Embedded@Trafalgar with Nelson's Navy

Embedded@Trafalgar

with Nelson's Navy

By

Roger Busby

Lt Cdr (SCC) RNR

Published by

Roger Busby at Smashwords

Embedded@Trafalgar

Copyright 2012 by Roger Busby

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy; recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now know or to be invented, without the permission in writing for the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

Dedication:

This version of the Trafalgar story is for the UK Sea Cadet Corps, junior image of the Senior Service, who commemorate Trafalgar Day on 21st October each year on behalf of the Royal Navy.

and

as always for Maureen with love

Table of Contents

Prologue

Day One

Day Two

Day Three

Day Four

Day Five

Day Six

Day Seven

Day Eight

Day Nine

Day Ten

Day Eleven

Day Twelve

Day Thirteen

Day Fourteen

Day Fifteen

Day Sixteen

Epilogue

Biography

Other Titles

Connect with me

My website

Prologue

Media mogul Big Billy thinks Nelson is a pussy and he’s going to do something about it . As news of Horatio’s love life leaks, paparazzi stake out Emma Hamilton Across the Channel Boney’s on French TV talking up invasion On the high seas off Southern Spain a British battle group clears for action. Seen through the eyes of a modern-day reporter embedded with the task force, this is Trafalgar - today

Day One

There's a certain intimacy about the word embedded. I don't know who came up with it, but once it was in common usage, we talked about it endlessly in the pub. Embedded, being there, part of the action, eyewitness news on the front line. Embedded became a term shared by the media and the military to describe correspondents who were carried to war as an extra mural member of a fighting unit, journalist as warrior, and it was hoped, certainly from the military standpoint, that this symbiosis, a new quirk on the old Stockholm syndrome, would rub off on the reporters and ensure that coverage swayed towards the soldiers' point of view. Sure there was huffing and puffing over journalistic integrity and freedom of the press, but if you wanted to go to war there was no better way than embedded.

You see the Vietnam War had taught the military a hard lesson. If you have newsmen running around the combat zone, left to their own devices, reporting the kill count as it happens, blood baths like Mi Li Four, then the public appetite for the conflict diminishes in direct proportion to the tv footage of body bags coming home. So if you couldn't muzzle the media, then the next best thing was to get them on board, get them embedded, in the hope that the old adage that it is better to have your critic in the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in, would pay dividends.

Not that the military were less than sanguine about the prospect, Imagine how it would have been if there had been reporters embedded at The Somme filing eyeball accounts from the trenches of soldiers eating rats to stay alive, and the criminal lunacy of officers ordering troops over the top into machinegun fire.

But those kind of considerations didn't cloud the judgement a couple of centuries ago when the spectre of invasion from across the Channel loomed large, and Napoleon Bonaparte summoned the combined naval strength of France and Spain into the largest battle fleet the world had ever seen; when the course of history hung by a thread. When the nation turned to one man, already hailed as a national hero, to save the day. So this is the story. With all the journalistic technique, the breakneck speed of instant communication technology and the clamour for on scene reporting; with every morsel of the action devoured to satisfy the voracious appetite of twenty four seven rolling news I can tell you what transpired when Nelson set sail for the great sea battle off Cape Trafalgar because I was there, embedded with the fleet.

My name is John Pretty, naval correspondent of the Daily Chronicle, and with the benefit of hindsight I have collected all my pieces, the news columns, the features, the e-mails, the tapes and scribbled shorthand notes, into a chronological sequence, translated the arcane patois of the eighteenth century tar into the modern idiom to give you a feel of how Trafalgar played in the press. If you want the unalloyed facts, go to the history books, but if you're curious to know how it felt to report Trafalgar then as Mark Twain put it, turn the page, read the log.

Transcripts of tape recording recovered from the Orlop deck, HMS Victory, at sea.

voice ident: John Pretty

Jesus I can hardly breathe. Smoke, black and dirty grey flecked with orange from the cannon flashes, just rolls down on us from out of nowhere. Now you can't distinguish it from the sickly colour of the sea, just the motion of our cutter rising and falling on the long swell is the only sense of movement. The lads are heaving on the oars, sweaty faces ashen, squinting against the stinging gun-smoke, and I can feel the fear in the air writhing out of this choking smoke like a serpent.

Heave and away - steady lads - steady.

That's the cox'n leaning hard on the tiller, threading us through the tangle of debris all around us now. I can make out shattered spars and rigging, all tangled up, and shredded canvas, washing about in the sea, and we're crashing through it, and it's a miracle we're still afloat. The lads are straining on the oars, willing the boat through this graveyard. Man, it's hard to believe just a few hours ago this was a clear sunny day with white sails against a blue sky and the only noise the gulls around the masts. Like we've been plunged into hell.

Two-six heave and away - two six heave.

I can see spurts of fire through the fog, and muffled thunder, getting closer now, percussions hitting us like dull clapper blows. I reckon we must be in the thick of it by now, not that we've been able to get our bearings much since we left the Pickle seems like an age ago.

Steady.. steady now

The cap'n was getting frustrated because we couldn't see what was going on, so he called for volunteers to take the sea boat over to the Victory and get a sitrep, and I jumped in for the ride, thinking the chance to file a first person piece from the flagship was too good to miss. So here I am, crouched in the bottom boards, just trying to keep a running commentary going for as, long as I can, so I don't miss any of the colour. Only this looks bad, I mean really bad.

Ship ho

That’s the lookout in the bow, and there's a break in the smoke now, and I can see a ship close by, looks like a black cliff from down here, and I can't make out -- Jesus, a big splinter of mast just came flying past us, and there's the thump of a carronade going off somewhere up there, shot whistling over us.

Ahoy the ship

That's the cox'n, yelling at the top of his voice so they don't shoot at us. Lots of boats get lost to friendly fire, blue on blue, from itchy gunners and we sure as hell don't want to join them. Just hope this is one of ours. Just got to pull for it, and hope for the best. There's bits of wood and rope swirling all around us, and we're going to (inaudible)

…Oh boy, that was close, looked like part of the mainmast, all chewed up, hit the water right alongside with a terrific splash, and we shipped scummy green over the side. Oh this is so bad. Now the smoke is clearing, like someone just drew a great big curtain aside, and I can see the hull right on top off us. Hey, good old English warship oak all right, black and ochre. It's the Victory all right. What-- what? Collins, one of our midshipmen is tugging at my sleeve. I can't hear him over the din from up above, but he’s pointing to an open gun-port just overhead -- I can just make out the mouth of the cannon, so they must be firing on the far side, the starboard side and we've come up to larboard. I can't hear him, but I think he wants to jump for the gun-port. I can see a scrambling rope, the cox'n's bringing us alongside now. I'm on my feet watching the pitch of the boat. Only a couple of yards to go, and I'm grabbing my stuff and thinking shall I jump for it? Weighing the odds. Old Harry's going to be proud of me if I make it this time. What the hell -- I'm going to jump…

(tape cuts off)

Daily Chronicle Newsroom conference (extract)

Harry Oakes - Features Editor

Samuel Foreacre - News Editor

SF: If you ask me the weapons of mass destruction malarkey is just so much horseshit whipped up by our lords and masters to keep the war going. I mean where's Napoleon going to get that kind of gear? It’s the French and Spanish for gods sake, and where in the name of sweet Jesus are they going to lay their hands on WMDs. Nah, it's all a smokescreen so we can kick ass with impunity and keep the lumpen proletariat on side come the next election. Nothing like a good old WMD scare to stiffen the sinews. Only has old Boney got any - has he hell.

HO: Maybe we could get a colour piece from one of the boffins who was out there looking for 'em, you know the cloak and dagger crowd, see if we can flush out a whistle blower.

SF: Could cost a packet if we try for a buy up, you know what they're like H, only one thing going to make a scientist put aside his scruples when he's sucking on the government's teat and that's a great big pay day, a sack-full of shekels, and you know what Big Billy said about buy ups. No Way. And that's come down on a tablet of stone, so you reach for the company chequebook and he'll have your balls on his watch chain.

HO: So what d'you reckon Sam?

SF: We're damned if we do, and we're damned if we don't. You want my opinion, this whole WMD angle is a dead duck, we're never going to get to the bottom of it, not in a million years, unless something happens to change the picture, so I think we ought to just let it lie for the time being and see what turns up. I mean, when you come down to it, everybody knows the only real weapon of mass destruction out there is His Britannic Majesty's Royal Navy. Projecting sea power, that's the name of the game, and any mug that gets in the way, blow him out of the water.

HO: Maybe we could do something on that then, Britannia rules the waves or some such. Make a change from all that gung-ho sabre rattling, mud plugging stuff we're getting over the wire from the agencies, you're lucky if you can get a par out of it, mostly spike fodder, and this war of attrition with long, drawn out blockades, has slipped off the news agenda, networks have ditched it ages ago, you watch TV you wouldn’t think we were still at war.

SF: Not sexy enough for the telly, but you’re right, we're still got good old Horatio to pull our nuts out of the fire. We sure as hell could do with a good splash, you see the latest circulation figures, the old man blew a gasket, started bellyaching if we don't deliver the goods soon, heads will roll. Hmm Nelson could be just the ticket, last I heard he was off to sunny Spain with the bit firmly between his teeth. Nice pics when he set off from Pompey. Yeah, the more I think about it, the more I like it. And not come half-baked stuff cobbled together from the PA. We need a good hard hitting incisive news feature, which will knock the socks off the red tops and put a smile on Big Billy's face. Who've we got with the fleet?

HO: You know, John Pretty, old Ted's boy, you remember. We had to bung half the Admiralty to get him on board, he's been bobbing about on the ocean wave for the past couple of months.

SF: Oh yeah, didn't he do those nutter-who-rowed-the-Atlantic stories?

HO: Don't knock it; we got good feedback on that.

SF And didn't he swing a keg of rum on his exes?

HO: To loosen matelots' tongues. Yeah, that was our John; they don’t call him Sitting Pretty for nothing. Shall I give him a bell; see what he can work up?

SF: Do that Harry, and tell him to make it something tasty so we can wean Big Billy off his WMD hobbyhorse. Yeah, get Pretty boy weaving and I'll shoot a memo upstairs.

e-mail

From H Oakes hoakes@dchron.com

To John Pretty jpretty@globalone.com

Cc sforeacre@dchron.com

Subject Nelson feature

John

Top of the morning shipmate. Out of your hammock, we need a thousand words for the leader page, Nelson and all that jazz. Make it good and hot, lots of colour. Keep your head down and your powder dry and as they say on Star trek - make it so. File soonest matey and pick up the web traffic if you want to keep your job! Have a tot for me

Harry

Harry Oakes

Features Editor

Daily Chronicle

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Daily Chronicle Features

Navy Blues

By John Petty

Naval Correspondent

Loitering off the coast of Spain under sun kissed skies and balmy breezes may seem like a holiday cruise, but here on the Royal Navy's most powerful warship, these languid days on patrol belie a much more serious intent, a deadly game of cat and mouse.

For at any moment the lookout's cry of sail ho could send battle hardened sailors to their guns ready to fight to the death. Strange as it may seem in this tranquil setting of blue seas and endless sky, we are the last line of defence against a cunning and determined enemy pledged to put England to the sword.

Not that this threat lurking just over the horizon in any way dampens the spirit of the gun crew aboard HMS Victory, First Rate Ship of the Line and flagship of the British fleet. Pressed men, landsmen and veteran sailors alike go about their routine duties, dressing sails and working the ship as if they were all on that pleasure cruise. Men like boatswains mate Lee Miller squatting on the blanched deck of the forecastle splicing a hawser, the marlinspike dancing a jig in his hands. I don’t care what they throw at us, he told me with a cheerful grin, long as he boss is on the quarterdeck we'll be all right.

The boss of course is Vice Admiral Lord Viscount Nelson, Duke of Bronte in Sicily, Knight of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath, Grand Cross of the Orders of Ferdinand and of Merit and Knight of the Imperial Order of the Crescent, charismatic victor of the battle of the Nile and countless sea duels of outstanding seamanship. This is his flagship, a gun platform of devastating firepower poised to deliver a hammer blow to any aggressor who dares challenge England’s supremacy at sea. This is the might of the Royal Navy personified in one man. And the crews of his fleet, from the career captains to the men so often snatched from the taverns of old England, the Kings shilling pressed into their palms, would follow him into the jaws of hell, so powerful is the myth and legend of this extraordinary seaman, this man of our time whose time has now come.

Dwarfed by the vastness of the C-in-C's stateroom, The Great Cabin with its sweeping seascape panorama, the diminutive figure of Nelson wearing his battle honours, eye-shade and armless sleeve, pores over a bundle of charts.

There was a time when I could have had him, he exclaims, the good eye sparking with intensity as he stabs a forefinger into the parchment. Only dammit, the old fox secured the weather gage and gave me the slip. He is referring to his archrival the French Admiral Pierre Charles Villeneuve who ducked and weaved and eventually succeeded in outmanoeuvring the Toulon blockade in March to escape through the Straits and strike out for the West Indies.

Nelson turns and leans on the chart-strewn table. Ah well, the word is his days are numbered, old Boney has lost confidence in his ancient mariner and plans to replace him with that popinjay Rosily, well time will tell, we've chased each other's tails half way around the world so I'll miss him when he finally swallows the anchor.

A slight frown darkens his brow. "We only have ourselves to blame for the last fiasco. If I'd had the ships I could've bottled him in so tight not even a ship's rat could have got through. But as you know, after the Treaty of