Champions of the fleet : $b Captains and men-of-war and days that helped to make the empireFraser, Edward
History
Champions of the fleet : $b Captains and men-of-war and days that helped to make the empire
Fraser, Edward
Great Britain -- History, Naval; Naval battles -- Great Britain
Master’s Mates and Midshipmen—William Chaseman; J. R. Walker; Thomas L.
Robins; Samuel Spencer; Wm. H. Symons; Robt. C. Barton; James Green;
Richard Bulkeley (wounded); John Carslake; Henry Carey; John Felton;
Festing Grindall; Daniel Harrington; John Lyons; David Ogilvie; Alexander
Palmer (killed); John Pollard; James Poad; Oliver Picken; William Rivers
(wounded); James Robertson; Richard F. Roberts: Robert Smith (killed);
Philip Thovez; Thomas Thresher; James Sibbald; Daniel Salter; Francis E.
Collingwood; George A. Westphal (wounded).
Surgeon’s Mates—Neil Smith; William Westenburgh.
Clerk—Thomas Whipple (killed).
First Class Volunteers—Henry Lancaster; Charles Chapell; J. R. Walker.
Midshipman William Ward Perceval Johnson of the _Childers_ sloop-of-war,
a former first-class Volunteer in the _Victory_, was on board the
flagship at Trafalgar as the guest of his former messmates. He died in
December, 1880, at the age of ninety, one of the five last survivors of
Trafalgar, and the last surviving officer of those on board the _Victory_.
* * * * *
At Trafalgar the _Victory’s_ nominal complement as a first-rate,
comprising the “ship’s company,” numbered 837 officers and men, including
in the total as well, 40 boys, 145 marines, and 8 “widows’ men.” She
had actually on board on the 21st of October 804 of all ranks and
ratings, with, in addition, 26 “supernumeraries for victuals”—under
which category Nelson himself and his secretary and personal suite and
certain others were returned. There were 24 officers, including Captain
Hardy and 9 lieutenants, and the various warrant officers; and 31 mates,
midshipmen, and clerks. In action 50 men were at the quarter-deck guns;
20 were stationed on the forecastle; 150 on the main-deck; 180 on the
middle-deck; and 225 on the lower-deck, where the heaviest guns were.
These, it may be observed, had 15 men told off to each, as compared with
12 men each to the middle-deck guns, and 10 men each to the guns on the
main-deck, quarter-deck, and forecastle. The signal-staff, comprising
a lieutenant, with a mate, 3 midshipmen and 9 men, were on the poop,
where the marines had also their post. Forty-eight men and boys were
employed in and about the ship’s three magazines in handing and passing
cartridges, besides 19 more at the hatchways. All these were in addition
to the powder-men—one man to each gun—employed on the battery decks in
supplying the guns’ crews in action. Six men were told off to attend
to the wounded in the cockpit under the orders of the surgeon and his
mates—not a very large number in the circumstances; and there were also
the small-arm men, the carpenter’s gangs to stop shot-holes and attend
to leaks, men told off to see to the state of the rigging, and others in
the various storerooms, at the helm, and so on. This brief _résumé_ will
give an idea of the distribution of the _Victory’s_ ship’s company at
quarters.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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