The responsibility of a commander-in-chief is not affected by the advice given him by any subordinate, however high his reputation or confidential the relations between them; but in the state of bodily weakness from which Howe suffered, he must, for subsequent action, have depended largely upon Curtis, and it was probably well not to undertake an undeniable risk against the judgment of the officer who might be called upon to superintend the operation. The battle therefore terminated with the movement of the two commanders-in-chief, with their serviceable ships, to the eastward, through which three French vessels escaped, the "Queen" was extricated, and seven dismasted enemies were cut off by the British. At quarter past one the general firing ceased, though a few random shots continued to be exchanged by scattered vessels.
Such were the principal features of the battle of the First of June, 1794, which, being fought so far from any land, [89] has received no other distinctive name. It has not been thought desirable to attempt narrating, in words, the innumerable incidents of the fight. While avoiding a superfluity of details, however, a tactical analysis of the course of the action may be not uninteresting to the professional reader. The method of attack undertaken by Lord Howe, single ship against single ship, was identical with that employed on many previous occasions by British admirals, and is to be justified only by the evidence he had received, on the 28th and 29th of May, of the enemy's professional incompetency and indifferent gunnery. He was probably right in concluding, from the events of those days, as was decisively proved by the issue on June 1st, that the French line was at every point weaker than the ships he could thus bring against it. Under such conditions it may be permissible to the assailant to throw away the opportunity, which the offensive gives him, of combining an attack in superior force upon a part of the enemy's order. It is very possible that Howe might have reaped better results by making such a combination, for the tactical inefficiency of the French fleet, which he had observed, assured him that it could not, in the moment of action, remedy any disadvantage under which he might place it; but, on the other hand, the drill of his own captains was not yet very good, nor were they all tried men upon whom he could depend. It was, therefore, not improbable that an attempt to execute a combination would result in a muddle, whereas he could count upon superior seamanship and superior gunnery, ship to ship, and the movement of approach which he made, though somewhat difficult in execution, is perfectly simple in idea. Upon the whole, weighing the pros and cons, it is the opinion of the author that Howe judged soundly in directing the simple attack that he did. [90]
It is instructive to observe that the results of the movement, though far more decisive in this than in previous battles, are, upon dissection, found to be closely analogous. The British fleet, in running down together, was ranged on a line parallel to the French, but steering a course (north-west) that was oblique to its own front as well as to that of the enemy. The issue in every other instance had been indecisive—scarcely ever was a ship taken or sunk. But while in this respect different, the experience of previous engagements was otherwise repeated. That flank of the assailant which in column had been the van came, as a whole, promptly and orderly into action, while delay and disorder, attended with imperfect execution, ensued in the rear. This feature of simultaneous fleet attacks was emphasized by the strenuous and brilliant efforts of three of the rear division, which prevented indeed a general failure there, but brought out all the more clearly how great the shortcoming would have been but for their exertions, unparalleled in former battles. The proportion of loss undergone in the different parts of the British column gives a fair measure of the vigor displayed by each. This test is indeed most misleading as a means of comparison between any two single ships. Instances can readily be chosen, from this very case, in which vessels skilfully placed and vigorously fought received less injury than others, which were badly handled and did little harm to the enemy; but when an average is taken of many ships, the specific causes of error in different directions tend to balance each other, and if the general conclusion is confirmed by the experience of other battles, it may be accepted with much confidence. Now, on the First of June, taking the total number of casualties in the British fleet, it will be found that in every hundred men killed the eight van ships lost forty-three, and in every hundred wounded forty-one; whereas the eight rear lost seventeen killed and twenty-two wounded, or rather less than half the proportion of the van. Nor does this tell the whole story, for four fifths of the entire loss of the rear fell upon the three vessels, [91] leaving but eight killed and thirty-three wounded to be divided among the remaining five; whereas, in the eight van ships, though there are marked individual differences, the loss is much more equally divided. The inference, were the truth not otherwise known, would amount almost to proof that the van ships went down in good order, attacked vigorously, and so afforded mutual support, whereas the rear, whatever the cause, did not impress themselves strongly on the enemy's line; while the exceptional casualties of the three which did their duty well indicate a lack of support from the others, which also appears to be confirmed by the ascertained facts.
When a result is thus reproduced in various battles, it cannot be attributed wholly to the fault of the captains. The exceptions to the rule on the First of June were not the rear ships which failed in gaining for themselves a fair share in the action, but those which succeeded in so doing. The cause of this usual result seems to be that the van ship is the pivot upon which the operation hinges, and in proportion as the distance from the pivot grows greater, irregularities become more frequent, while each one that occurs is propagated and increased, until at last, in a long line, an approach to disorder ensues. When this happens, the efficiency of each ship depends less upon her normal relations to the line than upon the initiative of her captain; and the differences between men, which had been controlled by the exigencies of the order, where it still existed, begin to tell. Short lines will suffer less than long ones from this cause; whence it follows that in a long line new pivots, or points of departure for the order beyond them, should be provided. On the 1st of June the "Queen Charlotte," by her steady action and the authority conveyed by the example of the commander-in-chief, served as such a pivot, and the conduct of the ships on her right was better than that of those on her immediate left, which were regulating their position by the van. [92] As it seems probable, from the character of modern ships and weapons, that attacks will be made in a line of front, it is a matter of interest to naval officers to provide against this tendency to disorder and imperfect execution, which seems to inhere in the part of an order distant from the guide, or pivot.
The French line, by awaiting Howe's attack, laid itself open to any combination he might see fit to make, but the plan actually adopted threw the burden of resistance upon the individual captains, rather than upon the admiral. Whenever a ship was vigorously attacked by an enemy, her captain's task was simple, however arduous; nor does there seem to have been an instance of a French officer in this position failing to do his duty manfully. The superior gunnery of the British at this time, however, generally beat down the resistance of the opponent, and the latter then bore up and ran to leeward, unless his masts had been shot away, or unless the assailant by piercing the line had barred retreat. Thus the "Mucius," seventh in the line, was engaged to leeward by the "Defence." She tried, therefore, to escape by passing to windward of the British "Marlborough," next ahead, but fell on board of her and there lost all her masts. This circumstance of inferior gunnery, together with the fixed idea of keeping the line closed, appear to have governed the movements of the French ships after the battle joined. Now the duty of keeping the line closed is most important and essential to mutual support, but it is not paramount to every other consideration, particularly when an action, as this inevitably must, had passed into a mêlée; but the French captains, having few other ideas on fleet-fighting, clung to this one in its simplest form—that of following close upon the heels of the next ahead. Thus the leading ship, "Convention," though not hotly attacked, wore out of the line and was closely followed by the "Gasparin," though the latter was vigorously engaged. The next five ships were hard pressed and fought manfully. The eighth, after a short engagement, ran to leeward and was followed by the three astern of her. This brings us to the twelfth, or nearly to the centre of the French line, and of the six that followed, down to and including the seventeenth, four were taken after a desperate resistance. The two that escaped were the flag-ship "Montagne," whose career has already been told, and the "Jacobin," next astern of her. The eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth seem to have received little injury, but yet ran to leeward; whether independently, or one following another, does not certainly appear. The remaining six suffered