During this time, Sir Hyde Parker sent a flag of truce to the Governor of Elsinore, to inquire if he meant to oppose the passage of the fleet through the Sound. It is almost impossible to imagine a greater insult to a weak nation, than such an inquiry. Governor Stricker, to his honor, replied that the guns of the Castle would certainly be fired at any British ships of war which approached. At length, on the morning of the 30th of March, the British fleet weighed anchor, from a point at the entrance of the Sound, and, with the wind about northwest, and consequently fair, proceeded into the Sound, in line ahead. The English fleet was composed of the 98-gun ship London, Sir Hyde Parker’s flag-ship, and the St. George, 98, with the flag of Vice-Admiral Lord Nelson. There were, in addition, eleven 74s, five 64s, one 54, one 50, one 38, two 36s, and one 32. Of these, six 74s, three 64s, and all the smaller vessels were afterwards placed under Nelson’s orders, and bore the brunt of the battle. As the fleet entered the Sound, the van division was commanded by Lord Nelson, in the Elephant, a 74 (into which ship, as a lighter and more active one than the St. George, he had, on the preceding day, shifted his flag), the centre division by the Commander-in-chief, and the rear division by Rear-Admiral Graves. At seven the batteries at Elsinore commenced firing at the Monarch, which was the leading ship, and at the other ships, as they passed in succession. The distance was, however, so great, that not a shot struck the ships; and only the van ships fired in return, and even those did not fire more than three broadsides. A gun burst on one of the English ships, and killed seven men, and this comprised the whole loss in the passage of the Sound. The English bomb-vessels, seven in number, threw shell at the Danes, however, and thereby killed and wounded a few in Cronenberg and Helsingen. As the Strait at Elsinore is less than three miles across, a mid-channel passage would have exposed the ships to a fire from Cronenberg Castle on the one side, and from the Swedish town of Helsinborg on the other; but the latter had very inconsiderable batteries, and did not make even a show of opposition. On observing this, the British inclined to the Swedish shore, passing within less than a mile of it, and thus avoiding a fire that, coming from nearly one hundred pieces of cannon, could not fail to have been destructive. About noon the fleet anchored at some distance above the Island of Huën, which is about fifteen miles distant from Copenhagen.