A King`s Commander

been overrun, its ice-bound navy captured-by French cavalry charging over the ice!-and was now a mostly enthusiastic French Republican possession called the Batavian Republic. And the unfortunate Duke of York's army, mostly Hessian and Hanoverian mercenaries, had been run from Dunkirk into Flanders, then into Holland as it was being conquered, and finally into Germany, where the Royal Navy had fetched off the officers, their baggage, and a large part of the supply train… but the men had mostly been abandoned, and lost. Spain, never much of an ally, anyway, had just signed a treaty with France, and had quit the Coalition!

Closer to home, Austria and Sardinia were still officially in… but Genoa and Tuscany were wavering, and what the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in Naples might do from one moment to the next was… iffy. With Tuscany now neutral, Leghorn and Porto Especia could no longer be considered allied, Royal Navy, bases, though they could refit and victual individually during a limited stay… as could every belligerent's warships! Genoa, directly in the path of both armies, maintained her shaky, but still friendly, neutrality; quite unable, or unwilling to defend her own territories. Or too frightened of the consequences!

'The trade with the French is bolstered by many Danish, Dutch, Tuscan of a certainty, vessels. Perhaps we shall see Spanish vessels seeking to profit, presenting the most plausible, but colorable, papers. Even Genoese ships are suspect. And must be stopped.'

Hullo, Alan gawped, slouching a bit less; hell of a way to deal with a neutral… almost an ally!

'This coast now occupied by the French, properly of the Genoese Republic, along here west of Vado Bay…' Nelson said with a sweep of his hand over the map, which encompassed Porto Mauritio in the far west, the harbors of Oneglia, Diano and Alassio, Luano and Finale, as well as a host of lesser ports, fishing villages tucked into almost every sheltered inlet on that steep-to, rocky coast, all the way to the wide sweep of Porto Vado and Vado Bay. Even further west, along the coast of formerly Sardinian Savoia-from Cape Antibes, Nice, and San Remo – the Riviera presented a hundred places where shoal-draught coastal trading ships could shelter, almost take to the shingly, stony beaches overnight, like ancient Greek or Roman galleys. It had more hidey-holes than a well-wormed cheese!

'To be perfectly charitable and humane, sirs,' Nelson glowered sternly, 'one might expect us to turn a blind eye to the Genoese trying to relieve the sufferings of their own subjects, who have been invaded and trampled under the conqueror's heel, through no fault of their own. Genoa cannot rescue them, free them of the tyrant's yoke. And, we may be certain, with their coastal trade cut off, and the French Army foraging from their larders, they shall certainly go hungry, until such time as General de Vins may liberate them. Short-commons may be the least of the suffering the French bring to them. You understand the callous and rapacious nature of triumphant soldiery… Yet, every morsel of pasta, every swig of wine or cup of flour that might charitably nourish a Genoese, may just as easily end in the gullet of a French Republican soldier. So, hard though it may be for me, and I am certain for you gentlemen, to contemplate… yet must we interdict that trade, completely. Mister Drake, our minister to the Tuscans and the Genoese Republic, and his agents… assure me that such a trade already flourishes.'

'Excuse me, sir,' Lewrie simply had to say, which drew another reproving sniff from Captain Cockburn, seated close to Nelson's desk and alternately frowning in humane concern, or beaming in rapture at his words. 'We're to base here, just off the Genoa Mole, and in Vado Bay. Might we not make the Genoese so angry with us that they order us out? And ally themselves with the Frogs?'

'A point well taken, Commander Lewrie,' Nelson allowed without a trace of rancor. 'Indeed, there is that risk. Mister Drake and I have wrestled with that contretemps many an anxious hour. But I believe it a sea officer's duty to not only have the moral, physical courage that our calling demands, but political courage as well. If it is political courage that the Genoese lack, then there is also the possibility that they will accede, temporarily, in the face of the greater good; that is to say, the preservation of their well-professed love of independence.'

'But are you not, sir… that is to say, we would be, uhmm…' Captain Cockburn fretted softly. 'Acting against orders? I mind…'

'Aye, Captain Cockburn,' Nelson confessed. 'There are extant instructions from home, which state that 'our warships are to avoid giving just cause of offense to any foreign power in amity with His Majesty's Government.' I am, in fact, acting without not only direct and specific orders and instructions from Admiral Hotham, but I am in some measure acting directly contrary to them.'

And good on you, Lewrie thought with rising expectations, feeling his face crease in a wolfish, rebellious grin. Anything that goes contrary to Hotham's edicts is probably the best course of all. Damn' fool!

' Genoa may qualify… loosely… as a foreign power in amity,' Nelson all but smirked, 'but they have proven too irresolute in defense of their neutrality, and their amity with us is but grudging. We will stop up the trade along the coast entirely. No matter which flag is presented. Horrible as it may be to make innocent civilians pay for a war, as against the honorable and Christian usage of a military campaign this may be, I am sure that I have the support of His Majesty's ministers both at Turin and Genoa… and a consciousness that I am doing the right and proper service of our King and Country.'

'Well, sir…!' Captain Cockburn grinned bashfully, sounding as if he had been turned around to a new way of thinking, and was enthusiastic.

'Aye, we are acting contrary to whatever orders might have come from our senior admiral,' Nelson further confessed.

Means he didn't think to issue any, that might've, Alan thought.

'Aye, we face the risk of litigation over illegal seizures, of political, diplomatic wrangles.' Nelson went on. 'No one knows more than I… and Commander Lewrie, I recall?… of how fraught with possible cost to career and purse such lawsuits that might be brought in Admiralty Court against us. Lewrie and I had a rough old time of it in the West Indies, 'tween the wars, did we not, sir? But we persevered, and succeeded in suppressing illegal foreign trade, in upholding lawful Navigation Acts. And in hanging a few pirates, in the end. Of bringing the biggest rogues to book. So, this is what we shall do, sirs…

'The harbor at Vado Bay will become our main anchorage, and where we will fetch all seizures, no matter how small. Mister Drake, here in the capнtol, is arranging agents to inspect and condemn our prizes, to pay the freight, release the vessels, sell their cargoes, and hold the monies for us until a real Admiralty Court may adjudicate them. Neutrals may be released, once emptied, should their papers prove legitimate and proper. But, without cargoes, or profit, thus hopefully deterring them from a second attempt. Vessels of belligerent nations to be kept as Droits of the Admiralty, subject to prize money. As will any ship, neutral or belligerent, found to be carrying warlike stores. Now, here are my specific orders, which you will also receive written…

'You will stop and inspect all ships bound for France, or any port now occupied by France, no matter how inconsequential such ships may be,' Nelson ticked off on his fingers. 'You will be careful not to give too great an offense, but stop them you will. You will prevent any embezzlement of their cargoes, taking inventory as best you are able against the manifests, should they still be aboard after seizure. The masters will be kept aboard, so they have no certifiable complaints to level against us at some future Court. You may take out of them such people as may be deemed by you improper to remain aboard, either of the crew or the passengers. Most especially those you deem suspect, or who cannot provide proper bona fides. Should they offer any resistance to you, then on their heads be it. As long as your responding force is commensurate and requisite to the situation, I assure you I will uphold you to the utmost of my power, as long as you feel you did your duty honorably, and as best you saw it.'

That cheered them up considerably. What Horatio Nelson proposed was fraught with risks; professional ruin, a court-martial, financial disaster and years of litigation so expensive, with possible judgment against error so steep, they'd die in debtor's prison, without even a penny for beer on Sundays!

'I know it is not the usual thing,' Nelson said with a smile on his face, a bit shy, 'that a senior officer explain himself so elaborately. But I have found, gentlemen, that hastily issued, unexplained or mystifyingly purposeless orders are never half so diligently pursued as those that are made clear, concise, and the sense, the reason for them, fully shared. I promise you all that I will endeavor to share with you all pertinent information, as soon as I come to know it, which pertains to our situation. So that you may feel free to act with more certainty, knowing that you are in full obedience, and full agreement with me, as well. So that we may diligently, enthusiastically, and cooperatively, function more as a like-minded band of supportive men toward the greater good, instead of at half- guessed loggerheads.'