The Memoirs of Admiral Lord Beresford
"No, ma'am," I replied. "I have no such power. I only made a
suggestion to the Prince."
"You may be right," said the Queen, "but I am an old woman now, and I
like to see faces I know about me, and not have to begin again with new
faces."
We had some excellent boat-racing in the _Osborne_. One famous race
was rowed at Cowes between the officers of the royal yachts _Victoria
and Albert_ and _Osborne_, in six-oared galleys. Her Majesty Queen
Victoria came down to the jetty to witness the contest. The stroke of
the _Victoria and Albert_ was my old comrade in the _Marlborough_ and
_Bellerophon_, Swinton Holland. I was stroke of the _Osborne's_ crew.
At first the _Osborne_ drew ahead--rather, I think, to {153} the
Queen's dismay--but eventually the _Victoria and Albert_ won the race,
to the delight of Her Majesty.
Another great race was rowed between the _Osborne_ six-oared galley and
the Dockyard boat. It took place off Southsea, the whole of the
foreshore being lined with people. The _Osborne_ won. Her boat was
manned by Irish bluejackets whom I had trained myself.
While I was commanding the _Osborne_ one of the crew met with a
singular accident. We were shooting the seine off Calshot, and, as it
fouled, I sent a man down to clear it. When he came up, he said that
he had been stabbed through the hand "by some beast." I examined the
wound and found that his hand had been pierced right through, and I
thought that he must have come upon a nail or a splinter in a piece of
wreckage. But when we hauled up the seine, there was a huge sting-ray.
I cut out the sting and gave it to the Princess. There is no doubt
that the fish had transfixed the man's hand. The sailor is still
alive, and is well known in Portsmouth for his political enthusiasms.
It was in the same haul that we caught a red mullet weighing about six
pounds, the biggest I have ever seen.
I ought here to record the very great interest taken by the Royal
Family in all matters connected with the Navy. While I was in command
of the _Osborne_, the Prince of Wales graciously consented to attend
one of the gatherings of members of Parliament who came at my
invitation to see something of the Navy. On this occasion they visited
Portsmouth Dockyard, where they were shown everything of interest.
One of the experiments performed for the entertainment and the
instruction of the party was firing at a floating cask with bombs
thrown by hand, a method of warfare since discontinued owing to the
danger it involves to the person bombarding. When the cask exploded, a
stave flew between the Prince and the general commanding at Portsmouth,
Sir Hastings Doyle. Had it struck either of them he must have been
killed.
{154}
The general's brother, Percy Doyle, a dear old gentleman well known in
society, had very bad sight. I once saw him trying to eat a red mullet
done up in paper. After a good deal of harpooning, he got it out, but
put the paper in his mouth. We always told him he had swallowed the
births, deaths, and marriages column of _The Times_.
On Sunday the 24th of March, 1878 (the date of my engagement to Miss
Gardner), the _Eurydice_, training frigate, capsized off the Isle of
Wight in a sudden squall and sank. The total loss of life was about
300, only two being saved. She was on her way home from the West
Indies. Coming under the Isle of Wight, she hauled her wind for
Spithead, thus closing the land, so that it was impossible for the
watch to see a squall coming up from windward. The captain, the Hon.
Marcus A. S. Hare, was anxious to reach the harbour as soon as possible
in order to give the men Sunday leisure. It was about four o'clock in
the afternoon when a sudden squall struck the ship, and she heeled
over; the lee main-deck ports being open, according to custom, she took
in a good deal of water, depressing her bows; so that instead of
capsizing, she simply sailed straight to the bottom, her fore-foot
being broken off with the force of the impact, and her topgallant masts
remaining above the surface. There was no time to shorten sail. When
she was raised it was found that only one rope, the mainroyal sheet,
had carried away.
Rear-Admiral Foley, admiral-superintendent of Portsmouth Dockyard,
kindly invited me to be his guest to take part in the salvage
operations arranged for the raising of the _Eurydice_. That occasion
was, I think, the first upon which the newly invented wire hawsers were
actually tested in practical work. When they were introduced it was
thought that they would not be flexible enough for their purpose. They
were, however, used with great success in raising the _Eurydice_. The
hawsers were passed under the hull of the sunken ship and secured to
lighters moored on either side of her. As the tide went down, the
hawsers were hove taut, and water was {155} let into the lighters so
that they should be brought as low in the water as possible. The water
was then pumped out of the lighters, thus putting the utmost strain
upon the hawsers. Then, as the rising of the tide exerted a powerful
lift upon lighters and hawsers, the lighters were towed towards the
shore, in order to drag the wreck upon the beach. As soon as she
grounded, the hawsers were fleeted and the whole process gone through
again until at low tide she was nearly high and dry.
My old ship, the _Thunderer_, which took a hawser to her after capstan
to tow the _Eurydice_, had the solid iron spindle of the capstan pulled
right out of her, as a long nail is bent and dragged out of a piece of
timber. I well remember the intense excitement when the wreck first
shifted from her bed. Eventually we hauled her up the beach. I was
just then taking a bearing for Admiral Foley, and could not have given
a better holloa if I had viewed a fox.
Before the water was pumped out of her, and as she lay on her side on
the beach, I climbed in at a porthole, and sat there waiting till I
could enter. As the water fell, I saw emerge the sentry's clock on the
main-deck. The hands had stopped at 4.5. The bodies lay in heaps,
tangled amid ropes; some had lost a head and some a limb. Black mud
had filtered in everywhere, even (as Sir Edward Seymour remarks) into
the closed drawers of the chests in the cabins.
When, as a cadet, I was learning to heave the lead from the chains of
the _Eurydice_, which, as I have already related, was then moored off
Haslar Creek in Portsmouth Harbour, I little thought I should one day
help to raise her from the bottom of the sea.
Dr. Boyd Carpenter (late Bishop of Ripon), in his charming volume of
recollections, _Some Pages of my Life_, narrates a remarkable story
concerning the _Eurydice_, as it was told to him. Sir John MacNeill
was the Bishop's cousin and, like other members of his family, had the
gift of second sight.
{156}
"Sir John MacNeill," writes the Bishop, "was looking out of the window
in Sir John Cowell's room at Windsor, when suddenly he exclaimed: 'Good
Heavens! Why don't they close the portholes and reef the topsails!'
Sir John Cowell looked up and asked him what he meant. He said, in
reply, that he hardly knew; but that he had seen a ship coming up
Channel in full sail, with open portholes, while a heavy squall was
descending upon her. At the very time this conversation was taking
place the fatal storm fell upon the _Eurydice_, and she foundered as
she was coming in sight of home."
In 1880, while I was still in command of the _Osborne_, I lost my seat
at Waterford. In the following year, desiring to hold another
independent command before my promotion to captain, I applied to go to
sea again, and was appointed to command H.M.S. _Condor_.
{157}
CHAPTER XVII
WITH THE PRINCE IN INDIA
In September, 1875, I was appointed A.D.C. to the Prince of Wales (our
late King) to accompany his Royal Highness upon his visit to India.
The complete list of the suite was as follows: The Duke of Sutherland,
K.G.; Sir Bartle Frere; Lord Suffield, Head of the Prince's Household;
Major-General Lord Alfred Paget, Clerk-Marshal to H.M. the Queen; Lord
Aylesford; Major-General Probyn, V.C., Equerry to the Prince, in charge
of the transport and sporting arrangements; Colonel Arthur Ellis,
Grenadier Guards, Equerry to the Prince; Mr. Francis Knollys
(afterwards Lord Knollys), the Prince's private secretary;
Surgeon-General Fayrer, Physician to the Prince; Captain H. Carr Glyn,
Royal Navy, A.D.C. to H.M. the Queen commanding H.M.S. _Serapis_;
Colonel Owen Williams; Lieutenant Lord Charles Beresford, Royal Navy,
A.D.C. to the Prince; Lord Carington, A.D.C. to the Prince; the Rev.
Canon Duckworth, Chaplain; Lieutenant (afterwards Colonel) Augustus
FitzGeorge, Rifle Brigade extra A.D.C. to the Prince; Commander
Durrant, Royal Navy, commanding royal yacht _Osborne_; Dr. W. H.
Russell, hon. private secretary to the Prince, chronicler of the
voyage; Mr. Albert Grey (afterwards Lord Grey), private secretary to
Sir Bartle Frere; Mr. Sydney Hall, artist.
The Indian officers, who joined the suite at Bombay, and whose energy
and ability were beyond all praise, were Major-General Sam Browne,
V.C., in charge of transport; Major Williams, in charge of horses and
grooms; Major {158} Bradford, head of the police and responsible for
the safety of the person of the Prince; Major Sartorius, V.C., in
charge of tents and servants; and Major Henderson, linguist.
The first announcement of the intention of the Prince to visit the
Indian Empire was made by Lord Salisbury to the Council of India on
16th March, 1875. The matter was subsequently discussed at length both
in Parliament and in the Press. The condition of affairs in India,
where the mass of the ruling princes and chieftains had still to
realise that the rule of the Honourable East India Company had given
place to a greater governance, rendered the visit of the future
Sovereign of paramount importance; and the Prince's sagacity was seldom
more admirably exemplified than in his determination to visit India as
the Heir-Apparent of the Crown. That the scheme was entirely and
supremely successful in achieving the object for which it was designed,
was due to the Prince's zeal, ability, tact and indomitable vigour. He
gave his whole mind to the enterprise; thought of everything in
advance; and set aside his personal comfort and convenience from first
to last. Only one regret was present in the minds of all: the regret
for the unavoidable absence of the Princess.
The whole history of the episode has been so excellently well told by
the late Dr. William Howard Russell, the famous war correspondent, who
was a member of the suite, in his _The Prince of Wales's Tour_ (London,
1877; Sampson Low) that any detailed account of it on my part would be
superfluous.
The Prince left England on 11th October, 1875, and embarked in H.M.S.
_Serapis_ at Brindisi on the 16th. In the Suez Canal we heard of the
purchase of Suez Canal shares by the British Government. The _Serapis_
arrived at Bombay on 8th November.
Thenceforward the Prince's tour was an unresting progress of Durbars,
receptions, dinners, visits, processions, ceremonies, speeches,
addresses, fireworks, entertainments, investitures, reviews, varied
only by intervals of sport. From Bombay, {159} the Prince went to Goa,
and thence to Ceylon, visiting Colombo, Kandy, where he viewed the
sacred tooth of Gotama Buddha, and Ruanwalla, where there was an
elephant hunt. Then he went to Tuticorin, Madura, Trichinopoly,
Madras, Calcutta, Bankipoor, Benares, Lucknow, Cawnpore, Delhi, Lahore,
Cashmir, Umritsar, Agra, Gwalior, and Jeypoor. From Jeypoor he went
into camp in the Terai and enjoyed excellent sport. Then, in Nepal,
under the auspices of Sir Jung Bahadur, there was the great elephant