The Memoirs of Admiral Lord Beresford
occasion, for instance, we carried away the starboard foremast swifter,
in the fore rigging--the _Tribune_ had rope lower rigging. Captain
Lord Gillford, instead of splicing the shroud to the masthead pennants,
chose, in order to educate us, to strip the whole foremast to a
gantline. We got the whole of the lower rigging over the masthead
again. I was in the sailmaker's crew; and another midshipman and
myself, together with the forecastle men, fitted in the new shroud,
turned it in, wormed, parcelled, and served it; put it over the
masthead, and got the fore rigging all a-taunto again. I also helped
to make a new foresail and jib out of number one canvas, roped them,
put the clews in, and completed the job. Lord Gillford's object was to
teach those under him to carry out the work in the proper shipshape
manner. The sailmaker's crew, among whom was another midshipman, named
Morrison, and myself, numbered 15 or 20 men, including able seamen, and
we were all as happy as possible. We were taught by one of the best
sailmakers in the Service, who was named Flood. We always worked in a
sailmaker's canvas jumper and trousers made by ourselves. I could cut
out and make a seaman's canvas working suit, jumper and trousers, in 30
minutes, using the sailmaker's stitch of four stitches to the inch.
I had a complete sailmaker's bag with every sailmaker's tool
necessary--serving and roping mallets, jiggers, seaming {63} and roping
palms, all-sized marling-spikes, fids, seam-rubbers, sail-hooks,
grease-pot, seaming and roping twine, etc. etc.
Morrison and I worked together at everything. We turned in new boats'
falls, replaced lanyards in wash-deck buckets, as well as taking our
turn at all tricks sailmaker's crew. We put in new clews to a topsail
and course. We roped a jib and other fore-and-aft sails. Both of
these jobs require great care and practice, and both of them we had to
do two or three times before we got them right. A sailmaker knows how
difficult it is to keep the lay of the rope right in roping a sail. We
used also to go aloft and repair sick seams in the sails to avoid
unbending.
Captain Lord Gillford himself could cut out a sail, whether
fore-and-aft or square. I have heard him argue with Flood as to the
amount of goring to be allowed, and Lord Gillford was always right. It
was he who put it into my head to try to teach myself all that I could,
by saying, "If a man is a lubber over a job, you ought to be able to
_show_ him how to do it, not _tell_ him how to do it."
We were never so proud as when Lord Gillford sent for us and told us
that we had made a good job of roping the new jib. Among other things,
I learned from the "snob," as the shoemaker was called, to welt and
repair boots. In after years, I made a portmanteau, which lasted for a
long time, for my old friend, Chief Engineer Roffey; and I made many
shooting and fishing bags for my brother officers.
Merely for the sake of knowing how to do and how not to do a thing, in
later years I have chipped a boiler (a devil of a job), filled
coal-sacks, trimmed bunkers, stoked fires and driven engines.
We used up all our spare canvas in the _Tribune_; and I remember that
on one occasion we were obliged to patch the main-royal with a
mail-bag, so that the main-royal bore the legend "Letters for England"
on it thereafter.
While in the _Tribune_, two misfortunes occurred to me on the same day.
As we all know, misfortunes never come singly. The sailmaker had
reported me for skylarking; and it {64} occurred to me that if he was
going to put me in the report, he might as well have a better reason
for that extreme action. I therefore rove a line attached to a
sailmaker's needle through the holes of the bench upon which he sat.
When he seated himself to begin his work, I jerked the line, and he
leaped into the air with a loud cry. That was my first misfortune.
The second was entirely due to the rude and thoughtless conduct of
another midshipman, who, in passing me as I sat at my sailmaker's
bench, industriously working, tilted me over. I took up the first
thing which was handy, which happened to be a carpenter's chisel, and
hurled it at his retreating figure. It stuck and quivered in a portion
of his anatomy which is (or was) considered by schoolmasters as
designed to receive punishment. I had, of course, no intention of
hurting him. But I was reported for the second time that day. I was
put on watch and watch for a week, a penance which involved being four
hours on and four hours off, my duties having to be done as usual
during the watch off in the daytime.
We sailed from Vancouver early in December, 1865. On 2nd January I was
promoted to be acting sub-lieutenant. I find that Captain Lord
Gillford endorsed my certificate with the statement that Lord Charles
Beresford had conducted himself "with sobriety, diligence, attention,
and was always obedient to command; and I have been much pleased with
the zealous manner in which he has performed his duties."
We arrived at Valparaiso towards the end of January. I continued to
discharge my duties in the _Tribune_ until the middle of February, when
I was transferred to the _Sutlej_.
I was as happy on board the _Tribune_ as I had been in the
_Marlborough_ and the _Clio_, and for the same reason: the splendid
seamanship and constant sailorising.
The _Sutlej_ was a steam frigate pierced for guns, of 3066 tons and 500
h.p., flagship of the Pacific station. Before I joined her, the
commander-in-chief of the station was Admiral Kingcome, who had (as we
say) come in through {65} the hawse-pipe. It was the delight of this
queer old admiral to beat the drum for night-quarters himself. He used
to steal the drum, and trot away with it, rub-a-dub all along the lower
deck, bending double beneath the hammocks of the sleeping seamen. On
one of these occasions--so runs the yarn--a burly able seaman thrust
his bare legs over the edge of his hammock, clipped the admiral under
the shoulders, swung him to and fro, and, with an appropriate but
unquotable objurgation, dispatched him forward with a kick.
Such (in a word) was the condition of the flagship to which
Rear-Admiral the Honourable Joseph Denman succeeded, after the
enjoyment of twenty-five years' profound peace in the command of the
Queen's yacht.
The captain, Trevenen P. Coode, was tall and thin, hooked-nosed and
elderly, much bent about the shoulders, with a habit of crossing his
arms and folding his hands inside his sleeves. He was a taut hand and
a fine seaman. He nearly broke my heart, old martinet that he was; for
I was mate of the upper deck and the hull, and took an immense pride in
keeping them immaculately clean; but they were never clean enough for
Captain Trevenen P. Coode. In those days we had little bright-work,
but plenty of whitewash and blacking. The test of a smart ship was
that the lines of white or black should meet with absolute accuracy;
and a fraction of error would be visited with the captain's severe
displeasure. For he employed condemnation instead of commendation.
There was an old yarn about a mate of the main deck, who boasted that
he had got to windward of his captain. We used to take live stock,
poultry and sheep to sea in those days. The captain found fault with
the mate because the fowls and coops were dirty. The mate whitewashed
the chickens and blacked their legs and beaks. Now the poultry in
question belonged to the captain. Thereafter the fowls died.
It was the custom for the admiral to take a cow or two {66} to sea, and
the officers took sheep and fowls. There is a tradition in the Navy
that the cow used to be milked in the middle watch for the benefit of
the officer on watch; and that, in order that the admiral should get
his allowance of milk, the cow was filled up with water and made to
leap backwards and forwards across the hatchways. Another tradition
ordains that when the forage for the sheep ran short, the innocent
animals were fitted with green spectacles, and thus equipped, they were
fed on shavings.
When we put into Valparaiso the Spanish fleet was threatening to
bombard the town. Rather more than a year previously, in 1864, Spain
had quarrelled with Chile, alleging that Chile had violated neutrality,
and had committed other offences. In March, 1864, Spain began the
diplomatic correspondence with Chile in which she demanded reparation,
which was refused. Chile sent artillery and troops to Valparaiso. The
Spanish admiral, Pareja, then proclaimed a blockade of the Chilian
ports, and Chile declared war.
The European residents in Valparaiso, who owned an immense amount of
valuable property stored in the custom-houses, were terrified at the
prospect of a bombardment, and petitioned Admiral Denman to prevent it.
An American fleet of warships was also lying in the Bay. Among them
was the _Miantonomoh_, the second screw ironclad that ever came through
the Straits of Magellan, the first being the Spanish ironclad
_Numancia_.
When the _Miantonomoh_ crossed the Atlantic in 1866, _The Times_ kindly
remarked that the existing British Navy was henceforth useless, and
that most of its vessels "were only fit to be laid up and 'painted that
dirty yellow which is universally adopted to mark treachery, failure,
and crime.'"
The British and American admirals consulted together as to the
advisability of preventing the bombardment. The prospect of a fight
cheered us all; and we entered into elaborate calculations of the
relative strength of the Spanish fleet and the British-American force.
As a matter of fact, they were about equal. The Spanish admiral,
Nunez, who {67} had succeeded Pareja, visited the _Sutlej_ and
conversed with Admiral Denman. It was reported by the midshipman who
was A.D.C. to the admiral that, upon his departure, the Spaniard had
said: "Very well, Admiral Denman, you know your duty and I know mine."
The information raised our hopes; but at the critical moment a telegram
forbidding the British admiral to take action was received from the
British Minister at Santiago.
So the British and American fleets steamed out to sea while the
Spaniards fired upon Valparaiso from eight in the morning until four in
the afternoon, setting the place on fire, and then retired to their
anchorage outside. The British and American fleets then returned to
the Bay, and I accompanied a landing-party to help to extinguish the
conflagration.
Five of us were standing on the top of the high wall of a building
whose roof had fallen in, so that the whole interior was a mass of
burning wreckage, upon which we were directing the hose, when the men
below shouted that the wall was falling. We slid down the ladder, and
no sooner had we touched the ground than the whole wall tottered and
fell inwards.
We put the fires out, but the inhabitants were so angry with us because
we had not prevented the bombardment, that they requested that the
landing-party should be sent back to their ships. Then the flames
broke out afresh. For years the resentment of the Valparaisians
remained so hot that it was inadvisable to land in the town men from
British ships.
The meeting of the British and American seamen gave rise to much
discussion concerning the respective merits of the British and American
theories of gunnery. The Americans advocated the use of round shot to
deliver a "racking blow"; the British preferred firing a pointed
projectile which would penetrate the target instead of merely striking
it. When an American bluejacket asked his British friend to explain
the new English system of {68} shell-fire, the British bluejacket said: