelson with his left hand

42 Letter to Nelson from his Captains after the Battle

43 Sir Sidney Smith—From the statue by T. Kirk

44 Le Muiron, the Venetian-built frigate in which Napoleon sailed back to France—From a model (1803) in the Musée de la Marine, Paris

1 — Eyewitness Ashore

FROM ALEXANDRIA, the coast-line of Egypt runs northeasterly to Aboukir Point—off which is a small island. Between Aboukir Point and Rosetta, where a spit of land conceals one of the two principal mouths of the Nile, there is a curving, shallow bay. It is about sixteen miles between the promontories.

On the 1st August 1798, or what he himself described, in the style of the French Revolutionaries, as the 14th of the month of Thermidor, Monsieur E. Poussielgue, Controller General of the Finances of General Bonaparte’s Eastern Army, was at Rosetta. At half past five in the afternoon, he heard cannon. M. Poussielgue and those who were with him at once went to the highest places they could find—terraces, the tops of houses, natural prominences, from which, away in the distance, they could just see some ten British ships of the line as they swept into Aboukir Bay on a course skirting Aboukir Island: others followed.

This, wrote the Controller General to his wife in France, was the beginning of the battle. He and his party lost sight of the vessels as they headed into shallower water, but gunfire continued, and darkness, when it came, brought no peace to M. Poussielgue and his compatriots.

The cannonade was very heavy until about a quarter past nine, he continued. Favoured by the clear night, we saw an immense illumination, which told us that some ship was burning. At this time the thunder of guns was heard with redoubled fury, and at 10 o’clock the ship on fire blew up with the most dreadful explosion.

Other accounts put the time of the event a little earlier or later, but all agree on what happened next. The sound was so shattering that the men of almost every vessel in the Bay thought that they themselves had been hit. Then, in M. Poussielgue’s words, there was the most profound silence for the space of about ten minutes, lit by the dying blaze of the French flagship L’Orient.

After that significant pause, said the writer, the firing began again, and continued without a break until three o’clock in the morning, when it ceased almost entirely until five. Then it continued with as much fury as ever.

When daylight came, the Frenchman could no longer bear to be without a proper view of what was happening; so, he said:

...I placed myself on a tower which is about a gun-shot from Rosetta...whence I could distinctly see the whole battle. At 8 o’clock I saw a ship on fire, and in about half an hour she blew up, like the other during the night.

Soon, details were discernible, though the general impression was one of the utmost confusion.

A large ship, entirely dismasted, was on shore on the coast, ran the description. We saw others of the fleet also dismasted, but the two squadrons were so mingled that it was impossible to distinguish French from English, or to tell on whose side advantage lay.

The battle itself was not quite over, and presently, some movement was apparent.

Firing continued until about 2 o’clock, and then we saw two of the line and two frigates under a press of sail on a wind, standing towards the eastward: we made out that all were under French colours. No other ships made any movement, and firing ceased entirely.

M. Poussielgue had seen the French remnant escaping, led by Rear Admiral Villeneuve. Then there followed another disconcerting silence.

Twenty-four hours passed without anyone to give us details, continued the latter. "At last a party from Alexandria told us news, though not tending to our comfort. They said that officers of the French fleet, who had saved themselves in a boat, arrived at Alexandria, and reported that early in the battle Admiral Brueys received three severe wounds, one in the head and two in the body. Notwithstanding, he persisted in keeping his station on the arms-chest, when a fourth shot hit him