notes to Burnet. Onslow, in stating that | ralty Board, because of his Tory votes in Rooke was a man of fashion, and fitter for the Commons, when his Majesty replied: a Court than any of his profession, yet "Sir George has served me faithfully at allowed that he was very able and of sea, and I will never displace him for actgreat courage in his profession. It is ing as he thinks most for the service of true Rooke was charged with want of his country in the House of Commons." vigor, but, to our thinking, unjustly. He That the immense value of Gibraltar was burned sixteen ships before La Hogue, not better appreciated a century and a and Lord Dartmouth, in his comments on half ago, is partly owing to the fact, that Burnet, asks: "Was it for burning six- it was at that period a source of profuse teen ships, or the winds not serving, that and ill-regulated expense. Lord Bolingthe Admiral was so much in fault? for the broke, in a dispatch to Lord Portmore, Bishop has specified nothing else to sup- the Governor, of March 29th, 1712, comport a party lie, that he would willingly plains "that at Gibraltar things have have pass for a truth because he hated been in the utmost confusion, and under the man." The truth is, as Captain Sayer the loosest management.' states, that Sir G. Rooke belonging to the Tory party, and having sat in Parliament as a Tory member, a spirit of rivalry at once sprang up between the partisans of Marlborough and the friends of Rooke; the Whigs taking care to extol the services of Marlborough, while the claims of the Admiral were sneered at and disparaged. Party spirit in that day-such was the hight to which political prejudice and fanaticism were carried-obliterated all sense of justice. The House of Commons congratulated the Crown on the battle of Malaga, but the Lords remained obstinately silent. The Commons, determined to carry the point, moved another address praying the Sovereign to reward the troops and seamen who had so greatly distinguished themselves. A collision between the Houses at this juncture seemed imminent. But at the critical juncture Rooke, with a magnanimity which proved the greatness of his character, appeased the clamor by resigning all his appointments, and retiring into a private station.* Burnet's calumnies recoiled on his own head. In a debate in the Lords, the Duke of Argyle, who had sat in the House with the Bishop, said: "With regard to what he says against Admiral Rooke, I know I have heard it from those who were present; the greatest part of it is a downright lie. The Bishop, it was well known, was no friend to that Admiral, and therefore he easily gave credit to every malicious story he heard against him." How different was the conduct of King William from that of Burnet! The King was pressed to remove Rooke from his seat at the Admi *For a fuller account of the services of Rooke, see Lediard's Naval History, Claude du Bosc's Mili. tary History, and Molyneux's Conjunct Expedition. For the capture of Gibraltar, one of the greatest services ever rendered to a maratime nation, Sir G. Rooke received no reward. He survived his unjust treatment only a few years, and died in 1708, in his fifty-eighth year. But if England did not justly value the prize she had won, it must be conceded the Spaniards fully appreciated their loss; and in attempting to recover the place the twelfth siege occurred. During the progress of this siege a surprise was attempted. A goatherd, a native of Gibraltar, who was intimately acquainted with the passes of the rock, made known to the Marquis Villadarias, the Spanish commander, the possibility of reaching the summit by a pathway little known, and termed the Senda del Pastor. Five hundred men were selected for this forlorn hope, and having taken the sacrament, marched from the advanced trenches round the eastern side. Following the goatherd, they crept up the precipitous track, and reached St. Michael's Cave, where they secreted themselves till morning. Before daybreak they advanced to the signal-station, where they massacred the guard, and succeeded in pulling up, by the assistance of ropes and ladders, many of the party who had been left behind. The garrison was now alarmed, and a regiment of Grenadiers, climbing a steep and stormy ascent, lost many men before they could close with torians, English and foreign, do full justice to the Spaniards, who, with an inaccessible | headed by the Epoca, has raised the cry precipice behind them, fought with des- of "Gibraltar for the Spaniards." The perate energy. Their ammunition, which regular cession of Gibraltar to England did not exceed three rounds per man, took place in 1713, when a general peace soon failed them, and losing one hundred was signed at Utrecht by the Sovereigns and sixty of their number, they surren- of England, Spain, France, and the other dered unconditionally. Nevertheless, the Allies, with the exception of Austria. By siege was continued for some time after the tenth article of the Treaty, the Cathothis, and was not raised till the eighteenth lic King, for himself, his heirs and succesof April, 1705. Even the events of this sors, yielded to the Crown of Great Britsiege did not open the eyes of the Eng ain the full and entire property and posligh Cabinet to the importance of Gibral- session of the town and castle, together tar. But though ministers were blind with the port, fortifications, and forts beand supine, the people of England began longing thereto, to be held and enjoyed to form a just estimate of the importance absolutely, with all manner of right, forof the place. The gallant defense was a ever. military achievement that excited the popular admiration, Gibraltar became valuable in the eyes of the public, as is truly said by Captain Sayer, "when its name was associated with British gallant ry and blood." Had it not been for the people of England, Gibraltar would have been the stronghold of some other power. Stanhope, our Envoy at Madrid, whose familiarity with the secret policy of that Court should have given him a clearer insight into the real value of the fortress, did not perceive that England could gain any advantage by the possession of it. Townsend held a similar opinion; and even the great Commoner, the greatest war minister England ever had, was willing to surrender the key of the Mediterranean. The truth is, as Lord Mahon admits of his kinsman,* that Stanhope relied very mnch in his diplomatic career in Spain on an offer of yielding Gibraltar, and the blame of the idea of giving up the fortress rests mainly with him. He had suggested it from Paris to his colleagues in England, and obtained their acquiescence. It is a proof of the intelligence of the present age, that the living Lord Stanhope regards the idea of his kinsman as an idea quite inconsistent with our national interest or national glory. How greatly Gibraltar was prized by Spain is proved by her unceasing efforts to recover it, either by force of arms or by negotiation. No system of foreign policy, as Captain Sayer remarks, was conceived by any of Spain's distinguished ministers which did not include Gibraltar. Alberoni, Ripperda, and Florida Blanca all sought to recover it; and now, in the autumn of 1862, the ministerial press of Madrid, + Mahon's England, vol. i. p. 458. VOL. LVIII.-NO. 1 Scarcely had the Treaty of Utrecht reestablished peace, before Spain, led on by Alberoni, alarmed all Europe by the magnitude of her warlike preparations. Every effort was made to induce her King to join the Quadruple Alliance, but in vain. It was resolved, therefore, once more to try, by way of inducement, the bait of the restoration of Gibraltar, the only condition involved being the accession of Philip to the Quadruple Alliance. But the King indignantly refused the proposal. Reverses in Sicily, however, and the failure of the schemes for the invasion of England, precipitated the downfall of Alberoni, and Philip now accepted the Alliance. Having thus complied with the desire of the Allies, the first act of the Spanish King was to demand the restoration of the rockfortress. But the English Ministry, threatened with the indignation of the people, decided on sounding the temper of the Parliament. No sooner was the real nature of the question understood, than the proposition was met with a universal outburst of indignation. The Houses met on the seventeenth of January, 1727. In his speech his Majesty said that he had received information that the placing the Pretender upon the throne was one of the articles of the secret negotiation of Vienna; "and if the time shall evince," said the King, "that the giving up the trade of this nation to one power, and Gibraltar and Mahon to another, is made the price and reward of imposing on. this kingdom a Popish Pretender, what an indignation must this raise in the breast. of every Prorestant Briton!" The speech further intimated, that the Spanish Minister insisted upon the restitution of Gibraltar, and announced that his Catholic Majesty was making preparations to attack 8 and besiege the fort. The indignation of both Houses was aroused, and in the Lords an address was voted, asserting that the fortress indisputably belonged to Great Britain by solemn treaties, and pledging the House to defend the right to Gibraltar and Minorca, "which are of the greatest importance to the preservation of the commerce and naval strength of Great Britain." A war between Spain and England now became inevitable, and an army for the siege of Gibraltar was soon organized by Spain. Philip had been convinced that the fortress might easily have been taken; but Villadarias, a brave and experienced soldier, who had been defeated before its walls in 1705, did not share his Sovereign's views, and refused to accept the conduct of the expedition. The command, therefore, devolved on Las Torres, who had run before Peterborough at Valencia,* and who boasted that in six weeks he would plant the standard of Spain on the rock, and drive the heretics into the sea. This was the thirteenth siege of Gibraltar, and preparations were made on a gigantic scale. For fourteen day seven hundred shot per hour were thrown into the fortress, and ninety-two guns and seventytwo mortars were in constant play. But by the end of May the guns of the garrison had gained a complete ascendency over the besiegers. One hundred guns were in play, and countless mortars occupied commanding positions on the hights. On the third of June, 1727, this mass of ordnance opened on the Spanish batteries; and so crushing was the fire, that not a single gun replied. So overpowering was the fire of the besieged, that when a suspension of hostilities was agreed to preparatory to a peace, it was found the garrison had strengthened their position. The events of this siege, in which the Spaniards lost seven thousand men, established the fact that, on the land-side at least, Gibraltar was impregnable. In 1757, disputes which had long prevailed between the courts of France and Spain resulted in open hostility. Even subsequent to the outbreak of hostilities, Spain had evinced no desire to involve herself in the impending strife. It was the desire of both belligerents to secure the promise of her alliance. France had craftily proposed to the Spanish Cabinet to seize upon *Mahon's England. Minorca, and to offer it, together with the promise of cooperation in the reduction of Gibraltar, in exchange of the ratification of a treaty with Spain. It was at this period that Byng, who sailed from England in April, 1756, left Minorca to its fate. Unable to hold out against an overwhelming force, the garrison of Minorca, after repelling the enemy's assault, agreed to capitulate on honorable terms; and the troops, having been allowed to embark, were conveyed to Gibraltar. The loss of Minorca was followed by an outburst of uncontrollable indignation, the Ministry were driven from power, and Byng, sacrificed to popular fury, was shot by order of a court-martial. It was at this period when France was luring Spain into a confederacy against England by the promise of a restoration of Gibraltar, that Pitt succeeded to office. The great Minister resolved, by one bold stroke, to secure the friendship of Spain and to bind her in an alliance against France. With the consent of all his colleagues, in a secret dispatch dated twenty-third of August, 1757, he authorized Sir Benjamin Keene to offer to Spain the cession of Gibraltar on condition that she would enter into an alliance against the French. The dispatch, remarkable for its pregnancy, is said to have cost Pitt three days' labor. It is difficult to understand how a statesman of his lofty mental stature could have been induced to entertain the notion of surrendering the great fortress. But it should be remembered that the great Commoner attached the mightiest importance to the prevention of the alliance between Spain and France, and that he also looked for a full equivalent for the rockfortress at the hands of Spain. But not even the discomfiture of the alliance between the two Crowns, nor any equivalent in the power of the Spanish Crown to bestow, could have justified the English Minister in proposing the surrender of the key of the Straits, and the most commanding position in the Mediterranean. It is true that the expenses of the fortress were then enormous and constantly increasing, that the maladministration of the local Government was monstrous, and a continnal source of complaint; it was true also that the representations of Lord Tyranley, the Governor, led Pitt to underrate the value of the place; and the great orator must have been scandalized at the plundering and perquisites of Governors, provisioned the garrison; yet General which made their aggregate emoluments Eliott, who had foreseen the coming storm, twenty thousand pounds per annum.* chiefly depended on his own efforts, and But the abuses incident to the administration of the rock were corrigible, and might have been corrected; whereas the loss of the fortress, if once surrendered or lost, could never have been repaired. Pitt, however, soon became convinced of his error. In 1779 he pronounced Gibraltar "situated in the very continent of Spain, the best proof of our naval power, and the only solid check on that of the house of Bourbon." Twice within a century Spain had attempted the recovery of the fortress, and on each occasion she had been compelled to retire with humiliation and defeat. Believing that the moment had now arrived when she might be more fortunate, the Court of Madrid allied herself to France in 1779, and declared war against England. Two years before this period, a remarkable man, a more remarkable soldier, had been made Governor of the rock. This was George Augustus Eliott, who was the youngest of the nine sons of Sir Gilbert Eliott, of Sleath, in the county of Roxburgh. Born in 1718, Eliott had been 'early sent to the University of Leyden, where he became a proficient in languages. Subsequently he studied with assiduity and success at the School of Engineers at La Fere. Having attained the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, he accompanied George II. to Germany as aide-de-camp in 1743, and was wounded at the battle of Dettingen. He distinguished himself in the seven years' war under the Duke of Cumberland, and was considered a man of great military talents, energy, and perseverance, qualities that were fully tested in the memorable siege with which his name is forever associated. Eliott, on assuming the command, soon discovered defects in the fortifications, and that the garrison was inadequate to perform even the duties necessary in a time of peace. The Governor declared it would be impossible to withstand a siege with the inefficient resources at his disposal; and he sent home Colonel Green, of the Engineers, to explain to Ministers how matters stood, and wrote pressingly to the Government. His remonstrances were scarcely heeded. Though the Cabinet had tardily and inadequately reinforced and General O'Hara was in the receipt of £7000 per annum for wine-licenses alone. prepared for an event which he had long contemplated. The garrison when the war broke out was composed of ten regiments, including the artillery and engineers, giving a total of five thousand three hundred and eighty-two officers and men; whereas Spain attacked the rock with all her naval and military resources. A Spanish squadron appeared in the bay. Rodney attacked it, and only one transport escaped. This advantage was quickly fol lowed by another. A few days afterward a Spanish squadron was discovered near Cape St. Vincent, and after a severe conflict, was defeated. The unfavorable disposition of Morocco, and the vigilance of Spanish armed vessels, however, deprived the garrison of supplies of provender from the African coast, and they were reduced to the sorest straits, when they were again relieved by a fleet under Admirals Darby, Digby, and Ross. Unable to force the garrison to capitulate by blockade, the Spaniards now resolved on a supreme effort. Works were carried on with renewed vigor, batteries were supplied with guns of the heaviest metal, and two hundred pieces of battering-cannon, and eighty mortars, poured an incessant shower of shot and shell into the place for the space of three weeks. The most eminent engineers of France and Spain were brought to superintend the approaches of the besiegers; but on the night of the twentyseventh of November, 1781, General Ross, at the head of two thousand picked men, marched out of the garrison for the purpose of destroying the batteries, and in a few minutes drove from them the astounded Spaniards. The guns and mortars were spiked, the magazines were blown up, the storehouses were fired, together with every part of the batteries. Thus, in somewhat less than two hours, the gigantic works which the enemy had raised at an expense of two millions sterling were annihilated. Spanish pride, no less than a sense of national interest, now induced his Catholic Majesty and his Ministers to direct the whole forces and resources of the monarchy upon the rock. The Chevalier d'Arcon, a famous French engi neer, who had been attached to the army of Marshal Broglie, was summoned to St. Roque. He had invented what he called "batteries, flottantes, insubmersibles, et in combustibles, révetues d'une forte cuirasse | forward his invincible batteries; and on the en bois de coté de l'ennemi," and which morning of the thirteenth they were put in must have somewhat resembled similar motion. Buenventura de Moreno, a distinbatteries which the Emperor of the French guished Spanish officer who commanded them, proclaims as his own special invention. brought them to the requisite position; and no sooner was this accomplished than the most Ten of these batteries, supposed to be in- dreadful firing commenced. The batteries on vulnerable, were launched. Their bottoms sea and on land opened at the same instant, were of thick timber, their sides of wood and poured into the garrison an incessant and cork, and they were supplied with shower of shot, while the British returned the sloping roofs. Each of them carried from fire with that celerity and skill which the ten to twenty-eight guns, manned by a greatness of the occasion demanded. From ten picked crew. They were supported by tinued without the smallest intermission. About in the morning till noon this firing was congunboats and armed vessels. A thousand two, Moreno's battering-ship was seen to emit pieces of artillery and twelve thousand of smoke as if burning. About midnight the ef the best troops of France were joined to fects of the red-hot shot which the garrison had those of Spain, and numerous volunteers used became conspicuous; the battery belongof the highest rank-such as the Count ing to the Admiral was discovered to be on d'Artois, afterward Charles X., and the fire, and in a short time the other eight were Duke de Bourbon-appeared on the staff. seen successively to be in flames, and made The direction of the operations was in- hundred men were saved by the exertions of signals of distress. Of their crews only four trusted to the Duke of Crillon, who had the British. The rest were either consumed in distinguished himself in the reduction of the flames, torn in pieces by the explosions, or Minorca. drowned in their attempts to escape. Thus were the sanguine expectations of the Spaniards completely disappointed, and the invincible batteries in one day totally annihilated." Colonel Drinkwater, who witnessed the siege, and who has described it with graphic minuteness, says: "That the Spaniards meant, previous to their final efforts, to strike a terror through their opponents by displaying an armament more powerful than had ever been brought against any fortress. Forty-seven sail of the line, including three inferior two-deckers, ten battering ships, deemed perfect in design, and esteemed invincible, carrying two hundred and twelve guns, innumerable frigates, xebeques, bombketches, cutters, gun and mortar-boats, and smaller craft for disembarking men, were assembled in the bay. On the land-side were most stupendous batteries and works, mounting two hundred pieces of heavy ordnance, managed by an army of near forty thousand men, commanded by a victorious general, and animated by the immediate presence of two princes of the blood-royal of France. In their certainty of success, however, the enemy seemed to have entirely overlooked the nature of that force which was opposed to them; for though the garrison scarcely consisted of seven thousand effective men, including the Marine Brigade, they forgot that they were now veterans in the service, and had been long habituated to the efforts of artillery. On the ninth of September, 1782, an attack was made by the Spaniards upon the land-side, where a battery of sixty-four guns was opened; but the fire was so warmly returned, that the Spaniards were driven from their works. At the same time several of the ships attacked Europa Point, but their success was not greater. Two of the largest vessels were so damaged as to be obliged to repair to Algeziras Bay for the purpose of refitting. Crillon now resolved to send During the siege the most common necessaries of life were exorbitantly dear. Bad ship-biscuit full of worms was sold at one shilling a pound; flour, not in much better condition, at the same price; old dried peas at one shilling and four pence; salt, half dirt, the sweepings of ships' bottoms and storehouses, at eight pence; old salt butter at two shilling and sixpence ; and English farthing candles at sixpence apiece. much higher prices. Turkeys sold at Fresh provisions commanded three pounds twelve shillings; suckingpigs at two pounds two shillings; and one pound one shilling was refused for a calf's pluck. The effect of the red-hot shot, recommended by General Boyd to be used against the Spanish works, exceeded the most sanguine expectations. The damage done was extensive, and for a time irreparable. An immense amount of ammunition was expended on both sides. Three hundred and twenty of the enemy's cannon were in play throughout the day, and to these were opposed only ninety-six guns from the rock. Upward of eight thousand shot and seven hundred and sixteen barrels of gunpowder were fired away by the garrison. The siege had lasted for three years, seven months, and twelve days; and for the elaborate magnitude of the attack, and above all |