164 Major- General Sir Howard Douglas 



quently an evolution of some difficulty. When an enemy dis- 

 covers this, he stands on close-hauled, or within six points, or 

 more commonly seven, of the wind, to allow leewardly ships to 

 keep their proper stations in the order of sailing ; and, conse- 

 quently, if the two adverse fleets sail nearly on an equality, which 

 they frequentl)/ do, the pursuing fleet will not easily weather 

 that of the enemy. Accordingly, all the operations of the fleet 

 under Sir George (afterwards Lord) Rodney on the 9th, 10th, 

 and 11th of April 1782, were performed, to avoid the lee-gage, 

 and get to windward of the enemy's fleet, under Count de Grasse. 

 On the 12th, early in the morning, the French were to leeward, 

 and afterwards formed on the larboard tack, close-hauled, to 

 try to regain the weather-gage, in which it seems they succeed- 

 ed, when they were approached by the British fleet. By a 

 change of wind, it finally appeared to the British Admiral, that 

 he would fail in getting to windward of the enemy, and he was 

 compelled either to manoeuvre afresh, or to meet the enemy on 

 his own terms. 



** The position," says Sir Howard Douglas, Naval Involutions, page 27, " in 

 which the two fleets now were, in relation to each other, and out of which the 

 manoeuvre arose in an unexpected and unpremeditated manner, resulted 

 therefore from the British Admiral having failed in a deliberate intention, a 

 systematic attempt, to gain a position (that to windward) the very reverse of 

 that which the (Edinburgh) reviewer asserts was premeditatedly taken ; and I 

 shall moreover show, that even after the British Admiral was of necessity 

 obliged to engage the enemy from the leeward, or not at all, there was still no 

 intention whatever of attempting to break his line." 



Now it must be kept distinctly in view, that, 07i breaking the 

 enemi/s linej'rom the leeward, rests the whole of Mr Clerk'' s 

 claim to the honour of having instructed the British admiral and 

 his captain in this celebrated manceuvre. 



If, therefore, it can be satisfactorily established that neither 

 Sir George Rodney nor Sir Charles Douglas had any commu- 

 nication, personally or by writing, with Mr Clerk, either direct- 

 ly or indirectly ; and that his tract on Naval Tactics, of which 

 a few copies were printed for distribution among his private 

 friends, about the spring of 1782, did not contain any instruc- 

 tions relative to the mode of breaking the enemy's line from the 

 leeward, it must follow as a matter of course, that the manoeuvre 

 executed by the British fleet on the 12th of April 1782, was not 



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